A Failed Experiment? – The Law of God and Public Policy

A Failed Experiment?
The Law of God and Public Policy

Is American national government a failed experiment?

“When you come to the land that the LORD your God is giving you, and you possess it and dwell in it and then say, ‘I will set a king over me, like all the nations that are around me,’ you may indeed set a king over you whom the LORD your God will choose.” Deuteronomy 17:14, 15

The objective of America’s national government, as expressed in the preamble to our Constitution, is “to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity.…” Here we note but scant mention of material wealth. The focus instead is on Union, Justice, and Liberty.

The objectives outlined in the United States Constitution are appropriate to the limited role of national government the Founders envisioned, and much more in line with an economics of justice than an economics of material prosperity. The Constitution was drafted not to “spread the wealth around” but to maintain a national framework of justice and opportunity against all threats, domestic and international.

Would we say that our national government today has brought us to “a more perfect Union”? The nation is divided racially, economically, and regionally against itself in a struggle for material advantage.

Would we say that this government is primarily concerned to “establish Justice” when, in fact, no working definition of justice is agreed upon by the different political factions? Our government works to “insure domestic Tranquility,” but this is mainly the responsibility of local officials. The national government has done a good job in working to “provide for the common defence” of the republic. However, at least in this observer’s view, it takes a far too aggressive view of what it means “to promote the general Welfare.” The reams and reams of regulations, codes, and other forms of public policy by which the national government seeks to “spread the wealth around” are more a hindrance to “the Blessings of Liberty” than a help.

And as for “our Posterity,” the government sponsors one of the least effective programs of education in the developed world, plunders the inheritances of heirs, and routinely puts the overall well-being of the money economy in doubt by its policies of taxation and regulation. In addition, it has encumbered the generations to come with a burden of debt which seems unlikely to go away any time soon.

The great American experiment in republican and representative government thus appears to many to be on its way to failure.

Visit our website, www.ailbe.org, and sign up to receive our thrice-weekly devotional, Crosfigell, featuring writers from the period of the Celtic Revival and T. M.’s reflections on Scripture and the Celtic Christian tradition. Does the Law of God still apply today? Order a copy of T. M.’s book, The Ground for Christian Ethics, and study the question for yourself.

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In the Gates is a devotional series on the Law of God by Rev. T. M. Moore, editor of the Worldview Church. He serves as dean of the Centurions Program of the Wilberforce Forum and principal of The Fellowship of Ailbe, a spiritual fellowship in the Celtic Christian tradition. He is the author or editor of twenty books, and has contributed chapters to four others. His essays, reviews, articles, papers, and poetry have appeared in dozens of national and international journals, and on a wide range of websites. His most recent books are The Ailbe Psalter and The Ground for Christian Ethics (Waxed Tablet).

Scripture quotations in this article are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version, (c) copyright 2001, 2007 by Crossway Bibles, a division of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.