| In treating the ideas of truth, goodness, and beauty, I dealt with each in itself and for its own sake before considering its relation to the other two. Turning now to the remaining three of the six great ideas—liberty, equality, and justice—I will proceed somewhat differently. Though I will examine each of these ideas in and for itself, I will be primarily interested in those aspects of them in which they are closely interrelated. It is in those aspects that this triad of ideas are the ideas we act on in governing our social, political, and economic affairs.
In the case of the first three ideas, we observed the sovereignty of truth in the way it regulates our thinking about goodness and beauty. So here, in dealing with the second set of ideas, we must note the sovereignty of justice. It regulates our thinking about liberty and equality. Without its guidance, certain errors are unavoidable and certain problems insoluble.
It should also be pointed out that all three of these ideas fall in the domain of the idea of goodness. We rightly regard liberty and equality as highly desirable goods, real goods that we need to lead decent human lives in the pursuit of happiness. Just action with respect to others, as we saw in an earlier chapter, is the good of doing. To act rightly or justly is to do good.
It is necessary to explain the sovereignty of justice with regard to liberty and equality before we embark, in subsequent chapters, on elucidating these ideas as well as exploring in detail the idea of justice itself. Readers will appreciate, I trust, that their understanding of what is said briefly here will be increased by the light that subsequent chapters will throw on the subject.
In the popular mind, and even in the opinions of the learned, either liberty, or equality, or both together, is accorded the highest honor as the prime value or values to be sought, secured, and preserved. Much more inflamed rhetoric, as well as much more reasoned argument, has called for liberty above all else, or for equality above all else, or for both together, than there have been appeals for justice first and foremost.
The maxim of the French Revolution still echoes in our ears:
liberte, egalite, fraternite. Justice is not even mentioned in the company of the other two. That might have been justified had the authors of that maxim written it on the basis of Aristotle's insight that if all human beings who are associated in a community were friends with one another, there would be no need for justice. It is doubtful that they had this in mind.
Against the weight of both popular and scholarly opinion, I will try to explain why justice is the supreme value, a greater good than either liberty or equality, and one that must be appealed to for the rectification of errors with regard to liberty and equality.
As I observed a moment ago, all three of these values are real, not apparent, goods—goods that human beings need for the conduct of their lives in the pursuit of happiness. However, all real goods are not of equal standing. Wealth and health, for example, are inferior to wisdom and friendship. Some real goods are truly good only when limited. Pleasure is a real good, but we can want more pleasure than we need or more than is good for us to seek or obtain. The same is true of wealth. These are limited real goods. In contrast, knowledge is an unlimited real good. We can never seek or obtain more than is good for us.
Only justice is an unlimited good, as we shall presently see. One can want too much liberty and too much equality—more than it is good for us to have in relation to our fellowmen, and more than we have any right to. Not so with justice. No society can be too just; no individual can act more justly than is good for him or for his fellowmen.
The failure to observe and understand the need for limitations upon liberty and equality leads to serious errors about them and to an irresolvable conflict between them.
On the one hand, there are the libertarians, who not only place the highest value on liberty but also seek to maximize it at the expense of equality. They not only want an unlimited amount of freedom, but they are also willing to try to achieve it even if achieving it results in an irremediable inequality of conditions, under which some portion of a society, usually a majority, suffer serious deprivations.
The only equality they are for is equality of opportunity, because this encourages and facilitates freedom of enterprise on the part of those who, favored by superior endowments or attainments, can make the best use of their freedom of opportunity to beat their fellowmen in the race of life—the devil take the hindmost! That a vast inequality of conditions will result does not deter them, for in their view trying to achieve an equality of conditions can only result in the loss of individual liberty, which is for them the higher of the two values.
On the other hand, there are the egalitarians, who not only regard an equality of conditions as the supreme value, but also are set upon trying to achieve it even if that infringes in many ways on individual liberty, and especially upon freedom of enterprise, exercised with the help of equality of opportunity. In their view equality of opportunity, if that alone exists and if individual freedom in taking advantage of it is unrestrained, will necessarily result in an inequality of conditions. This they deplore. They seek to maximize an equality of conditions, even if to do so requires many infringements upon individual liberty, which is the lesser value in their view.
The conflict, not between liberty and equality, but between extremist exponents of these values, cannot be resolved without correcting the errors that lead to the extremisms respectively espoused by the libertarian and by the egalitarian. These errors can be corrected only by understanding that neither liberty nor equality is the prime value, that neither is an unlimited good, and that both can be maximized harmoniously only when the maximization is regulated by justice.
Should an individual have unlimited freedom of action or enterprise, or only as much liberty as he can use without injuring others, without depriving them of freedom, and without causing them to suffer the serious deprivations that are consequences of an inequality of conditions? In short, should an individual have more liberty than he can exercise justly?
Negative answers to these questions lead to the conclusion that everyone should have only as much liberty as justice allows, and no more than that.
Should a society try to achieve an equality of conditions attended by no inequalities in the degree to which individuals enjoy that equality of conditions? Should it seek to maximize such an equality of conditions, even if that results in serious deprivations of individual freedom? Should it ignore the fact that human beings are unequal as well as equal, in both their endowments and attainments, and that they make unequal contributions to the welfare of the community?
Negative answers to these questions lead to the conclusion that a society should seek to achieve only as much of an equality of conditions as justice requires, and no more than that. More than that would be unjust, even as more freedom than justice allows would be an unjust exercise of liberty that is license. The reader will have noted that justice stands in a different relation to liberty and to equality.
With respect to liberty, it imposes a limitation on the amount of individual freedom that it allows, if the exercise of freedom is to be just rather than unjust.
With respect to equality, it imposes a limitation on the kind and degree of the equality, as well as the kind and degree of the inequality, it requires, if a community is to deal justly with all its members.
When justice thus regulates the pursuit of liberty and equality, both can be maximized harmoniously within the limits set. The irresolvable conflict between the erroneous extremism of the libertarian and the erroneous extremism of the egalitarian vanishes. The sovereignty of justice has corrected the errors and resolved the conflict.
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