Wednesday, August 29, 2007

Whose Bathroom?   [John Hood]

I am an admirer of Reason magazine's Nick Gillespie, and generally share his libertarian views, but I think he misfired in this Los Angeles Times op-ed about the Larry Craig affair. Urging Republicans to rediscovered their minimal-government, Goldwater roots, Nick sought to use the Craig case as an example:

Goldwater, who inspired Ronald Reagan and helped lay the groundwork for the rise of the Republicans to majority status in the late 20th century, preached a small-government gospel that was appealing and logically consistent. To Goldwater, the state was inefficient at best and predicated on violence and coercion at worst. As much as possible, he argued, individuals should be left alone to pursue their happiness as they saw fit, whether in the workplace or the home. A longtime proponent of reproductive rights, Goldwater was an outspoken defender of gays and lesbians, noting during the original gays-in-the-military debates of the early 1990s that "you don't have to be straight" to serve, "you just have to shoot straight."

Partly owing to their own misbehavior, the Republicans have (thankfully) lost the culture wars, especially when it comes to shutting down alternative sexuality. They should follow the message of the architect of their success. As author Sheila Kennedy has written, "To Goldwater, government did not belong either in your boardroom or your bedroom." Or, as Craig might add, in your bathroom.

In your bathroom? This was a public place. And my guess is that even if the Minneapolis airport were privatized, as Nick and I would both like to see, travelers would never settle for a policy allowing strangers to have sex in the bathroom stalls. Although he didn't intend it, Nick managed to commit the same mistake that many other libertarians do: trying to advance the case for government restraint by denying the deleterious consequences of immoral or idiotic behavior.

There are many, many Americans who have the right instincts about the private behavior of others — that even if they don't like it, the government shouldn't prohibit it. But Craig's alleged misbehavior wasn't private. It was public. To seem to endorse this kind of behavior is to give libertarianism a bad name. Unfortunately, this is all too common.

I'm going to go out on a not-very-long limb here and suggest that if Sen. Goldwater was still around, he'd be urging Craig to take personal responsibility for the disrepute he has brought upon himself and the Senate.

08/29 08:23 AMShare