Libertarianism 101: Government Welfare or Private Charity

When hurricane Katrina slammed into the gulf coast, I went to the Red Cross website and made a contribution. When my closet starts to get overloaded with clothing that I don't wear anymore or have grown out of, I pack everything up and take it to the Salvation Army or the Goodwill. At Thanksgiving, I take a bag or two of groceries to work to be given to the local food bank. And, for every Sunday that I'm in church, I leave a check in the offering plate (to alleviate the guilt I feel for not showing up every Sunday).

The point of this is not to pat myself on the back for all my wonderful compassion and caring. In fact, I'm pretty embarrassed that I don't do more. I know a number of people who work with our local Christmas in April program, have helped build houses with Habitat for Humanity, and took time off from their regular jobs to travel to Mississippi and Louisiana to help with the cleanup of Katrina.

What I and these others have in common is that we feel the desire to help others in need and we've choosen specific areas in which we want to help. Nobody told us we had to do this nor forced us to give our contributions to any particular organization or cause.

Now, what if somebody confronted you on the street, pulled out a gun, and said you had to give some of your money to somebody else? And what if that somebody else was some person or organization you had no inclination to otherwise assist? Would you think that was fair? Well, this is essentially what the federal government does when it uses your tax dollars for "charitable" giving. It forces you to give your money to people and organizations you would not otherwise give to.

And, to top it off, the government's giving is most definitely inequitable. For example, why should the families of the victims of the World Trade Center (WTC) disaster have received federal assistance when the families of, say, people who died in automobile accidents or from heart attacks - on that same September 11th - got absolutely nothing? Was a WTC victim somehow more worthy of government assistance? Shouldn't these people, especially the ones with families, have taken some personal responsibility and had life insurance policies to provide for others in the event of such an unforeseen accident? In a similar vein, why do people who have their homes destroyed by floods or hurricanes or tornadoes qualify for federal assistance when someone who's house burns down from faulty electrical wiring does not? Shouldn't all homeowners take personal responsibility for their property by buying insurance?

The federal government is authorized under our Constitution to engage in a specific list of enterprises. It has proven, over its more than 200 years of experience, to be about as inefficient - not to mention ineffective - as one could possibly imagine at most of these enterprises. Why on earth would we want such an organization to:

• get its hands on any more money than is absolutely necessary to accomplish its minimal set of functions, and


• ask it to go into a line of business it has no authority to engage in?

Congressman Davy Crockett, (D-TN), was probably one of the first to understand what happens when you try to legislate charity. Where does the giving stop? And why, as free individuals, should we be forced to give money to government for purposes that are not within it's charter?

If one took all the money the federal government spends on "charity" and gave it to private organizations, who knows how many more people could be assisted and in a more equitable manner? And better yet, if we didn't like the way a private organization was operating, we would all have the choice to give our money to somebody else.

For additional views on private charity replacing government welfare, check out these links:

• What Gives? The Possibilities of Private Charity


• The War on Charity


• What Makes Charity Work?