Freedom From Fear: A Historical Perspective
"Freedom from fear" has been a key justification for many of the most restrictive Covid pandemic policies. According to Lawrence Gostin, a law professor at Georgetown University, Covid-19 vaccines are a scientific tool that allows society to live with greater freedom and less fear. He argues that using all available tools, including mandates, to achieve high vaccination coverage enhances freedom.
While many vaccine skeptics were surprised by the intellectual gymnastics of mandate advocates, "freedom from fear" has been a favored phrase of political opportunists for almost a century. Providing "freedom from fear" has become one of the most common political promises in this century.
Freedom from Fear: A Political Tool
Politicians often portray freedom from fear as the pinnacle of freedom, superior to the specific freedoms upheld by the Bill of Rights. Although presidents have defined "freedom from fear" in different ways, the common factor is that it requires the mobilization of government agents. A review of nearly a century of bipartisan invocations of freedom from fear provides good reason to question the next grandiose statement on the subject.
"Freedom from fear" first entered the American political lexicon thanks to a January 1941 speech by President Franklin Roosevelt. In his State of the Union address, he promised citizens freedom of speech and freedom of worship—two cornerstones of the First Amendment—and then added socialist-style "freedom from want" and "freedom from fear." However, FDR's revised freedoms did not include freedom to dissent, as he stated the government would need to deal with the "few slackers or trouble makers in our midst."
Freedom from Fear: A History of Misuse
FDR's enhanced freedoms did not include the freedom not to be rounded up for internment camps, as FDR ordered for Japanese-Americans after Pearl Harbor. Three years later, FDR altered his definition of freedom by advocating a Universal Conscription Act to entitle the government to the forced labor of any citizen.
Richard Nixon, in his acceptance speech at the 1968 Republican National Convention, promised, "We shall re-establish freedom from fear in America so that America can take the lead in re-establishing freedom from fear in the world." Nixon asserted: "The first civil right of every American is to be free from domestic violence, and that right must be guaranteed in this country."
However, with Nixon's record, government violence didn't count. He continued the war in Vietnam, resulting in another 20,000 American soldiers dying needlessly. On the domestic front, he established the Drug Enforcement Administration and appointed the nation's first drug czar. The FBI continued its COINTELPRO program, conducting "a secret war against those citizens it considers threats to the established order," as a 1976 Senate report noted.
Freedom from Fear: A Modern Perspective
In the 2020 presidential race, Democratic candidate Joe Biden personally blamed President Donald Trump for every one of the 220,000 Covid deaths in the nation. Biden had a simple promise based on a simple message: "People want to be safe." And the only way to survive was to put Uncle Joe in the White House and unleash him.
Biden ran one of the most fear-based presidential campaigns in modern history. He spoke as if every American family had lost a member or two from this pestilence. He routinely exaggerated Covid death tolls by a factor of a hundred or a thousand, publicly asserting that millions of Americans had already been killed by Covid-19. Biden was aided significantly by fear-mongering media coverage. CNN ramped up the fear with a Covid Death Counter always on the screen. But the death count was statistical garbage. Individuals who died of gunshot wounds were counted as Covid deaths if a postmortem showed any Covid trace.
Freedom from Fear: A Political Blank Check
"Freedom from fear" is the ultimate political blank check. The more people the government frightens, the more legitimate dictatorial policies become. Pledging "freedom from fear" allows politicians to seize power over anything that frightens anyone. Giving politicians more power based on people's fears is like giving firefighters pay raises based on how many false alarms they report.
Promises of "freedom from fear" suggest that freedom, properly understood, is a risk-free, worry-free condition. It is the type of promise that a mother would make to a young child. New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham epitomized this mindset when she proclaimed at the Democratic National Convention: "We need a president who can be Consoler-in-Chief. We need a president capable of holding us in a great big hug." And continuing to hold us until we officially become psychological wards of the State?
Bottom Line
"Freedom from fear" offers freedom from everything except the government. Anyone who sounds the alarm about excessive government power will automatically be guilty of undermining freedom from fear. Presumably, the fewer inviolable rights the citizen has, the better the government will treat him. But as John Locke warned more than 300 years ago, "I have no reason to suppose, that he, who would take away my Liberty, would not when he had me in his Power, take away everything else."
Why not simply offer voters "freedom from the Constitution?" "Freedom from fear" means security through mass delusions about the nature of political power. Painting the motto "freedom from fear" on shackles won't make them easier to bear. Perhaps our ruling class should be honest and replace the Bill of Rights with a new motto: "Political buncombe will make you free."
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