Bottom Line:
There is a danger that traditional Christians will seek social justice by using the power of the state. We will fear and envy the rich and so misuse our numbers to treat the wealthy unjustly. Beware the candidate who attacks the wealthy or big business as if a class of people can be unjust. This is bigotry just as surely as any such generalizations are bigotry.
The Normal Betrayal of People by Princes
Conservative Christians are sometimes treated badly by certain establishment Republican types. We can have a long memory for slights or for betrayals on issues such as stem cell research. In fact, all conservatives, not just traditional Christians, are in a surly mood feeling that Republicans forget them once they are in office.
Christians should realize they are not alone. The Washington establishment in both parties frequently forgets what they say to the folks back home when they begin to drink the corrupting tonic of power.
At least for conservatives, this is what we expect. We put no trust in princes and are not looking for a messiah from our political leaders. Cultural salvation will not come from the waters of the Potomac, but from crossing the Jordan.
When we vote, we are looking for the best we can get this side of paradise, not the source of our hopes and dreams. To modify Herodotus, “call no politician honest until he dies.” Only history can judge our leaders. Meanwhile we should do the best we can to pick the men and women who will set modest goals, enforce the rule of law fairly, and give us liberty to pursue virtue.
What Should We Expect from Government
All the more reason to avoid putting our faith in cultural change that is fundamentally based in politics. Surely the president can use what Theodore Roosevelt described as the “pulpit” (such religious language would shock the ACLU today!) to help elevate the tone of the nation.
There are actions that are so morally depraved and so harmful to those who cannot protect themselves, like the murder of unborn children, that to support such action all but disqualifies a person from high office. There should be few laws, but the few laws we have should support the right to life, liberty, and the ownership of private property.
Real charity, which begins and ends in love, cannot come from huge institutions like government. Any institution that spits out millions of checks cannot reach the hearts of men and women and bring about lasting change. While a social safety net (as Reagan called it) is desirable, it cannot bring lasting happiness or prosperity to anyone.
Individuals, the Church, families, and social institutions are the most important parts of the culture. The state, in its proper role, stands not as a Church, family, or club, but as a guardian “to truly and indifferently minister justice to the punishment of wickedness and vice . . .”
Once I had a student who believed that to “indifferently minister justice” was to be lazy about it! In older English this phrase meant to treat each man or woman equally before the bar of justice. The governor or executive power should be “indifferent” to the social status of the supplicant.
Some politicians are not indifferent to the rich by inventing government programs and favors for them. Other politicians are not indifferent to the rich by inventing government programs and penalties for them.
Both are failing their duty as Christian governors.
It is not moral leadership to lampoon the rich or to bow to them. Populism is no more moral than plutocracy.
Wealth: No Special Favors for the Rich, but No Special Penalties!
It is the last that it is tempting to deny, because of the power of wealth. Riches can corrupt in one of two ways: it can buy injustice and have it proclaimd justice or it can provoke envy in those who do not have it who then use their numbers to seize it.
Greed is not good, nor is it the basis of conservative or free economics. Conservatism believes in the liberty for men and women to keep their hard earned money as long as they do not use it pervert justice or oppress others.
There is no sin in the mere possession of even great wealth, however conservatives are not blind to the evils of some rich people.
Let us be blunt. Some politicians become slaves to wealth and pervert justice.
Conservatives have no tolerance for this when they are being consistent with their own position. Equal justice must exist (so far as possible in this life) before the law for the rich and poor. Both are governed by the Constitution of 1789 which applies to both equally.
The rich can oppress the poor by attempting to deny them agreed to compensation for goods or services. They can attempt to buy “justice” and deny it to the poor. Both actions are morally wrong and must be condemned. Where it is prudent and possible to do so, laws should protect the poor and the helpless. A good president will enforce the laws that keep the wicked from oppressing the poor.
But in the same way the rich are not made good by their wealth, the poor are not justified simply by their poverty. The poor can easily become a mob coveting the wealth of their neighbor. The twentieth century was the blood stained story of what happens when commandment against covetousness is broken.
The poor have the power of their numbers and their desires, just as the rich have the power of wealth. Some poor are poor due to oppression, but others due to their own wickedness. Since no man can surely judge the status of another, rich or poor, the government most do all it can to treat each equally.
The poor should no more abuse their numbers to fulfill their disappointments at the expense of their wealthier neighbor, than the rich may morally use their money to fulfill their unjust desires.
The poor must treat the rich equally before the law. They must not give larger judgments to the poor, because they hate the rich defendant for being rich. They must not steal his money by punitive taxes that sap initiative and penalize risk taking.
If it is wrong to pander to the wealthy in a campaign, it is just as dangerous to pander to covetousness.
Inciting class envy treats the rich as less human than the poor. It elevates financial status above the dignity each man owes to other men.
Make no mistake: it will always be popular to attack businesses and the wealthy, because of their wealth, but it will always be wrong. It will always be lucrative to pander to the rich by giving them corrupt favors from government, but it will always be immoral.
The best solution to this mess is to keep government small and tightly centered on the business of doing justice. Following the blood soaked twentieth century, when the rhetoric of class warfare led to the blood soaked gulags of Russia, Eastern Europe, China, North Korea, and Cambodia, it is wrong and dangerous to incite the passions of the poor to envy the wealth of the rich.
How can we vote?
Traditional Christians know “money” will never leave politics. In fact, we should distrust those who invent elaborate schemes to get money out of politics. Elaborate schemes will always benefit the rich who can afford the lawyers and accountants that can keep big business on the right side of complex laws.
We should look for candidates who cannot be bought and have shown integrity in their personal use of wealth. We should look for candidates who do not do favors to campaign contributors and who have never been brought to judgment for doing so.
We should avoid candidates who stoke envy by playing on class warfare as surely as we should shun candidates who play to racial politics.
It is simple to hate the rich or to be slavish to them. It is the difficult way of the traditional Christian in government to love the rich no more or less than the poor.