Don’t Tread on My Sphere!

Is it merely the existence of free markets, limited government, and rule of law?

Or is it intimately connected to virtues, both individual and collective—a people who honor time-tested traditions: families, civil society, and individual responsibility?

In short, what is more important: liberty or virtue? Adam Smith, or Jesus?

This choice, argued Frank Meyer, a founding editor at the National Review, assumes a false dichotomy. Meyer asserted that the key to unraveling this is to recognize two different spheres: the government sphere, where preserving liberty should be the dominant goal, and non-government institutions, which should inculcate virtue. When each institution stays in their best-suited role, the common good emerges. 

Long before Meyer there was an astute 19th century Dutch theologian-politician (now, there’s a combination you don’t see often today) named Abraham Kuyper (pictured above), who argued for something similar called “sphere sovereignty.” Each sphere of life has its own authority, and we run into mischief when one sphere (say, theology) intrudes on another (say, recreation). Humans have created churches, families, businesses, and the like; each “has its own rules and possesses its own integrity and correct way of doing things,” journalist David Brooks notes, and each has its “responsible zone of flourishing.”  Which seems tenuous today.

First of all, Brooks notes that “In a healthy society, we try to assert differences without demeaning one another’s identities.” We need to be nice, which is another virtue.

But in addition, a healthy society recognizes the integrity of various spheres.

This is why the Los Angeles Dodgers were wrong to honor the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence. It wasn’t merely the Sisters’ tawdry message: the spectacle sphere (say, professional wrestling or reality TV) intruded upon baseball. Spheres have boundaries for a reason, and today, those boundaries are collapsing.

I’d like to think that Meyer’s broader view of political and non-political spheres coalesces well with Kuyper’s view of sphere sovereignty.

If we take liberty as the core value for all non-political institutions, we get hedonism and relativism. Junior identifies as a furry in his fourth grade class? Sure: accommodate him by providing a scratching post and some cat litter! Though his parents might complain if that post is relegated to the corner of the classroom, or if the other furry species want to chase him up a tree.

If we take virtue as the core for political institutions, a tyrannical regime might result: with Saudi Arabian departments of virtue and vice enforcing morality, or, closer to home, outlawing all drag shows, Hostess Twinkies, and what you blurt out before you say, “Pardon my French.” Remember, virtues haven’t disappeared; some have multiplied like rabbits (tolerance), while the older virtues (prudence) seem to be hibernating.

Government’s role is to protect liberty (or, as the founders stated it, our innate rights) SO THAT people can live lives of virtue. A republic without virtue will extinguish its liberty.

But what if that drag show is proposed for the public school, the public library, or the public parade on the public street?

Here, the political and non-political bump into each other.

I have long suggested to students that the more government crowds itself into our private affairs, even in benign areas such as schools, roads and parks, the more a disparate public argues for its share to shape that public space in its own image: Imago Sapiens. It’s a little glib to say, “Then privatize the library” to the activists of left and right, who might exclude Huck Finn or Heather has Two Mommies from the taxpayer-supported public library. Still, it’s worth noting that the more we turn private spheres into public spheres, the more discord we engender, and as long as we keep mixing the spheres, we’re bound to have messy debates and delicate compromises.

Reason magazine’s Stephanie Slade reminds us that the worst option is to force people to join in your passion—closing the exits, in a way. Since governments not only use my tax dollars to fund public schools, but compel school attendance as well, education can be a lightning rod for messy conflicts, whether that’s a drag show or a posting of the 10 commandments. Enlisting people into causes that they don’t share creates resentment, and resentment leads to retaliation and even civil conflict.

As our society becomes increasingly secular, the sort of religious fanaticism that used to occur (the Salem witch trials come to mind) seems to have evolved into political fanaticism. We’ve lost the commonly-held vision of classical virtues, and since the fingers of government are touching every aspect of society, people want their visions to be affirmed in the public square. Salem no longer has witch trials, but it has a Haunted Happenings Grand Parade in October, of course. 

So, what’s the solution?

First, recognize the spheres. Your way is not the highway.

And then, can we all just agree? Probably not: James Madison suggested that divisive factions could be eliminated only if conformity could be achieved, but of course, that was and remains impossible, but I would add, “well, outside of tiny communities.” Retreating into our own smaller communities within the larger body politic is an option. Find your tribe, but don’t go on the warpath. The more we practice subsidiarity—placing government functions at the lowest level possible—the better government functions, and the less we offend others. The Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence can march in their own subdivision, or even be honored by a baseball team: we who find that libertine expression distasteful can avoid the subdivision and avoid patronizing that team. Boycotts of Target or the Dodgers just might nudge them off the bandwagons of the day.

Such an atomized society of little islands of expression might be troubling, especially to those who long for life as it once was. I get it. But that might be the best we can do. 

After all, in the marketplace of ideas, silly ideas should ultimately collapse from the weight of their own absurdities.