I was too busy to notice Austin Cline’s response to me regarding his comments on Justice Brown. He begins by insisting on the accuracy of his claim that Brown used the phrase “atheistic humanism,” even though he has no evidence that she did so and even though the article does not obviously attribute the quote to Brown at all. I don’t know if she used the phrase or not; neither does Cline. Yet he continues to insist that she did.
Then he complains that I “make[] up [my] own definition of autonomy, saying ‘it means the “freedom” provided by the welfare state.’ I can’t find a single dictionary that uses that definition or anything like it,” he says. Well, I suppose not, but dictionary definitions of political terms are rarely much use, nor would such a thing be relevant. The question is, what does Brown mean by autonomy. I know Janice Brown. I have studied her work attentively for years. I am a Lincoln Fellow at the Claremont Institute, a student of John Eastman. I am, shall we say, somewhat familiar with the political theory of Brown’s variety of conservatism. I am also a lawyer specializing in Constitutional law. I suspect I am a bit better qualified to say what Brown means by “autonomy” than is Austin Cline, who is not a lawyer, not a specialist in Constitutional law, not, it seems, acquainted with Justice Brown, and, obviously, not a specialist in conservative political philosophy (which is a different thing entirely than the dynamics of the Party).
Cline then chides me on the grounds that I “can’t see how [the view that] atheistic humanism is pushing hostility towards faith in America (and that there is a war between the two now) qualifies as religious extremism.” Well, I still don’t. It has been a doctrine of religious belief since the beginning of time that religion and irreligion are at war with one another, and it has been a principle of Christianity since its inception that Christians are persecuted by secularists and people of other faiths. The question is not whether these principles are repugnant—they certainly are; I am as appalled by religious conservatism as anyone. But the question is whether they qualify as “extreme,” and they certainly do not. They are the views of a great many, if not most, Christians. There is nothing more “extreme” about these principles than about all religion in general. So, calling them extreme is a meaningless smear. Moreover, it is not warranted by a single word of (the reported sections) of Justice Brown’s speech.
Austin Cline is as ignorant of Janice Brown’s beliefs as the very moss on the trees. Yet he claims that Brown’s “complaints about autonomy (as it is actually defined by everyone else [but not by Brown–TMS]) and secularism are a sign of Dominionism.” Again, Cline asserts that (a) Dominionists complain about autonomy and secularism, (b) Brown complains about autonomy and secularism, (c) therefore Brown is a Dominionist. Affirming the consequent is only the most obvious flaw in Cline’s “reasoning” here.
Finally, Cline says that Brown “strikes me as someone more like Robert Bork than anyone else,” revealing his profound ignorance of the divisions within the conservative movement. Janice Brown has been an outspoken defender of the principles of natural rights. Bork is a positivist, and could very well be an atheist for all we know. For Cline to conflate these two oil-and-water political views reveals like nothing else that Cline has no idea what he is talking about.
If Cline is upset by a libertarian defending a person who bases her views of political liberty on Christianity—as did, say, Locke, Bastiat, Milton, Acton, Sidney, Garrison, and any number of great figures in libertarian history—then that is fine. But for him to wade into a subject about which he knows practically nothing, and to attack a person whose views he does not understand, and persistently mischaracterizes, is indeed worthy of shame.
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