As part of my application to George Mason University in Virginia, I was required to write an essay of no more than 500 words on one of three topics. I choose to write to the question of What values are most important for the preservation of human freedoms?
This is my second draft, so if I have missed any grammatical errors I am truly sorry.
On that note, and without any more unnecessary ado my essay is be pasted below the fold:
What values are most important for the preservation of human freedoms?
When considering the question, ‘What values are most important for the preservation of human freedoms?’, one must first begin by determining what constitutes a human freedom. Freedom is a fluid thing; that is to say that its definition and what those rights are that can be called freedom is in an almost continuous state of flux that is dependent on the will of society and the laws of a ruling government. Thomas Jefferson, largely influenced by the likes of Hobbes and other philosophers, was able to develop a fairly short, but concise and reasonable definition of what freedoms are, in a letter to Isaac H. Tiffany, written in 1819, he stated that "rightful liberty is unobstructed action according to our will within limits drawn around us by the equal rights of others." For this essay, that will function very well as a workable definition of human freedoms.
To preserve an individual freedom it becomes necessary to also ensure that no other member of society should feel a need to infringe upon another individual or group’s freedoms. One of the primary motives that causes people to attempt to stifle others’ freedoms is a sense of poverty or a desire for more wealth, that is to say the motive is greed. Thus, it often becomes the case that in order to ensure freedoms one must prevent groups of people from holding too much power, whether in the governmental or business senses. This attempt at gaining power is caused because once a group or person has observed how much they can benefit themselves with their newfound power, they want more of it, much in the same way a person might become addicted to cocaine. Once on top a ruling cadre will consistently strive to push down the new lower class, and will scheme with whomever necessary to ensure that they remain in their position on top. It is for these reasons that society must prevent small minority groups from taking hold of a government or economic system, because this control does not just lead to the disenfranchisement of citizens in the governmental processes and the impoverishment of people in the economic realm, but it is truly the beginning of the restriction of society’s and therefore of individuals’ freedoms. This is because the ruling class, as it attempts to gain an ever larger amount of power, will inevitably resort first to restricting dissidents from speaking out against the ruling class, this will inevitably progress to restricting the ability of anyone they feel might slow their consolidation of power from doing anything they find questionable. This slippery slope will continue, if not halted by citizens, until a formerly free nation finds itself a police state controlled by a small cadre of rulers interested only in their personal welfare and not concerned with the state of their nation. And so it is that the most critical value in the preservation of freedom is that of equality in not just the government but also in an economic sense.