The government is often tempted to be overactive — to do more than it should. The main task of the government is to protect the lives, freedoms, and properties of its citizens. But often, governments want to do more than that — to regulate, encourage, or discourage activities; to undertake programs and projects that go beyond defending people’s individual political liberty.
To be sure, often government actions are undertaken with good intentions, and with sincere desires to help. But even when the government wants to help, it cannot. In some situations, the best thing the government can do is stand back, and let society fix its own problems.
As President Ronald Reagan said in 1986, “The nine most terrifying words in the English language are: I'm from the Government, and I'm here to help.”
Well-intentioned government programs usually have unintended consequences: Government programs to end poverty actually cause more poverty; when the government tried to reduce illegal drug use, such use increased; when governments try to make peace, the result is usually a war; when governments try to fix the economy, wages fall and more people become unemployed.
In 1849 Henry David Thoreau wrote, “That government is best which governs least.” He was likely recalling a magazine article from 1837 which included this line: “The best government is that which governs least.”
To protect people’s freedom is to limit the power of the government. The idea of “limited government” is the foundation of freedom.
People should not, in the words of Ben Shapiro, “become accustomed to the government taking care of them.” It seems like a nice idea, but throughout history, it has led only to dictatorships and atrocities.
There is a choice: people can have freedom, or they can have a government which reaches into their lives and tries to help them. They cannot have both. Solutions to social problems come from society, not from the government. Solutions to economic problems come from businesses and economists, not from the government.
If people mistakenly believe that the government can fix problems, then that belief “leads to calls for government action with every supposed crisis,” as Ben Shapiro says. He continues:
If we want to restore logical boundaries to government, we can begin by restoring logical boundaries to our desire to rely on the government. To do that, however, we must first understand how the government currently works. Here’s a hint: it has almost nothing to do with the Constitution.
Consider how our government currently works, how it worked in the past, and how it might work in the future.
Again, people from nearly every political viewpoint, from every race, from every religion, all agree — the government isn’t working well at present. That’s because, as Shapiro points out, the government currently has little to do with the Constitution.
While nearly every elected or appointed political leader will quote from the Constitution and praise it, in reality, the organizational mechanisms of the Constitution are routinely ignored.
When the Constitutional system is working properly, it does things like end slavery, as it did between 1863 and 1865, or ensure women’s right to vote, as it did in 1869, long before the amendment confirmed it in 1920.
So what does it mean for the Constitutional system to work properly? What does that look like? A big part of the answer is the “separation of powers.”
Each part of the government has its own assignment to do. The legislature, or Congress, is supposed to make laws. The executive, or president, is supposed to apply the laws. The judiciary, or court system, is supposed to interpret the laws.
Yes, it gets a little more complex than that in some situations, but the basic principle of “separation of powers” is this simple principle.
Things go wrong when the executive branch makes laws. For example, the president appoints people to operate government agencies, like the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) or Department of Commerce. When those agencies start making their own rules and policies, instead of applying the laws which Congress has made, then there is a problem. They have effectively taken Congress’s job. There is a name for this problem: “administrative law.” It’s when the administration, instead of the Congress, makes laws.
Another way things can go wrong is this: The legislative branch can usurp the role of the executive branch. This happens when Congress has hearings and investigations. While it is appropriate for Congress to hold committee meetings and to gather facts relevant to debates about potential legislation, it is not appropriate for Congress to investigate (that’s a task for the executive branch), and it is not appropriate for Congress to hold hearings (that’s the work of the judicial branch). The one rare exception is an impeachment process for a federal employee.
Many of our current problems arise from the fact that the three branches of government are not restricting themselves to their assigned tasks. If each branch of government will do its work, and not the work of the other branches, then many of our problems will be solved, and desired outcomes like freedom, prosperity, justice, and peace are more likely.
