Democrats: The Party of Freedom? | EDITORIAL | Editorial

The great Kamala Harris remake began with abandon in Chicago, as zealous Democrats enthusiastically nominated the vice president as their presidential candidate for 2024. Joe Biden is now a distant memory.

The challenge for Ms. Harris will be to maintain her chameleon-like transformation. After serving in an administration that unleashed the worst price increases in four decades, she wants voters to believe she is now an inflation fighter. After arguing that we need to “start over” with ICE and failing in her role as border czar, Ms. Harris is now portraying herself as an aggressive proponent of border control. After appeasing radical Greens by opposing fracking, she is now changing course in search of votes.

Two months ago, Ms. Harris was a political lightweight who wasted staff at an alarming rate and achieved little of substance. Today, she is the reincarnation of Franklin Delano Roosevelt, John F. Kennedy and Barack Obama rolled into one.

But the reorganization does not only affect the vice president. During the convention, the Democrats tried to reposition the party as a representative of “freedom.” Wednesday evening was even declared Freedom Night. Harris's running mate, Minnesota Governor Tim Walz, devoted part of his speech to this topic.

“When we Democrats talk about freedom,” he said, “we mean the freedom to make a better life for yourself and the people you love, the freedom to make your own health care choices and, yes, the freedom for your children to go to school without fear of being shot.”

Yes, if unrestricted abortion is your most important measure of freedom, the Democratic Party is for you. But the progressive agenda is otherwise in reality overwhelmingly authoritarian and based largely on coercion. “It is fair to say that the most consistent theme of the progressive approach to public policy,” Roy Cordato wrote for the John Locke Foundation, “is its reliance on the use of force, or at least the threat of force, to achieve its goals.”

It is fair to ask, now that Mr. Walz has raised the point, whether Americans would even recognize the left's version of “liberty.” The liberties guaranteed in the Bill of Rights are prohibitions on government behavior and do not require special permission from others. The liberties envisioned by Democrats like Mr. Walz – guaranteed health care, jobs and housing, free college, free child care, etc. – all require the coercive involvement of others, financial or otherwise, to provide them. Dependence is the opposite of freedom.

If Democrats are the party of freedom, would they agree that Americans should have the freedom to choose not to join a union? To start a small business without the interference of dozens of state, local and federal agencies? To rent their property to tenants without being told how much to charge for it? To own a gun for self-defense? To homeschool their children or otherwise escape the ailing public school system? To sell their products without price controls? To work as a hair braider without government approval? To run for office as a member of a third party?

Should they be free to protest outside abortion clinics? Should they be allowed to choose their own doctors and pay for their own medical care in a government system? Should they be allowed to use their own property without undue government interference? Should they be allowed to keep more of their hard-earned money? Should they be free to enter into employment and wage contracts? Should they be allowed to decide on their own child's medical care? Should they be allowed to make decisions based on their religious beliefs? Should they be allowed to walk on the beach during the pandemic? Should they be allowed to buy a gas stove or a gasoline-powered SUV? Should they be prohibited by law from misgendering someone?

Democrats have spent decades building and maintaining an aggressive federal administrative state with its fingers in every nook and cranny of everyday life. These agencies – and the unelected bureaucrats who toil for them – have amassed enormous power and usurped legislative functions with little or no oversight. Separation of powers is secondary. But when federal judges cast doubt on the constitutionality of this arrangement, Democrats cry out in horror. That is freedom indeed.

Republicans may have their blind spots when it comes to “liberty,” too. But if Democrats think they can redefine the word for political purposes, they must really believe HL Mencken's observation that “no one ever went broke by underestimating the intelligence of the American people.”