The American Social Contract
The American conception of the "social contract" is bounded by four basic precepts.
One of the most abused terms in America today consists of two words: “social contract”.
So many people of the left throw this terminology around as if it only has one meaning to all but they define it significantly differently than most Americans do (or would if they thought about it) and their definition is completely at odds with what America has always been.
The American conception of the "social contract" is bounded by four basic precepts: the Christian biblical expressions of the Golden Rule and the Ten Commandments (which, while expressed in Christianity are not uniquely Christian - many cultures prior to the birth of Christ expressed similar precepts) and two documents, the Declaration of Independence, and the Constitution of the United States.
Considering the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution, I would compare them to a business’ statement of core values (the Declaration) and a mission statement (the Constitution). I believe that these tenets are statements of principle based on natural law and therefore transcendent through time without need for modification or adaptation.
The Declaration and Constitution don’t tell us what to do; they tell us how we should do it. It is the Golden Rule and the Ten Commandments tell us what we should do. These go beyond simple natural laws and define for us our basic duties and responsibilities to our fellow man.
America was blessed by God as unique in the world in that our founding was based solidly on Judeo-Christian tenets. This does not mean that every American must be forced to become a Jew or a Christian but it does mean that we should recognize that these tenets are drawn from natural law or as Jefferson wrote, “…the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God…” and adherence to Judeo-Christian morality is required for the survival of the Republic.
Any form of coerced, permanent collectivism means the death of freedom because it eliminates the very morality that our country was founded upon. Collectivism substitutes morality with the arbitrary and capricious rules of government. I believe that Hayek was correct in stating that a collectivist system rejects the kind of morality that has built the free Western Civilizations and without morality, the “only tastes which are satisfied are the taste for power as such and the pleasure of being obeyed and of being part of a well-functioning and immensely powerful machine to which everything else must give way”.
The most basic of tenets of any form of collectivism is that nothing is more important than the good of the collective. In the mind of the collectivist, that is the primary and solitary requirement stemming from the social contract.
The social contract of the collectivist is a bastardized hybrid of the thoughts of Jean Jacque-Rosseau and Karl Marx, one that says that the productive of society OWE a debt to the non-productive and the non-productive have no obligation to anyone, including themselves, to even attempt to become productive or contribute in any way whatsoever.
When that frame of reference is installed in enough people, especially those who aspire to govern others, any expression of individualism, especially the Lockean proviso - that a person has a right to their own productivity, is tantamount to a crime against society. It is the equivalent of theft from society.
Perhaps the most interesting of this discussion is this definition of the "social contract" and why collectivists simply have never gained traction within American society or directly through the government. Thinking people can see and understand the inherent contradictions in the collectivist social contract, that to be free everybody must be controlled, to be successful everybody must participate (sounds like the argument for masking, doesn’t it? It works when EVERYBODY does it!), even though an individual isn’t smart enough to decide what is best for themselves, a committee (or a government) can and while an individual may be immoral, a divine cloud descends from Heaven to bestow righteousness and wisdom on a group.
So what is a committed collectivist to do?
The started at the university level but found that even college students had some common sense left, then they went to secondary and then primary schools to indoctrinate kids with their cognitive dissonance.
And yet, they still have not convinced people that their version of the social contract makes sense, even kids know when someone isn’t pulling their weight and resent having their productivity taken and given to other kids. There is the famous story about how one professor illustrated the redistribution of wealth by telling the class that the upper scoring members would necessarily need to have their grades reduced with points given to lesser performing students until a grade equilibrium was achieved. Of course, the lower scoring students were all for it, the higher performers, not so much.
The only avenue after that process is revolution, a violent one if necessary. We have seen the precursors to that in major US cities in 2020. Ibram X. Kendi and Robin DiAngelo are the twins born of a sexual liaison between ANTIFA and BLM – the solution to racism in America is always the same – collectivism. Something always must be taken from one to be given to the other. That is always the solution.
While it is true America has drifted closer to collectivism than ever with the Biden administration in control of the Executive Branch and the Democrats in control of the Legislative, total takeover is still not possible under the American concept of the "social contract".
The collectivist agenda has been temporarily derailed by the incompetence of the Biden administration. The debacle in Afghanistan began badly enough but now that US soldiers have been killed, the entire agenda is in trouble, no matter how hard Pelosi is pushing it (and she is risking a lot to keep the focus on these catastrophic spending bills designed to fund the collectivist wish lists). Some Democrats in the House are getting wobbly and the positions of Krysten Sinema and Joe Manchin in the Senate have become even more solid.
It is a year away, but 2022 is an opportunity to put their agenda on the smoldering ash heap of history and revive the American social contract where everybody is free, everybody has equal opportunity and everybody gets to go as far as their individual attributes can carry them.