First off- Happy Easter!
It is so good to read the Postmodern Conservative again. Carl gave us an excellent refresher American music, and we are now joined by my friend and colleague at UST in Houston, Tom Harmon. I was also reminded by Titus and Carl of several great PomoCon writers I failed to mention in my last post whom I hope will contribute again: Flagg Taylor, Paul Seaton, John Presnall (whom I remember as a Southern gentleman), and Jim Caesar (the legendary UVA professor with the Fed 49 license plate).
One of the great discussion topics that came up all the time at the old PomoCon blog was the “liberalism war,” as Samuel Gregg calls it. In other words: what should the place of classical liberal thought (such as that of John Locke) be within Conservativism?
Peter Lawler was OK with “libertarian means used for conservative ends” in the economic realm, but condemned libertarianism in the social, moral realm. The perennial temptation to abandon social conservativism for economic libertarianism was the reason he greatly feared Rand Paul would be the future of the Republican Party.
As it turned out, Peter’s fears did not come to fruition at the level of party politics with the influence of Donald Trump. Additionally, Conservative intellectuals have become much more wary of simple minded libertarianism in just about every realm (see, for example, the popularity of a book by Peter’s old interlocutor and friend Pat Deneen, Why Liberalism Failed). But there’s still the pervasive threat of libertarianism in the culture, of the “autonomy freak” mentality. Peter would say that we need to “keep Locke in a Locke-box”; by which he meant that we should not allow the Lockean ideas of “consent” and “contract” to make every relationship in our lives conditional. The unconditional love taught by Christianity was the saving grace of America for Peter, keeping our Lockean instincts locked up.
I think we should keep the discussion about liberalism and how to “keep Locke in the Locke-box” going on this substack. My own view at the time was that Peter bought into a bad interpretation of John Locke put forward by East Coast-Straussian Michael Zuckert. That interpretation has it that Locke was really a Hobbesian and did not really believe in natural law at the end of the day. I much more agree with the West Coast-Straussian Tom West about Locke, that the Locke of the Founders was not a Hobbesian. But that’s getting into the weeds; for an excellent analysis, read Carl’s National Affairs article “5 Conceptions of Liberty” to catch up. Hopefully Carl will have even more to share with us about this.
Here is a question to get the discussion going that occurred to me recently while sitting in church:
Q: Is there a difference between the Biblical ideal that our bodies are “temples of the Holy Spirit” and John Locke’s ideal that our bodies are God’s property?
Compare the two, and the obligations they imply.
Here's the relevant text from Locke:
"...men being all the workmanship of one omnipotent, and infinitely wise maker; all the servants of one sovereign master, sent into the world by his order, and about his business; they are his property, whose workmanship they are, made to last during his, not one another’s pleasure: and being furnished with like faculties, sharing all in one community of nature, there cannot be supposed any such subordination among us, that may authorize us to destroy one another, as if we were made for one another’s uses, as the inferior ranks of creatures are for our’s."
I'll get it started: I think the fact that the Holy Spirit actually is in the person calls for more respect than the respect owed in justice to God's property right. It's like a house; I would be less inclined to vandalize a house if I knew the owner was in there.
If Locke is as Christian as I think you're implying, your comparison makes sense and is worth doing; and in that case you make the right call about Holy Spirit's indwelling being more important than the person, or anything else for that matter, such as a random stone, being understood as God's property. But I think I may be more with the "bad Zuckert" interp on this. Not to be too weedy, but maybe you can remind us of the main T. West points for why it is wrong?