(Note: Freedom usually means free from something, whereas liberty tends to imply the freedom to do something.)
Is freedom more important than safety?
In regard to my grandson, John Henry, age 17 months, the answer to that question is a resounding no. His parents could give John Henry the freedom to drink Liquid Drano, explore the back yard and woods by himself, or let him toddle down the steps to the basement. They could give him all those freedoms and more, but John Henry would end up injured or dead.
But what about adults, by which I mean anyone over the age of 18?
Freedom wins hands down.
Why?
Is freedom more important than safety?
In regard to my grandson, John Henry, age 17 months, the answer to that question is a resounding no. His parents could give John Henry the freedom to drink Liquid Drano, explore the back yard and woods by himself, or let him toddle down the steps to the basement. They could give him all those freedoms and more, but John Henry would end up injured or dead.
But what about adults, by which I mean anyone over the age of 18?
Freedom wins hands down.
Why?
First, the older you get, the more you realize that safety is an illusion. Some kid in a car is texting his girlfriend, crosses the yellow line, and smashes head-on into your minivan. Your flight to Omaha experiences mechanical failure, the aircraft starts shaking, and you’re suddenly praying for the first time in thirty years. Your elderly mother-in-law drowns in that swimming pool you had built in your back yard. A knock on the door at midnight means you will never see your sixteen-year-old daughter again.
Our ancestors, even just a century ago, knew well the fickleness of fate. An infected foot could put a loved one in an early grave. A kick from a cow could cripple a farmer for life. A drought in Oklahoma meant pulling up stakes and migrating to California.
Because we live in times less fraught by disease and better equipped to handle natural disasters, and because we practice safety standards unknown to those ancestors—seat belts, building codes, immunizations, and other like measures—we sometimes entertain the illusion we can make the world a safe place. The woman holding the sign in the picture undoubtedly believes that banning guns will eliminate much of the violence in our country. I could cite a myriad of reasons why a ban on guns is unrealistic and impractical, from the Constitution to the sheer number of weapons involved, but the broader question the woman raises--"Is freedom more important than safety?"-- I would answer with a vigorous "Yes!"
Safety is an illusion. We can make life safer, but not safe. To promote safety, the law orders us to drive a certain speed on the highway, wear seat belts, and have our cars inspected. All well and good, but despite these measures 40,000 people a year die on the highway and another two million are injured.
Sticking with our highway example, we see that we give up certain freedoms for the safety of ourselves and others. The woman with the sign would probably argue that we might do the same by banning guns. If that option was not an impossibility at this point, she might even have a case.
But we must be careful if we decide to place safety over freedom. Safety involves practical measures and can be achieved to some extent in any enterprise. Freedom is ethereal, harder to see or hold, more wind than stone. Once diminished or given away, it may be almost impossible to recover.
Time often dims both memory and gratitude, and many Americans today have either forgotten or never learned that at its founding America was unique in world history. Other societies had instituted constitutions, granted rights to certain citizens, and allowed for debate and assemblies, but none had ever issued a Declaration of Independence with these words:
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….
The author of these words, Thomas Jefferson, and the men who fixed their signatures to this document, pledged “to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.” By that pledge they clearly believed in the Declaration and in liberty. They believed in self-evident truths, that all human beings are created equal before the law (but have different talents and aspirations); that their Creator, their God, had granted to all human beings inalienable rights, meaning rights inherent to the human person, rights no state could grant; that some of these rights include life, liberty and the pursuit of Happiness, which to Jefferson and others meant the right to pursue life as you saw fit; and that governments derive their power—their just powers—from the governed.
Freedom and liberty are dangerous animals. They put individuals, not a king or a dictator, in charge of their own affairs. Freedom and liberty allow a woman who opens a coffee shop to thrive or fail, depending on her business skills. They allow a man with cancer to choose between hospital oncology and herbal medicine for his treatment. They allow youngsters to frolic on a playground containing monkey bars, fifteen-foot slides, and climbing walls.
We live today under a government whose tentacles reach into our lives in ways never envisioned by the men who signed that Declaration. Nevertheless, we remain one of the freest people in the world, and still profess a love of liberty, but we have forgotten that we are intended to be the masters, the government our servant. Too often progressives, liberals, and conservatives seek change by calling on the government to regulate, to tax, or to institute change outside the proper purview of government. Too often as well, many of those citizens looking to the government for solutions to their problems are abysmally ignorant about the Declaration, the Constitution, and the Bill of Rights. Many even regard those documents as dated and useless, disregarding the truth that these very instruments created the prosperity and freedom Americans enjoy today.
We have forgotten, too, that liberty involves individual responsibility. Freedom of choice means accepting the outcomes of that choice. During my life, I have made various choices, some of them wise, some foolish, but in general I have lived with the consequences. Yet I have known adults, men and women claiming to be grownups, who blame their failures on everyone and everything except themselves. They demand all the advantages of freedom, but refuse to be held accountable for their actions.
Is freedom more important than safety?
For a toddler, no.
For an adult, a most definite yes.
Our ancestors, even just a century ago, knew well the fickleness of fate. An infected foot could put a loved one in an early grave. A kick from a cow could cripple a farmer for life. A drought in Oklahoma meant pulling up stakes and migrating to California.
Because we live in times less fraught by disease and better equipped to handle natural disasters, and because we practice safety standards unknown to those ancestors—seat belts, building codes, immunizations, and other like measures—we sometimes entertain the illusion we can make the world a safe place. The woman holding the sign in the picture undoubtedly believes that banning guns will eliminate much of the violence in our country. I could cite a myriad of reasons why a ban on guns is unrealistic and impractical, from the Constitution to the sheer number of weapons involved, but the broader question the woman raises--"Is freedom more important than safety?"-- I would answer with a vigorous "Yes!"
Safety is an illusion. We can make life safer, but not safe. To promote safety, the law orders us to drive a certain speed on the highway, wear seat belts, and have our cars inspected. All well and good, but despite these measures 40,000 people a year die on the highway and another two million are injured.
Sticking with our highway example, we see that we give up certain freedoms for the safety of ourselves and others. The woman with the sign would probably argue that we might do the same by banning guns. If that option was not an impossibility at this point, she might even have a case.
But we must be careful if we decide to place safety over freedom. Safety involves practical measures and can be achieved to some extent in any enterprise. Freedom is ethereal, harder to see or hold, more wind than stone. Once diminished or given away, it may be almost impossible to recover.
Time often dims both memory and gratitude, and many Americans today have either forgotten or never learned that at its founding America was unique in world history. Other societies had instituted constitutions, granted rights to certain citizens, and allowed for debate and assemblies, but none had ever issued a Declaration of Independence with these words:
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….
The author of these words, Thomas Jefferson, and the men who fixed their signatures to this document, pledged “to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.” By that pledge they clearly believed in the Declaration and in liberty. They believed in self-evident truths, that all human beings are created equal before the law (but have different talents and aspirations); that their Creator, their God, had granted to all human beings inalienable rights, meaning rights inherent to the human person, rights no state could grant; that some of these rights include life, liberty and the pursuit of Happiness, which to Jefferson and others meant the right to pursue life as you saw fit; and that governments derive their power—their just powers—from the governed.
Freedom and liberty are dangerous animals. They put individuals, not a king or a dictator, in charge of their own affairs. Freedom and liberty allow a woman who opens a coffee shop to thrive or fail, depending on her business skills. They allow a man with cancer to choose between hospital oncology and herbal medicine for his treatment. They allow youngsters to frolic on a playground containing monkey bars, fifteen-foot slides, and climbing walls.
We live today under a government whose tentacles reach into our lives in ways never envisioned by the men who signed that Declaration. Nevertheless, we remain one of the freest people in the world, and still profess a love of liberty, but we have forgotten that we are intended to be the masters, the government our servant. Too often progressives, liberals, and conservatives seek change by calling on the government to regulate, to tax, or to institute change outside the proper purview of government. Too often as well, many of those citizens looking to the government for solutions to their problems are abysmally ignorant about the Declaration, the Constitution, and the Bill of Rights. Many even regard those documents as dated and useless, disregarding the truth that these very instruments created the prosperity and freedom Americans enjoy today.
We have forgotten, too, that liberty involves individual responsibility. Freedom of choice means accepting the outcomes of that choice. During my life, I have made various choices, some of them wise, some foolish, but in general I have lived with the consequences. Yet I have known adults, men and women claiming to be grownups, who blame their failures on everyone and everything except themselves. They demand all the advantages of freedom, but refuse to be held accountable for their actions.
Is freedom more important than safety?
For a toddler, no.
For an adult, a most definite yes.
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