Rescuing Human Rights from Human Beings

"La Scapagliata," by Leonardo da Vinci, ca. 1500

The whole civilized world takes the notion of "human rights" for granted. Ask an American if he or she has rights and a doctor's hammer below the knee couldn't provoke such an instant and reflexive response. “Of course I have rights!” (Why would you even ask?) Probe a little bit deeper and ask one of those obnoxious "why" questions and you may possibly get "It's in the Constitution." Pursue it further and ask if it would be okay if a Constitutional amendment took away a right like the freedom of speech. You'll either get stony silence or, if this pedestrian is unusually clever (or unusually good at parroting his professors), an appeal to "humanity." People have human rights because they're human beings. It's circular, of course, but, then, didn't Plato believe that the circle was the most perfect of shapes?

Fantastic as it sounds, we're supposed to believe that this rights-by-virtue-of-humanity argument is sufficient.The only problem with it is that an individual who is the sole owner of his rights (as opposed to being “endowed” with his rights) can forever give them away if he or she so chooses – and if history is any guide, he or she often so chooses. Rights that can be given away at whim are, in reality, no rights at all. The government may as well have absolute jurisdiction if it only refuses to infringe on its citizens’ rights when it’s convenient. An even more fundamental problem with basing rights in humanity itself is our era’s postmodernism. You’re telling me there’s no such thing as absolute right and wrong, but an African tribesman still has an absolute right to food, water and condoms? The absurdity is self-evident and goes a long way in explaining why nothing akin to individual rights was ever recognized until the coming of Christianity, and has receded whenever and wherever the tides of the Gospel have ebbed.

One would think this would be obvious to anyone who bothered to take the most cursory glance at the historical record. Even ancient Greece and Rome, where conceptions of humanistic individualism reached their zenith, had no such concept as individual rights. Plato spoke of the importance of the polis as the source of a kind of communitarian right. Romans emphasized the freedom granted by a just legal system. One searches ancient laws in vain for anything resembling our modern versions of individual rights. Slavery was never prohibited anywhere in the ancient world; in fact, it served as the fundamental basis of those societies. Plato and Aristotle both believed that certain people were meant to be slaves by their very nature. The rest of the world was even worse. Most non-Western languages don't even have a word for freedom.

Only with the coming of Christianity did people begin to recognize that all of mankind is made in the imago dei – the image of God—and therefore deserving of certain rights. In the words of the Apostle Paul in Colossians 3, “there is no Gentile or Jew…barbarian, Scythian, slave or free, but Christ is all, and is in all.” Christians in early Rome shocked their pagan rulers by adopting the children Romans left out in the elements to die. Over the centuries, Christianity persistently eroded the philosophical underpinnings that had allowed slavery to survive. Significantly, the first widespread movement against the slave trade began, not under the auspices of Platonists, but under a Christian queen of France, Bathilda. Charlemagne was opposed to slavery; Pope Callistus himself had been a slave. Abogard, Anselm and Wulfstan and other luminaries of the medieval church all campaigned against the existence of the institution. As Rodney Stark has written, “The theological conclusion that slavery is sinful has been unique to Christianity.”

The Protestant Reformation’s rediscovery of the believer’s direct relationship to God launched a whole new inquiry into individual rights, particularly vis a vis government. If an individual is justified by his or her faith and not by physically going through a sacrament, the logic went, then no person can force salvation on another. This led to the formal enumeration of the right of conscience, and by logical extension, the rights of speech and the press, where conscience was expressed, challenged and forged. Religious thinkers like the Protestant theologian Hugo Grotius applied the principles of Christianity when theorizing about international law. Regardless of culture, government or race, people everywhere possessed certain rights because they possessed a common Creator. In the 17th century, John Locke’s theory of government went so far as to assert that political bodies are instituted for the express purpose of protecting the God-given rights of individuals. From here it was a short step to the Declaration of Independence. The distinctly Christian idea of human rights now also became a part of civic religion, with all the mixed blessings that entailed.

All our modern ideas on this subject can therefore be traced back to Christian theology, which alone has birthed, and can alone sustain, so sweeping an idea as the dignity of the entire human race. It’s all too easy to view this Christian accomplishment in a vacuum, as many American do today. Most people have never considered that humanitarianism, foreign aid, abolition and systematic resistance to tyranny have only ever existed in countries touched by Christianity. As Christianity fizzles out in this country, we should expect to see our ideas of human rights—already so twisted, mutable and vacuous that we call abortion a fundamental right—die out, too.

The Schism in Modern Political Thought

“I know your deeds, that you are neither cold nor hot. I wish you were either one or the other! So, because you are lukewarm—neither hot nor cold—I am about to spit you out of my mouth.” It’s better to be consistent - to be hot or cold. Even a man who sells his sword to the wrong cause, but fights like the Devil in defense of it, wins honor and respect from his enemies. In the same way, if a man believes something false, but believes it with all his heart, he earns a kind of honor by his sheer dedication. He weighed the sides of the controversy and chose one to throw his whole weight behind. But a man who's weak, inconsistent or illogical is not only wrong; he’s contemptible.

Perhaps this is why the philosophies of two men continue to inspire so much respect. Thomas Jefferson and Alexander Hamilton could not have been farther apart on the political spectrum of 18th century America. Where Jefferson trusted “the people” to order their affairs better than someone in Washington could, Hamilton excoriated them as slaves to the “impulse of passion.” Jefferson wanted low taxes and the self-reliance of local governments; Hamilton wanted high taxes and a policy of easy credit for industries, roads, canals and bridges. Distribution and decentralization of government, the Jeffersonian ideal, stood in stark contrast to Hamilton’s desire for a “common, directing power.” The differences extended into foreign policy as well. The gentleman from Virginia wanted the policy of limited government he advocated on American soil to be equally as limited abroad: “Peace, commerce, and honest friendship with all nations, entangling alliances with none.” The New York lawyer had his heart set not only on establishing a European-style government, but an army and navy imperial enough to win battles, glory and overseas possessions. Despite all these differences, these two men had one thing in common: the beliefs of each formed a logical, reasoned whole.

Regardless of which man history vindicated, both have an unimpeachable record of intellectual honesty. Both were consistent. They understood that beliefs filter through one’s whole worldview to form an integral whole; beliefs can’t be mixed and matched according to preference. They can't be pawned to win votes or do what’s politically expedient without shaking the whole foundation on which they rest. Hamilton knew and admitted that an aggressive foreign policy required a complex, bureaucratic state at home. Jefferson knew that power corrupted. This led him to the conclusion that small government at home was meaningless if a powerful military establishment tempted the young republic into wars and empire-building. As his friend James Madison said, "War is the parent of armies; from these proceed debts and taxes; and armies, and debts, and taxes are the known instruments for bringing the many under the domination of the few." Republicans today have rebuked their heritage as the party of humble foreign policy and instead embraced a massive military-industrial complex – as if this can be maintained with the low taxes and small government they trumpet. Democrats are no better. How can a welfare state of crony capitalism and exploding government hope to preserve the liberties the party professes such attachment to? Today's administration and its rivals insult our intelligence. Hamilton –whatever else one might say of him- would have known better.

Becoming the Beast

"Justice and Divine Vengeance Pursuing Crime," Pierre-Paul Prud'hon, 1808

No one can fail to have heard about the assassination of Anwar al-Alwaki last week. What you may not have heard was how unprecedented this killing was. Never before (as far as I'm aware) has our government been legally allowed to kill anyone, much less a citizen, without having to prove his guilt in trial. His guilt was beyond doubt? It doesn't matter. I’ve written about this previously, but there’s a reason that our symbol of Justice, the Roman goddess Justitia, is portrayed with a blind-fold and a scale. These aren’t just artistic flourishes; they communicate a deep truth. God’s justice is perfect. He is "no respecter of persons" - he is blind. He always convicts the guilty and exonerates the innocent because he can see into their hearts and minds and can separate truth from lies - he is balanced. Our human judges thankfully don’t have this same omniscience, and “there’s the rub” in this case. Whatever blood may have been on his head, Alwaki was killed unjustly because he never got a chance to defend himself to the nation. Without the accused having that chance, the verdicts of governments, judges and juries can be easily mistaken. They can be swayed by their own prejudices, false testimony and their own lack of knowledge. Verdicts are, at best, educated guesses. Then how can we protect the innocent from being hauled into court and jailed or executed on false premises? How do we keep justice blind and balanced like a scale? These were just the questions Englishmen faced in the 17th century and Americans in the 18th century: kings and courts abusing their powers to bend people to their tyrannical wills.

As the Anglo-American world found out, the answer lay in keeping true to the old maxim “innocent until proven guilty.” This principle has been the cornerstone of our legal system ever since. After all, the men who codified our laws had lurid experiences with judges who convicted the innocent so as to increase royal power in the colonies. Even before that hard lesson, however, our Founding Fathers had defended the innocent even when it was incredibly inconvenient. Two examples will suffice. After the Boston Massacre, John Adams (a lawyer in Boston at that time) thought it was so important to give a fair trial to the British soldiers involved in the shooting that he went against his every inclination (he later hazarded angry mobs, his reputation and his livelihood) to defend them personally. Bostonians were caught up in the tragedy of the moment and wanted the soldiers dead. Wasn’t their guilt evident enough after three people lay bleeding in the streets? But human passions can cloud fair judgment. What they took to be certain guilt was actually not so certain at all, as Adams proved. Or take Thomas Jefferson, who, as a young lawyer, took slaves and free blacks as clients to defend in court, when having dark-skinned clients was enough to imperil even the most well established law practice.

Given how integral this idea of blind, even-handed justice is to Christianity, and how it launched the life of our nation and its heroes, it’s deeply unsettling that many Americans and Christians are ignoring our government's departure from these principles in the case of Alwaki's assassination. Alwaki was not shot on a battleground. In fact, as far as we know he only ever preached violence. While there can be little doubt judging from his sermons that Alwaki was an evil man, the simple fact is that, under our Constitution, even the most evil of men are entitled to a fair trial for their crimes. Nazis whose guilt was established beyond the residue of doubt were famously given trials at Nuremberg. Although Southerners were regarded as traitors after the Civil War, those who were captured outside the field of battle were at least afforded hearings in military courts. According to the Bible, conviction of murder (not the preaching of murder, but murder) requires the testimony of “two or three witnesses.” (Deut. 17:6) The verse goes on: “…no one shall be put to death on the testimony of only one witness.” And what about when the person himself isn't a murderer? Are the testimonies of fewer witnesses required to convict him than to convict an actual  murderer? Why, even Iran sees the need to keep up the semblance of a capital trial as it tries to convict Yousef Nadarkhani. The fact that our "Christian" government doesn’t feel compelled to put on a charade of justice should give us pause to consider whether, through fear of our enemy, we are becoming the beast we mean to destroy.

Rousseau, Human Nature and Our Foreign Policy Problem

Put aside for a moment the constitutional arguments (and they are many) against being involved in the internal squabblings of governments overseas. Put aside the pragmatic arguments of finance and sustainability that see these wars for the vacuous black hole that they are. Even put aside the Founding Fathers' warnings against "foreign entanglements." Let's examine the philosophical moorings required to think we can"make the world safe for democracy."

As Christians, it is our duty to not only recognize, but actively live like we believe that sin is something each of us has the choice -the free-will- to indulge in or resist. Furthermore, God tells us in his word that man is fallen, that he delights in sin, just as St. Augustine delighted in stealing an apple, not to eat, but for the pure pleasure of sinning.  How does this reverberate into how we should see man's place in civil society? He is a law-breaker by choice. 

Not everyone agrees with what the Bible says, however. In fact, for a couple hundred years now it's been in vogue to take a position that owes more to Jean Jacques Rousseau: that man is born free and decent, and it's society's institutions that corrupt him. Break the back of these institutions and a violent man suddenly finds himself cherubized. Freud agreed. Man is a complex animal without a soul who responds to impulses in his environment. Pavlov believed that his famous discovery of reinforcement and the salivating dog was equally true of human beings: man is mechanical and needs stimuli to provoke the "right" responses. As these theories became mainstream, education shifted from its classical focus on searching for truth and instead began treating children like Pavlov's dog. It became about conditioning children to make the right responses to stimuli in the world.

Once this generation of children became adults, they could be found at the helm of this nation and most others in the Western world. They had a firm belief in the innate goodness of man - if only the harmful stimuli can be removed. Man is perfectible if he can just be given the right environment. Crime was no longer the rebellion of the soul, it was the automatic response to poverty and inner-city decay. Housing projects and the welfare state resulted. But there was something else, too. If this picture of human nature was true, then it was now within the grasp of the government of the United States of America not only to perfect its own citizens, but to perfect the citizens of the world - in effect to create a new world order of peace and prosperity for all. To free them to that natural state that Rousseau had talked about. Remove the evil effects of institutions and governments and you will cure the men under them. Or in more modern terms: "If we only remove the dictators, they will be good people." The French tried it in their Revolution of 1789. We did it in Cuba, in Europe (twice) and all across the third world ever since, and we've seen how it's played out. Iran was one of our first projects in the 1950s. Now it's Iraq and Afghanistan, which, despite all dreams of flag-waving Iraqi children, are not Jeffersonian democracies or anything remotely like. Egypt has been delivered, not to democracy, but to the Muslim Brotherhood. Now there are reports that Libya may be falling under the sway of Al Qaeda.

The problem of our foreign policy is primarily a problem with our view of human nature. Try as we might to export freedom and American ideals, our plans will continue to backfire until we understand that we cannot make men and women desire freedom by getting rid of the evil around them. Correcting our foreign policy starts with understanding that sin is a choice; that any inherent desire for freedom and democracy in the human race is outweighed by an inherent desire to sin. People around the world need to be reached by the Great Commission, not by Operation Odyssey Dawn.