Of course, it isn’t the first two changes in the law that really upset Sara. She’s particularly angry about the prospect of a divorce taking two years instead of just one. And here is the point where Sara’s libertarianism really gets the best of her. If a one-year wait is better than a two-year wait then, presumably, a six-month wait is better than a one-year wait. And six weeks is better than six months.
And six days is better than six weeks. And so on.
Sara is like all libertarians in that she asks the question “are we free?” without ever asking the follow-up question “are we good?” In other words, she is under the impression that America’s biggest problems result from a loss of liberty. But that is foolish and naive. America’s biggest problems are not the result of a loss of freedom. America’s biggest problems are the result of a loss of virtue.
Put simply, it is wrong to walk out of marriages because walking away from your commitments is wrong in principle. Taking a decision like divorce lightly is evidence of a lack of character and virtue.
Oftentimes, libertarians miss the point that divorce is not just an isolated individual decision. Divorce costs taxpayers money. Increases in divorce mean increases in fatherlessness, which correlate strongly with a myriad of social problems. Of course, when the family dissolves, the government is asked to come in and fill the void. Surely, Sara and her libertarian friends can understand why conservatives believe that family, not government, should be the backbone of society.
It was fitting that Sara un-friended me on Facebook before we were able to finish our conversation on marriage. She is free to think that marriages should be dissolved as easily as Facebook friendships. But impulsive decision-making is still a vice and not a virtue. There are times when the moral authority of the law should be leveraged against it.
Mike Adams is a criminology professor at the University of North Carolina Wilmington and author of Letters to a Young Progressive: How To Avoid Wasting Your Life Protesting Things You Don’t Understand.
