It Is Dangerous to Be Right When the Government Is Wrong - Andrew P. Napolitano [41]
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Lastly, if Mrs. Murphy opens up a pub down the street, she may still choose to serve only those she wishes to serve. There is really no difference between this scenario and the lemonade stand situation; the food and service are hers to sell, the pub is her property, and it is her choice to make poor business decisions to exclude customers. As a private business owner, she has that freedom because the government has no business telling Mrs. Murphy how to run her private company, the pub. It is not, however, in Mrs. Murphy’s interest to deny her Italian, Muslim, or black neighbors entry because she will lose business, the business of those excluded and the business of those that abhor Mrs. Murphy’s racism.
Laurence M. Vance, an adjunct scholar of the Mises Institute, equates the private home scenario with the private business scenario, as well. There is no distinction, he says:
Just as no one has a right to enter my home, so no one should have a right to stay at my inn, hotel, or motel; eat at my restaurant, cafeteria, lunchroom, or lunch counter; enjoy a beverage at my soda fountain; fill up at my gas station; view a movie at my theater; listen to a concert in my hall; or watch a sporting event at my arena or stadium.9
This notion is difficult to accept today because our society teaches us that racial discrimination is wrong. And I completely agree! Racism is morally wrong and thus deplorable. The problem is: When government interjects itself and tells a private business owner with whom he or she can associate on his or her own property—that becomes a constitutional and legal problem that could generate far more harm to natural rights than the owner of a movie theater could. It is not the government’s job to insert itself in this manner. It is the government’s job to protect the voice and actions of the unpopular opinion. It just so happens that the racist is in the minority here. The pacifist, agriculturalist, Jew, or Scientologist may be in the minority next time. Roger Pilon at the Cato Institute explains, “We do not all agree on ‘the good’ . . . one person’s ‘irrational’ discrimination is another’s perfectly reasonable decision.”10 It may feel like the world is upside down when we are defending the racist, the misogynist, or the homophobe, but the Rule of Law is in place to protect the minority from the tyranny of the majority.
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The (In)consistency of Governmental Intervention
As we have seen, because we have the right to associate, we also have the right to discriminate. Ignoring these freedoms, the government chooses to circumvent our natural rights all the time, combating discrimination in the form of anti-discrimination laws at the local, state, and federal levels. As a result of these regulations, free individuals are required to associate with everyone. Again, we call this forced association, and forced association is unnatural and unconstitutional. In its quest to eliminate discrimination, the government violates our rights and is wholly inconsistent in the process. It only mandates that we associate with everyone in theory. The state makes exceptions to these anti-discrimination laws all the time.
Take professional sports, for example. Why isn’t the government forcing the National Football League (NFL), Major League Baseball (MLB), or the National Basketball Association (NBA) to add women to their all-male rosters? If the government is so committed to eliminating discrimination, it should be consistent across the board. If the government can force Mrs. Murphy to serve Asians, Italians, and blacks at her Irish pub, the government should force three of the biggest industries in America to eliminate