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Speech to the International Affairs student organization For some reason, the Bradley University International Affairs group trusted me with the microphone and their attention to talk about foreign aid. I had a blast even though I was caught with the Bush bug of mis-pronoucing words. I've become so used to saying idiotology and idiotarian the id has crept into the work ideology (instead of AYEdeology). Oh well, they got my point, and I guess the word bumbles qualifies me for President. Another lesson learned is don't exaggerate about welfare queens because women will call you sexist. Oh yeah, and if you are on a panel with Dr. Daniel Drezner from the U of Chicago, turn around every so often while you're giving your address and stick your tongue out at him so he stops mocking you from behind.

Read the text of the speech Speech to the International Affairs student organization
Jeffrey L. Trigg � Executive Director of the Libertarian Party of Illinois

Thank you to the International Affairs organization for asking me to participate in this forum. As Dr. Felder said in my introduction, I am not a scholar or purport to be an expert on foreign aid or international relations. I also hope to learn from this forum, and I will try to inject a unique perspective about foreign aid.

Let me start off by giving you some information about the Libertarian Party. The Libertarian Party was formed in 1972, inspired by former Barry Goldwater Republicans and other individuals disgruntled with the direction America was headed at the time, especially with the Vietnam War. Libertarian is a form of the word liberty, and we are often considered classical liberals, but are much different from today�s liberal. In a nutshell, libertarians are typically socially liberal and fiscally conservative. To give you an idea about libertarians, some great novelists and economists in our history have influenced libertarian ideology. Ayn Rand, Friedrich Hayek, H.L. Menken, Milton Friedman, Robert Heinlein, Murray Rothbard, and I could go on.

Libertarians are for liberty, which is freedom. We are often accused of applying the principles of freedom to the extreme in our politics, so I might as well live up to the extreme label this evening.

Foreign aid. What is foreign aid? How do you define foreign aid? From America�s perspective, I think you can define it in two basic ways. It is a gift from the United States government to the government or people of other countries. The second way, does not necessarily involve our government. Charities are also a huge source of money and other items going from America to a foreign country. Foreign aid comes from our government, but it also comes from churches and synagogues and mosques and charities and even Sally Struthers commercials.

The question this forum is asking tonight is, Can foreign aid work? The answer to the question is yes, it can work and has worked in some specific instances. I hope we will explore some examples of the success and failure of many of our foreign aid initiatives tonight.

However, I�d like to challenge everyone to consider the answer to a different question. Is it the proper function of the US Government to furnish aid to foreign countries?

My answer to that question, is no, that is not the proper role of our government. In order to furnish this money to other countries, the money is first collected through taxes from the paychecks of the 280 odd million people we have in America.

And this is where I�m going to come off as extreme. Taxes are not voluntary. Government forces us to pay these income taxes so they can give our money to these foreign countries. What happens if you don�t pay your taxes? Well, eventually, an IRS agent or officer of the law is going to make you pay your taxes. If you can�t or won�t pay those taxes, they will put you jail. You have then lost your liberty and are figuratively at the end of the government�s gun without your freedom.

Libertarians like to claim that our founding fathers had a libertarian society in mind when they wrote the documents that created America. Our Declaration of Independence accurately says that each individual�s rights come from his (or her) Creator. Rights are not granted by the government. Government is instead supposed to protect individual�s rights.

So to be extreme, I don�t believe our Federal government has the right to take money from individuals in America, and give it to other countries. Nowhere in our Constitution did our founding fathers grant our government the authority or the responsibility to collect taxes from our citizens in order to give that money to other countries. To us it is that simple. The ends do not justify the means.

Not everyone in America can afford to help send money to foreign countries. Sometimes, that foreign aid is causing people here in America to suffer. Foreign aid isn�t free when it comes from the government. It costs our economy and our society and our families.

Right now, almost 50% of one�s income goes to the government in various forms of taxes. Most families do not have the luxury of having one parent stay home with their children. Some families decide not to have children or do not have as many as they would like. The average age when a person becomes a first time homeowner is now over 30 years old. People shorten their education because they can�t afford it. People live without health insurance. When half of your income is going to the government in taxes, government is taking away your freedom to make some of these important life choices.

If 100% of our income were going to the government, we would call that slavery and hopefully do something about it. Economic freedom is just as important as physical freedom for libertarians. You should be free to keep the money you earn and to spend it or give it freely with your own choices. It is not the right of our federal government to force you to give your money to someone else who needs help.

Now that admittedly sounds pretty darn harsh and un-caring because it doesn�t address the needs of the people in those countries. It doesn�t solve the problem. We feel responsible to do our best to help to them. I would tell you that we are responsible for helping those countries. But when I say we, I mean each individual who can afford to help, not we as in our federal government. Libertarians recognize that a government can�t care and it doesn�t care, and we should probably stop pretending that government does care. Libertarians recognize that you care though. Most of you anyway. With freedom, comes personal responsibility. I would suggest it is our personal responsibility to help where it is needed, both foreign and domestic, but this is not the responsibility of our federal government.

So how do we solve the problems that foreign aid is designed to solve without government? I�d like to suggest the story behind our Statue of Liberty is a good model. If you�re thinking, but that was a gift from France�s government to the US government, you perhaps haven�t heard the whole story. It was a charity in France that gave us the statue, and it was grateful individuals in the newly liberated France freely deciding to donate to the project that made it happen. When Americans learned of the gift, it again, was a private citizen�s group who put together the resources to take care of the Statue of Liberty once it got here. That is part of what makes the Statue of Liberty so special.

To me it is this spirit of goodwill between foreign countries that shows how important freedom really is, and what awesome things can result from freedom. I trust free individuals to help when it is needed. We always have helped and we always will as long as our government allows us to by respecting our freedom and letting us keep what we earn. I see government foreign aid as not only taking away a bit of our freedom, but of also taking away a bit of our humanity. When the government is taking away 50 or 60 or someday maybe even 80% of a person�s income, that person is losing out on opportunities to feel good about themselves, or to better take care of themselves. Like the Statue of Liberty, when individuals are free to care, they can and will generously support what they believe in. We don�t need government to care, we need government to let us be free to care and to realize the great things that come from the human spirit. Posted by: Jeff Trigg at 5:14 pm| 05/12/03 | National Politics