"A common (I'm not sure if its typical but its not rare) libertarian position, is not that such discrimination is ok, but that legally punishing people for it is wrong. Its like many people's reaction to adultery."
See Tim, this is the place where I break with Libertarianism. It totally ignores many aspects of human nature. We are a society. We have rules. And those rules get enforced. Yes, the rules can change over time. The legal system has a fair amount of hysteresis built into it, and that is a good thing. But, sooner or later, the legal system catches up to social systems and certain laws get passed.
And that is what happened here. The idea that our society has no right in controlling private action is something that is only theoretical. Granted, it is something that society should only do in extreme circumstances, but that is exactly what was happening in the South. And we are better for it.
Libertarianism ignores this. They like to pretend that everyone is rational and have their own self-interest at the first thing in mind. In addition, they can see the big picture and the greater affects in an unbiased manner. But, that isn't anywhere close to the case. Libertarianism is a highly theoretical, not at all pragmatic creed that fails in the face of human nature. It has never been tried, for good reason. Every time we put pieces of it in action, it fails. You can make the argument that we never tried hard enough, but there is no way to boot up an entire economy, legal system, civilization all in one shot. So even if it were some utopia, we can't get there from here. And there is no real reason to believe it would be some utopia. Because it exists only in theory.
The best thing Libertarians could do, if they are really serious, is to find someplace to build a Libertarian stronghold. If it proves to be stable over decades, then they have an argument and can be taken seriously. Until then, not so much. |
