There aren’t any prominent conservative EAs (or at least none that I’ve heard of). As a result, EA thought tends to ignore conservative perspectives in general, even when (in my opinion as a conservative) they can be highly valuable.
You care deeply about human life, and I think you are fighting for others, but the particular topic you linked to, might be difficult to talk about right now.
Is there another topic you wanted to discuss, or you think other conservatives here would share an interest in?
Maybe a topic, where once discussion starts, might be illuminating or build a bridge toward “conservative” thinking?
Sure! Conservatives and libertarians in the United States hail the separation of powers between the federal and state governments. The framers explicitly designed this separation of powers to stymie tyrannical actors:
The smaller the number of individuals composing a majority, and the smaller the compass within which they are placed, the more easily will they concert and execute their plans of oppression. Extend the sphere, and you take in a greater variety of parties and interests; you make it less probable that a majority of the whole will have a common motive to invade the rights of other citizens” (Madison, Federalist No. 10).
The framers’ intentions were for the vast majority of actual governance to take place at the state level, with the federal government’s enumerated powers used primarily for foreign relations:
The powers delegated by the proposed Constitution to the federal government are few and defined. Those which are to remain in the State governments are numerous and indefinite. The former will be exercised principally on external objects, as war, peace, negotiation, and foreign commerce; with which last the power of taxation will, for the most part, be connected. The powers reserved to the several States will extend to all the objects which, in the ordinary course of affairs, concern the lives, liberties, and properties of the people, and the internal order, improvement, and prosperity of the State. (Madison, Federalist No. 45)
I think this separation of powers is an extremely valuable idea. Federalism lends the United States a Byzantine fault tolerance with redundancy in the form of individual states. Novel policies can be experimented with on the state level, pros and cons can be assessed, and either other states will be convinced by the marketplace of ideas to adopt the policy or the policy will be rolled back. Even in the worst case where some states succumb to tyranny, the United States will endure.
As the centuries have passed, power has become increasingly concentrated in the federal government, and our politics have become nationalized to the point that virtually every contentious issue today concerns the actions of the federal government.
Progressives (and many EAs) have been frustrated about how the filibuster has prevented Democrats in the federal government from delivering on their ambitious promises during the 2020 election cycle and how conservative the Supreme Court is. The existence of the filibuster, which admittedly was very much unintended by the framers, has the useful role of decreasing the effective power of the federal government. The Supreme Court’s power has expanded drastically outside of its original confines to the point that it can be stacked (or has been stacked, depending upon your point of view) to create tyrannical outcomes. I think EAs (and progressives writ large) could do with a greater appreciation of federalism and ways the concept of separation of powers could be extended to our altruistic goals.
You care deeply about human life, and I think you are fighting for others, but the particular topic you linked to, might be difficult to talk about right now.
Is there another topic you wanted to discuss, or you think other conservatives here would share an interest in?
Maybe a topic, where once discussion starts, might be illuminating or build a bridge toward “conservative” thinking?
Sure! Conservatives and libertarians in the United States hail the separation of powers between the federal and state governments. The framers explicitly designed this separation of powers to stymie tyrannical actors:
The framers’ intentions were for the vast majority of actual governance to take place at the state level, with the federal government’s enumerated powers used primarily for foreign relations:
I think this separation of powers is an extremely valuable idea. Federalism lends the United States a Byzantine fault tolerance with redundancy in the form of individual states. Novel policies can be experimented with on the state level, pros and cons can be assessed, and either other states will be convinced by the marketplace of ideas to adopt the policy or the policy will be rolled back. Even in the worst case where some states succumb to tyranny, the United States will endure.
As the centuries have passed, power has become increasingly concentrated in the federal government, and our politics have become nationalized to the point that virtually every contentious issue today concerns the actions of the federal government.
Progressives (and many EAs) have been frustrated about how the filibuster has prevented Democrats in the federal government from delivering on their ambitious promises during the 2020 election cycle and how conservative the Supreme Court is. The existence of the filibuster, which admittedly was very much unintended by the framers, has the useful role of decreasing the effective power of the federal government. The Supreme Court’s power has expanded drastically outside of its original confines to the point that it can be stacked (or has been stacked, depending upon your point of view) to create tyrannical outcomes. I think EAs (and progressives writ large) could do with a greater appreciation of federalism and ways the concept of separation of powers could be extended to our altruistic goals.