Er ... allow me to reformat for easier reading:
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LAW AND VIOLENCE
by Roy Halliday
Pacifists
At one extreme are the Christian libertarians and the followers of Robert LeFevre who are opposed to all violence. They deny the right to self-defense as most people understand that right. For example, they regard forcible rape as a crime, but unlike other libertarians, they also regard violent resistance to forcible rape as a crime. To support this view they argue that you cannot use brute force to make a person virtuous, because if virtue is not chosen voluntarily it is not really virtue. So when a woman is attacked, she has the right to use moral reasoning to persuade her attacker to repent, but she has no right to use violence to impose her desire not to be raped.
There isn't much point in distinguishing between criminal and non-criminal behavior if you can't respond differently to them. In the non-violent legal system, the concepts of crime and law have no practical significance.
On the other hand, the pacifists are the only ones who believe that all relations between people should be voluntary and that it is always wrong to use violence to impose your will on others. My own view comes close to this, but I must concede that these extreme pacifists win the prize for being the purest and only consistent voluntaryists.
These extreme pacifists, or voluntaryists, also deserve the prize for being the world champions of self-ownership. No other philosophy is completely consistent with the idea that each individual has the absolute right to own himself.
Pacifists believe that laws should be enforced voluntarily. They are one of the four libertarian anarchist groups.
Self-Defense Libertarians
The nearest group to the pacifists, this group avoids the absurdities of extreme pacifism by accepting the common-sense view that the individual has the right to use brute force to defend himself against invasion. In other words, we believe in the right to self-defense, and we believe this right justifies the use of violence when the following three conditions are met:
1. The violence is directed only against someone who is invading someone's rights (aggressing).
2. The purpose of the violence is to stop that invasion.
3. The violence is necessary to stop the invasion.
We believe violence against a person without his consent is morally justified when all three of these conditions are satisfied, and only when all three of these conditions are satisfied.
Even though self-defense libertarianism occupies one of the few logical positions on the libertarian-violence spectrum, and even though it seems like a view that most people would find more acceptable than total pacifism, the fundamental law of the self-defense libertarians is the non-aggression principle. In this legal theory, intentional and unintentional violations of the non-aggression principle can be legally met by violent resistance. All other acts of violence imposed on someone without his consent are illegal.
Free-Market Reparationists
The next group of principled libertarians on the violence spectrum consists of those who oppose violence against people without their consent except for self-defense and to extract reparation from criminals and tortfeasors. I call them free-market reparationists because they believe the free-market can completely replace the State and because their belief in using violence to obtain reparation is their only deviation from the non-aggression principle.
Like the self-defense libertarians, the free-market reparationists believe it is legitimate to use violence against a criminal to stop him from committing a crime. However, unlike the self-defense libertarians, the free-market reparationists do no regard the right to self-defense against aggressors as an absolute right. Instead they believe criminals and tortfeasors lose this right to some extent and do not get their right to self-defense back in full until they have paid for their crimes and torts by compensating their victims. Consequently, in addition to condoning violence against a criminal to stop him from committing a crime, free-market reparationists condone the use of violence against criminals and tortfeasors to force them to make reparations.
The fundamental law of the free-market reparationists is a modified version of the non-aggression principle:
No man or group of men may aggress against the person or property of anyone else, except to force him to make reparations to the victims of his crimes and torts.
Free-Market Retributionists
This group, like the self-defense libertarians and the free-market reparationists, opposes the use of violence against anyone who has not violated someone's rights, so this group is still within the anarchist camp, along with the pacifists. But with regard to invaders, the free-market retributionists condone three reasons for violence: (1) for self-defense, (2) to force a criminal or tortfeasor to compensate his victim, and (3) to punish a criminal for his crime. The leading exponent of this point of view in the 20th century was Murray Rothbard. The Rothbardians probably constitute a majority of the individualist-anarchist wing of the libertarian movement. I have chosen to call them free-market retributionists to emphasize that they deviate from the non-aggression principle on the issue of punishment (as well as on the issue of reparation).
Like the free-market reparationists, the free-market retributionists do not believe in the absolute right to self-defense. They believe that criminals lose this right until they have compensated their victims and been punished for their crimes.
The free-market reparationists and the free-market retributionists try to reconcile their views with the non-aggression principle by arguing that forcing a criminal to make reparation and imposing physical punishment on a criminal are not examples of the initiation of force, because the criminal is the initiator of force, and reparation or retribution, like self-defense, is a response to aggression. The problem with this argument, as I see it, is that the violence used in legitimate self-defense occurs while a criminal or tortfeasor is initiating aggression, whereas the violence used for reparation or punishment generally takes place after the criminal or tortfeasor has stopped his aggression. Therefore, violence used to compel compensation to a victim or to punish a criminal constitutes a new round of aggression and violates the non-aggression principle.
The free-market retributionists appeal to our innate feeling that criminals deserve to be punished for their crimes. Few of us can deny that we derive satisfaction from seeing harm come to bad people. However, the pacifists, the self-defense libertarians, and the free-market reparationists reject coercive punishment. Instead, they say we should restrain our desire for retribution rather than inflict physical punishment on criminals without their consent.
In addition to the moral objections from the less violent libertarians, the free-market retributionists have to face the argument from the more violent libertarians who say that we need government to administer punishments.
What is the objectively correct punishment for stealing a car? A whip lashing, a prison sentence, community service, a fine-are all incommensurate and arbitrary. There is no conclusive answer. But surely to whip, imprison, enslave, or fine someone more than he deserves is a crime. That is why most retributionists agree that we need a government to select one schedule of punishments and impose it impartially on all criminals in society. (I believe that the free-market reparationists have a similar problem. There is no way to prove conclusively that any particular form or amount of compensation to a victim of a crime is exactly correct. So free-market reparationists risk violating the rights of criminals and tortfeasors by using violence to extract reparation without the criminal's or tortfeasor's consent.)
The fundamental law in the legal system of the free-market retributionists is a modified version of the non-aggression principle:
No man or group of men may aggress against the person or property of anyone else, except to force him to make reparations to the victims of his crimes and torts or to punish him for his crimes.
Minarchists
The minarchists are the next group on the scale of increasingly more violent libertarian legal theorists. They are called minarchists because they believe we need a very small State, whose functions are limited to enforcing justice and protecting us from criminals. Minarchists are morally opposed to the initiation of violence against people without their consent except as follows:
1. It is legitimate for anyone to use violence against aggressors in self-defense.
2. It is legitimate for designated government officials to use violence against convicted criminals (and tortfeasors) to force them to pay reparation to the victims of their crimes (or torts).
3. It is legitimate for designated government officials to use violence against convicted criminals to administer government-designated punishments.
4. It is legitimate for designated government officials to use violence against anyone to prevent him from competing with the government in assessing and enforcing reparations and punishments for crimes.
Unlike the anarchists, the minarchists condone the use of violence against people who have not violated anyone's rights. The fundamental legal principle of the minarchists is a highly modified version of the non-aggression principle:
No man or group of men may aggress against the person or property of anyone else, except for authorized agents of the State who may use aggression to (1) force a person to make reparations to the victims of his crimes or torts, (2) punish a person for his crimes, or (3) prevent anyone from competing with the State in administering punishment of criminals.
Limited-Government Libertarians
The most violent legal theory on the libertarian spectrum is the limited-government theory. The limited-government libertarians have the same view of violence as the minarchists, except that the limited-government libertarians believe the government needs to provide more functions and has to forcefully interfere in the lives of peaceful people more than the minarchists believe is necessary. The difference between the minarchists and the limited-government libertarians is that the highest legal principle of the minarchists is a uniform system for protecting rights and enforcing reparations and punishments, whereas the highest legal principle of the limited-government libertarians varies from one person to the next, depending on which services the individual wants the government to provide.
Because limited-government libertarians have a variety of reasons for holding their views, and because this is the least radical of the natural-rights-based libertarian groups, it is the largest libertarian group. It overlaps the non-libertarian mainstream of society. It includes principled libertarians who have not thought through their principles, and it includes people who place practical considerations above moral principles.
The fundamental legal principle of the limited-government libertarians, if they can be said to have any, could be the following version of the non-aggression principle, which is modified to such an extent that it might better be named the tyranny principle:
No man or group of men may aggress against the person or property of anyone else, except for authorized agents of the State who may force a person to make reparations to the victims of his crimes and torts or to punish a person for his crimes or to prevent a person from doing anything at all that the State has decided to prohibit or to compel a person to do anything at all that the State has decided to make mandatory.
This is a bit unfair to the limited-government libertarians, because they generally favor placing restrictions on the State, such as those listed in the Bill of Rights. But history has shown that such restrictions can be overcome, especially when the State insists on having the authority to interpret what the restrictions mean.