Is government inherently good or inherently bad?

Question

I'm just curious as to what other people think. Also, please no yes/no answers ... give me a sentence or two, or more, of WHY you think this! Thanks. =)

Answer 1

I believe that the Government, as envisioned by the founders, was inherently good. The original intent was for the states to essentially govern themselves, with a small centralized federal government to hold everything together. The Federal Government as laid out in the Constitution, was made up of three CO-EQUAL branches, The Executive, Legislative, and Judicial. With none being more or less powerful than the others. The people who served in those branches were not supposed to be there for life. The purpose of the Bill Of Rights was not to give us rights, but to prevent the government from taking our God given "inalienable" rights away. Sadly, those ideals seem to have been lost. Now the Courts have the final say in everything the government does, and the Bill of Rights are "cherry picked" by those who support some of the amendments over others. (1st amendment good, 2nd amendment bad.)
It all began changing during Frankin Roosevelt's Presidency. While his "New Deal" ideas did help bring the country out of the Great Depression, they also did irreversible damage to our form of Government.
F.D.R.'s policies gave birth to the "Welfare State". The insidious idea that it is the job of the Federal Government to take care of us from cradle to grave. Since then, the Federal government has ballooned into a massive bureaucracy that only exists to support itself. It does nothing well. It sucks up the income of hard working people and wastes most of it. Everything it does becomes more expensive, more complicated and less efficient than it otherwise would, could or should be. It hurts the people it proclaims to help, by trapping them in a cycle of dependency, with little or no opportunity, or encouragement, to escape from it. The Government measures it's success by the number of people dependent on it. The more the better. It should be the other way around.
Unfortunately, there doesn't seem to be any way to reverse this. Those who go into politics now with an idea of reforming our Government, find that those who are already there either have no interest in actually doing it, have given up trying, or have gotten sucked into the corruption themselves.
I believe that the further away from the original intent of the Founders the government gets, the worse it is going to be. And that, in my opinion, makes it inherently bad.

Answer 2

Government, as the concept is usually used today, is inherently in violation of the Non-Aggression Principle (I have a link explaining this below). This is why it is an evil. Some philosophers have tried to justify government by speaking of some sort of "social contract". A contract however can only morally be justified if you consent to it. In other words, it can only be morally justified if you choose it. Unless you immigrated to a new country as an adult you did not CHOOSE your government. You did not sign a piece of paper agreeing to a set of rules. If I choose not to pay taxes I will be thrown in jail. Why? I did not sign a contract saying I agreed to pay for certain services.

The truly ironic thing about a democracy in particular is that if something is supported by enough people that politicians are willing to "do something" about it you do not "need" a government to do it! If a majority support the idea of helping the homeless and donate to the political campaigns of people willing to help them wouldn't it make more sense for those people to donate that money to a charity that helps the homeless? If a majority of people support the idea that poor kids should get to go to school and donate money to the political campaigns of congressman who want more money for schools wouldn't make more sense for them to donate that money to a charity that does so? If you do NOT have popular support for a cause the politicians in a democracy will not do anything about it anyway.

Answer 3

Government is neither inherently good nor bad but since it is so easily corruptible it must be kept in check and citizens should not let it control every aspect of their life. That is why the framers of our US constitution went to great length to spell out the limitations of the Federal Government. Even apes and other mammals have hierarchies and leaders when they live in groups.

Answer 4

Government is inherently bad. People/animals/beings are meant to live in a state of total and complete freedom. We choose to give up certain freedoms in exchange for services and protection of other freedoms from governments.
Our culture or society necessitates governments, however there are cultures (very few now) that don't necessitate governments. Thus, these cultures are "better" than ours.

Answer 5

I think that it is inherently neutral in the sense that it is a tool like fire or water. Fire can be used to provide life-giving heat, but it also can be used to destroy homes. Water is necessary for life, but people can drown in water. Like fire and water, governments can save lives, and destroy them.
It is what people use government for that gives governments their moral compass.

Answer 6

The government does nothing but set restrictions we could do without and make war with other governments over power and oil. "When the power of love overcomes the love of power the world will know peace." -Jimi Henrix