Socialism = Slavery

On this past Wednesday Walter E. Williams, of George Mason University, offered an editorial titled "Evil Concealed by Money". Within this he suggests that the goverment under the guise of caring for less fortunate citizens impugns moral legitimacy of the entire society.

Mr. Williams says....

Imagine there's an elderly widow down the street from you. She has neither the strength to mow her lawn nor enough money to hire someone to do it. Here's my question to you that I'm almost afraid for the answer: Would you support a government mandate that forces one of your neighbors to mow the lady's lawn each week? If he failed to follow the government orders, would you approve of some kind of punishment ranging from house arrest and fines to imprisonment? I'm hoping that the average American would condemn such a government mandate because it would be a form of slavery, the forcible use of one person to serve the purposes of another.
Would there be the same condemnation if instead of the government forcing your neighbor to physically mow the widow's lawn, the government forced him to give the lady $40 of his weekly earnings? That way the widow could hire someone to mow her lawn. I'd say that there is little difference between the mandates. While the mandate's mechanism differs, it is nonetheless the forcible use of one person to serve the purposes of another.
Probably most Americans would have a clearer conscience if all the neighbors were forced to put money in a government pot and a government agency would send the widow a weekly sum of $40 to hire someone to mow her lawn. This mechanism makes the particular victim invisible but it still boils down to one person being forcibly used to serve the purposes of another. Putting the money into a government pot makes palatable acts that would otherwise be deemed morally offensive.
This is why socialism is evil. It employs evil means, coercion or taking the property of one person, to accomplish good ends, helping one's fellow man. Helping one's fellow man in need, by reaching into one's own pockets, is a laudable and praiseworthy goal. Doing the same through coercion and reaching into another's pockets has no redeeming features and is worthy of condemnation.
Some people might contend that we are a democracy where the majority agrees to the forcible use of one person for the good of another. But does a majority consensus confer morality to an act that would otherwise be deemed as immoral? In other words, if a majority of the widow's neighbors voted to force one neighbor to mow her law, would that make it moral?
I don't believe any moral case can be made for the forcible use of one person to serve
the purposes of another. But that conclusion is not nearly as important as the fact that so many of my fellow Americans give wide support to using people. I would like to think it is because they haven't considered that more than $2 trillion of the over $3 trillion federal budget represents Americans using one another. Of course, they might consider it compensatory justice. For example, one American might think, "Farmers get Congress to use me to serve the needs of some farmers. I'm going to get Congress to use someone else to serve my needs by subsidizing my child's college education."
The bottom line is that we've become a nation of thieves, a value rejected by our founders. James Madison, the father of our Constitution, was horrified when Congress appropriated $15,000 to help French refugees. He said, "I cannot undertake to lay my finger on that article of the Constitution which granted a right to Congress of expending, on objects of benevolence, the money of their constituents." Tragically, today's Americans would run Madison out of town on a rail.

It seems like such a small effort on my part to copy the text from this editorial. The content articulates my feelings accurately. Taxation in the United States is applied forcibly. Those that approve of the system would suggest that the income tax pattern is voluntary. I would disagree, all of us have only the choice to work or not to work. To work requires acceptance of the precondition that the goverment will exact its price before gross payment is received. To circumvent this system is to do so under the assumption of risking penalty fees and or incarceration. Like Madison said, there are no provisions for benevolence in the Constitution. The federal goverment was designed to govern over interstate commerce, administer treaties and maintain a standing force for the protection of the citizenry. Starting in the early 20th century the federal goverment installed the constitutional amendment for legalization of income taxation and as that revenue stream grew it fed the escalation of class pandering by politicians. Now all, corporations and individuals alike can demand he benevolence of the federal goverment by applying the threat of mutual destruction, suggesting that if the weekest link fails, we all fail. It is wrong to assume this to be an all encompasssing mutual destruction, weakest link fail because they are the weakest, to stave off the envitable only weakens the community. Like Atlas Shrugged the receivers are bound to outnumber the providers in ever increasing numbers.

Accepting socialism is no different that accepting slavery.

We're screwed.