Political Justice by Alexander J Illingworth

Author:Alexander J Illingworth [Illingworth, Alexander J]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: immigration, western, religion, ethnicity, morality, multiculturalism
ISBN: 9781910524145
Publisher: Arktos Media Ltd.
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter VIII

Limited Executives

Monarchs and ministers are not the sole operators of a governmental executive. American citizens will be familiar with ‘executive orders’ from their Presidents, and pundits from the cabinet offices of most major governments speak to representatives in parliaments and to the media, expressing their intentions for various areas of society, giving opinions which are bound to please some and upset others. The purpose of an executive, as a concept, must be explored. We have already considered that ministries ought to be accountable to a parliament and should restrict themselves to the day-to-day administration of their areas of concern, and kings too should be limited to certain duties in order to ensure a balance between tradition and representation of the people. The truth is that we can find fault in almost every system of government: Godwin criticises monarchy and presidency for both being systems in which power is too concentrated in the hands of a few, yet he founds his own political system on a mass intellectual improvement among the general population where every man and woman is able to express his or her own opinion and exercise individual reason in distinguishing moral right from wrong. If we are to criticise the potential faults of state government, surely the potential faults of an individualistic personal government which he proposes are much greater? The communism of Marx offers similar conundrums: a state-controlled socialism where ministries direct the distribution of property and means of production, until such a time when the state is no longer required when a state of communism — complete equality of person and property — is reached. Godwin’s theory of government is (it seems to me) a form of proto-communism. Both theories rely on a naïve hope that humans are both fundamentally able to achieve equality, and that ministries will not use their power over the people to maintain that power rather than implement an equality of existence.

Our argument then is this: whilst we must embrace inequality in order to properly sate human nature, whilst using this inequality to our advantage, it is also in our interests to limit the power of the executive in order to ensure it does not take control of the means for providing a society with its own existence, such as in a communistic society, where all individuals become dependent on the state in a horrifyingly sickly manner. If liberty is the best environment in which man may search for the truth of moral improvement, then there cannot be moral improvement when individuals constantly look to their executive government for food, for income, for moral answers. Natural society relies on the executive promoting virtue, community and very little else.

It is in the interests of society for the executive to be limited in its duties. A virtuous executive should look to the following administrative capacities: the maintenance of a just legal system to punish criminal wrongdoers for the preservation of personal liberty; ensuring that society does not fail those who are not able to enjoy liberty by

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