mck@ratex.UUCP (Daniel Kian Mc Kiernan) (03/22/85)
Lines marked '>>>' and '>>' are mine; lines marked '>' are those of Mr Torek. >>> ... Should I ever possess a piece of land such that an Indian can >>>reasonably demonstrate that (s)he is legitimate heir to a legitimate >>>owner who had the property wrested from h(im|er), I will turn it over. >[And in another article] > >> not surrendering their land to Indians. > >Mr. McKiernan took my jibe as an accusation of hypocrisy. WRONG. It >was an attempt to show how libertarians fail to examine the consequences >of their principles, by way of an example. Okay, I was wrong, and I apologize; you were doing something even dumber: Assuming what Libertarians did and did not think about without conducting a reasonable investigation. The question of reparations is OFTEN discussed amongst Libertarians, and with informed outsiders. For example, I have talked about this matter several times with friends and with Professor Hubin (NOT a Libertarian) of the OSU Philosophy Department. For example, American Indians have been invited (and come) to Libertarian Party conventions to speak. For example, there was an emotional battle some years ago in the SLS when members from the LPRC advocated seizing lands which had been plantations, and redistributing them amongst American Negroes. > I think that libertarian >principles, together with a conveniently ignored fact, imply that >massive numbers of "rectifying" property transfers are in order. The >conveniently ignored fact is that almost none of what any of us possess >is untainted with coercion in its history. As I have noted above, we Libertarians do not ignore the issue. Further, that Torek accuses us of ignoring an issue in the same posting in which he attacks my addressing of the issue, implies that he views his readers as too irrational or stupid to notice the contradiction. > The disruption and confusion >that would result, if we tried to trace the history of each possession >to find its "rightful owner", constitutes a reductio ad absurdum (or at >least "ad implausibilium") of libertarianism. No, it's a reductio ad implausibilium of a straw man. > >Note that Mr. McKiernan seems to put the "burden of proof" on the Indian, >above: the Indian must *demonstrate* his ownership. If all he could say >was, "My father['s father ...] told me [my father, who told me ...] that >he would have bequeathed the land to me", but couldn't prove this, would >that do? The answer is important, because if the burden of proof is on >the Indians, few of them can meet it so the "ad absurdity" can be avoided. >However, if there is no such burden of proof, THEN THE INDIAN HAS THE >BETTER CLAIM to the land, and much redistribution of land is necessary. >And then there is compensation to made for depriving the Indian of the >*use* of the land -- and so on, ad absurdum. The idea that the burden of proof is on the accuser, rather than on the occupier, is in complete accord with Libertarian principle -- and, in fact, with Anglo-American tradition. If Mr Torek wants to develop and study a Napoleonic Pseudo-Libertarianism, he is of course welcome to do so; but let's not damn Libertarianism for the sins of Mr Torek's new toy. >One more point. Mr. McKiernan tries to reduce the problem by saying: > >> It should be recognized that not all the land of the Americas was used >> by Indians, and that this land was therefore legitimately up for grabs. > >But in the absence of a precise definition of "use", this begs questions. No, it doesn't 'beg the question'; it begins to establish the limits of the problem. Further refinement is, of course, necessary, but that shouldn't prevent us from discussing what we've developed so far. >If buffalo need to roam far and wide and the Indians use the buffalo, >perhaps they use more land than one first thinks. As Biep Dieroux (sp?) >pointed out, what constitutes "use" is not obvious. Not only did I not imply that it was; I have mentioned elsewhere that there is disagreement amongst Libertarians on this point. The subject of internally consistent but mutually exclusive systems of property fascinates me; I have had many intellectually challenging discussions with friends on the matter. In fact, this point is integral to my argument against anarcho-Libertarianism. Back in the saddle again, DKMcK