Among the more unsettling images now the icons of January 6 are those in which the Capitol attackers display symbols representing the Christian faith: signs and flags with such slogans as “Make America Godly Again,” “Hold the line, patriots. God wins,” “Jesus 2020,” “An Appeal to Heaven”; Christian flags; flags bearing the icthys (sign of the fish). Perhaps most troubling of all is a photo of a man standing behind a wooden cross with his head bowed against it and surrounded by others in postures of prayer, as if invoking the Almighty to align with them in their evil deeds.
A question I have often grappled with over the last decade or so is, When did the government become the enemy? Along with the related question, How did Christian Nationalism become the most prominent and influential religious ideology in America? The image of government as Evil Empire, promoted primarily by Christian Nationalists, has been used to justify everything from unregulated gun ownership to defiance of public health mandates meant to reduce the devastation of a pandemic.
Government as Evil Empire is not supported by our Constitution, the Declaration of Independence, the writings of any of our leaders and great thinkers, and–sorry!–not even by the Bible. On the contrary, each of those sources depicts government as (1) necessary to maintaining order among communities of human beings and (2) needing to be closely monitored by the governed to prevent its overreach. James Madison said it most effectively in Federalist 52: “You must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place, oblige it to control itself.”
The Old Testament Book of Judges reiterates several times the statement of chapter 17, verse 6: “In those days there was no king in Israel; all the people did what was right in their own eyes.” With no central government, only tribal leaders, even the high crime of murder was left to families who usually assigned an avenger of blood to administer justice. It’s pretty easy to imagine how such a system would play out in a nation with a current population of 331,000,000 people of wildly varying backgrounds and moral codes.
The simplest social contract in our country’s history was the Mayflower Compact, composed in 1620 by English colonists who sailed across the ocean on the Mayflower ship. The written compact was a preemptive measure by leaders who foresaw rebellion and chaos if the 102 passengers were turned loose on dry land with no guide for self-governance. The group had originally planned to join the Virginia Company, an established community, but–as a result of storms which blew them far off their charted course–found themselves in Massachusetts, near Cape Cod, instead. As the History.com editors put it, “Knowing life without laws could prove catastrophic, colonist leaders created the Mayflower Compact to ensure a functioning social structure would prevail.”
Essentially, those who signed and agreed to live under the Mayflower Compact consented to do three things: form a civil union, enact whatever laws were deemed necessary to maintain order within that union, and individually obey the laws enacted. That rudimentary compact is at the heart of the more sophisticated documents that have since formed the framework for our civil society: first, The Articles of Confederation and then our Constitution. Since allowing everyone to do what is right in their own eyes would lead to anarchy and chaos, the only way to live together in harmony is to be members of a society, elect leaders who will enact laws necessary for the common good, and then all play by the rules.
That sounds pretty ideal, right? But what happens when government does go awry, when officials do overstep the bounds of their power? And they do. Henry David Thoreau, in his well-known 1849 essay “Civil Disobedience,” begins by asserting that the best government is no government and that “when men are prepared for it, that will be the kind of government which they will have.” One can’t miss the implication that humans were not in 1849 prepared for complete self-governance and I would argue are even less so in 2021.
Further on in the essay, Thoreau poses some questions:
“Can there not be a government in which majorities do not virtually decide right and wrong, but conscience?- in which majorities decide only those questions to which the rule of expediency is applicable? Must the citizen ever for a moment, or in the least degree, resign his conscience to the legislation? Why has every man a conscience, then?”
He concludes,
“I think that we should be men first, and subjects afterward. It is not desirable to cultivate a respect for the law, so much as for the right. The only obligation which I have a right to assume is to do at any time what I think right.”
That last statement sounds almost like no government, but I think in context he’s saying the only appropriate time to exercise civil disobedience–that is, knowingly and thoughtfully disregarding the law–is when the law requires something which the conscience forbids.
Thomas Jefferson’s well-known words, in the introduction to the Declaration of Independence, establish the purpose of government:
“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.–That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.”
Humans are given certain rights by their Creator, and governments are instituted to secure–preserve, protect–those rights; and governments’ “just powers” are the ones assigned to them by the governed.
Thomas Paine, in his powerful book “The Rights of Man,” elaborates a bit more on Jefferson’s idea by dividing human rights into two categories: natural rights and civil rights. According to Paine,
“Natural rights are those which always appertain to man in right of his existence. Of this kind are all the intellectual rights, or rights of the mind, and also all those rights of acting as an individual for his own comfort and happiness, which are not injurious to the rights of others.”
He then defines civil rights:
“Civil rights are those which appertain to man in right of his being a member of society. Every civil right has for its foundation some natural right pre-existing in the individual, but to which his individual power is not, in all cases, sufficiently competent. Of this kind are all those which relate to security and protection.”
To sum up Paine, we all are born with rights which we should be allowed to exercise throughout our lives without interference, so long as our actions harm no one else. However, since John Donne nailed it when he said “No man is an island” and the book of Judges was onto something in reiterating the pitfalls of allowing everyone to do what is right in their own eyes and the writers of the Mayflower Compact were wise in their forethought that turning loose 102 people who’d been cooped up on a little ship together for a few months would not end well, Paine recognizes that problems may arise within communities and that individuals will lack the power to adequately defend their own rights to security and protection. Therefore, we consent to yield certain individual liberties in exchange for mutual safety and well-being.
The Preamble to our Constitution codifies the themes of human rights, human nature, and the need for a central authority to keep order and peace:
“We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.”
According to the writers, governments have certain specific purposes. First, to “form a more perfect union.” A tribal unit is a union but a far from perfect one; a constitution tightens and defines that union and the responsibilities of each member. Second, a central government will “establish justice”; ideally, that means justice will be uniformly administered, as opposed to allowing blood avengers to deal with matters in their own ways. Third, a centralized authority will “insure domestic tranquility.” Walk into a roomful of third graders when the adult in charge has stepped out for a moment and you’ll get a pretty clear picture of how tranquil our society would be if there were no one in charge. Fourth, the framers wanted to “provide for the common defence,” which we Americans now spell “defense.” External threats will always exist; someone has to organize the response to those threats, since none of us is capable of defending ourselves against a foreign or domestic power intent on doing harm. Fifth, our Constitution is intended to provide a framework by which we can “promote the general welfare,” or make sure everyone is equally protected and the greater good is always our common goal. Finally, our Constitution contains guidelines to “secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity”–ideally, to be sure our generation can live in freedom (within the limits of the common good) and can pass on a free country to our children and grandchildren.
Alexander Hamilton, in Federalist 23, wrote:
“The principle purposes to be answered by Union are these — The common defense of the members — the preservation of the public peace as well as against internal convulsions as external attacks — the regulation of commerce with other nations and between the States — the superintendence of our intercourse, political and commercial, with foreign countries.”
The Bible also says a good deal about government, one of the central passages appearing in the New Testament book of Romans:
“Let every person be subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and those that exist have been instituted by God. Therefore whoever resists the authorities resists what God has appointed, and those who resist will incur judgment. . . . Pay to all what is owed to them: taxes to whom taxes are owed, revenue to whom revenue is owed, respect to whom respect is owed, honor to whom honor is owed.” (Rom. 13: 1-2, 7)
Jesus said it even more succinctly in Mark 12: 17: “Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s.”
So far, I see no discrepancies among these documents on the ideals of human government. Has any government on earth ever perfectly lived up to those ideals? Well, no. But these are worthy goals which every generation should continue to strive for. And until we have achieved the ideal of a “more perfect union,” it’s important to consider when laws should be disregarded and thoughtfully broken.
For Thoreau, the breaking point comes when the law requires something the conscience forbids. The Bible consistently emphasizes the difference between human law and God’s law and instructs us to obey both when possible, but when they are in conflict, obey God’s law. Martin Luther King, in his “Letter from a Birmingham Jail,” addresses the subject of civil disobedience by drawing a distinction between types of laws:
“One may well ask: ‘How can you advocate breaking some laws and obeying others?’ The answer lies in the fact that there are two types of laws: just and unjust. I would be the first to advocate obeying just laws. One has not only a legal but a moral responsibility to obey just laws. Conversely, one has a moral responsibility to disobey unjust laws. . . . Now, what is the difference between the two? How does one determine whether a law is just or unjust? A just law is a man made code that squares with the moral law or the law of God. An unjust law is a code that is out of harmony with the moral law. To put it in the terms of St. Thomas Aquinas: An unjust law is a human law that is not rooted in eternal law and natural law.”
In this time of deeply divided, tribalized, paranoid national crisis, many have simply concluded that government is the enemy and citizens must protect themselves against it. Attempts to place reasonable restrictions on gun ownership are vehemently rejected as nefarious plots to leave citizens helpless and vulnerable to government attacks. Government actions which contradict individual opinions, however unfounded they may be, are clear evidence in many minds that our government is run by evil people who will bring about the end of civilization as we know it. “Conspiracy theory” is another term for paranoia, which has reached epidemic levels. What has to happen to the mind of a reasonable person to make that person believe there are government officials and celebrities who worship Satan while they kill and eat babies? That’s a serious level of mental illness, yet it is present all around us and even in our Congress. During my lifetime, lots of people have been displeased with the results of every election, but until now there was no widespread distrust of the officials announcing the results. We accepted the results, though sometimes grudgingly.
Dr. Anthony Fauci, leading epidemiologist and new household name, said recently:
“We had such divisiveness in our country that even simple common-sense public health measures took on a political connotation. If you wanted to wear a mask, you were on this side. If you wanted to stay in and avoid group settings, you were on this side. It wasn’t [a] pure public health approach. It was very much influenced by the divisiveness that we had in this country.”
In October of 2020, Dr. Fauci said,
“The wearing of masks became more of a political issue where there were, you know, those in favor and those against. It became almost an ideological thing as opposed to what it really is. It’s a public health issue. It doesn’t know politics. The common enemy is the virus.”
In addition to the powers enumerated in the Constitution, our government is also accorded certain emergency powers: the right to impose temporary restrictions for what our Constitution calls promoting the general welfare. During wartime, the government can restrict distribution of certain commodities to ensure that those fighting the battles are adequately equipped. When roads and bridges become unsafe, it is the responsibility of the government to restore them to a usable condition and in the meantime to keep citizens off them. Following natural disasters, the government assumes additional power to restore order to devastated areas.
As summarized by ASTHO (Association of State and Territorial Health Officials),
“The Public Health Service Act (PHSA) provides the legal authority for the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), among other things, to respond to public health emergencies. The act authorizes the HHS secretary to lead federal public health and medical response to public health emergencies, determine that a public health emergency exists, and assist states in their response activities.”
Since health is a part of our overall welfare, I’d say the Constitutional purpose of promoting the general welfare must include keeping as many people as possible from contracting a deadly virus and insuring the health-care system is adequate to meet the needs of those who do get sick either from the virus or from other health issues. Therefore, the government is well within its limits–both constitutionally and according to its emergency powers–when it requires people to wear masks, avoid close contact, and stay out of large gatherings. Based on scientific evidence, these things keep more people alive and healthy; and since allowing everyone to do what’s right in their own eyes never has worked out well, someone has to coordinate the effort to “promote the general welfare.”
James Madison, in Federalist 52, wrote:
“If men were angels, no government would be necessary. If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary. In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: You must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place, oblige it to control itself.”
I haven’t seen any angels around lately, so I guess we’re stuck with government by our fellow humans. It’s unclear who deserves credit for saying it, but somebody once said, “Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty.” You and I must never for a moment let our guard down, for it is our job to oversee the last part of Madison’s caveat: making sure the government controls itself. That doesn’t mean, however, that we have the right to demonize the whole for the actions of some. It is our legal and moral–and yes, Biblical, for those interested–responsibility to subject ourselves to the governing authorities unless doing so violates our personal moral code. Then it’s our legal and moral responsibility to resist and to speak out for change.
March 2020 to March 2021 has felt like a decade instead of a year, but the most intolerable part of all has been the whining about “rights.” Objections to government actions, resistance to government, and civil disobedience are rightly based on conscience and morals, not “rights”; on conflicting loyalties–law vs individual conscience or obedience to God–not “rights.” Thoreau, Gandhi, King, and the Bible–not one of them advocates anarchy or allowing “everyone to do what is right in their own eyes.” Not one of them says government is illegitimate or “has no right to tell me what to do”; they all say it does have that right and responsibility.
And then there’s the eternal vigilance thing. If my government requires me to treat any of my fellow citizens as less valuable or less important or less human than I am, I will break that law, because my conscience and my faith tell me everyone is equal and should be treated as such. If my government forbids me to gather at my chosen house of worship, I will break that law, because it conflicts with my conscience, my faith, and the U.S. Constitution. But if my government tells me to temporarily refrain from gathering in a congregation in order to promote the general welfare by containing the spread of a deadly virus, I will willingly obey, because nothing in my moral code says I can’t cooperate to protect the common good.
If my fellow citizens elect a con man to the high office of the presidency, I will protest (and have). If my government attempts to restrict the voting rights of any of my fellow citizens, I will protest. If my government imprisons children in inhumane conditions, I will protest (and have). If another government oppresses an entire sector of their population and imposes apartheid laws, I will travel there as often as I can to plant olive trees and help pick the harvest of ripe olives to enable them to retain ownership of their ancestral lands.
If my government tells me I must wear a mask for the rest of my life to demonstrate my patriotism, I will break that law. But if my government tells me I have to wear a mask in public for a short time to help prevent the spread of a deadly virus, I will wear the damn mask, and I won’t whine about it, because nothing in my moral code or religious beliefs forbids me to wear a mask. Therefore, it’s not a political or civil disobedience issue.
Government is not the enemy; it’s not the Evil Empire. It is an imperfect human institution which is necessary to our life and well-being. It’s our job to know the difference between just and unjust powers, to oppose the unjust, to cooperate with the just, and not to get the two confused. It’s not an easy job, but we have to do it if we’re to continue being a government of, by, and for the people.