Thinking Critically About Abortion
Dennis Schroader
PHI 103
Stephen Carter
August 2, 2010
Introduction/Thesis
Very few topics generate as much passionate debate from both sides as does the issue of abortion. Even twenty-seven years after Roe v Wade (1973), the abortion debate rages on talk-radio, Sunday morning political commentary, editorial pages and even in the halls of Congress. While this student is under no delusion that this paper will encompass the entire debate, what follows will argue that abortion should not be legal due to medical, legal and ethical reasons. This paper will further attempt to argue the case from the pro-abortion standpoint, and then conclude by refuting those very arguments.
The medical arguments against abortion are legion; however, let it suffice for now to establish that the child in utero is not, in fact, a part of the mother’s body. Human embryos developing in the womb are individual human beings. At conception, an embryo is genetically distinct from his or her mother. The pregnant mother has her own presumably unique set of chromosomes and DNA, whereas the embryo is comprised of approximately 23 chromosomes from both parents, thus making its DNA an amalgamation of the two and distinct from each. This distinction makes the developing child a unique being, not merely an extension of the mother’s body.
Furthermore, according to the Mayo Clinic’s website (2009), the embryo develops a heart and primitive circulatory system between 15 and 21 days after conception, and possesses distinct brain activity at approximately 35-42 days. While these developmental milestones may not establish the beginning of “life” in the minds of everyone, they must certainly raise the question of when life begins.
This leads to the legal matter. To be plain, the law is unable to determine when life begins. According to the majority opinion in Roe vs. Wade (1973), the Supreme Court of the United States wrote:
"We need not resolve the difficult question of when life begins. When those trained in the respective disciplines of medicine, philosophy, and theology are unable to arrive at any consensus, the judiciary, at this point in the development of man's knowledge, is not in a position to speculate as to an answer" (Section IX, Part B).
If the judiciary is unable to make this determination, and if it is true that a child in utero is a biologically distinct being, then should not other laws and legal precedent apply? This can only be answered as a matter of opinion. It is the opinion of this author that human life is human life and should be treated as such, regardless of its “address” (in or out of the womb). Even absent that belief, the American justice system requires that individuals receive the presumption of innocence before they receive any form of punishment, especially execution.
A near universally held belief in America is that the destruction of human life, absent desert, is a reprehensible act. There are many types of and legal definitions for this sort of behavior, a discussion of which goes far beyond the scope of this discussion. At this point, it is important to define a term: for the purposes of this discussion, desert refers to a person deserving or having earned something. In the heated debate between pro-life and pro-abortion advocates, the topic of capital punishment – the only other form of state-sanctioned homicide – often comes up.
With regard to the matter of capital punishment, Dr. Louis Pojman, a renowned American philosopher, explains the ethical basis for retributive punishment for the commission of crimes as it is practiced in the United States:
“The retributivist holds three propositions: 1) that all the guilty deserve to be punished; 2) that only the guilty deserve to be punished: and 3) that the guilty deserve to be punished in proportion to the severity of their crime” (Pojman, in Waller, 2008, Kindle location 8242).
Pojman continues to provide a persuasive ethical argument in favor of capital punishment as retribution:
“People often confuse retribution with revenge. Governor George Ryan, who recently commuted the sentences of all the prisoners on death row in the State of Illinois… quotes a letter from the Reverend Desmond Tutu that ‘to take a life when a life has been lost is revenge, it is not justice.’ This is simply false. While moral people will feel outrage at acts of heinous crimes… the moral justification of punishment is not vengeance, but desert.” (Kindle location 8248).
The point is that capital punishment is practiced as a form of retributive justice in response to the actions of the individual condemned to death. This is absolutely and necessarily different from abortion in that the child in utero - or children at all according to Roper v Simmons (2005) – is/are incapable of committing any offense so heinous as to deserve death.
Antithesis
While this author would very much like to think the above arguments should prove sufficient to convince even the staunchest of abortion supporter, that simply is not the case. Pro-abortion activists commonly take the position that abortion is legal and should remain so.
One of the strongest arguments in favor of legal abortions is that they provide safe alternatives to “back alley” abortions, which would occur anyway if made illegal. This author presumes the reader’s familiarity with at least some of the horror stories about pre-1973 abortion practices, particularly in states where it had not been legalized. This argument is often chosen because it is extremely difficult to argue in favor of putting pregnant women in dangerous situations. This, however, seems to demonstrate the fallacy of the false dilemma, “if not one, then surely the other” (Moore, 2007, p181).
Abortion supporters will also correctly assert that abortion is a settled matter of law in the United States. The legal history of abortion is a lengthier matter than the average American might expect. Legal abortion existed under English Common Law and is found in the writings of James Wilson, one of the founding fathers of the United States:
“With consistency, beautiful and undeviating, human life, from its commencement to its close, is protected by the common law. In the contemplation of law, life begins when the infant is first able to stir in the womb. By the law, life is protected not only from immediate destruction, but from every degree of actual violence, and, in some cases, from every degree of danger” (On the Natural Rights of Individuals, 1790-1792).
Upon first reading, this may not seem like much of an approval for terminating life in utero, however, the statement that “life begins when the infant is first able to stir in the womb” (Wilson) leaves room for the time from conception and implantation through those months where such stirring either does not happen or is perhaps undetectable.
Moving forward to the late 1960’s, the Supreme Court of the United States ruled on a number of cases that either directly or indirectly affected the legality of abortion under certain circumstances. Additionally, the state legislatures of at least twenty states had passed laws making abortion legal to varying degrees – restricted in sixteen of the twenty and only available on demand in Washington, Alaska, Hawaii, and New York. In 1973, the Supreme Court effectively removed the major barriers to abortion (Roe v Wade), and all subsequent rulings have served only to expand its access and applicability, with the exception of Gonzales v Carhart (2007), which upheld the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act of 2003.
Finally, the pro-abortion supporter may assert that “choice” is an essential part of women’s empowerment. Elisabeth Porter, an Australian professor and researcher, arguing in favor of the “special rights” of women, writes:
“Given women’s body, sexuality, and reproductive potential, reproductive rights affirm equality as an extension of the principle of bodily integrity and self-determination. Given the social position of women, a defense of autonomy in important. Insofar as women are not only responsible for pregnancy but also usually for the care of children, women must be the ones who ultimately decide on contraception, abortion, and childbearing” (Porter, 1994).
Synthesis/Conclusion
These are just a few of what this author views as the more convincing arguments in favor of maintaining legal abortion. The problem with these arguments is that they are logically flawed. The premises that because abortions are legal they are safer (presumably for the mother as they are by definition unsafe for the child), that the legal matter is settled and that women are entitled to “special rights”, even if true, fail to justify an act that amounts to infanticide.
Making an unconscionable act legal and medically safe does nothing to make the act morally acceptable. As has already been established in this paper, children in utero, at whatever stage of development, are distinctly individual human beings. The only way to make a moral argument in favor of abortion is somehow to de-legitimize the life by referring to the child as an “embryo”, “fetus”, or “blob of tissue” since those words are less emotionally charged than “baby”, or even outright deception. According to one Kathy Sparks, a former abortion clinic worker:
“Sometimes we lied. A girl might ask what her baby was like at a certain point in the pregnancy: Was it a baby yet? Even as early as 12 weeks, a baby is totally formed, he has fingerprints, turns his head, fans his toes, feels pain. But we would say ‘ it’s not a baby yet. It’s just tissue, like a clot’” (Williamson, 1986, p 28).
Even the words used to describe the procedure, such as “abortion” or “termination”, are chosen because they are clinically accurate and sound much better than “kill your baby”.
Additionally, with regard to the false dilemma fallacy mentioned above, overturning Roe v Wade (1973) would neither immediately make all abortions illegal nor return women or the medical profession to pre-1973 states. In fact, also as previously established, twenty-three states already had laws on the books, which made abortion legal within those jurisdictions. It stands to reason that other states would follow suit in the event Roe were overturned. The only difference is that the authority would come from elected state legislatures rather than appointed judges and thus ostensibly reflect the will of the voters in those states.
Furthermore, Dr. Bernard Nathanson, one of the co-founders of the National Association for the Repeal of Abortion Laws (NARAL) and a abortion provider himself, wrote in his book Aborting America (1979):
“I confess that I know the figures [5,000 to 10,000 annual deaths resulting from “back alley” abortions] were totally false…But in the ‘morality’ of our revolution, it was a useful figure, widely accepted, so why go out of our way to correct it with honest statistics?” (p 193).
The simple fact is that bad law, no matter how “settled” is still bad law. By deciding Roe, the Supreme Court seized authority not granted by the Constitution. Instead of interpreting the Constitution and its amendments, the Court established a new Constitutional right to privacy, which did not previously exist (Ely, 1973). While the Court has authority to interpret the Constitution, the power to amend it lies with the Congress, the President and the states (Article V). Further, the tenth amendment limits federal authority to those powers specifically granted to it and reserves all others to the states or people. By that rationale, the Supreme Court was wrong to invent what did not exist in the Constitution. The Court should therefore overturn this decision and devolve the issue to the states, who have actual Constitutional authority in this matter.
Finally, as far as women’s rights are concerned, what makes murder wrong is the loss of the victim’s future, presumed to be of value. This is unarguable when discussing any human being having already been born. Professor Porter (1994) may argue for the “special rights of women”, however no reasonable person would argue that such rights would extend to infanticide. Don Marquis, a professor of philosophy, argues against abortion from an ethical perspective by first establishing the wrongness of killing adults, stating, “… it would seem that what makes killing any adult human being prima facie seriously wrong is the loss of his or her future” (Marquis, in Waller, 2008, Kindle location 8556). He goes on in his explanation of his theory of wrongness to include infants and children: “…it is prima facie seriously wrong to kill children and infants, for we do presume that they have futures of value” (Kindle location 8590).
This reasoning leads to his ultimate thesis that the argument for determining rights by personhood as established in current law is flawed and incomplete (Kindle location 8592). In fact, similar legal justification was used in the Dread Scott(1857) decision that slaves were not “legal persons”, but the property of their owners. This author assumes that no refutation of that reasoning is necessary.
As first quoted, what makes killing wrong is the loss of that individual’s future (Marquis). If that is true, he argues, then it follows that a child in utero, at whatever stage of development has a valuable future, thereby making the killing thereof “prima facie seriously wrong”. Whatever the role of women in society, whatever “special rights” they may claim, surely those cannot extend to these kinds of acts.
References
Ely, J. (1973, April). The wages of Crying Wolf: A comment on Roe v. Wade. Yale Law Journal, 82(5), 920-949.
Gonzales v Carhart, 550 U.S. 124 (2007)
Marquis, D. (2008). Abortion is immoral. In B. Waller, Consider Ethics: Theory, Readings, and Contemporary Issues, 2nd Edition. (Kindle locations 8519 – 8669). New York: Pearson
Mayo Clinic. (2009). Fetal development: The first trimester. Retrieved July 31, 2010 from http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/prenatal-care/PR00112
Moore, B., Parker, R. (2007). Critical Thinking, 8th Edition. Boston: McGraw Hill
Nathanson, B. (1979). Aborting America: The Case Against Abortion. New York: Pinnacle Books.
Pojman, L. (2008). The death penalty is sometimes morally legitimate. In B. Waller, Consider Ethics: Theory, Readings, and Contemporary Issues, 2nd Edition. (Kindle locations 8213 – 8458). New York: Pearson
Porter, E. (1994, Summer). Abortion ethics: Rights and responsibilities. Hypatia, 9(3), 66-87.
Rice, B. (2006, March 23). Abortion: Ethical analysis. Lifestyle. Retrieved April 16, 2010 from http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/25347/abortion_ethical_analysis.html
Roper v Simmons, 543 U.S. 551 (2005)
Roe v. Wade, 410 U.S. 113 (1973)
Williamson, G. (1986, January). The conversion of Kathy Sparks. Christian Herald. 28.
Wilson, J. (1792). Of the Natural Rights of the Individual. Retrieved April 18, 2010, from the Ashbrook Center for Public Affairs at Ashland University, TeachingAmericanHistory.org Project Web site: http://teachingamericanhistory.org/library/index.asp?document=831
Tuesday, August 3, 2010
Nuclear Power
Nuclear Power
Dennis Schroader
SCI 207
Jeremiah Convery
Feburary 8, 2010
The decision to develop a civil nuclear power program is one of immense gravity for any nation seeking to step further into the “first world” of industrialized and post-industrial societies. By its very nature, nuclear power comes with the great responsibility to take every precaution while building and operating a power plant as well as disposing of the extremely toxic waste. These weighty considerations notwithstanding, every country with the technological capability and economic and political fortitude are seeking to join the “nuclear club”.
For the United States of America, the nation that invented the use of atomic energy, the infrastructure and knowledge is already in place. All that lacks is political will. In light of the 9/11 attacks, the two wars that followed and the huge spike in energy prices – especially oil – nuclear power rises as a potential answer to all of America’s energy related woes. The purpose of this paper is to discus why increased use of nuclear power is key for American political, economic, environmental and security interests.
Increased use of nuclear power will reduce greenhouse gas emissions and other pollutants. Whatever position the reader takes on the global warming debate, pollution is an indisputable fact. All reasonable people would prefer to live in a clean, healthy environment. To that end, replacing heavily polluting sources of energy with nuclear reactors would drastically reduce energy production caused pollution. In an article titled Lowering Greenhouse Gas Emissions: Using Nuclear Power to Fight Global Warming (2008), the author states:
“The realization that global warming could be man made and the increasing evidence that the rise in greenhouse gas could have disastrous consequences for mankind, has forced society to rethink its attitude to nuclear power. The Financial Times, one of the world's most highly respected publications, reported in November 2006: 'For the first time in its 32-year history, the International Energy Agency [IEA] will urge governments around the world to help speed the construction of new nuclear power plants.'” (O’Sullivan, 2008).
Even the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), a division of the United Nations, issued a report citing nuclear power as a key component for reducing air pollutants believed by some to contribute to the phenomenon known as “global warming” (IAEA, 2000).
While greenhouse gas emissions are all but eliminated, there are other environmental concerns associated with the development and use of nuclear power. In particular, the by-product of nuclear reactors is a highly toxic and radioactive “soup” that cannot be disposed of without great difficulty. The same article states:
“Nuclear reactors produce toxic waste. The waste material is highly radioactive and according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency can remain so for ten thousand years or so. Storage and management of this waste is costly and dangerous to those involved.” (O’Sullivan, 2008).
The problem of disposal is not news. Scientists from all over the globe continue to work on plausible solutions that will make disposal of nuclear waste – and therefore the expanded use of nuclear power – more palatable to the public. Some of these solutions range from storage miles deep in the earth to ejecting capsules of waste into a solar orbit (orbiting the Sun, not Earth). The science and public opinion of these solutions, among the many others proposed, are yet to be settled.
In addition to environmental considerations, increased use of nuclear power will help to revitalize the American economy. From 2007 to present, the American economy has suffered through its worst post-World War II recession. The federal government has spent trillions of dollars – largely borrowed from China and other foreign investors – in so-called “stimulus” projects with questionable results. A potential long term stimulus for local and the overall national economic woes is to expand federal investment in new nuclear power sites. According to the Nuclear Energy Institute:
“Each year, the average nuclear plant generates approximately $430 million in sales of goods and services (economic output) in the local community and nearly $40 million in total labor income. These figures include both direct and secondary effects. The direct effects reflect the plant’s expenditures for goods, services and labor. The secondary effects include subsequent spending attributable to the presence of the plant and its employees, as plant expenditures filter through the local economy (such as restaurants and shops buying goods and hiring employees). Total labor income calculates to $153.6B paid over 60 years from 64,000. Economic value calculates to $1.65T paid over 60 years from 64,000 MW.” (Nuclear Energy Institute, 2009).
United States Senator Mark Udall (Democrat, Colorado) also acknowledges the importance of nuclear power as a means of meeting many national interest concerns – including economic – simultaneously:
“Given the economic, national security, and environmental threats that our current energy system creates, we need a comprehensive and cleaner energy policy. In this regard, nuclear energy clearly has emerged as an important player in our search for a stable and domestic energy source that has less greenhouse gas emissions.” (Udall, M, 2009).
The primary economic argument against further investment in nuclear reactors is the staggering upfront expense to build the site. According to the website NuclearInfo.net, a recent proposal by Westinghouse to build their AP1000 reactor would cost approximately, $1.4 Billion (2010) while coal and hydroelectric generators cost a mere fraction of that figure.
Increased use of nuclear power is a vital component to America’s national security interests through energy independence. According to the US Energy Information Administration (USEIA, 2010), a division of the Energy Department, in 2009 the United States imported an average of 1,023,000 barrels of petroleum per day from Saudi Arabia, 1,099,000 barrels per day from Venezuela, and 570,000 barrels per day from Russia. While the US does have other significant sources of petroleum, namely Canada and Mexico, these three unfriendly sources make up roughly 27% of total US petroleum imports. Increasing the amount of energy produced domestically, such as that produced by nuclear power, could reduce or eliminate America’s dependence on foreign oil.
On August 4, 2007, the United States House of Representatives passed HR 3221, the New Direction for Energy Independence, National Security, and Consumer Protection Act. This bill addresses some of the concerns about the United States’ vulnerability due to its dependence on foreign sources of energy. Representative Nancy Pelosi (Democrat, California), Speaker of the House and third in line for the Oval Office behind the Vice President, said in a statement on her website, “This legislation will move the United States toward greater energy independence and security…” (2007).
In a speech given on January 26, 2010, General Wesley Clark (US Army, retired), a well known political liberal and one time candidate for the Democrat Party’s Presidential nomination, while speaking on behalf of the benefits of ethanol optimization, stated that energy independence is critical to America’s national security interests (Clark, 2010).
On the other hand, “Unfortunately one of the products of nuclear reactors is weapons grade plutonium. This could encourage the spread of nuclear weapons” (O’Sullivan, 2008). Promoting and implementing a global nuclear power program could therefore prove contrary to American and global security interests. The principle answer to this concern, at least in this student’s mind, is for the United States and other nations already part of the “nuclear club” to build the reactors and sell the energy. Another option is light-water reactors, such as those sold to North Korea under the Clinton administration, which cannot produce such weapons grade material.
The threat of such nuclear proliferation and environmental damage gives people great cause for concern. Unfortunately, the nuclear reactor accidents at Three Mile Island in 1979 and Chernobyl in 1986 have given civilian nuclear power generation a bad name altogether. At least in the case of Three Mile Island, no real damage was done and the Kemeny Commission Report (1979) predicted no increased incidents of negative health effects associated with radiation.
Due to the passage of time, increased awareness of environmental concerns and the ever-increasing cost of energy produced with fossil fuels, increased use of nuclear power can be a political win for America, both at home and abroad. Recent studies on public perception of nuclear energy conducted by the Nuclear Energy Institute (2010) indicate a rising positive public opinion in the United States. Similar reports have surfaced in Germany (der Spiegel, 2007, July 3), the United Kingdom (World Nuclear Association, 2009, November 30), and Japan (Kolter, M and Hillman, I, 2000), all indicating a greater global acceptance, especially among America’s closest allies, to increased use of nuclear power generation.
When it comes to the long-term production of energy and the national concerns arising therefrom, nothing has proven as versatile as the atom. Atomic energy provides a plausible answer to environmental, economic, security and political concerns. No other energy source can produce as much energy with as little environmental impact for as low a cost – as calculated by dollars per kilowatt-hour produced over the lifetime of the reactor – while providing for much needed economic stimulus.
References
Clark, W. (2010, January 26). Ricardo and Growth Energy to Demonstrate Benefits of Extreme Ethanol Optimization. PRNewswire. Washington. Retrieved on 26 January 2010 from: http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/ricardo-and-growth-energy-to-demonstrate-benefits-of-extreme-ethanol-optimization-82658352.html
der Spiegel. (2007, July 3). Merkel Nudges for Nuclear Power Comeback. Retrieved on 26 January 2010 from der Spiegel’s website: http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/0,1518,492202,00.html
International Atomic Energy Agency. (2000). Nuclear Power for Greenhouse Gas Mitigation. Retrieved on 20 January 2010 from the IAEA website: http://www.iaea.org/Publications/Booklets/GreenhouseGas/greenhousegas.pdf
Kemeny, J., et al. (1979). Report of The President's Commission on the Accident at Three Mile Island. Retrieved on January 18, 2010 from: http://www.pddoc.com/tmi2/kemeny/commission_and_its_staff.htm
Kolter, M. and Hillman, I. (2000). Japanese Energy Security and Changing Global Energy Markets: An Analysis of Northeast Asian Energy Cooperation and Japan’s Evolving Leadership Role in the Region. Retrieved on 26 January 2010 from: http://www.rice.edu/energy/publications/docs/JES_NuclearEnergyPolicyPublicOpinion.pdf
Nuclear Energy Institute. (2009). The Economic Benefits of New Nuclear Power Plant Development. Retrieved on 20 January 2010 from the NEI’s website: http://www.nei.org/resourcesandstats/documentlibrary/reliableandaffordableenergy/factsheet/economic-benefits-of-new-nuclear-development
Nuclear Energy Institute. (2010). Perspective on Public Opinion, Winter 2010. Retrieved on 26 January 2010 from NEI’s website: http://www.nei.org/resourcesandstats/documentlibrary/publications/perspectiveonpublicopinion/winter-2010/
NuclearInfo.Net. (2010). Everything you want to know about Nuclear Power. Retrieved on 27 January 2010 from: http://nuclearinfo.net/Nuclearpower/WebHomeCostOfNuclearPower
O’Sullivan, L. (2008, April 1). Lowering Greenhouse Gas Emissions: Using Nuclear Power to Fight Global Warming. Retrieved on 20 January 2010 from: http://environmentalism.suite101.com/article.cfm/lowering_greenhouse_gas_emissions
Pelosi, N. (2007). New Direction for Energy Independence, National Security, and Consumer Protection Act. Retrieved on 20 January 2010 from: http://www.speaker.gov/legislation?id=0076
Udall, M. (2009, October 29). Senator Mark Udall’s speech delivered on the floor of the US Senate. Retrieved on 20 January 2010 from Senator Udall’s website: http://markudall.senate.gov/?p=video&id=306
US Energy Information Administration. (2010). Crude Oil and Total Petroleum Imports Top 15 Countries. Retrieved on 27 January 2010 from: http://www.eia.doe.gov/pub/oil_gas/petroleum/data_publications/company_level_imports/current/import.html
World Nuclear Association (2009, November 30). Nuclear Power in the United Kingdom. Retrieved on 26 January 2010 from: http://www.world-nuclear.org/info/inf84.html
Dennis Schroader
SCI 207
Jeremiah Convery
Feburary 8, 2010
The decision to develop a civil nuclear power program is one of immense gravity for any nation seeking to step further into the “first world” of industrialized and post-industrial societies. By its very nature, nuclear power comes with the great responsibility to take every precaution while building and operating a power plant as well as disposing of the extremely toxic waste. These weighty considerations notwithstanding, every country with the technological capability and economic and political fortitude are seeking to join the “nuclear club”.
For the United States of America, the nation that invented the use of atomic energy, the infrastructure and knowledge is already in place. All that lacks is political will. In light of the 9/11 attacks, the two wars that followed and the huge spike in energy prices – especially oil – nuclear power rises as a potential answer to all of America’s energy related woes. The purpose of this paper is to discus why increased use of nuclear power is key for American political, economic, environmental and security interests.
Increased use of nuclear power will reduce greenhouse gas emissions and other pollutants. Whatever position the reader takes on the global warming debate, pollution is an indisputable fact. All reasonable people would prefer to live in a clean, healthy environment. To that end, replacing heavily polluting sources of energy with nuclear reactors would drastically reduce energy production caused pollution. In an article titled Lowering Greenhouse Gas Emissions: Using Nuclear Power to Fight Global Warming (2008), the author states:
“The realization that global warming could be man made and the increasing evidence that the rise in greenhouse gas could have disastrous consequences for mankind, has forced society to rethink its attitude to nuclear power. The Financial Times, one of the world's most highly respected publications, reported in November 2006: 'For the first time in its 32-year history, the International Energy Agency [IEA] will urge governments around the world to help speed the construction of new nuclear power plants.'” (O’Sullivan, 2008).
Even the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), a division of the United Nations, issued a report citing nuclear power as a key component for reducing air pollutants believed by some to contribute to the phenomenon known as “global warming” (IAEA, 2000).
While greenhouse gas emissions are all but eliminated, there are other environmental concerns associated with the development and use of nuclear power. In particular, the by-product of nuclear reactors is a highly toxic and radioactive “soup” that cannot be disposed of without great difficulty. The same article states:
“Nuclear reactors produce toxic waste. The waste material is highly radioactive and according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency can remain so for ten thousand years or so. Storage and management of this waste is costly and dangerous to those involved.” (O’Sullivan, 2008).
The problem of disposal is not news. Scientists from all over the globe continue to work on plausible solutions that will make disposal of nuclear waste – and therefore the expanded use of nuclear power – more palatable to the public. Some of these solutions range from storage miles deep in the earth to ejecting capsules of waste into a solar orbit (orbiting the Sun, not Earth). The science and public opinion of these solutions, among the many others proposed, are yet to be settled.
In addition to environmental considerations, increased use of nuclear power will help to revitalize the American economy. From 2007 to present, the American economy has suffered through its worst post-World War II recession. The federal government has spent trillions of dollars – largely borrowed from China and other foreign investors – in so-called “stimulus” projects with questionable results. A potential long term stimulus for local and the overall national economic woes is to expand federal investment in new nuclear power sites. According to the Nuclear Energy Institute:
“Each year, the average nuclear plant generates approximately $430 million in sales of goods and services (economic output) in the local community and nearly $40 million in total labor income. These figures include both direct and secondary effects. The direct effects reflect the plant’s expenditures for goods, services and labor. The secondary effects include subsequent spending attributable to the presence of the plant and its employees, as plant expenditures filter through the local economy (such as restaurants and shops buying goods and hiring employees). Total labor income calculates to $153.6B paid over 60 years from 64,000. Economic value calculates to $1.65T paid over 60 years from 64,000 MW.” (Nuclear Energy Institute, 2009).
United States Senator Mark Udall (Democrat, Colorado) also acknowledges the importance of nuclear power as a means of meeting many national interest concerns – including economic – simultaneously:
“Given the economic, national security, and environmental threats that our current energy system creates, we need a comprehensive and cleaner energy policy. In this regard, nuclear energy clearly has emerged as an important player in our search for a stable and domestic energy source that has less greenhouse gas emissions.” (Udall, M, 2009).
The primary economic argument against further investment in nuclear reactors is the staggering upfront expense to build the site. According to the website NuclearInfo.net, a recent proposal by Westinghouse to build their AP1000 reactor would cost approximately, $1.4 Billion (2010) while coal and hydroelectric generators cost a mere fraction of that figure.
Increased use of nuclear power is a vital component to America’s national security interests through energy independence. According to the US Energy Information Administration (USEIA, 2010), a division of the Energy Department, in 2009 the United States imported an average of 1,023,000 barrels of petroleum per day from Saudi Arabia, 1,099,000 barrels per day from Venezuela, and 570,000 barrels per day from Russia. While the US does have other significant sources of petroleum, namely Canada and Mexico, these three unfriendly sources make up roughly 27% of total US petroleum imports. Increasing the amount of energy produced domestically, such as that produced by nuclear power, could reduce or eliminate America’s dependence on foreign oil.
On August 4, 2007, the United States House of Representatives passed HR 3221, the New Direction for Energy Independence, National Security, and Consumer Protection Act. This bill addresses some of the concerns about the United States’ vulnerability due to its dependence on foreign sources of energy. Representative Nancy Pelosi (Democrat, California), Speaker of the House and third in line for the Oval Office behind the Vice President, said in a statement on her website, “This legislation will move the United States toward greater energy independence and security…” (2007).
In a speech given on January 26, 2010, General Wesley Clark (US Army, retired), a well known political liberal and one time candidate for the Democrat Party’s Presidential nomination, while speaking on behalf of the benefits of ethanol optimization, stated that energy independence is critical to America’s national security interests (Clark, 2010).
On the other hand, “Unfortunately one of the products of nuclear reactors is weapons grade plutonium. This could encourage the spread of nuclear weapons” (O’Sullivan, 2008). Promoting and implementing a global nuclear power program could therefore prove contrary to American and global security interests. The principle answer to this concern, at least in this student’s mind, is for the United States and other nations already part of the “nuclear club” to build the reactors and sell the energy. Another option is light-water reactors, such as those sold to North Korea under the Clinton administration, which cannot produce such weapons grade material.
The threat of such nuclear proliferation and environmental damage gives people great cause for concern. Unfortunately, the nuclear reactor accidents at Three Mile Island in 1979 and Chernobyl in 1986 have given civilian nuclear power generation a bad name altogether. At least in the case of Three Mile Island, no real damage was done and the Kemeny Commission Report (1979) predicted no increased incidents of negative health effects associated with radiation.
Due to the passage of time, increased awareness of environmental concerns and the ever-increasing cost of energy produced with fossil fuels, increased use of nuclear power can be a political win for America, both at home and abroad. Recent studies on public perception of nuclear energy conducted by the Nuclear Energy Institute (2010) indicate a rising positive public opinion in the United States. Similar reports have surfaced in Germany (der Spiegel, 2007, July 3), the United Kingdom (World Nuclear Association, 2009, November 30), and Japan (Kolter, M and Hillman, I, 2000), all indicating a greater global acceptance, especially among America’s closest allies, to increased use of nuclear power generation.
When it comes to the long-term production of energy and the national concerns arising therefrom, nothing has proven as versatile as the atom. Atomic energy provides a plausible answer to environmental, economic, security and political concerns. No other energy source can produce as much energy with as little environmental impact for as low a cost – as calculated by dollars per kilowatt-hour produced over the lifetime of the reactor – while providing for much needed economic stimulus.
References
Clark, W. (2010, January 26). Ricardo and Growth Energy to Demonstrate Benefits of Extreme Ethanol Optimization. PRNewswire. Washington. Retrieved on 26 January 2010 from: http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/ricardo-and-growth-energy-to-demonstrate-benefits-of-extreme-ethanol-optimization-82658352.html
der Spiegel. (2007, July 3). Merkel Nudges for Nuclear Power Comeback. Retrieved on 26 January 2010 from der Spiegel’s website: http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/0,1518,492202,00.html
International Atomic Energy Agency. (2000). Nuclear Power for Greenhouse Gas Mitigation. Retrieved on 20 January 2010 from the IAEA website: http://www.iaea.org/Publications/Booklets/GreenhouseGas/greenhousegas.pdf
Kemeny, J., et al. (1979). Report of The President's Commission on the Accident at Three Mile Island. Retrieved on January 18, 2010 from: http://www.pddoc.com/tmi2/kemeny/commission_and_its_staff.htm
Kolter, M. and Hillman, I. (2000). Japanese Energy Security and Changing Global Energy Markets: An Analysis of Northeast Asian Energy Cooperation and Japan’s Evolving Leadership Role in the Region. Retrieved on 26 January 2010 from: http://www.rice.edu/energy/publications/docs/JES_NuclearEnergyPolicyPublicOpinion.pdf
Nuclear Energy Institute. (2009). The Economic Benefits of New Nuclear Power Plant Development. Retrieved on 20 January 2010 from the NEI’s website: http://www.nei.org/resourcesandstats/documentlibrary/reliableandaffordableenergy/factsheet/economic-benefits-of-new-nuclear-development
Nuclear Energy Institute. (2010). Perspective on Public Opinion, Winter 2010. Retrieved on 26 January 2010 from NEI’s website: http://www.nei.org/resourcesandstats/documentlibrary/publications/perspectiveonpublicopinion/winter-2010/
NuclearInfo.Net. (2010). Everything you want to know about Nuclear Power. Retrieved on 27 January 2010 from: http://nuclearinfo.net/Nuclearpower/WebHomeCostOfNuclearPower
O’Sullivan, L. (2008, April 1). Lowering Greenhouse Gas Emissions: Using Nuclear Power to Fight Global Warming. Retrieved on 20 January 2010 from: http://environmentalism.suite101.com/article.cfm/lowering_greenhouse_gas_emissions
Pelosi, N. (2007). New Direction for Energy Independence, National Security, and Consumer Protection Act. Retrieved on 20 January 2010 from: http://www.speaker.gov/legislation?id=0076
Udall, M. (2009, October 29). Senator Mark Udall’s speech delivered on the floor of the US Senate. Retrieved on 20 January 2010 from Senator Udall’s website: http://markudall.senate.gov/?p=video&id=306
US Energy Information Administration. (2010). Crude Oil and Total Petroleum Imports Top 15 Countries. Retrieved on 27 January 2010 from: http://www.eia.doe.gov/pub/oil_gas/petroleum/data_publications/company_level_imports/current/import.html
World Nuclear Association (2009, November 30). Nuclear Power in the United Kingdom. Retrieved on 26 January 2010 from: http://www.world-nuclear.org/info/inf84.html
The Ethics of Death: An Analysis of Abortion and the Death Penalty
The Ethics of Death:
An Analysis of Abortion and the Death Penalty
Dennis Schroader
Phi 107
Tirizia York
April 19, 2010
The state sanctioned termination of life – particularly as it applies to capital punishment and abortion – is an ethical quagmire generating heated debate on both sides of these issues and endless fodder for politicians and pundits alike. This essay attempts to analyze the history of both capital punishment and abortion as it relates to United States Supreme Court decisions, the ethical arguments for and against each, and then answer the question of whether consistency allows an individual to take a “pro” position on one issue while taking an “anti” position on the other.
In order to accomplish this, it is important first to establish the meaning of consistency. In the textbook used in the class for which this essay is written, Bruce Waller states, “…allowing contradictions within my views makes it possible to prove anything, and thus makes careful critical thinking impossible” (2008, Kindle location 547). Therefore, it is assumed for the purposes of this essay that an analysis of consistency is both appropriate and desirable for furtherance of the ultimate goal of determining the answer to the question posed in the paragraph above. This analysis calls for a bit of historical context. As with many such controversial topics, the Supreme Court of the United States issues forth the final word on constitutional legality.
A Brief Legal History
With regard to capital punishment, the Supreme Court, decided in a five to four decision, in favor of the plaintiffs in the case of Furman v Georgia (1972), a consolidated case which included Jackson v Georgia and Branch v Texas. This decision hinged upon the apparent inconsistency with which the death penalty had been applied in the cases and states considered. The majority ruled that a requirement exists for consistency in the application of capital punishment – note, not that capital punishment is, in and of itself, cruel and unusual – thus imposing a de facto moratorium on executions in the United States.
This moratorium was effectively overturned in 1976 with Gregg v Georgia, another consolidated case which included Proffitt v Florida, Jurek v Texas, Woodson v North Carolina, and Roberts v Louisiana, also known as “the July 2” cases.” This seven to two decision established the guidelines by which states may impose capital punishment. The first is that they must provide objective criteria to direct and limit death sentencing, which must then be ensured by appellate court review of all death sentences. The second guideline required the states’ death penalty statutes must allow the judge or jury to take into account the character and record of the defendant. By establishing these guidelines for the states, the Supreme Court made clear the requirement for consistency, established a method to ensure it, and gave the states a way to legally apply capital punishment once more. Other, later cases established further restrictions and requirements on capital punishment: forbidding capital punishment for the crime of rape (Cocker v Georgia, 1977), restricting application in cases of felony murder (Enmund v Florida, 1982), exempting the mentally handicapped (Atkins v Virginia, 2002) and exempting juvenile murderers (Roper v Simmons, 2005), among others.
The legal history of abortion is another story altogether. Legal abortion existed under English Common Law and is found in the writings of James Wilson, one of the founding fathers of the United States:
“With consistency, beautiful and undeviating, human life, from its commencement to its close, is protected by the common law. In the contemplation of law, life begins when the infant is first able to stir in the womb. By the law, life is protected not only from immediate destruction, but from every degree of actual violence, and, in some cases, from every degree of danger” (On the Natural Rights of Individuals, 1790-1792).
Upon first reading, this may not seem like much of an approval for terminating life in utero, however, the statement that “life begins when the infant is first able to stir in the womb” (Wilson) leaves room for the time from conception and implantation through those months where such stirring either does not happen or is perhaps undetectable. Moving forward to the late 1960’s, the Supreme Court ruled on a number of cases that either directly or indirectly affected the legality of abortion under certain circumstances. Additionally, the state legislatures of at least twenty states had passed laws making abortion legal to varying degrees – restricted in sixteen of the twenty and only available on demand in Washington, Alaska, Hawaii, and New York. In 1973, the Supreme Court effectively removed the major barriers to abortion (Roe v Wade), and all subsequent rulings have served only to expand its access and applicability, with the exception of Gonzales v Carhart (2007), which upheld the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act of 2003.
Ethical arguments
The legal matters, for the present, being settled, it becomes incumbent upon the individual to analyze the ethical arguments for and against. With regard to the matter of capital punishment, Louis Pojman provides a persuasive ethical argument in favor of punishment as retribution for the commission of crime:
“The retributivist holds three propositions: 1) that all the guilty deserve to be punished; 2) that only the guilty deserve to be punished: and 3) that the guilty deserve to be punished in proportion to the severity of their crime” (Pojman, in Waller, 2008, Kindle location 8242).
“People often confuse retribution with revenge. Governor George Ryan, who recently commuted the sentences of all the prisoners on death row in the State of Illinois,… quotes a letter from the Reverend Desmond Tutu that ‘to take a life when a life has been lost is revenge, it is not justice.’ This is simply false. While moral people will feel outrage at acts of heinous crimes,… the moral justification of punishment is not vengeance, but desert.” (Kindle location 8248).
Another argument in favor of capital punishment is that of deterrence. This is perhaps the most controversial of the utilitarian lines of reasoning and the counter argument is presented later. In an article in The American Economic Review, Isaac Ehrlich states, “Contrary to previous observations, this investigation, although by no means definitive, does indicate the existence of a pure deterrent effect of capital punishment” (1975). The specifics of his investigation, while fascinating, extend far beyond the scope of this essay. Let it therefore be sufficient to say that Ehrlich’s research did indeed indicate the existence of a deterrent effect.
The ethical arguments against capital punishment receive equal thought and consideration by modern philosophers. One such, Stephen Bright, refutes the deterrent effect, claiming, “Nor is crime deterred by the executions in fewer than half the states of an arbitrarily selected 1 percent of those who commit murders, many of whom are mentally ill or have limited intellectual functioning.” (Bright, in Waller, 2008, Kindle location 7997). Bright goes on to indict the judicial system that applies such sentencing as fatally flawed, stating, “The race of the victim and the defendant, political considerations, and other extraneous factors influence whether prosecutors seek the death penalty and whether juries or judges impose it.” (Bright, in Waller, 2008, Kindle location 8042). In both cases, his argument seems to echo the thinking of the Supreme Court.
Another argument against capital punishment is that of simple economics. While that may not, on its surface, seem an ethical consideration, the fiduciary duty of the state to spend wisely the taxpayers’ money is, in every way, an ethical consideration. In this line of thinking, Corinna Barrett-Lain, a professor and former prosecutor, while writing for the Christian Science Monitor states:
“The bittersweet reality is that money, rather than morality, has become the tipping point for saving lives. Why? Administering the death penalty is breathtakingly expensive. Contrary to popular opinion, it costs substantially more to execute people than to send them to prison for the rest of their lives. In California, which houses the nation's largest death row, it costs about $137 million annually to maintain the state's death penalty system. The state has conducted only 11 executions since reinstating the death penalty in 1978, bringing the average cost per execution to $250 million. That's right – a quarter of a billion dollars per execution” (Barrett-Lain, 2009).
While clearly not intending to make an ethical case against capital punishment, hers is, nevertheless, damningly effective, particularly given the current economic climate in the United States, and particularly California, which is the subject of her article.
As it relates to abortion, the ethical debate focuses on the rights of the mother and those of the unborn child. Making a completely rational argument in favor of so-called “reproductive rights”, Brian Rice, while apparently a simple blogger, makes an effective utilitarian argument when he writes:
“When using the rule-utilitarian consequential principle of ethics, we establish a set of general morals and rules in which we can apply to every moral question based upon our utilitarian findings. When this is applied to abortion, we can see that abortion is a completely ethical entity that provides the greatest amount of happiness for the greatest amount of people.” (Rice, 2006).
Elisabeth Porter, an Australian professor and researcher, arguing in favor of the “special rights” of women, writes:
“Given women’s body, sexuality, and reproductive potential, reproductive rights affirm equality as an extension of the principle of bodily integrity and self-determination. Given the social position of women, a defense of autonomy in important. Insofar as women are not only responsible for pregnancy but also usually for the care of children, women must be the ones who ultimately decide on contraception, abortion, and childbearing.” (Porter, 1994).
The voices against abortion make similarly impassioned cases on their side of the debate. Such notables as Susan B. Anthony and Norma McCorvey – aka Jane Roe, of Roe v Wade - neither of whom presumably require introduction, have lent their weight to the struggle to end abortion in the United States. Anthony, in her publication, The Revolution, wrote:
"Guilty? Yes. No matter what the motive, love of ease, or a desire to save from suffering the unborn innocent, the woman is awfully guilty who commits the deed. It will burden her conscience in life, it will burden her soul in death; But oh, thrice guilty is he who drove her to the desperation which impelled her to the crime!" (Anthony, 1869)
Here she indicts not only the woman who “commits the deed”, but especially the man who drove her to it. As is well known, Susan B. Anthony was a 19th century women’s rights activist, so is Norma “Jane Roe” McCorvey:
“I felt "crushed" under the truth of this realization. I had to face up to the awful reality. Abortion wasn't about 'products of conception.' It wasn't about 'missed periods.' It was about children being killed in their mother's wombs. All those years I was wrong. Signing that affidavit, I was wrong. Working in an abortion clinic, I was wrong. No more of this first trimester, second trimester, third trimester stuff. Abortion--at any point--was wrong. It was so clear. Painfully clear.” (McCorvey, 1998).
Don Marquis, a professor of philosophy, argues against abortion from an ethical perspective by first establishing the wrongness of killing adults, stating, “… it would seem that what makes killing any adult human being prima facie seriously wrong is the loss of his or her future” (Marquis, in Waller, 2008, Kindle location 8556). He goes on in his explanation of his theory of wrongness to include infants and children:
“… the account of the wrongness of killing defended in this essay does straightforwardly entail that it is prima facie seriously wrong to kill children and infants, for we do presume that they have futures of value.” (Kindle location 8590).
This reasoning leads to his ultimate thesis that the argument for determining rights by personhood (as has been established in current law) is flawed and incomplete (Kindle location 8592). As first quoted, what makes killing wrong is the loss of that individual’s future. If that is true, he argues, then it follows that a child in utero, at whatever stage of development has a valuable future, thereby making the killing thereof “prima facie seriously wrong”.
Consistency
Finally, with all the preceding now established can the question be asked, “Can an honest person hold differing views on abortion and capital punishment?” It seems obvious that one could hold an anti-abortion and anti-death penalty stance without jeopardizing consistency. It might then logically follow that one could hold a similar opinion from the opposite point of view (pro-abortion/pro-death penalty), but it only appears that way. If Marquis’ argument that personhood is moot and that what makes killing wrong is the denial of the future is true, then abortion – in all cases – must therefore be wrong without exception. If that is untrue, then the murder of children or adults could just as easily find justification, given anyone sufficiently intelligent with the stomach for such a macabre line of reasoning.
Therefore, the only seemingly contrary position allowable should be the one of anti-abortion and pro-death penalty. Remember from Pojman that capital punishment is not vengeance but desert. Since the United States’ justice system follows a form of retributivist theory - that “1) all the guilty deserve to be punished; 2) only the guilty deserve to be punished; and 3) the guilty deserve to be punishment in proportion to the severity of their crime” (Pojman, in Waller, 2008, Kindle location 8242) - desert is central to the philosophy. The arguments made by Barret-Lain – that execution is mind-bogglingly expensive – and particularly Bright – that capital punishment is applied in an arbitrary and unjust manner – are issues to be addressed within the system and indict application rather than the form of punishment itself.
References
Anthony, S. (1869, July 4). Untitled editorial. The Revolution, 4(1), 4.
Atkins v. Virginia, 536 U.S. 304 (2002)
Barrett-Lain, C. (2009, May 11). The new case against the death penalty. The Christian Science Monitor. http://www.csmonitor.com/Commentary/Opinion/2009/0511/p09s01-coop.html
Bright, S. (2008). The death penalty should be abolished. In B. Waller, Consider Ethics: Theory, Readings, and Contemporary Issues, 2nd Edition. (Kindle locations 7958 – 8212). New York: Pearson
Coker v. Georgia, 433 U.S. 584 (1977)
Ehrlich, I. (1975). The deterrent effect of capital punishment: A question of life and death. The American Economic Review, 65(3), 397-417.
Enmund v. Florida, 458 U.S. 782 (1982)
Furman v Georgia, 408 U.S. 238 (1972)
Gonzales v Carhart, 550 U.S. 124 (2007)
Gregg v. Georgia, 428 U.S. 153 (1976)
Marquis, D. (2008). Abortion is immoral. In B. Waller, Consider Ethics: Theory, Readings, and Contemporary Issues, 2nd Edition. (Kindle locations 8519 – 8669). New York: Pearson
McCorvey, N. (1998). Roe v McCorvey. Retrieved April 16, 2010, from http://www.leaderu.com/norma/nmtestimony.html
Pojman, L. (2008). The death penalty is sometimes morally legitimate. In B. Waller, Consider Ethics: Theory, Readings, and Contemporary Issues, 2nd Edition. (Kindle locations 8213 – 8458). New York: Pearson
Porter, E. (1994, Summer). Abortion Ethics: Rights and Responsibilities. Hypatia, 9(3), 66-87. Retrieved July 31, 2010, from Research Library. (Document ID: 5846778)
Rice, B. (2006, March 23). Abortion: Ethical analysis. Lifestyle. Retrieved on April 16, 2010 from http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/25347/abortion_ethical_analysis.html
Roe v. Wade, 410 U.S. 113 (1973)
Roper v Simmons, 543 U.S. 551 (2005)
Waller, B. (2008). Consider Ethics: Theory, Readings, and Contemporary Issues, 2nd Edition. New York: Pearson
Wilson, J. (1792). Of the Natural Rights of the Individual. Retrieved April 18, 2010, from the Ashbrook Center for Public Affairs at Ashland University, TeachingAmericanHistory.org Project Web site: http://teachingamericanhistory.org/library/index.asp?document=831
An Analysis of Abortion and the Death Penalty
Dennis Schroader
Phi 107
Tirizia York
April 19, 2010
The state sanctioned termination of life – particularly as it applies to capital punishment and abortion – is an ethical quagmire generating heated debate on both sides of these issues and endless fodder for politicians and pundits alike. This essay attempts to analyze the history of both capital punishment and abortion as it relates to United States Supreme Court decisions, the ethical arguments for and against each, and then answer the question of whether consistency allows an individual to take a “pro” position on one issue while taking an “anti” position on the other.
In order to accomplish this, it is important first to establish the meaning of consistency. In the textbook used in the class for which this essay is written, Bruce Waller states, “…allowing contradictions within my views makes it possible to prove anything, and thus makes careful critical thinking impossible” (2008, Kindle location 547). Therefore, it is assumed for the purposes of this essay that an analysis of consistency is both appropriate and desirable for furtherance of the ultimate goal of determining the answer to the question posed in the paragraph above. This analysis calls for a bit of historical context. As with many such controversial topics, the Supreme Court of the United States issues forth the final word on constitutional legality.
A Brief Legal History
With regard to capital punishment, the Supreme Court, decided in a five to four decision, in favor of the plaintiffs in the case of Furman v Georgia (1972), a consolidated case which included Jackson v Georgia and Branch v Texas. This decision hinged upon the apparent inconsistency with which the death penalty had been applied in the cases and states considered. The majority ruled that a requirement exists for consistency in the application of capital punishment – note, not that capital punishment is, in and of itself, cruel and unusual – thus imposing a de facto moratorium on executions in the United States.
This moratorium was effectively overturned in 1976 with Gregg v Georgia, another consolidated case which included Proffitt v Florida, Jurek v Texas, Woodson v North Carolina, and Roberts v Louisiana, also known as “the July 2” cases.” This seven to two decision established the guidelines by which states may impose capital punishment. The first is that they must provide objective criteria to direct and limit death sentencing, which must then be ensured by appellate court review of all death sentences. The second guideline required the states’ death penalty statutes must allow the judge or jury to take into account the character and record of the defendant. By establishing these guidelines for the states, the Supreme Court made clear the requirement for consistency, established a method to ensure it, and gave the states a way to legally apply capital punishment once more. Other, later cases established further restrictions and requirements on capital punishment: forbidding capital punishment for the crime of rape (Cocker v Georgia, 1977), restricting application in cases of felony murder (Enmund v Florida, 1982), exempting the mentally handicapped (Atkins v Virginia, 2002) and exempting juvenile murderers (Roper v Simmons, 2005), among others.
The legal history of abortion is another story altogether. Legal abortion existed under English Common Law and is found in the writings of James Wilson, one of the founding fathers of the United States:
“With consistency, beautiful and undeviating, human life, from its commencement to its close, is protected by the common law. In the contemplation of law, life begins when the infant is first able to stir in the womb. By the law, life is protected not only from immediate destruction, but from every degree of actual violence, and, in some cases, from every degree of danger” (On the Natural Rights of Individuals, 1790-1792).
Upon first reading, this may not seem like much of an approval for terminating life in utero, however, the statement that “life begins when the infant is first able to stir in the womb” (Wilson) leaves room for the time from conception and implantation through those months where such stirring either does not happen or is perhaps undetectable. Moving forward to the late 1960’s, the Supreme Court ruled on a number of cases that either directly or indirectly affected the legality of abortion under certain circumstances. Additionally, the state legislatures of at least twenty states had passed laws making abortion legal to varying degrees – restricted in sixteen of the twenty and only available on demand in Washington, Alaska, Hawaii, and New York. In 1973, the Supreme Court effectively removed the major barriers to abortion (Roe v Wade), and all subsequent rulings have served only to expand its access and applicability, with the exception of Gonzales v Carhart (2007), which upheld the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act of 2003.
Ethical arguments
The legal matters, for the present, being settled, it becomes incumbent upon the individual to analyze the ethical arguments for and against. With regard to the matter of capital punishment, Louis Pojman provides a persuasive ethical argument in favor of punishment as retribution for the commission of crime:
“The retributivist holds three propositions: 1) that all the guilty deserve to be punished; 2) that only the guilty deserve to be punished: and 3) that the guilty deserve to be punished in proportion to the severity of their crime” (Pojman, in Waller, 2008, Kindle location 8242).
“People often confuse retribution with revenge. Governor George Ryan, who recently commuted the sentences of all the prisoners on death row in the State of Illinois,… quotes a letter from the Reverend Desmond Tutu that ‘to take a life when a life has been lost is revenge, it is not justice.’ This is simply false. While moral people will feel outrage at acts of heinous crimes,… the moral justification of punishment is not vengeance, but desert.” (Kindle location 8248).
Another argument in favor of capital punishment is that of deterrence. This is perhaps the most controversial of the utilitarian lines of reasoning and the counter argument is presented later. In an article in The American Economic Review, Isaac Ehrlich states, “Contrary to previous observations, this investigation, although by no means definitive, does indicate the existence of a pure deterrent effect of capital punishment” (1975). The specifics of his investigation, while fascinating, extend far beyond the scope of this essay. Let it therefore be sufficient to say that Ehrlich’s research did indeed indicate the existence of a deterrent effect.
The ethical arguments against capital punishment receive equal thought and consideration by modern philosophers. One such, Stephen Bright, refutes the deterrent effect, claiming, “Nor is crime deterred by the executions in fewer than half the states of an arbitrarily selected 1 percent of those who commit murders, many of whom are mentally ill or have limited intellectual functioning.” (Bright, in Waller, 2008, Kindle location 7997). Bright goes on to indict the judicial system that applies such sentencing as fatally flawed, stating, “The race of the victim and the defendant, political considerations, and other extraneous factors influence whether prosecutors seek the death penalty and whether juries or judges impose it.” (Bright, in Waller, 2008, Kindle location 8042). In both cases, his argument seems to echo the thinking of the Supreme Court.
Another argument against capital punishment is that of simple economics. While that may not, on its surface, seem an ethical consideration, the fiduciary duty of the state to spend wisely the taxpayers’ money is, in every way, an ethical consideration. In this line of thinking, Corinna Barrett-Lain, a professor and former prosecutor, while writing for the Christian Science Monitor states:
“The bittersweet reality is that money, rather than morality, has become the tipping point for saving lives. Why? Administering the death penalty is breathtakingly expensive. Contrary to popular opinion, it costs substantially more to execute people than to send them to prison for the rest of their lives. In California, which houses the nation's largest death row, it costs about $137 million annually to maintain the state's death penalty system. The state has conducted only 11 executions since reinstating the death penalty in 1978, bringing the average cost per execution to $250 million. That's right – a quarter of a billion dollars per execution” (Barrett-Lain, 2009).
While clearly not intending to make an ethical case against capital punishment, hers is, nevertheless, damningly effective, particularly given the current economic climate in the United States, and particularly California, which is the subject of her article.
As it relates to abortion, the ethical debate focuses on the rights of the mother and those of the unborn child. Making a completely rational argument in favor of so-called “reproductive rights”, Brian Rice, while apparently a simple blogger, makes an effective utilitarian argument when he writes:
“When using the rule-utilitarian consequential principle of ethics, we establish a set of general morals and rules in which we can apply to every moral question based upon our utilitarian findings. When this is applied to abortion, we can see that abortion is a completely ethical entity that provides the greatest amount of happiness for the greatest amount of people.” (Rice, 2006).
Elisabeth Porter, an Australian professor and researcher, arguing in favor of the “special rights” of women, writes:
“Given women’s body, sexuality, and reproductive potential, reproductive rights affirm equality as an extension of the principle of bodily integrity and self-determination. Given the social position of women, a defense of autonomy in important. Insofar as women are not only responsible for pregnancy but also usually for the care of children, women must be the ones who ultimately decide on contraception, abortion, and childbearing.” (Porter, 1994).
The voices against abortion make similarly impassioned cases on their side of the debate. Such notables as Susan B. Anthony and Norma McCorvey – aka Jane Roe, of Roe v Wade - neither of whom presumably require introduction, have lent their weight to the struggle to end abortion in the United States. Anthony, in her publication, The Revolution, wrote:
"Guilty? Yes. No matter what the motive, love of ease, or a desire to save from suffering the unborn innocent, the woman is awfully guilty who commits the deed. It will burden her conscience in life, it will burden her soul in death; But oh, thrice guilty is he who drove her to the desperation which impelled her to the crime!" (Anthony, 1869)
Here she indicts not only the woman who “commits the deed”, but especially the man who drove her to it. As is well known, Susan B. Anthony was a 19th century women’s rights activist, so is Norma “Jane Roe” McCorvey:
“I felt "crushed" under the truth of this realization. I had to face up to the awful reality. Abortion wasn't about 'products of conception.' It wasn't about 'missed periods.' It was about children being killed in their mother's wombs. All those years I was wrong. Signing that affidavit, I was wrong. Working in an abortion clinic, I was wrong. No more of this first trimester, second trimester, third trimester stuff. Abortion--at any point--was wrong. It was so clear. Painfully clear.” (McCorvey, 1998).
Don Marquis, a professor of philosophy, argues against abortion from an ethical perspective by first establishing the wrongness of killing adults, stating, “… it would seem that what makes killing any adult human being prima facie seriously wrong is the loss of his or her future” (Marquis, in Waller, 2008, Kindle location 8556). He goes on in his explanation of his theory of wrongness to include infants and children:
“… the account of the wrongness of killing defended in this essay does straightforwardly entail that it is prima facie seriously wrong to kill children and infants, for we do presume that they have futures of value.” (Kindle location 8590).
This reasoning leads to his ultimate thesis that the argument for determining rights by personhood (as has been established in current law) is flawed and incomplete (Kindle location 8592). As first quoted, what makes killing wrong is the loss of that individual’s future. If that is true, he argues, then it follows that a child in utero, at whatever stage of development has a valuable future, thereby making the killing thereof “prima facie seriously wrong”.
Consistency
Finally, with all the preceding now established can the question be asked, “Can an honest person hold differing views on abortion and capital punishment?” It seems obvious that one could hold an anti-abortion and anti-death penalty stance without jeopardizing consistency. It might then logically follow that one could hold a similar opinion from the opposite point of view (pro-abortion/pro-death penalty), but it only appears that way. If Marquis’ argument that personhood is moot and that what makes killing wrong is the denial of the future is true, then abortion – in all cases – must therefore be wrong without exception. If that is untrue, then the murder of children or adults could just as easily find justification, given anyone sufficiently intelligent with the stomach for such a macabre line of reasoning.
Therefore, the only seemingly contrary position allowable should be the one of anti-abortion and pro-death penalty. Remember from Pojman that capital punishment is not vengeance but desert. Since the United States’ justice system follows a form of retributivist theory - that “1) all the guilty deserve to be punished; 2) only the guilty deserve to be punished; and 3) the guilty deserve to be punishment in proportion to the severity of their crime” (Pojman, in Waller, 2008, Kindle location 8242) - desert is central to the philosophy. The arguments made by Barret-Lain – that execution is mind-bogglingly expensive – and particularly Bright – that capital punishment is applied in an arbitrary and unjust manner – are issues to be addressed within the system and indict application rather than the form of punishment itself.
References
Anthony, S. (1869, July 4). Untitled editorial. The Revolution, 4(1), 4.
Atkins v. Virginia, 536 U.S. 304 (2002)
Barrett-Lain, C. (2009, May 11). The new case against the death penalty. The Christian Science Monitor. http://www.csmonitor.com/Commentary/Opinion/2009/0511/p09s01-coop.html
Bright, S. (2008). The death penalty should be abolished. In B. Waller, Consider Ethics: Theory, Readings, and Contemporary Issues, 2nd Edition. (Kindle locations 7958 – 8212). New York: Pearson
Coker v. Georgia, 433 U.S. 584 (1977)
Ehrlich, I. (1975). The deterrent effect of capital punishment: A question of life and death. The American Economic Review, 65(3), 397-417.
Enmund v. Florida, 458 U.S. 782 (1982)
Furman v Georgia, 408 U.S. 238 (1972)
Gonzales v Carhart, 550 U.S. 124 (2007)
Gregg v. Georgia, 428 U.S. 153 (1976)
Marquis, D. (2008). Abortion is immoral. In B. Waller, Consider Ethics: Theory, Readings, and Contemporary Issues, 2nd Edition. (Kindle locations 8519 – 8669). New York: Pearson
McCorvey, N. (1998). Roe v McCorvey. Retrieved April 16, 2010, from http://www.leaderu.com/norma/nmtestimony.html
Pojman, L. (2008). The death penalty is sometimes morally legitimate. In B. Waller, Consider Ethics: Theory, Readings, and Contemporary Issues, 2nd Edition. (Kindle locations 8213 – 8458). New York: Pearson
Porter, E. (1994, Summer). Abortion Ethics: Rights and Responsibilities. Hypatia, 9(3), 66-87. Retrieved July 31, 2010, from Research Library. (Document ID: 5846778)
Rice, B. (2006, March 23). Abortion: Ethical analysis. Lifestyle. Retrieved on April 16, 2010 from http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/25347/abortion_ethical_analysis.html
Roe v. Wade, 410 U.S. 113 (1973)
Roper v Simmons, 543 U.S. 551 (2005)
Waller, B. (2008). Consider Ethics: Theory, Readings, and Contemporary Issues, 2nd Edition. New York: Pearson
Wilson, J. (1792). Of the Natural Rights of the Individual. Retrieved April 18, 2010, from the Ashbrook Center for Public Affairs at Ashland University, TeachingAmericanHistory.org Project Web site: http://teachingamericanhistory.org/library/index.asp?document=831
Minimum Wage vs. Living Wage: Making a Bad Idea Even Worse
Minimum Wage vs. Living Wage:
Making a Bad Idea Even Worse
Dennis Schroader
ECO 308
Nicholas Bergan
March 30, 2009
Every year politicians and pundits spend countless hours on Sunday morning news shows debating how to improve economic conditions for the country as a whole and for the lowest wage earners in particular. To be fair, they have taken advantage of the twenty-four hour news cycle and are on the air much more frequently than Sunday mornings. These debates inevitably lead to discussions of the minimum wage with someone crying about the injustice that unskilled, inexperienced workers aren’t paid enough to support a family of three. The minimum wage defies actual market forces and does not actually do anything to help the poor. Minimum wage laws serve only to establish an artificial floor for wages, thereby circumventing market forces and artificially raising prices.
The CATO institute published Policy Analysis No. 106, written by Matthew Kibbe, then a graduate student of economics and fellow at the Center of the Study of Market Processes at George Mason University. In this policy analysis, Kibbe asserts:
“Minimum-wage legislation is and always has been the result of special-interest politics. Behind the rhetoric of economic justice and fairness lie purely self-serving political considerations. [sic] The simple truth about the issue is that any minimum-wage rate that is forced onto the market will have only negative effects on the distribution of economic justice. Minimum-wage legislation, by its very nature, benefits some at the expense of the least experienced, least productive, and poorest workers” (1988).
The Real-nominal Principle states, “What matters to people is the real value of money or income – its purchasing power – not the “face” value of the money or income” (O’Sullivan, Sheffrin, & Perez, Survey of Economics: Principles, Applications, and Tools, 2008, p. 40).
Minimum Wage Effect on Labor Costs
Among the many inputs used by companies for production is labor. That labor comes with a cost which includes wages, mandatory employer match of federal withholding, unemployment insurance, L&I, and other labor related expenses. In most states, all of the aforementioned costs of employment are calculated as a percentage of wages. When that wage goes up, so do all of the other costs associated with employment.
“For many businesses, particularly those in the service industry, such as restaurants or manufacturing companies that are labor intensive, the cost of payroll is the single largest line item on the profit and loss statement” (BusinessTown.Com, 2003). Assuming that most of the personnel of such firms are minimum wage earners (a faulty assumption, as will be discussed later, but it serves to illustrate the point), any small increase in the per unit cost – the hourly wage times the number of employees – is likely to have a sizeable impact on the firms’ profitability.
In an article for the Washington Policy Center, Carl Gipson, Director of the Center for Small Business, wrote:
“For most businesses, the largest expense is the cost of labor. When labor costs increase, a business has only a few options. First, it can simply absorb the cost (often limited to businesses with large cash reserves). Second, it can take active steps to decrease the cost of labor—often through layoffs, increasing workloads for employees or implementing automation. Third and most common, it can increase the cost to the consumer to cover the difference” (2007).
Gipson goes on further to state, “When a government actively takes steps to arbitrarily set a higher wage rate th[a]n the market dictates, it faces the unintended consequence of passing the cost onto taxpayers.” Gipson’s article refers specifically to wages earned by employees of companies bidding for government contracts, but if the word “taxpayers” is substituted with “customers”, the rest of the statement holds true for non-state businesses.
Minimum Wage Effect on Unemployment
The law of supply and demand with regard to market equilibrium tells us that as prices increase, demand decreases. This is as true of employees as it is with pizza. As the minimum wage increases, the demand for minimum wage labor decreases. This is illustrated by the following graph taken from the Congressional Joint Economic Committee Report:
(Saxon, 1996).
Congressman Jim Saxon (R-NJ), used this graph from the Bureau of Labor Statistics to demonstrate that a higher minimum wage results in higher unemployment, particularly among teenagers and other unskilled/inexperienced workers. The greatest danger lies in their inability to gain valuable work related skills and experience, thus becoming more productive and able to demand higher than minimum wages. Craig Garthwaite, chief economist at the Employment Policy Institute, wrote in an article for the Seattle Post Intelligencer, “Decades of research confirm Nobel Prize-winning economist Gary Becker's observation: "A higher minimum will further reduce the employment opportunities of workers with few skills” (High Minimum Wage = High Unemployment, 2003). Higher than natural unemployment also has a significantly detrimental affect on a nation’s Gross Domestic Product. The text states, “… in 1983, when the unemployment rate averaged 9.6 percent, typical estimates the shortfall of GDP from potential were near 6 percent” (O’Sullivan, Sheffrin, & Perez, 2008, p. 312).
Minimum Wage Effect on Purchasing Power
In addition to the real macroeconomic damage of decreased GDP due to unemployment caused by a high minimum wage, there is a microeconomic detriment as well. As previously discussed, increasing wages increases the cost of doing business which causes a decrease in employment and an increase in product prices. When the price of goods increases, the real value of a dollar decreases. This is known as the Real-nominal Principle.
The politicians who legislate increases in the minimum wage may do so with the intention of lifting the poorest workers out of their poverty. Good intentions cannot always be accurately ascribed to those holding elected office, but for the purposes of this discussion, we give them the benefit of the doubt. Unfortunately, good intentions are not good enough. At least a passing familiarity with economic principles is necessary for making good public policy.
The following graph shows the purchasing power of the federal minimum wage, both nominal and inflation adjusted from 1958 to 2001. While some would view the information contained herein as proof that the minimum wage has not kept up with the cost of living, this data more accurately demonstrates that as the minimum rises, the cost of goods rises, thereby decreasing the purchasing power of everyone in the economy, but most notably the minimum wage earners.
(Fiscal Policy Institute, 2002).
Dr. Tim Kane, Ph.D, writes in an article for the Heritage Foundation:
“The notion that increasing the federal minimum wage will push up real wages is also fiction. Average pay in America has been increasing steadily in recent years, despite the fact that the minimum wage has not changed since 1997. Real wages rise when productivity rises. Labor productivity has gained 26 percent since 1997, and real earnings for non-supervisory workers are up 7 percent.” (2005).
Myth of the Living Wage
The whole idea of a “living wage” versus the minimum wage is nothing new. According Robert Shelburne, of the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe, “The current attempts to define a wage rate that would provide an “acceptable” standard of living which is above the minimum required for biological existence go back at least to the Middle Ages.” (The History and Theory of the Living Wage Concept, 1999). More recently – say within the last half century – politicians misuse the concept of a “living wage” by contrasting it against the current minimum wage laws. In an article originally appearing in the Boulder Weekly, Ari Armstrong writes, “Is a policy better merely because we say it's "living" versus "minimum?" (“Living Wage” Hurts the Poor, 2003).
To further exacerbate the problem, politicians – who are more likely to be lawyers or teachers rather than business-persons or economists – ignore the principle of diminishing returns. Our text assumes that wages are stagnant and that diminishing returns is a function of how much each person is able to accomplish given the facilities available (O’Sullivan, Sheffrin & Perez, 2008). The principle of diminishing returns states that as one input increases while all others remain fixed, the marginal benefit of each unit of increased input will decrease. Economists assume that all firms are operating at or near the point where marginal benefit equals marginal cost. Politicians seem to fail to realize that the price of labor is one of those inputs. When that input increases while all others – including labor force – remain the same, the marginal cost curve shifts. In order to continue operating at that equilibrium point, firms are likely to make do with fewer employees.
D.W. MacKenzie, professor of economics at State University of New York, wrote:
“The economic case for a living wage is unfounded. Current minimum wage rates do create high levels of unemployment among low productivity workers. Higher "living wages" would only make these problems worse. The alleged moral case for a living wage ignores the fact that minimum wage increases adversely affect the very people whom advocates of living wages intend to help. If politicians wish to pursue sound policies, they should consider repealing minimum wage laws, especially where teens are concerned” (Mythology of the Minimum Wage, 2006).
The idea that a living wage is required for everyone who works at the lowest paid rung on the economic ladder is, in itself, ludicrous. To prove that statement, we examine just who earns the minimum wage. Consider the following statistics compiled by the Heritage Foundation. These numbers indicate that the vast majority of minimum wage earners either do not have a family to support or are not the sole wage earner in the household. That fact alone alleviates any real need for a so-called “living wage”.
Table 1
Demographic Characteristics of Minimum Wage Workers
16-24 years old 25+ Total
Men 35.2% 33.6% 34.4%
Women 64.8% 66.4% 65.6%
White 83.6% 79.5% 81.7%
Black 11.1% 11.8% 11.4%
Asian 1.7% 5.4% 3.4%
Married 4.8% 42.5% 22.5%
Wage and Income Characteristics of Minimum Wage Earners
Part Time 67.0% 55.6% 61.7%
Full Time 33.0% 44.4% 38.3%
Avg. Family Income $64,273 $33,606 $49,885
At or Below the Poverty Line 16.9% 22.8% 19.5%
Family Income > 200% of Poverty Line 64.7% 44.8% 56.1%
Education Levels of Minimum Wage Workers
Less Than High School 36.3% 22.0% 29.8%
High School Graduate 20.9% 38.5% 29.1%
Some College 35.6% 20.5% 28.5%
Associates Degree 3.4% 8.5% 5.8%
Bachelors Degree or Higher 3.4% 10.6% 6.8%
Source: Heritage Foundation calculations based on the Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2005 Current Population Survey and merged outgoing rotation group files
Furthermore, we know from the law of supply and demand that as supply increases, prices decrease, and as demand increases, prices increase. In this case, the price is wages. Lowering or eliminating the minimum wage will necessarily increase employment. As to the argument that eliminating the minimum wage will lead to abuse of employees, the fact is that employment in America is non-compulsory. Workers also obey the law of supply and demand. They will not supply their labor unless the demand yields a price (wage) sufficient to make it worth their while. This is exactly how everyone who does not work for minimum wage operates in the real world.
Conclusion
Although it makes for great political theater, the minimum wage is really nothing more than an artificial floor on the price of labor. In all markets, demand should dictate prices, not government meddling. Contrived price controls increase the cost of production to a company, thus disrupting the equilibrium of marginal cost and marginal benefit. A company has no choice at that point but to change other inputs: either reducing labor costs by reducing the workforce or raising prices to the customer, or both. In the case of laying off workers, the company reduces its cost of labor, but also reduces its potential customer base. In the case of raising prices to the consumer, the company serves to reduce the purchasing power of all of their customers and reduce their own demand. Neither case is desirable for employers, employees or the public at large.
The argument that the minimum wage is somehow a moral issue – that society as a whole must pay a premium to provide least skilled and most inexperienced workers with wages higher than they could demand on the free market – is absurd on its face. The fact is that the vast majority of minimum wage earners are not solely responsible for the support of their household. In fact, most of those who work for minimum wage are teenagers and college age young adults.
Perhaps the most important unintended consequence of artificially high employment costs, high unemployment, and diminished purchasing power is the negative affect they have on Gross Domestic Product. All of the facts point directly to the obvious conclusion that the minimum wage (never mind the so-called “living wage”) is an overall detriment to the lowest paid workers and society in general. Of course, if facts alone influenced policy makers, the minimum wage would be abolished and there would be no talk about this living wage nonsense.
References
Armstrong, A. (2003, November 20). “Living Wage” Hurts the Poor. Boulder Weekly. Retrieved March 28, 2009, from the Colorado Freedom Report web site: http://www.freecolorado.com/2004/01/livingwage.html
BusinessTown.Com. (2003). Payroll and the Cost of Labor. Retrieved March 28, 2009 from http://www.businesstown.com/accounting/slashing-payroll.asp
Fiscal Policy Institute. (2002) Minimum Wage Update. Retrieved March 28, 2009, from http://www.fiscalpolicy.org/MinimumWageGraphs.pdf
Garthwaite, C. (2003, December 26). High Minimum Wage = High Unemployment. Seattle Post Intelligencer on the Web. Retrieved March 28, 2009 from http://www.seattlepi.com/opinion/153901_unemploy26.html
Gipson, C. (2007). Living Wage Proposals: Imposing Price Controls on Labor. Retrieved March 28, 2009, from the Washington Policy Center web site: http://www.washingtonpolicy.org/Centers/smallbusiness/legislativememo/07_gipson_livingwages.html
Heardman, R, and Sherk, J. (2006, August 3). Who Earns the Minimum Wage – Single Parents or Suburban Teenagers? The Heritage Foundation. Retrieved March 29, 2009, from http://www.heritage.org/Research/Economy/wm1186.cfm
Kane, T. (2005, March 4). Minimizing Economic Opportunity by Raising the Minimum Wage. The Heritage Foundation. Retrieved March 28, 2009, from http://www.heritage.org/Research/Economy/wm676.cfm
Kibbe, M. (1988). Cato Policy Analysis No. 106: The Minimum Wage: Washington’s Perennial Myth. Retrieved March 28, 2009, from The Cato Institute web site: http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa106.html
MacKenzie, D.W. (2006, May 3). Mythology of the Minimum Wage. Daily Mises. Retrieved March 28, 2009 from the Ludwig von Mises Institute website: http://mises.org/story/2130
O’Sullivan, A., Sheffrin, S., & Perez, S. (2008). Survey of Economics: Principles, Applications, and Tools. New Jersey: Pearson/Prentice Hall.
Saxon, J. (1996). Joint Economic Committee Report: The Case Against a Higher Minimum Wage. Retrieved March 28, 2009, from http://www.house.gov/jec/cost-gov/regs/minimum/against/against.htm
Making a Bad Idea Even Worse
Dennis Schroader
ECO 308
Nicholas Bergan
March 30, 2009
Every year politicians and pundits spend countless hours on Sunday morning news shows debating how to improve economic conditions for the country as a whole and for the lowest wage earners in particular. To be fair, they have taken advantage of the twenty-four hour news cycle and are on the air much more frequently than Sunday mornings. These debates inevitably lead to discussions of the minimum wage with someone crying about the injustice that unskilled, inexperienced workers aren’t paid enough to support a family of three. The minimum wage defies actual market forces and does not actually do anything to help the poor. Minimum wage laws serve only to establish an artificial floor for wages, thereby circumventing market forces and artificially raising prices.
The CATO institute published Policy Analysis No. 106, written by Matthew Kibbe, then a graduate student of economics and fellow at the Center of the Study of Market Processes at George Mason University. In this policy analysis, Kibbe asserts:
“Minimum-wage legislation is and always has been the result of special-interest politics. Behind the rhetoric of economic justice and fairness lie purely self-serving political considerations. [sic] The simple truth about the issue is that any minimum-wage rate that is forced onto the market will have only negative effects on the distribution of economic justice. Minimum-wage legislation, by its very nature, benefits some at the expense of the least experienced, least productive, and poorest workers” (1988).
The Real-nominal Principle states, “What matters to people is the real value of money or income – its purchasing power – not the “face” value of the money or income” (O’Sullivan, Sheffrin, & Perez, Survey of Economics: Principles, Applications, and Tools, 2008, p. 40).
Minimum Wage Effect on Labor Costs
Among the many inputs used by companies for production is labor. That labor comes with a cost which includes wages, mandatory employer match of federal withholding, unemployment insurance, L&I, and other labor related expenses. In most states, all of the aforementioned costs of employment are calculated as a percentage of wages. When that wage goes up, so do all of the other costs associated with employment.
“For many businesses, particularly those in the service industry, such as restaurants or manufacturing companies that are labor intensive, the cost of payroll is the single largest line item on the profit and loss statement” (BusinessTown.Com, 2003). Assuming that most of the personnel of such firms are minimum wage earners (a faulty assumption, as will be discussed later, but it serves to illustrate the point), any small increase in the per unit cost – the hourly wage times the number of employees – is likely to have a sizeable impact on the firms’ profitability.
In an article for the Washington Policy Center, Carl Gipson, Director of the Center for Small Business, wrote:
“For most businesses, the largest expense is the cost of labor. When labor costs increase, a business has only a few options. First, it can simply absorb the cost (often limited to businesses with large cash reserves). Second, it can take active steps to decrease the cost of labor—often through layoffs, increasing workloads for employees or implementing automation. Third and most common, it can increase the cost to the consumer to cover the difference” (2007).
Gipson goes on further to state, “When a government actively takes steps to arbitrarily set a higher wage rate th[a]n the market dictates, it faces the unintended consequence of passing the cost onto taxpayers.” Gipson’s article refers specifically to wages earned by employees of companies bidding for government contracts, but if the word “taxpayers” is substituted with “customers”, the rest of the statement holds true for non-state businesses.
Minimum Wage Effect on Unemployment
The law of supply and demand with regard to market equilibrium tells us that as prices increase, demand decreases. This is as true of employees as it is with pizza. As the minimum wage increases, the demand for minimum wage labor decreases. This is illustrated by the following graph taken from the Congressional Joint Economic Committee Report:
(Saxon, 1996).
Congressman Jim Saxon (R-NJ), used this graph from the Bureau of Labor Statistics to demonstrate that a higher minimum wage results in higher unemployment, particularly among teenagers and other unskilled/inexperienced workers. The greatest danger lies in their inability to gain valuable work related skills and experience, thus becoming more productive and able to demand higher than minimum wages. Craig Garthwaite, chief economist at the Employment Policy Institute, wrote in an article for the Seattle Post Intelligencer, “Decades of research confirm Nobel Prize-winning economist Gary Becker's observation: "A higher minimum will further reduce the employment opportunities of workers with few skills” (High Minimum Wage = High Unemployment, 2003). Higher than natural unemployment also has a significantly detrimental affect on a nation’s Gross Domestic Product. The text states, “… in 1983, when the unemployment rate averaged 9.6 percent, typical estimates the shortfall of GDP from potential were near 6 percent” (O’Sullivan, Sheffrin, & Perez, 2008, p. 312).
Minimum Wage Effect on Purchasing Power
In addition to the real macroeconomic damage of decreased GDP due to unemployment caused by a high minimum wage, there is a microeconomic detriment as well. As previously discussed, increasing wages increases the cost of doing business which causes a decrease in employment and an increase in product prices. When the price of goods increases, the real value of a dollar decreases. This is known as the Real-nominal Principle.
The politicians who legislate increases in the minimum wage may do so with the intention of lifting the poorest workers out of their poverty. Good intentions cannot always be accurately ascribed to those holding elected office, but for the purposes of this discussion, we give them the benefit of the doubt. Unfortunately, good intentions are not good enough. At least a passing familiarity with economic principles is necessary for making good public policy.
The following graph shows the purchasing power of the federal minimum wage, both nominal and inflation adjusted from 1958 to 2001. While some would view the information contained herein as proof that the minimum wage has not kept up with the cost of living, this data more accurately demonstrates that as the minimum rises, the cost of goods rises, thereby decreasing the purchasing power of everyone in the economy, but most notably the minimum wage earners.
(Fiscal Policy Institute, 2002).
Dr. Tim Kane, Ph.D, writes in an article for the Heritage Foundation:
“The notion that increasing the federal minimum wage will push up real wages is also fiction. Average pay in America has been increasing steadily in recent years, despite the fact that the minimum wage has not changed since 1997. Real wages rise when productivity rises. Labor productivity has gained 26 percent since 1997, and real earnings for non-supervisory workers are up 7 percent.” (2005).
Myth of the Living Wage
The whole idea of a “living wage” versus the minimum wage is nothing new. According Robert Shelburne, of the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe, “The current attempts to define a wage rate that would provide an “acceptable” standard of living which is above the minimum required for biological existence go back at least to the Middle Ages.” (The History and Theory of the Living Wage Concept, 1999). More recently – say within the last half century – politicians misuse the concept of a “living wage” by contrasting it against the current minimum wage laws. In an article originally appearing in the Boulder Weekly, Ari Armstrong writes, “Is a policy better merely because we say it's "living" versus "minimum?" (“Living Wage” Hurts the Poor, 2003).
To further exacerbate the problem, politicians – who are more likely to be lawyers or teachers rather than business-persons or economists – ignore the principle of diminishing returns. Our text assumes that wages are stagnant and that diminishing returns is a function of how much each person is able to accomplish given the facilities available (O’Sullivan, Sheffrin & Perez, 2008). The principle of diminishing returns states that as one input increases while all others remain fixed, the marginal benefit of each unit of increased input will decrease. Economists assume that all firms are operating at or near the point where marginal benefit equals marginal cost. Politicians seem to fail to realize that the price of labor is one of those inputs. When that input increases while all others – including labor force – remain the same, the marginal cost curve shifts. In order to continue operating at that equilibrium point, firms are likely to make do with fewer employees.
D.W. MacKenzie, professor of economics at State University of New York, wrote:
“The economic case for a living wage is unfounded. Current minimum wage rates do create high levels of unemployment among low productivity workers. Higher "living wages" would only make these problems worse. The alleged moral case for a living wage ignores the fact that minimum wage increases adversely affect the very people whom advocates of living wages intend to help. If politicians wish to pursue sound policies, they should consider repealing minimum wage laws, especially where teens are concerned” (Mythology of the Minimum Wage, 2006).
The idea that a living wage is required for everyone who works at the lowest paid rung on the economic ladder is, in itself, ludicrous. To prove that statement, we examine just who earns the minimum wage. Consider the following statistics compiled by the Heritage Foundation. These numbers indicate that the vast majority of minimum wage earners either do not have a family to support or are not the sole wage earner in the household. That fact alone alleviates any real need for a so-called “living wage”.
Table 1
Demographic Characteristics of Minimum Wage Workers
16-24 years old 25+ Total
Men 35.2% 33.6% 34.4%
Women 64.8% 66.4% 65.6%
White 83.6% 79.5% 81.7%
Black 11.1% 11.8% 11.4%
Asian 1.7% 5.4% 3.4%
Married 4.8% 42.5% 22.5%
Wage and Income Characteristics of Minimum Wage Earners
Part Time 67.0% 55.6% 61.7%
Full Time 33.0% 44.4% 38.3%
Avg. Family Income $64,273 $33,606 $49,885
At or Below the Poverty Line 16.9% 22.8% 19.5%
Family Income > 200% of Poverty Line 64.7% 44.8% 56.1%
Education Levels of Minimum Wage Workers
Less Than High School 36.3% 22.0% 29.8%
High School Graduate 20.9% 38.5% 29.1%
Some College 35.6% 20.5% 28.5%
Associates Degree 3.4% 8.5% 5.8%
Bachelors Degree or Higher 3.4% 10.6% 6.8%
Source: Heritage Foundation calculations based on the Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2005 Current Population Survey and merged outgoing rotation group files
Furthermore, we know from the law of supply and demand that as supply increases, prices decrease, and as demand increases, prices increase. In this case, the price is wages. Lowering or eliminating the minimum wage will necessarily increase employment. As to the argument that eliminating the minimum wage will lead to abuse of employees, the fact is that employment in America is non-compulsory. Workers also obey the law of supply and demand. They will not supply their labor unless the demand yields a price (wage) sufficient to make it worth their while. This is exactly how everyone who does not work for minimum wage operates in the real world.
Conclusion
Although it makes for great political theater, the minimum wage is really nothing more than an artificial floor on the price of labor. In all markets, demand should dictate prices, not government meddling. Contrived price controls increase the cost of production to a company, thus disrupting the equilibrium of marginal cost and marginal benefit. A company has no choice at that point but to change other inputs: either reducing labor costs by reducing the workforce or raising prices to the customer, or both. In the case of laying off workers, the company reduces its cost of labor, but also reduces its potential customer base. In the case of raising prices to the consumer, the company serves to reduce the purchasing power of all of their customers and reduce their own demand. Neither case is desirable for employers, employees or the public at large.
The argument that the minimum wage is somehow a moral issue – that society as a whole must pay a premium to provide least skilled and most inexperienced workers with wages higher than they could demand on the free market – is absurd on its face. The fact is that the vast majority of minimum wage earners are not solely responsible for the support of their household. In fact, most of those who work for minimum wage are teenagers and college age young adults.
Perhaps the most important unintended consequence of artificially high employment costs, high unemployment, and diminished purchasing power is the negative affect they have on Gross Domestic Product. All of the facts point directly to the obvious conclusion that the minimum wage (never mind the so-called “living wage”) is an overall detriment to the lowest paid workers and society in general. Of course, if facts alone influenced policy makers, the minimum wage would be abolished and there would be no talk about this living wage nonsense.
References
Armstrong, A. (2003, November 20). “Living Wage” Hurts the Poor. Boulder Weekly. Retrieved March 28, 2009, from the Colorado Freedom Report web site: http://www.freecolorado.com/2004/01/livingwage.html
BusinessTown.Com. (2003). Payroll and the Cost of Labor. Retrieved March 28, 2009 from http://www.businesstown.com/accounting/slashing-payroll.asp
Fiscal Policy Institute. (2002) Minimum Wage Update. Retrieved March 28, 2009, from http://www.fiscalpolicy.org/MinimumWageGraphs.pdf
Garthwaite, C. (2003, December 26). High Minimum Wage = High Unemployment. Seattle Post Intelligencer on the Web. Retrieved March 28, 2009 from http://www.seattlepi.com/opinion/153901_unemploy26.html
Gipson, C. (2007). Living Wage Proposals: Imposing Price Controls on Labor. Retrieved March 28, 2009, from the Washington Policy Center web site: http://www.washingtonpolicy.org/Centers/smallbusiness/legislativememo/07_gipson_livingwages.html
Heardman, R, and Sherk, J. (2006, August 3). Who Earns the Minimum Wage – Single Parents or Suburban Teenagers? The Heritage Foundation. Retrieved March 29, 2009, from http://www.heritage.org/Research/Economy/wm1186.cfm
Kane, T. (2005, March 4). Minimizing Economic Opportunity by Raising the Minimum Wage. The Heritage Foundation. Retrieved March 28, 2009, from http://www.heritage.org/Research/Economy/wm676.cfm
Kibbe, M. (1988). Cato Policy Analysis No. 106: The Minimum Wage: Washington’s Perennial Myth. Retrieved March 28, 2009, from The Cato Institute web site: http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa106.html
MacKenzie, D.W. (2006, May 3). Mythology of the Minimum Wage. Daily Mises. Retrieved March 28, 2009 from the Ludwig von Mises Institute website: http://mises.org/story/2130
O’Sullivan, A., Sheffrin, S., & Perez, S. (2008). Survey of Economics: Principles, Applications, and Tools. New Jersey: Pearson/Prentice Hall.
Saxon, J. (1996). Joint Economic Committee Report: The Case Against a Higher Minimum Wage. Retrieved March 28, 2009, from http://www.house.gov/jec/cost-gov/regs/minimum/against/against.htm
Merit Essay
Merit Essay
Dennis Schroader
Phi 107
Tirizia York
March 29, 2010
The concept of merit, in the context of a philosophical argument, is one in which the subject receives an award based upon a characteristic or attribute possessed by the subject. In this context, merit is entirely different from desert. To be clear, for the purposes of this paper “desert” means the condition of being deserving of something, rather than a barren wasteland characterized by a severe lack of precipitation. Therefore, whereas merit conveys an entitlement, desert conveys a reward.
In his essay, “Merit: Why do we Value it?” (1999), Louis Pojman leads with a brief description of the evolution of prevailing philosophical thought on the matter of morals. Beginning with Homeric society (ancient Greece), the predominant philosophy was that success or failure were all that mattered. Those individuals in high stations merited their position in society by virtue of their birth (p 84). This was the foundation for what developed into the feudal society of Europe and was the dominant philosophy until Immanuel Kant (1781) defined a new world order (my terminology, for want of a better one) in which the concept of merit faded in favor of desert. Simply put, Kant proposed that a subject’s intentions are more important that their end results (Pojman, p 84). John Rawls (1971) takes political philosophy to a new level. “For Rawls all desert claims reduce to entitlements and justified entitlements are those obtaining in a society governed by the principles of justice-as-fairness” (p 88). That which follows is Pojman’s attempt to lay a broad foundation for the defense of a meritocracy in stark contrast to the notion of the communist ideal of “from each according to his ability, to each according to his need” (Marx, 1875). Rather, Pojman cites Marx’s fallback position, “from each according to his ability, to each according to his contribution” (p 92).
While this student loathes agreeing with Karl Marx on anything, at least that second position seems more tenable to free market sensibilities than the first. It is this student’s firm opinion that individual freedom is an inherent concept in market-based capitalism a la Adam Smith and the cornerstone upon which the foundation of the United States was built. In order for individual freedom to reign truly supreme, a society must successfully marry both the concepts of merit and desert. This deeply held conviction aligns with Pojman’s statement regarding, “… a theory of natural rights, as opposed to positive rights [sic] are recognized in our nations Declaration of Independence…” (p 97).
Pojman goes on to eviscerate the practice of “affirmative action” in the United States (pp 98-99). It is assumed that the reader is sufficiently familiar with this term and that it needs no special definition. His conclusion and argument leading thereto could not be more correct. This practice is an affront to merit or desert based justice and causes greater social ills than those it seeks to cure.
The argument against Rawls’ claim of justice-by-fairness (p 99) is incomplete. In simple terms, Rawls argues that we do not deserve that into which we are born: our genetic make up, natural talents, socio-economic status, etc. This thesis extrapolates to a psychological and sociological indictment of our notion of free will, which this student ardently rejects. Pojman states:
“Human beings, though thoroughly the products of casual forces, still act voluntarily and may be held as the centers of these casual operations, and treated as such. We hold each other responsible for our voluntary acts, praise and blame, reward and punish whether or not determinism is true” (p 99).
Insofar as it goes, Pojman’s claim is correct. The problem lies in the fact that it does not go far enough; a truth to which Pojman himself confesses, to his great credit (p 99). Take, for instance, the case of two men from a lower-middle-class part of town. Both have divorced working mothers and absentee fathers. Neither are particularly talented in athletics or the performing arts, nor do either have any exceptional intellectual gifts. Societal norms would expect at least one of these men to be involved in some sort of criminal (or at least illicit) activity. A moral relativist might claim that such an occupation is perfectly acceptable for that person in their circumstance. What is missing from the sociological thirty-thousand-foot view of the world is that human beings are not in fact ants. Free will and self-determination do indeed exist. The example above is a fair – if crude – approximation of the teenage experience of this student and his best friend through high school. Both chose to work their way out of their poverty and lead lives as productive and useful (and law abiding) members of society despite the so-called disadvantages.
Human beings, in the strictest of biological terms, may belong to the animal kingdom, but are in fact distinct from animals, as the word is used in the common vernacular. Because we are capable of voluntary, reasoned action, we must establish and be held accountable to standards of conduct. Among these standards is that each should reap the benefits or consequences of his or her own actions. The individual is solely responsible for his or her own success or failure in the world, although the ends (or merit) must not be the only means by which we evaluate the rightness of the individual. That person’s motives and means play an equal part in determining what is their just due (or desert). The marriage and balancing of the two principles is not a simple task, but a necessary one.
References
Pojman, L. (1999). Merit: Why do we Value it? In Journal of Social Philosophy, Vol 30 No 1 (pp 83 – 102). Blackwell Publishers
Dennis Schroader
Phi 107
Tirizia York
March 29, 2010
The concept of merit, in the context of a philosophical argument, is one in which the subject receives an award based upon a characteristic or attribute possessed by the subject. In this context, merit is entirely different from desert. To be clear, for the purposes of this paper “desert” means the condition of being deserving of something, rather than a barren wasteland characterized by a severe lack of precipitation. Therefore, whereas merit conveys an entitlement, desert conveys a reward.
In his essay, “Merit: Why do we Value it?” (1999), Louis Pojman leads with a brief description of the evolution of prevailing philosophical thought on the matter of morals. Beginning with Homeric society (ancient Greece), the predominant philosophy was that success or failure were all that mattered. Those individuals in high stations merited their position in society by virtue of their birth (p 84). This was the foundation for what developed into the feudal society of Europe and was the dominant philosophy until Immanuel Kant (1781) defined a new world order (my terminology, for want of a better one) in which the concept of merit faded in favor of desert. Simply put, Kant proposed that a subject’s intentions are more important that their end results (Pojman, p 84). John Rawls (1971) takes political philosophy to a new level. “For Rawls all desert claims reduce to entitlements and justified entitlements are those obtaining in a society governed by the principles of justice-as-fairness” (p 88). That which follows is Pojman’s attempt to lay a broad foundation for the defense of a meritocracy in stark contrast to the notion of the communist ideal of “from each according to his ability, to each according to his need” (Marx, 1875). Rather, Pojman cites Marx’s fallback position, “from each according to his ability, to each according to his contribution” (p 92).
While this student loathes agreeing with Karl Marx on anything, at least that second position seems more tenable to free market sensibilities than the first. It is this student’s firm opinion that individual freedom is an inherent concept in market-based capitalism a la Adam Smith and the cornerstone upon which the foundation of the United States was built. In order for individual freedom to reign truly supreme, a society must successfully marry both the concepts of merit and desert. This deeply held conviction aligns with Pojman’s statement regarding, “… a theory of natural rights, as opposed to positive rights [sic] are recognized in our nations Declaration of Independence…” (p 97).
Pojman goes on to eviscerate the practice of “affirmative action” in the United States (pp 98-99). It is assumed that the reader is sufficiently familiar with this term and that it needs no special definition. His conclusion and argument leading thereto could not be more correct. This practice is an affront to merit or desert based justice and causes greater social ills than those it seeks to cure.
The argument against Rawls’ claim of justice-by-fairness (p 99) is incomplete. In simple terms, Rawls argues that we do not deserve that into which we are born: our genetic make up, natural talents, socio-economic status, etc. This thesis extrapolates to a psychological and sociological indictment of our notion of free will, which this student ardently rejects. Pojman states:
“Human beings, though thoroughly the products of casual forces, still act voluntarily and may be held as the centers of these casual operations, and treated as such. We hold each other responsible for our voluntary acts, praise and blame, reward and punish whether or not determinism is true” (p 99).
Insofar as it goes, Pojman’s claim is correct. The problem lies in the fact that it does not go far enough; a truth to which Pojman himself confesses, to his great credit (p 99). Take, for instance, the case of two men from a lower-middle-class part of town. Both have divorced working mothers and absentee fathers. Neither are particularly talented in athletics or the performing arts, nor do either have any exceptional intellectual gifts. Societal norms would expect at least one of these men to be involved in some sort of criminal (or at least illicit) activity. A moral relativist might claim that such an occupation is perfectly acceptable for that person in their circumstance. What is missing from the sociological thirty-thousand-foot view of the world is that human beings are not in fact ants. Free will and self-determination do indeed exist. The example above is a fair – if crude – approximation of the teenage experience of this student and his best friend through high school. Both chose to work their way out of their poverty and lead lives as productive and useful (and law abiding) members of society despite the so-called disadvantages.
Human beings, in the strictest of biological terms, may belong to the animal kingdom, but are in fact distinct from animals, as the word is used in the common vernacular. Because we are capable of voluntary, reasoned action, we must establish and be held accountable to standards of conduct. Among these standards is that each should reap the benefits or consequences of his or her own actions. The individual is solely responsible for his or her own success or failure in the world, although the ends (or merit) must not be the only means by which we evaluate the rightness of the individual. That person’s motives and means play an equal part in determining what is their just due (or desert). The marriage and balancing of the two principles is not a simple task, but a necessary one.
References
Pojman, L. (1999). Merit: Why do we Value it? In Journal of Social Philosophy, Vol 30 No 1 (pp 83 – 102). Blackwell Publishers
Arizona Senate Bill 1070
Arizona Senate Bill 1070
Dennis Schroader
ENG 122
Andrea Pfaff
June 7, 2010
Regulating immigration and naturalization is one of the chief responsibilities of the federal government as outlined in Article 1, Section 8 of the Constitution. Chief among the many reasons for controlling who and what comes into the country is our national security, which is threatened by illegal immigration. This has been a hot issue in American politics since at least 1986 when President Ronald Reagan signed the Immigration and Reform Control Act.
According to a 2004 report by the Congressional Research Service, the estimated number of illegal aliens residing in the United States increased by more than seven million between 1988 and 2002 (Unauthorized Aliens in the United States: Estimates Since 1986). Varying government and media sources estimate the number of illegal aliens currently residing in the United States anywhere between thirteen million and twenty-three million, with an estimated less than one million coming from nations other than Mexico.
Federal efforts to stem the tide of illegal immigration – from amnesty bills and lackluster crack downs on employers to electronic “virtual fences” and an insulting few 1,200 military troops sent to patrol - have amounted to little more than political showmanship. Arizona’s new immigration law (Senate Bill 1070) picks up where the federal government has dropped the ball.
Let us begin with a brief history of federal efforts, beginning with the last major amnesty bill, Immigration and Reform Control Act (1986). This was a blanket amnesty for over 2.7 million illegal aliens. The argument of the day was that there were just too many illegal aliens to track down and deport for the federal government to handle, so the answer was to enforce the border, crack down on employers and grant amnesty to those who had broken our laws and allow them to live as lawful residents. The idea was that we would stop the influx through the southern border by tougher enforcement, and perhaps that would have worked, if it had ever been implemented.
As it is, it was not, and people continued to pour through our open border by the tens of thousands per month. So great was the draw of America that in 1994, Congress passed another amnesty bill, known as Section 245(i), which was a temporary rolling amnesty affecting an estimated 578,000 illegal immigrants (Congressional Research Service, 2002). This was followed quickly by an extension in 1997. This passed nearly simultaneously with the Nicaraguan Adjustment and Central American Relief Act (1997), yet another amnesty for close to one millions illegals from Central America, and the Haitian Refugee immigration Fairness Act (1998), which granted legal status to 125,000 illegal aliens from Haiti. Two short years later, a bill known as Late Amnesty (2000) passed granting amnesty for some illegal aliens who claim they should have been amnestied under the 1986 IRCA amnesty, for an estimated 400,000 illegal aliens, along with the LIFE Act (2000) which reinstated the rolling Section 245(i) amnesty for an estimated 900,000 illegal aliens.
This brings us up to date on the various amnesty bills enacted in the last twenty-four years. At this point, the American public has grown weary of the constant “second chances”. A Quinnipiac poll (May 19-24, 2010) showed that 59% of registered voters consider illegal immigration a very serious problem and 66% want stricter enforcement of the laws currently on the books. A CBS News poll (April 28 – May 2, 2010) likewise showed the common ground among Americans of differing viewpoints, showing that 65% overall consider it a very serious problem, including 75% of Republicans, 55% of Democrats and 67% of Independents. A CNN/Opinion Research Corp poll (May 21-23, 2010) revealed 60% support for stopping the flow of illegal immigrants and deporting those found here versus 38% who support legalization/amnesty, and 88% favor increased border patrol and federal law enforcement along Mexican border.
As a result of the growing problem of illegal immigration and the federal government’s ineffective response, the State of Arizona enacted its own law that closely mirrors existing federal codes (Archibold, R., The New York Times, 2010, April 23). This action touched off a media firestorm, which set the political left against the center and right. Even as the Obama Administration criticized Arizona Governor Jan Brewer, CBS News showed in another poll (May 20-24, 2010) that 52% of Americans think the Arizona law is “about right”, including 46% of Democrats and 45% of Independents versus just 40% and 45%, respectively, who believe it goes too far.
The primary argument against the law is that it is seen as “racist”, particularly by Hispanics. According to the New York Times article:
“Governor Brewer caved to the radical fringe,” a statement by the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund said, predicting that the law would create “a spiral of pervasive fear, community distrust, increased crime and costly litigation, with nationwide repercussions” (2010, April 23).
Furthermore, critics of the law, which allows police officers, in the course of other legal contact, to ask for proof of legal residency, provided they have reason to suspect otherwise, have attempted to link this provision to the behavior of Nazi’s in World War II. In that, these critics commit the “strawman fallacy” of argument, which is an attempt to defeat the real target by making them seem like a different, more easily assailed enemy, and usually in an unfair and unjust manner (Waller, 2008, Kindle Location 515). The problem with these arguments is that the Arizona law, just like the federal law it mimics, specifically prohibits racial profiling and any other kind of discriminatory act on the part of law enforcement.
The simple conclusion to all of this is that, while it is the role of the United States government to enforce the border and immigration policy, it falls to the border states, so egregiously affected by the onslaught of illegal immigration, to pick up where the feds have failed.
References
CBS News. (2010). CBS News Opinion Poll, May 20-24, 2010. Retrieved on June 4, 2010 from http://www.pollingreport.com/immigration.htm
CNN/Opinion Research Corp. (2010). CNN/Opinion Research Corp Opinion Poll, May 21-23, 2010. Retrieved on June 4 2010 from http://www.pollingreport.com/immigration.htm
Congressional Research Service. (2002). Immigration: Adjustment to Permanent Resident Status Under Section 245(i) (Order Code RL31373). Washington D.C: Government Printing Office.
Congressional Research Service. (2004). Unauthorized Aliens in the United States: Estimates Since 1986 (Order Code RS21938). Washington D.C: Government Printing Office.
Haitian Refugee Immigration Fairness Act Amnesty of 1998.
Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986. Retrieved on 4 June 2010 from the U.S. Department of Justice website: http://www.justice.gov/crt/cor/byagency/doj1255a.php
Nicaraguan Adjustment and Central American Relief Act of 1997, P.L. 105-100, title II. Retrieved on 4 June 2010 from the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration website: http://www.uscis.gov/ilink/docView/PUBLAW/HTML/PUBLAW/0-0-0-15244.html
Quinnipiac University. (2010). Quinnipiac Opinion Poll, May 19-24, 2010. Retrieved from http://www.pollingreport.com/immigration.htm
Waller, B. (2008). Consider Ethics: Theory, Readings, and Contemporary Issues, Second Edition. New York: Pearson Longman
Dennis Schroader
ENG 122
Andrea Pfaff
June 7, 2010
Regulating immigration and naturalization is one of the chief responsibilities of the federal government as outlined in Article 1, Section 8 of the Constitution. Chief among the many reasons for controlling who and what comes into the country is our national security, which is threatened by illegal immigration. This has been a hot issue in American politics since at least 1986 when President Ronald Reagan signed the Immigration and Reform Control Act.
According to a 2004 report by the Congressional Research Service, the estimated number of illegal aliens residing in the United States increased by more than seven million between 1988 and 2002 (Unauthorized Aliens in the United States: Estimates Since 1986). Varying government and media sources estimate the number of illegal aliens currently residing in the United States anywhere between thirteen million and twenty-three million, with an estimated less than one million coming from nations other than Mexico.
Federal efforts to stem the tide of illegal immigration – from amnesty bills and lackluster crack downs on employers to electronic “virtual fences” and an insulting few 1,200 military troops sent to patrol - have amounted to little more than political showmanship. Arizona’s new immigration law (Senate Bill 1070) picks up where the federal government has dropped the ball.
Let us begin with a brief history of federal efforts, beginning with the last major amnesty bill, Immigration and Reform Control Act (1986). This was a blanket amnesty for over 2.7 million illegal aliens. The argument of the day was that there were just too many illegal aliens to track down and deport for the federal government to handle, so the answer was to enforce the border, crack down on employers and grant amnesty to those who had broken our laws and allow them to live as lawful residents. The idea was that we would stop the influx through the southern border by tougher enforcement, and perhaps that would have worked, if it had ever been implemented.
As it is, it was not, and people continued to pour through our open border by the tens of thousands per month. So great was the draw of America that in 1994, Congress passed another amnesty bill, known as Section 245(i), which was a temporary rolling amnesty affecting an estimated 578,000 illegal immigrants (Congressional Research Service, 2002). This was followed quickly by an extension in 1997. This passed nearly simultaneously with the Nicaraguan Adjustment and Central American Relief Act (1997), yet another amnesty for close to one millions illegals from Central America, and the Haitian Refugee immigration Fairness Act (1998), which granted legal status to 125,000 illegal aliens from Haiti. Two short years later, a bill known as Late Amnesty (2000) passed granting amnesty for some illegal aliens who claim they should have been amnestied under the 1986 IRCA amnesty, for an estimated 400,000 illegal aliens, along with the LIFE Act (2000) which reinstated the rolling Section 245(i) amnesty for an estimated 900,000 illegal aliens.
This brings us up to date on the various amnesty bills enacted in the last twenty-four years. At this point, the American public has grown weary of the constant “second chances”. A Quinnipiac poll (May 19-24, 2010) showed that 59% of registered voters consider illegal immigration a very serious problem and 66% want stricter enforcement of the laws currently on the books. A CBS News poll (April 28 – May 2, 2010) likewise showed the common ground among Americans of differing viewpoints, showing that 65% overall consider it a very serious problem, including 75% of Republicans, 55% of Democrats and 67% of Independents. A CNN/Opinion Research Corp poll (May 21-23, 2010) revealed 60% support for stopping the flow of illegal immigrants and deporting those found here versus 38% who support legalization/amnesty, and 88% favor increased border patrol and federal law enforcement along Mexican border.
As a result of the growing problem of illegal immigration and the federal government’s ineffective response, the State of Arizona enacted its own law that closely mirrors existing federal codes (Archibold, R., The New York Times, 2010, April 23). This action touched off a media firestorm, which set the political left against the center and right. Even as the Obama Administration criticized Arizona Governor Jan Brewer, CBS News showed in another poll (May 20-24, 2010) that 52% of Americans think the Arizona law is “about right”, including 46% of Democrats and 45% of Independents versus just 40% and 45%, respectively, who believe it goes too far.
The primary argument against the law is that it is seen as “racist”, particularly by Hispanics. According to the New York Times article:
“Governor Brewer caved to the radical fringe,” a statement by the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund said, predicting that the law would create “a spiral of pervasive fear, community distrust, increased crime and costly litigation, with nationwide repercussions” (2010, April 23).
Furthermore, critics of the law, which allows police officers, in the course of other legal contact, to ask for proof of legal residency, provided they have reason to suspect otherwise, have attempted to link this provision to the behavior of Nazi’s in World War II. In that, these critics commit the “strawman fallacy” of argument, which is an attempt to defeat the real target by making them seem like a different, more easily assailed enemy, and usually in an unfair and unjust manner (Waller, 2008, Kindle Location 515). The problem with these arguments is that the Arizona law, just like the federal law it mimics, specifically prohibits racial profiling and any other kind of discriminatory act on the part of law enforcement.
The simple conclusion to all of this is that, while it is the role of the United States government to enforce the border and immigration policy, it falls to the border states, so egregiously affected by the onslaught of illegal immigration, to pick up where the feds have failed.
References
CBS News. (2010). CBS News Opinion Poll, May 20-24, 2010. Retrieved on June 4, 2010 from http://www.pollingreport.com/immigration.htm
CNN/Opinion Research Corp. (2010). CNN/Opinion Research Corp Opinion Poll, May 21-23, 2010. Retrieved on June 4 2010 from http://www.pollingreport.com/immigration.htm
Congressional Research Service. (2002). Immigration: Adjustment to Permanent Resident Status Under Section 245(i) (Order Code RL31373). Washington D.C: Government Printing Office.
Congressional Research Service. (2004). Unauthorized Aliens in the United States: Estimates Since 1986 (Order Code RS21938). Washington D.C: Government Printing Office.
Haitian Refugee Immigration Fairness Act Amnesty of 1998.
Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986. Retrieved on 4 June 2010 from the U.S. Department of Justice website: http://www.justice.gov/crt/cor/byagency/doj1255a.php
Nicaraguan Adjustment and Central American Relief Act of 1997, P.L. 105-100, title II. Retrieved on 4 June 2010 from the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration website: http://www.uscis.gov/ilink/docView/PUBLAW/HTML/PUBLAW/0-0-0-15244.html
Quinnipiac University. (2010). Quinnipiac Opinion Poll, May 19-24, 2010. Retrieved from http://www.pollingreport.com/immigration.htm
Waller, B. (2008). Consider Ethics: Theory, Readings, and Contemporary Issues, Second Edition. New York: Pearson Longman
Empire: A Brief History of America’s Global Influence
Dennis Schroader
HIS 204
Lynn Elisabeth Marlow
May 4, 2009
“Can you feel it coming? Empire!” (Queensryche, 1990).
America’s rapid rise to global dominance has been steady and a nearly foregone conclusion. With the exception of a few periods of stalled territorial expansion and/or projection of political and economic interests, America’s story is that of rapid expansion, rise to the status of world power and eventual emergence as the sole remaining Superpower. Today, America stands alone as the dominant military, economic and political force in the world.
State of the Union, 1865: Distractions
The War Between the States shook America to its very foundation and challenged the basic principles upon which the country was founded. After the eventual defeat of the Confederacy, America faced the long, arduous task of bringing its fractured pieces back together and reforming the Union, a process called Reconstruction. It was not enough to pass legislation to bring former Confederate states back into the fold. The aim of Reconstruction was primarily to win back the people of the South (Davidson, Delay, Heyrman, Lytle & Stoff, 2007, p 474).
Another major problem facing America immediately after the Civil War was dealing with the repercussions of the Thirteenth Amendment. Of course, ratification of the Thirteenth Amendment was a part of Reconstruction as a whole, but once again, passing laws do not change the hearts of men. Integrating the Freedpeople was more problematic after Lincoln’s assassination than it might otherwise have been. In any event, the whole ordeal made impossible any notion of consolidating America’s power base within the country or expanding American influence abroad.
Manifest Destiny
With the annexation of the Oregon Territory in 1846, America’s reach extended from sea to shining sea and achieved the vision of Manifest Destiny. Of course, with new lands came new challenges. Native Americans were no strangers to the white man, but relations with them became continuously more strained as more and more settlers moved west. Regular skirmishes with settlers and the U.S. Army served only to strengthen the resolve of politicians in Washington D.C. Treaties with the tribal nations were enacted to confine the tribes to specific lands called Reservations. Settlers regularly ignored these treaties when it suited their purposes. Military attention to the Native American “problem” was the most visible sign of the white man’s dominance, but it was the linkage of the transcontinental railroad in 1869 that spelled the eventual doom of their nomadic culture. Rapid transportation meant more people coming west and more land being used by them, and hunters and traders killing off entire herds of buffalo, which the tribes used for much of their subsistence. Eventually, Indian resistance subsided and they retired to their Reservations where they – for the most part – remain to this day, though now by choice rather than force.
These events coupled with the Mexican Cession of 1848 and the Alaska Purchase of 1867 from Russia effectively marked the end of American expansion on the North American continent. By 1900, after Hawaii became a U.S. Territory, all of the present day states had come under control of the United States government. With the aspirations of domestic imperialists realized, they began to cast their gaze overseas.
Big Stick Moves South
As Americans saw the colonial empires of England, France and Spain reach across the globe, ambitions of parity began to foment. Manifest Destiny not only gave justification for the conquest of what is now the continental United Sates, but also laid a foundation, a way of thinking, which made projection of American influence not merely justifiable but a moral obligation. Charles Denby, lawyer, diplomat, Minister to China and member of the U.S. Philippines Commission said in 1898, “We are stretching out our hands for what nature meant should be ours. We are taking our proper rank among the nations of the world... along with these markets will go our beneficent institutions, and humanity will bless us” (Nostro, 2008). It was this manner of thinking which influenced Theodore Roosevelt’s Big Stick policy and shaped the American approach to our neighbors in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.
The Spanish-American War, set off by the destruction of the USS Maine in February 1898, was a short-lived but hard-fought conflict over which country would shape the future of Cuba, and by extension the entire Caribbean (Events – Spanish-American War, 1998). Although the exact cause of the explosion on the Maine is still not completely certain, popular opinion at the time was that Spain was at fault. That tragedy, along with the now-long-standing rationale of the Monroe Doctrine, was all Congress needed to authorize military action. After a few months, American forces were victorious, thus confirming America’s dominance in the Caribbean (Davidson, Delay, Heyrman, Lytle & Stoff, 2007, p 617).
Events in the Philippines went in much the same order, although without the sinking of a U.S. vessel. The Treaty of Paris in 1898 ended the war with Spain and resulted in the U.S. gaining Cuba, the Philippines, Guam, and Puerto Rico. The Philippines ended up being more difficult to bring under American rule with a bloody, three year long guerilla war ensuing from the time the U.S. assumed control of the islands. This rebellion was quelled in 1902.
Theodore Roosevelt’s Big Stick diplomacy also led to increasing American activity in Latin American affairs. He was once quoted, “If we intend to say hands off to Europe, then sooner or later we must keep order ourselves,” referring to the tenets of the Monroe Doctrine which told Europeans to mind their own hemisphere. This came to be known as the Roosevelt Corollary which led to direct American involvement in Latin American affairs (p. 663). This policy led to the building of the Panama Canal and direct U.S. responsibility for territories throughout the Caribbean and Latin America.
President Taft, who immediate succeeded Roosevelt, preferred flexing economic muscles. According to the U.S. Department of State’s website:
“From 1909 to 1913, President William Howard Taft and Secretary of State Philander C. Knox followed a foreign policy characterized as "dollar diplomacy." Taft shared the view held by Knox [sic] that the goal of diplomacy was to create stability and order abroad that would best promote American commercial interests” (2009).
The State Department’s site goes on to say, “In spite of successes, ‘dollar diplomacy’ failed to counteract economic instability and the tide of revolution in places like Mexico, the Dominican Republic, Nicaragua, and China” (2009).
By the time of the First World War, the new President (Wilson) had a new idea. He saw the war in Europe as an opportunity for America to emerge as a leader on the world stage. “Only if the United States stood above the fray could it lead the way to a higher peace. ‘Americans must remain impartial in thought as well as action,’ Wilson insisted in 1914” (p 670). For all his good intentions, the Wilson Administration ended up supplying the war effort. At first, both sides could purchase from the United States. The Allied blockade of Central Powers’ ports, however, made America’s pretense of neutrality moot. With the sinking of the Lusitania by a German submarine, Wilson had little choice but to enter the war full force in support of the Allies.
Failure of the League of Nations
Wilson’s dream of American global leadership did not die in the mustard gas filled trenches of Europe. The Treaty of Versailles, which ended the war, was to be Wilson’s masterpiece and he worked tirelessly for a League of Nations. He was successful with the Europeans. Not so much within the halls of Congress. By the time the treaty was passed out of committee, Wilson’s essential Article X, which required member nations to come to each other’s aid in the event of attack, had been all but gutted. The amendments to the bill assumed no responsibility under Article X unless prior Congressional approval was obtained (p 686).
Congressional Republicans were loathed to cede control of American foreign policy to international treaty. Due to the unwillingness to compromise on the part of the Congressional Republicans and President Wilson alike, the Treaty of Versailles – and by extension the League of Nations – was never ratified by the United States. With Wilson’s failure to bring the United States into the League, global support evaporated. Wilson’s dream died not on the battlefields of Europe, but in the halls of Congress.
According to Charles Townsend, Professor of International History at Keele University:
“How the League would have worked with American participation remains one of the great 'what ifs' of modern history. As it was, the direction of the system was left in the hands of states - primarily Britain and France - whose altruism was questionable and whose economic resources had been crippled by the war” (2003).
After World War I, American attention turned back toward its own hemisphere. By the time of the Coolidge Administration, the appetite for military conflict in Washington had long been sated. Instead of sending troops to deal with Mexican confiscation of American properties, Coolidge sent an ambassador. President Hoover held a similar attitude when he ordered the withdrawal of troops from Nicaragua. This departure from the Roosevelt Corollary came to be known as the “Good Neighbor” policy (p 763).
Franklin Roosevelt wholeheartedly embraced this policy. In 1933 and 1934 his Administration signed agreements renouncing America’s right to involve itself in the internal or external affairs of its neighbors. Roosevelt instead preferred exerting American influence through politics and economics. Unlike Taft’s “Dollar Diplomacy”, however, Roosevelt was largely successful in spreading American interests and influence abroad.
The Second World War, which arguably started shortly after Adolf Hitler’s accent to the German Chancellorship in 1933, affected U.S. economic interests abroad, but since America was still in the grips of the Great Depression, scant attention was paid to goings on in Europe. Roosevelt struggled in the 1930s to bring America out of the Depression by implementing his New Deal policies and, in part, by advancing U.S. business interests with our neighbors. American economic salvation, as it turned out, was to be delivered not by bills in Congress, but by bombs in Hawaii.
On December 7, 1941, the Japanese attack on the naval installation at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, galvanized the American populace and government alike, who were otherwise content to sit this one out. The massive industrial mobilization to rebuild the navy, beef up the Army and create an Army air corps (later the U.S. Air Force) was to the American economy what a bucket of ice water is to a sleeping person. With America back at work and a two-front war to fight – some might argue that the North Africa campaign was a third front, but it was really just an extension of the European Theater of War – the United States was once again able to project its military might across oceans. After the Allied defeat of the Axis Powers, the U.S. established a permanent military presence throughout Western Europe – in Germany and England in particular – and in Asia – in Australia, Japan, and other small Pacific islands – primarily to help prevent another such World War.
Cold War Expansion
The defeat of the Nazi and Imperial Japanese threats gave rise to the new threat of global Communism. The Soviet Union sought to expand its influence and territories for much the same reasons as Western powers: to prevent the reoccurrence of the destruction of World War II. Unlike the West, however, Russian expansion meant not self-determination and alliances formed, but the installation of puppet governments whose strings were pulled from Moscow. Soviet Socialism was brutal and benefited only those in power, and left those for whom the powers-that-were had no use out in the cold. By some estimates, Lenin’s non-war-related body count dwarfs even the war deaths caused by Adolf Hitler.
The conflicts in Korea and Vietnam in the 1950s through 1975 were, in effect, proxy wars where Communist forces fought against Western, pro-Democracy armies. The Korean conflict was fought to a stand-still which remains to this day. The armistice which ended the fighting did not establish a peace agreement. Accordingly, the De-Militarized Zone is still one of (if not the) most heavily guarded borders in the world and relations between the Communist North Korean government and the rest of the free world can only be described as coolly hostile.
This is contrasted by the results in Vietnam. By all military accounts, the American and South Vietnamese forces utterly destroyed those of the Communist North Vietnamese Army regulars and the Viet Cong guerillas. The body count is not even close. The Communists won this conflict in the media, not the battlefield. It is important also to note that American anti-war sentiment, although certainly present, did not flair to its history making heights until the selective service draft was activated and expanded. Today, however, much of the West has somewhat normalized relations with Vietnam since the government there embraced economic policies more in-line with free societies.
During this period, American ties with pro-democratic governments across the globe were strengthened, as were America’s economic interests. The first country to develop nuclear power (and the only country ever to use it in anger) had become a true global Superpower. The development of nuclear arms and their delivery methods, however, were not the only fronts of the Cold War. Every aspect of national identity became a front in that conflict from the Space Race to the 100 meter dash at the quadrennial Olympic Games.
1970’s – Misery Index and Moral Equivalence
The end of the conflict in Vietnam marked a shift in American thinking. The perception at the time, which endures to this day, was that the Americans lost the war. Carl von Clausewitz, a Prussian soldier in the 18th and 19th centuries, famously stated that “War is a continuation of politics by other means” (Brassford, 1994). In so keeping, the American psyche and belief in the irresistible force of Jeffersonian democracy was damaged after the “loss” in Vietnam.
Compounding the problem were the scandal of Watergate surrounding Richard Nixon’s re-election (and eventual resignation), lingering resentment from the Civil Rights movement and the abuse received by veterans returning from Vietnam, and a stagnant economy brought quickly to its knees by oil shortages (Heritage). President Carter, by all accounts a good man, nevertheless presided over what is arguably the worst period in American history since the Great Depression. Under his Administration, the Misery Index rose from 12.72 to 19.72, and averaged out at 16.26, the highest average for any president on record and the second highest raw increase from the beginning to the end of his single term in office (U.S. Misery Index).
So poor was American self-confidence that President Carter spoke about living with and accepting the reality of a long-term Soviet Union. In a commencement address at Notre Dame University in May of 1977, Carter said, “We are now free of that inordinate fear of Communism which once led us to embrace any dictator who joined us in our fear” (Lord, 2009). His disastrous point-of-view made Communism – which was responsible for unimaginable human suffering and corruption – morally equivalent to the governments of the free world.
Tearing Down the Wall - Enter the Gipper
Not surprisingly, Carter was easily defeated in 1980 by Ronald Reagan. Reagan ushered in a new era of optimism and spoke of America as a “shining city on a hill” (1974) to which the whole freedom-loving world looked and admired. Reagan rebuilt the American military and ramped up spending on defense research projects. His most famous project was nick named Star Wars. In military parlance, it was (and is) known as SDI – Strategic Defense Initiative. For all practical purposes it was a proposal to deploy space-based anti-ballistic missile defenses.
During this time Reagan strengthened alliances throughout the free world which had been damaged by the specter of Vietnam, Nixon’s scandal, and Carter’s neglect, particularly with England and Israel. Reagan also took a page from Theodore Roosevelt’s playbook by taking a more active role in Latin America and ousting Manuel Noriega from Panama. Reagan and British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher are primarily credited with the economic collapse of the Soviet Union.
The Middle East
Since the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989, America’s role as the lone remaining Superpower has been one of world police force. In 1990, Iraqi forces, under the command of another brutal dictator, Saddam Hussein, invaded their oil rich neighbor Kuwait. Through the auspices of the United Nations, the U.S., then under President George H.W. Bush, led a coalition of allied countries in driving Iraq out of Kuwait and containing Iraqi aggression by establishing military bases in Kuwait and Saudi Arabia and using the long standing base at Incirlik, Turkey, to patrol the northern and southern no-fly zones established by U.N. Security Council resolutions.
The presence of U.S. forces in the Middle East was seen by many in the Muslim world as an affront to Islam and a return to the Crusades, giving rise to international Islamic terrorist organizations such as Al Qaeda. Terrorists struck at the U.S. throughout the 1990s with minimal response from the Clinton Administration. It wasn’t until September 11, 2001, when terrorists flew commercial air planes into the World Trade Center in New York, the Pentagon in Washington D.C., and the tragedy aboard American Airlines Flight 93 – where the passengers’ attempt to take back the plane resulted in its crash in a field in Pennsylvania – that America began to take international terrorism seriously.
President George W. Bush, the son of the elder President Bush, declared a Global War on Terror and quickly invaded Afghanistan, where Al Qaeda was headquartered and received avid support from the Taliban government. In 2003, the younger President Bush, citing Iraqi defiance of 14 U.N. Security Council resolutions over 12 years, led a multi-national “Coalition of the Willing” in a six week rout of Saddam Hussein’s forces. The long-term occupation of Iraq proved to be much more difficult and controversial, but that goes beyond the scope of this discussion.
Conclusion: Going Forward Looking Backward
America has come a long way in the 233 years since the July 4, 1776 signing of the Declaration of Independence. In this relatively short period of time, the United States has risen from a rag-tag group of former European colonies into the undisputed leader of the free world. This long term trend of expansion, punctuated by periods of isolationist introspection, seems to lend credence to the 19th century idea of Manifest Destiny.
Whether by means of military, political or economic force, America has grown to a truly global empire. Not an empire under the iron fist of a dictator, such as envisioned by the likes of Roman Caesars and Communist oppressors, but an empire of interrelated societies with freedom of self-determination. Presidents Wilson, Franklin Roosevelt, and Reagan would be proud.
References
Bassford, C. (1994). Clausewitz in English: The Reception of Clausewitz in Britain and America, 1815-1945. New York: Oxford University Press
Davidson, J.W., Delay, B., Heyrman, C.L., Lytle, M., & Stoff, M. (2007). Nation of Nations, Volume 2, 6th Edition. Boston: McGraw-Hill
Lord, J. (2009). http://spectator.org/archives/2009/03/31/jimmy-carters-spirit-of-notre/print
Nostro, R. (2008). Acquisition of the Philippines and Hawaii. Retrieved on April 29, 2009 from http://www.hyperhistory.net/apwh/essays/comp/cw26HawaiiPhilippines_3hm.htm#note1
Phillips, J. (1979). The Iranian Oil Crisis. Retrieved on May 2, 2009, from the Heritage Foundation website: http://www.heritage.org/research/middleeast/bg76.cfm
Reagan, R. (1974, January 25). The Shining City Upon A Hill. Retrieved on April 28, 2009, from http://www.originofnations.org/books,%20papers/quotes%20etc/Reagan_The%20Shining%20City%20Upon%20A%20Hill%20speech.htm
Tate, W. (1990). Empire (Recorded by Queensryche). On Empire album: EMI America
Townsend, C. (2003). The League of Nations and the United Nations. http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/worldwars/wwone/league_nations_02.shtml
U.S. Department of State. (2009). Dollar Diplomacy, 1900-1913. Retrieved on May 2, 2009 from U.S. Department of State website: http://www.state.gov/r/pa/ho/time/ip/16324.htm
U.S. Misery Index. (2009). Retrieved on May 2, 2009, from http://www.miseryindex.us/
U.S. Territorial Maps (1996). Retrieved on May 1, 2009, from University of Virginia website: http://xroads.virginia.edu/~MAP/terr_hp.html
Dennis Schroader
HIS 204
Lynn Elisabeth Marlow
May 4, 2009
“Can you feel it coming? Empire!” (Queensryche, 1990).
America’s rapid rise to global dominance has been steady and a nearly foregone conclusion. With the exception of a few periods of stalled territorial expansion and/or projection of political and economic interests, America’s story is that of rapid expansion, rise to the status of world power and eventual emergence as the sole remaining Superpower. Today, America stands alone as the dominant military, economic and political force in the world.
State of the Union, 1865: Distractions
The War Between the States shook America to its very foundation and challenged the basic principles upon which the country was founded. After the eventual defeat of the Confederacy, America faced the long, arduous task of bringing its fractured pieces back together and reforming the Union, a process called Reconstruction. It was not enough to pass legislation to bring former Confederate states back into the fold. The aim of Reconstruction was primarily to win back the people of the South (Davidson, Delay, Heyrman, Lytle & Stoff, 2007, p 474).
Another major problem facing America immediately after the Civil War was dealing with the repercussions of the Thirteenth Amendment. Of course, ratification of the Thirteenth Amendment was a part of Reconstruction as a whole, but once again, passing laws do not change the hearts of men. Integrating the Freedpeople was more problematic after Lincoln’s assassination than it might otherwise have been. In any event, the whole ordeal made impossible any notion of consolidating America’s power base within the country or expanding American influence abroad.
Manifest Destiny
With the annexation of the Oregon Territory in 1846, America’s reach extended from sea to shining sea and achieved the vision of Manifest Destiny. Of course, with new lands came new challenges. Native Americans were no strangers to the white man, but relations with them became continuously more strained as more and more settlers moved west. Regular skirmishes with settlers and the U.S. Army served only to strengthen the resolve of politicians in Washington D.C. Treaties with the tribal nations were enacted to confine the tribes to specific lands called Reservations. Settlers regularly ignored these treaties when it suited their purposes. Military attention to the Native American “problem” was the most visible sign of the white man’s dominance, but it was the linkage of the transcontinental railroad in 1869 that spelled the eventual doom of their nomadic culture. Rapid transportation meant more people coming west and more land being used by them, and hunters and traders killing off entire herds of buffalo, which the tribes used for much of their subsistence. Eventually, Indian resistance subsided and they retired to their Reservations where they – for the most part – remain to this day, though now by choice rather than force.
These events coupled with the Mexican Cession of 1848 and the Alaska Purchase of 1867 from Russia effectively marked the end of American expansion on the North American continent. By 1900, after Hawaii became a U.S. Territory, all of the present day states had come under control of the United States government. With the aspirations of domestic imperialists realized, they began to cast their gaze overseas.
Big Stick Moves South
As Americans saw the colonial empires of England, France and Spain reach across the globe, ambitions of parity began to foment. Manifest Destiny not only gave justification for the conquest of what is now the continental United Sates, but also laid a foundation, a way of thinking, which made projection of American influence not merely justifiable but a moral obligation. Charles Denby, lawyer, diplomat, Minister to China and member of the U.S. Philippines Commission said in 1898, “We are stretching out our hands for what nature meant should be ours. We are taking our proper rank among the nations of the world... along with these markets will go our beneficent institutions, and humanity will bless us” (Nostro, 2008). It was this manner of thinking which influenced Theodore Roosevelt’s Big Stick policy and shaped the American approach to our neighbors in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.
The Spanish-American War, set off by the destruction of the USS Maine in February 1898, was a short-lived but hard-fought conflict over which country would shape the future of Cuba, and by extension the entire Caribbean (Events – Spanish-American War, 1998). Although the exact cause of the explosion on the Maine is still not completely certain, popular opinion at the time was that Spain was at fault. That tragedy, along with the now-long-standing rationale of the Monroe Doctrine, was all Congress needed to authorize military action. After a few months, American forces were victorious, thus confirming America’s dominance in the Caribbean (Davidson, Delay, Heyrman, Lytle & Stoff, 2007, p 617).
Events in the Philippines went in much the same order, although without the sinking of a U.S. vessel. The Treaty of Paris in 1898 ended the war with Spain and resulted in the U.S. gaining Cuba, the Philippines, Guam, and Puerto Rico. The Philippines ended up being more difficult to bring under American rule with a bloody, three year long guerilla war ensuing from the time the U.S. assumed control of the islands. This rebellion was quelled in 1902.
Theodore Roosevelt’s Big Stick diplomacy also led to increasing American activity in Latin American affairs. He was once quoted, “If we intend to say hands off to Europe, then sooner or later we must keep order ourselves,” referring to the tenets of the Monroe Doctrine which told Europeans to mind their own hemisphere. This came to be known as the Roosevelt Corollary which led to direct American involvement in Latin American affairs (p. 663). This policy led to the building of the Panama Canal and direct U.S. responsibility for territories throughout the Caribbean and Latin America.
President Taft, who immediate succeeded Roosevelt, preferred flexing economic muscles. According to the U.S. Department of State’s website:
“From 1909 to 1913, President William Howard Taft and Secretary of State Philander C. Knox followed a foreign policy characterized as "dollar diplomacy." Taft shared the view held by Knox [sic] that the goal of diplomacy was to create stability and order abroad that would best promote American commercial interests” (2009).
The State Department’s site goes on to say, “In spite of successes, ‘dollar diplomacy’ failed to counteract economic instability and the tide of revolution in places like Mexico, the Dominican Republic, Nicaragua, and China” (2009).
By the time of the First World War, the new President (Wilson) had a new idea. He saw the war in Europe as an opportunity for America to emerge as a leader on the world stage. “Only if the United States stood above the fray could it lead the way to a higher peace. ‘Americans must remain impartial in thought as well as action,’ Wilson insisted in 1914” (p 670). For all his good intentions, the Wilson Administration ended up supplying the war effort. At first, both sides could purchase from the United States. The Allied blockade of Central Powers’ ports, however, made America’s pretense of neutrality moot. With the sinking of the Lusitania by a German submarine, Wilson had little choice but to enter the war full force in support of the Allies.
Failure of the League of Nations
Wilson’s dream of American global leadership did not die in the mustard gas filled trenches of Europe. The Treaty of Versailles, which ended the war, was to be Wilson’s masterpiece and he worked tirelessly for a League of Nations. He was successful with the Europeans. Not so much within the halls of Congress. By the time the treaty was passed out of committee, Wilson’s essential Article X, which required member nations to come to each other’s aid in the event of attack, had been all but gutted. The amendments to the bill assumed no responsibility under Article X unless prior Congressional approval was obtained (p 686).
Congressional Republicans were loathed to cede control of American foreign policy to international treaty. Due to the unwillingness to compromise on the part of the Congressional Republicans and President Wilson alike, the Treaty of Versailles – and by extension the League of Nations – was never ratified by the United States. With Wilson’s failure to bring the United States into the League, global support evaporated. Wilson’s dream died not on the battlefields of Europe, but in the halls of Congress.
According to Charles Townsend, Professor of International History at Keele University:
“How the League would have worked with American participation remains one of the great 'what ifs' of modern history. As it was, the direction of the system was left in the hands of states - primarily Britain and France - whose altruism was questionable and whose economic resources had been crippled by the war” (2003).
After World War I, American attention turned back toward its own hemisphere. By the time of the Coolidge Administration, the appetite for military conflict in Washington had long been sated. Instead of sending troops to deal with Mexican confiscation of American properties, Coolidge sent an ambassador. President Hoover held a similar attitude when he ordered the withdrawal of troops from Nicaragua. This departure from the Roosevelt Corollary came to be known as the “Good Neighbor” policy (p 763).
Franklin Roosevelt wholeheartedly embraced this policy. In 1933 and 1934 his Administration signed agreements renouncing America’s right to involve itself in the internal or external affairs of its neighbors. Roosevelt instead preferred exerting American influence through politics and economics. Unlike Taft’s “Dollar Diplomacy”, however, Roosevelt was largely successful in spreading American interests and influence abroad.
The Second World War, which arguably started shortly after Adolf Hitler’s accent to the German Chancellorship in 1933, affected U.S. economic interests abroad, but since America was still in the grips of the Great Depression, scant attention was paid to goings on in Europe. Roosevelt struggled in the 1930s to bring America out of the Depression by implementing his New Deal policies and, in part, by advancing U.S. business interests with our neighbors. American economic salvation, as it turned out, was to be delivered not by bills in Congress, but by bombs in Hawaii.
On December 7, 1941, the Japanese attack on the naval installation at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, galvanized the American populace and government alike, who were otherwise content to sit this one out. The massive industrial mobilization to rebuild the navy, beef up the Army and create an Army air corps (later the U.S. Air Force) was to the American economy what a bucket of ice water is to a sleeping person. With America back at work and a two-front war to fight – some might argue that the North Africa campaign was a third front, but it was really just an extension of the European Theater of War – the United States was once again able to project its military might across oceans. After the Allied defeat of the Axis Powers, the U.S. established a permanent military presence throughout Western Europe – in Germany and England in particular – and in Asia – in Australia, Japan, and other small Pacific islands – primarily to help prevent another such World War.
Cold War Expansion
The defeat of the Nazi and Imperial Japanese threats gave rise to the new threat of global Communism. The Soviet Union sought to expand its influence and territories for much the same reasons as Western powers: to prevent the reoccurrence of the destruction of World War II. Unlike the West, however, Russian expansion meant not self-determination and alliances formed, but the installation of puppet governments whose strings were pulled from Moscow. Soviet Socialism was brutal and benefited only those in power, and left those for whom the powers-that-were had no use out in the cold. By some estimates, Lenin’s non-war-related body count dwarfs even the war deaths caused by Adolf Hitler.
The conflicts in Korea and Vietnam in the 1950s through 1975 were, in effect, proxy wars where Communist forces fought against Western, pro-Democracy armies. The Korean conflict was fought to a stand-still which remains to this day. The armistice which ended the fighting did not establish a peace agreement. Accordingly, the De-Militarized Zone is still one of (if not the) most heavily guarded borders in the world and relations between the Communist North Korean government and the rest of the free world can only be described as coolly hostile.
This is contrasted by the results in Vietnam. By all military accounts, the American and South Vietnamese forces utterly destroyed those of the Communist North Vietnamese Army regulars and the Viet Cong guerillas. The body count is not even close. The Communists won this conflict in the media, not the battlefield. It is important also to note that American anti-war sentiment, although certainly present, did not flair to its history making heights until the selective service draft was activated and expanded. Today, however, much of the West has somewhat normalized relations with Vietnam since the government there embraced economic policies more in-line with free societies.
During this period, American ties with pro-democratic governments across the globe were strengthened, as were America’s economic interests. The first country to develop nuclear power (and the only country ever to use it in anger) had become a true global Superpower. The development of nuclear arms and their delivery methods, however, were not the only fronts of the Cold War. Every aspect of national identity became a front in that conflict from the Space Race to the 100 meter dash at the quadrennial Olympic Games.
1970’s – Misery Index and Moral Equivalence
The end of the conflict in Vietnam marked a shift in American thinking. The perception at the time, which endures to this day, was that the Americans lost the war. Carl von Clausewitz, a Prussian soldier in the 18th and 19th centuries, famously stated that “War is a continuation of politics by other means” (Brassford, 1994). In so keeping, the American psyche and belief in the irresistible force of Jeffersonian democracy was damaged after the “loss” in Vietnam.
Compounding the problem were the scandal of Watergate surrounding Richard Nixon’s re-election (and eventual resignation), lingering resentment from the Civil Rights movement and the abuse received by veterans returning from Vietnam, and a stagnant economy brought quickly to its knees by oil shortages (Heritage). President Carter, by all accounts a good man, nevertheless presided over what is arguably the worst period in American history since the Great Depression. Under his Administration, the Misery Index rose from 12.72 to 19.72, and averaged out at 16.26, the highest average for any president on record and the second highest raw increase from the beginning to the end of his single term in office (U.S. Misery Index).
So poor was American self-confidence that President Carter spoke about living with and accepting the reality of a long-term Soviet Union. In a commencement address at Notre Dame University in May of 1977, Carter said, “We are now free of that inordinate fear of Communism which once led us to embrace any dictator who joined us in our fear” (Lord, 2009). His disastrous point-of-view made Communism – which was responsible for unimaginable human suffering and corruption – morally equivalent to the governments of the free world.
Tearing Down the Wall - Enter the Gipper
Not surprisingly, Carter was easily defeated in 1980 by Ronald Reagan. Reagan ushered in a new era of optimism and spoke of America as a “shining city on a hill” (1974) to which the whole freedom-loving world looked and admired. Reagan rebuilt the American military and ramped up spending on defense research projects. His most famous project was nick named Star Wars. In military parlance, it was (and is) known as SDI – Strategic Defense Initiative. For all practical purposes it was a proposal to deploy space-based anti-ballistic missile defenses.
During this time Reagan strengthened alliances throughout the free world which had been damaged by the specter of Vietnam, Nixon’s scandal, and Carter’s neglect, particularly with England and Israel. Reagan also took a page from Theodore Roosevelt’s playbook by taking a more active role in Latin America and ousting Manuel Noriega from Panama. Reagan and British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher are primarily credited with the economic collapse of the Soviet Union.
The Middle East
Since the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989, America’s role as the lone remaining Superpower has been one of world police force. In 1990, Iraqi forces, under the command of another brutal dictator, Saddam Hussein, invaded their oil rich neighbor Kuwait. Through the auspices of the United Nations, the U.S., then under President George H.W. Bush, led a coalition of allied countries in driving Iraq out of Kuwait and containing Iraqi aggression by establishing military bases in Kuwait and Saudi Arabia and using the long standing base at Incirlik, Turkey, to patrol the northern and southern no-fly zones established by U.N. Security Council resolutions.
The presence of U.S. forces in the Middle East was seen by many in the Muslim world as an affront to Islam and a return to the Crusades, giving rise to international Islamic terrorist organizations such as Al Qaeda. Terrorists struck at the U.S. throughout the 1990s with minimal response from the Clinton Administration. It wasn’t until September 11, 2001, when terrorists flew commercial air planes into the World Trade Center in New York, the Pentagon in Washington D.C., and the tragedy aboard American Airlines Flight 93 – where the passengers’ attempt to take back the plane resulted in its crash in a field in Pennsylvania – that America began to take international terrorism seriously.
President George W. Bush, the son of the elder President Bush, declared a Global War on Terror and quickly invaded Afghanistan, where Al Qaeda was headquartered and received avid support from the Taliban government. In 2003, the younger President Bush, citing Iraqi defiance of 14 U.N. Security Council resolutions over 12 years, led a multi-national “Coalition of the Willing” in a six week rout of Saddam Hussein’s forces. The long-term occupation of Iraq proved to be much more difficult and controversial, but that goes beyond the scope of this discussion.
Conclusion: Going Forward Looking Backward
America has come a long way in the 233 years since the July 4, 1776 signing of the Declaration of Independence. In this relatively short period of time, the United States has risen from a rag-tag group of former European colonies into the undisputed leader of the free world. This long term trend of expansion, punctuated by periods of isolationist introspection, seems to lend credence to the 19th century idea of Manifest Destiny.
Whether by means of military, political or economic force, America has grown to a truly global empire. Not an empire under the iron fist of a dictator, such as envisioned by the likes of Roman Caesars and Communist oppressors, but an empire of interrelated societies with freedom of self-determination. Presidents Wilson, Franklin Roosevelt, and Reagan would be proud.
References
Bassford, C. (1994). Clausewitz in English: The Reception of Clausewitz in Britain and America, 1815-1945. New York: Oxford University Press
Davidson, J.W., Delay, B., Heyrman, C.L., Lytle, M., & Stoff, M. (2007). Nation of Nations, Volume 2, 6th Edition. Boston: McGraw-Hill
Lord, J. (2009). http://spectator.org/archives/2009/03/31/jimmy-carters-spirit-of-notre/print
Nostro, R. (2008). Acquisition of the Philippines and Hawaii. Retrieved on April 29, 2009 from http://www.hyperhistory.net/apwh/essays/comp/cw26HawaiiPhilippines_3hm.htm#note1
Phillips, J. (1979). The Iranian Oil Crisis. Retrieved on May 2, 2009, from the Heritage Foundation website: http://www.heritage.org/research/middleeast/bg76.cfm
Reagan, R. (1974, January 25). The Shining City Upon A Hill. Retrieved on April 28, 2009, from http://www.originofnations.org/books,%20papers/quotes%20etc/Reagan_The%20Shining%20City%20Upon%20A%20Hill%20speech.htm
Tate, W. (1990). Empire (Recorded by Queensryche). On Empire album: EMI America
Townsend, C. (2003). The League of Nations and the United Nations. http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/worldwars/wwone/league_nations_02.shtml
U.S. Department of State. (2009). Dollar Diplomacy, 1900-1913. Retrieved on May 2, 2009 from U.S. Department of State website: http://www.state.gov/r/pa/ho/time/ip/16324.htm
U.S. Misery Index. (2009). Retrieved on May 2, 2009, from http://www.miseryindex.us/
U.S. Territorial Maps (1996). Retrieved on May 1, 2009, from University of Virginia website: http://xroads.virginia.edu/~MAP/terr_hp.html
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