On Voting

A short piece written by Llewellyn H. Rockwell Jr. for The American Conservative which I post in its entirety, below.


The critical problem we face today is the same one all mankind has faced: the state, those monopolists who claim the right to break the laws that they make and enforce. How to restrain them is the critical problem of all sound political thinking. Making matters worse, this gang now has a monopoly on the money and the ability to print it, and they are abusing that power at our expense.

How does voting change the situation? Neither of the candidates for president wants to do anything about the problem. On the contrary, they want to make it worse. This is for a reason. The state owns the “democratic process” as surely as it owns the Departments of Labor and Defense and uses it in ways that benefit the state and no one else.

On the other hand, we do have the freedom not to vote. No one has yet drafted us into the voting booth. I suggest that we exercise this right not to participate. It is one of the few rights we have left. Nonparticipation sends a message that we no longer believe in the racket they have cooked up for us, and we want no part of it.

You might say that this is ineffective. But what effect does voting have? It gives them what they need most: a mandate. Nonparticipation helps deny that to them. It makes them, just on the margin, a bit more fearful that they are ruling us without our consent. This is all to the good. The government should fear the people. Not voting is a good beginning toward instilling that fear.

This year especially there is no lesser of two evils. There is socialism or fascism. The true American spirit should guide every voter to have no part of either.

Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on 10/28 at 07:14 AM

  1. I can understand—though I don’t fully share—the interpretation of voting as a voluntary and formal grant of permission for the government to wield authority over oneself.  Likewise its interpretation as the tacit approval of systematic forceful taxation of oneself and ones countrymen. 

    I can see how people decline to vote based on these concerns about the significance of casting a vote. 

    That said, I absolutely do not imagine that politicians are in the least afraid of people not voting (except to the extent they imagine it favors their opponents rather than them).  They might make as much political hay as possible out of mandates, but they don’t especially need them. 

    Think of all the local, state and national-level officeholders in this country right now who’ve never received the nod of even a quarter of the potential voters in their districts.  They raise taxes and spew regulations just as effectively as if all their constituents voted for them twice a week. 

    And should one of these pols somehow manage to really rile his base, no mandate from some election day past is going to keep him his job past the end of his term—or keep the angry mob from burning down his phone lines—or more—in the meantime.

    As for pols being “fearful that they are ruling us without our consent,” I don’t think they give a durn so long as we—voting and nonvoting constituents alike—mind our manners and cower like we’re supposed to.

    To summarize:  Nonparticipation in electoral politics for the purpose of expressly withholding one’s approval of coercive government makes sense to me, at least as a gesture of independence and goodwill (in not granting sanction of taxation).  But not voting in the hope that you will thereby frighten politicians impresses me as pretty lame.  Par for the course for Rockwell.

    Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)  on  10/28  at  11:14 AM

  2. Linda, thank you for your comment.  In regards to your statement,

    But not voting in the hope that you will thereby frighten politicians impresses me as pretty lame.

    I agree.  My not voting, or any other single individual’s not voting, will not frighten any professional jobholder (politician), but, if more and more individuals actively withheld their vote from the empty promisers which are the professional jobholders, apprehension on their part would begin to grow, and fear would follow.

    In January 2004 I stated why I will not vote in a post titled I’m Thinking Clearly, Now.

    ...I stated something to the effect that I do not vote for individuals, I only vote on issues that effect my pocketbook, i.e. millage increases, tax issues etc.  I now want to formally state that I will not vote at all.  I acknowledge that my voting on issues that effected my pocketbook, affected each and every individuals pocketbook, and I apologize for contributing to the coercive power of the state, against each and every individual, both on a local and federal level.

    I’m thinking clearly, now.

    Though I did not say this, it also bears thinking about.  “What if they held an election and nobody came?”

    Posted by John Venlet  on  10/28  at  02:32 PM

  3. If the monopoly was comprised of a bunch of Ron Pauls you know Rockwell would singing an entirely different tune.

    Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)  on  10/30  at  12:25 AM

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