“Both great wings of conservatism need each other. They complement and complete each other.”
Not if “social conservatives” consider government the proper means by which to advance on the norms of personal conduct they value so highly.
As a conservative (and a Catholic), I value traditional wisdom about personal good conduct highly. As a libertarian, I reject and oppose the use of force to compel others to behave as I would prefer them to behave (except, of course, for the punishment of crimes of violence, theft, fraud, and abuse of the helpless). The “social conservative” who agrees with me is my beloved brother…but the “social conservative” who wants to use the police powers of the State to enforce laws against private sexual conduct, private use of intoxicants, private gambling, private irreligion, and the like is no fellow-traveler of mine.
Libertarians, in short, cannot make common cause with social-cons who don’t understand and appreciate privacy.
In recent years, “social conservatism” has begun to shed some of its indefensible political extensions, a positive development. Eventually, it will coalesce around wholly defensible positions and defensible uses of government power: banning second and third-trimester abortions, acting against the abuse of children, defending women against spousal abuse, and similar mala in se. At that point, there’ll no longer be a significant cleavage between libertarians and social-cons. Because, in case no one else has noticed, this isn’t Iran. It isn’t even 17th century Massachusetts.
