The local blogosphere is celebrating Lincoln's bicentennial. I highly recommend my colleague, Professor Schaff's post, and that of Professor Newquist.
Esteemed reader Vic sends us this note:
Professor Schaff:
In your commentary entitled "Vindicating Lincoln"… you say in part:
It seems the central lesson learned from Lincoln is this: man has by nature certain natural rights, therefore there are limits to the modern project of democracy and science. This project is only just in so far as it has a proper understanding of man's nature and acts appropriately. Basing one's politics on nature provides a firm grounding, limits the sometimes Utopian projects of men, and has the additional virtue of actually being true. If we start from the notion that man is a creature with language and reason, that he has the ability to know himself and make himself known to others through speech, then he must be treated as one to be reasoned with, not one to simply rule over as master as one does a dog.
I consider reference to "natural rights", to be utterly puzzling. If Charles Darwin was right -- that humans are the result of millions of years of evolution, a process by which they came out of the jungle -- where and when during that long process did "natural rights" for humans ensue? I suggest that Hamlet was right when he said that there is nothing good or bad but thinking makes it so.
This wonderful note deserves as wonderful an answer as we can give it. I defer to Professor Schaff on Lincoln, though we have no disagreements regarding the rail splitter. On the question of the relationship between natural right and natural selection, I claim some small expertise.
To begin with, Hamlet was wrong. Someone might conceivably think it's a good idea to switch on a lamp, remove the bulb, and stick his tongue in the socket, but thinking it's good doesn't make it so. The health of the body provides one standard for distinguishing what is good from what is bad. Exercise and a sensible diet are good; drinking a gallon of whiskey before breakfast every day is bad. It doesn't matter what one thinks about such things. People often get it tragically wrong. What matters is what does and does not promote health.
Just as the human body comes to be by nature, so also human beings form societies and governments by nature. We do so not only because it is very difficult to live a good life outside such societies, but because it is almost impossible even to live a human life in isolation. We can form political societies because we are, again by nature, morally responsible creatures.
Vic asks when during the long process of evolution did natural rights emerge? I answer: pretty early, when we acquired a natural recognition of reciprocity. The earliest human societies were small, and evidence suggests that they were remarkably egalitarian. Each member of the tribe understood that he owed obligations to the group and to individual partners, and they owed him obligations in return. It is possible that the evolution of moral capacity drove the evolution of the human mind, for one needs a pretty sophisticated brain to keep track of the web of contracts that make up even the simplest community. Likewise the range of moral passions seem to fit this story. Righteous indignation is bred into us by natural selection.
With the rise of cities came the political apparatus that made possible the massive and pervasive exploitation of the many by the few. But because the roots of political evolution lay in the natural human capacity for moral responsibility, which all human beings share, the exploiters needed an argument to justify their exploitation. We have a right to dominion because our ancestors were Gods and theirs were not; or because our people are the master race; or because we possess the true Marxist science, etc., etc. The trouble is, all these claims are unfounded.
The American regime was based on a simple recognition of that fact: that all the claims of one human being to rule another without the other's consent were based on lies. Once that is seen to be true, and I believe that it is true, there is no legitimate alternative but a regime based on consent.
Darwinism helps us understand how morality, like language and families, emerged in the long history of our species. Lincoln was right about natural rights. Darwinism would confirm that.
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