Reconstruction of Philosophy Applied

Reconstruction of Philosophy Applied

This website has unfolded with the literary format of a "book" about how it was written. It has been preparatory to the following five essays. They compact reconstruction into the fewest pages yet attainable. The viewer can thus retrace, step by practical step, the author`s journey toward these windows opening to heights of abstraction, depths of the subconscious mind and some subtle secrets about language: revealing the biggest surprise of all--peering through verbiage-- to a neglected OBVIOUS...

MANIFESTO OF A STONE-COUNTY REPUBLICAN

A Conservative View of Justice...

entails respect for basically American principles of government: as enunciated in Walter Lippmann`s classic, THE PUBLIC PHILOSOPHY (l955). He contrasted a "jacobin" urge to uproot existing society and start anew with a rhetorical blueprint for replacing the old. (This temptation is represented by "radical" degeneration of the French Revolution, into a reign of terror, and by the Communist Revolution.)

The American Revolution maintained instead a "continuity" of history—as pragmatically favored by Justice Holmes, among others –and in the natural law upon which this nation was expressly founded.

Jeffersonian Government in Stone County, Missouri

I was raised by traditionally Republican Ozarkians exemplified by the legendary Congressman Dewey Short. He battled the New Deal with a rural color that packed the galleries; reflecting an old self-reliant resolve to run "federal men" out of these hills.

(Jack Anderson, CONFESSIONS OF A MUCKRAKER ((around mid-century)) tells how Dewey got snockered at a big banquet in Washington, cussed out the Chief Justice and brawled with the police chief.)

Short once delivered on Memorial Day in Stone County a fiery preference for local self-government which expressed the conservative bent of my upbringing. Law classmate Robert Wylie also attended and later penned the biography, DEWEY SHORT: ORATOR OF THE OZARKS (l985) (emphasizing his remarkably schooled intellect).

My own disenchantment with the national GOP was, however, blooming in those days: too "citified" somehow, and ensconced enough with big business to belie any professed preference for de-centralized power. The common people were increasingly degraded, moreover, as neo-ideologues crustified a credo that confounded the foundational pragmatism of frontier America.

New "Conservatism"...

increasingly advances a "left-brain" conquest of natural order—economically and religiously—featuring fundamentalist control over the inherently "evil" urges of common citizenry. The old pragmatic notion of working with whatever nature provides got lost in the fray. I soon smelled trouble.

Accordingly I voted against Goldwater, when first old enough, and have waited in vain since for a Republican supportable in good conscience. The new "conservatives" would, despicably, dismantle the New Deal by depriving the government of resources to help the common people; while blatantly transferring overly centralized power (and money) to the privately rich who have long exploited them.

(This approach reflects the soft "head" of one who thinks too much, and the hard "heart" that would bassackwardly subvert compassion to the unbalanced rigors of left-brain deductions from purely verbal suppositions about reality.)

The old pragmatism surfaced briefly in Bill Clinton's observation that the "era of big government" is obviously over. This demands, of course, a national debate on how to de-centralize both political and economic power (in accordance with traditionally republican principles of federalism).

By contrast the Bush Gang now follows a virtual "theology" of draconian tax cuts. This panacea is presented fraudulently in terms of trickle-down economic stimulation; when the backstage agenda is to starve welfare programs out of kingdom come.

The Gang's left-brain plans for a new "world order" are similarly closer to the jacobin than the classically American model. They would restructure international relations artificially, according to a rather "utopian" blueprint, and force the fantasy through with American might. (They are shamelessly turning power over to a military-industrial complex.)

If they had their way, moreover, the new order would be authoritarian and patriarchal: a fundamentalist/ corporate "l984." The people would be exploited and strictly controlled (again to curb inherently "evil" urges). Their "pursuit of happiness" would vanish.

This is a far cry from the "l776" design of Thomas Jefferson and Adam Smith (combined) for modern political -economy; which was squarely based on...

Natural Law

Lost these days is any pragmatic appreciation for the natural dynamic referenced in Jefferson's Second Inaugural Address. "A wise and frugal government" will (to paraphrase) minimally restrain citizens from injuring one another unjustly. Otherwise they must be freed to risk a pursuit that will produce unhappiness if their personal choices are improvident.

Nature will thereby educate citizens on how to increasingly govern themselves (under the driving incentive of their own self-interest in maximizing the enjoyment of life). This is how formal government can be minimized.

Economic and religious tyranny can be minimized also, as people mature accordingly. When they learn to interact more like adults than children, they will tolerate fewer outrages by demagogues, economic exploiters and religious nuts.

The classic "architecture" of Jefferson and Adam Smith can be realized—nationally and internationally—under a government both lean and mean. It would feature "wise and frugal" oversight more than detailed regulation; with teeth to step in selectively and stop especially tyrannical outrage in its tracks.

Self-Interest

Otherwise let folks learn to play fairly the great game provided by nature. Unleash their self-interest in securing sustenance (and additional wealth as reasonably sought). Free them with education—ideological de-confusion—to exploit honestly therefor the readily available benefits of contractual mechanisms: driven by healthy competition, naturally.

More than that, free folks for a pursuit which will force upon them the hard lesson that individual character must be developed if their happiness is indeed to be maximized. Plato stated the intractably obvious (in Book 9 of THE REPUBLIC): the "just" person (adult) can maximize pleasure. (Tyranny, however, hurts everyone concerned—especially the tyrant.) The people need liberty more than authoritarian bosses to learn this subtle lesson of nature.

Natural Political-Economy

Natural law is also the basis of Adam Smith's foundational design for modern economics (in THE WEALTH OF NATIONS ((l776)). Obviously it would work better if people were indeed freed, educationally, from the confusion of so many (often conflicting) behavioral rules and ideological/ religious dogmas that secondary goals for life—like greed and power—become unduly attractive in default of anything more coherently instructive.

Confusion about beliefs thereby obscures peoples' real self-interest in exploiting honestly, for material needs, the give-and-take mechanisms of contract and competition. The economic system could tick more or less on its own once relieved of childish trouble aroused by their "secondary" adventures.

People could then pursue without distraction the primary goal of developing individual character as their most happiness-producing asset (as indicated by Jefferson's Second Inaugural in conjunction with the phrase "pursuit of happiness" in his mighty Declaration ((l776)).

Critique

The foregoing effects a confluence of American Pragmatism with an often neglected mainstream of philosophy (since Plato's days): providing an empirical basis for political-economy with the crucial concept of a pervading "rationality"--readily discernible to the human mind as natural law—representing a workable alternative to the primitive notion that events are dictated by the "whims" of fanciful deities.

Of course natural law itself is rather "spiritual" as so conceived: an abiding invisibility. Thus it has been eclipsed, for over a century, by "positivist" demands for more tangible evidence of principles governing phenomena.

This website has demonstrated enough "tangible" manifestation to revitalize natural law under an intractable standard in the Declaration of Independence: "We hold these truths to be self-evident..."

McCord
Stone County
Around July 4, 2003