By Rep. Ron Paul, MD, Edited and Republished by Lewis Loflin (2025)
"...man is not free unless government is limited. There’s a clear cause and effect here that is as neat and predictable as a law of physics: As government expands, liberty contracts." — Ronald Reagan
We’ve all heard the words "democracy" and "freedom" used countless times, especially in the context of the U.S. invasion of Iraq. They’re often used interchangeably in modern political discourse, yet their true meanings are very different.
George Orwell warned about "meaningless words" in politics. In his 1946 essay Politics and the English Language, he explained that terms like "freedom," "democracy," and "justice" have been abused so long that their original meanings have been eviscerated. Orwell argued that such words are "often used in a consciously dishonest way." Without precise meanings, politicians and elites can obscure reality, conditioning people to reflexively associate certain words with positive or negative perceptions. Unpleasant facts can thus be hidden behind purposely vague language.
As a result, Americans have been conditioned to accept "democracy" as a synonym for freedom, believing democracy is unquestionably good. But the problem is that democracy is not freedom.
Democracy is simply majoritarianism, which is inherently incompatible with real freedom. Our Founding Fathers understood this, as evidenced by our republican constitutional system and their writings in the Federalist Papers. James Madison cautioned that under a democratic government, "There is nothing to check the inducement to sacrifice the weaker party or the obnoxious individual." John Adams argued that democracies grant revocable rights based on the whims of the masses, while a republic exists to secure and protect pre-existing rights.
Yet how many Americans know that the word "democracy" appears neither in the Constitution nor the Declaration of Independence, our founding documents?
A truly democratic election in Iraq, without U.S. interference or puppet candidates, would likely result in a Shiite theocracy. Shiite majority rule might mean the complete political, economic, and social subjugation of the minority Kurd and Sunni Arab populations. Such an outcome would be democratic, but would it be free? Would the Kurds and Sunnis consider themselves free? The U.S. administration talks about democracy in Iraq, but is it prepared to accept a democratically elected government hostile to the U.S. occupation? Hardly.
For all the talk of freedom and democracy, we have no idea whether Iraqis will be free in the future. They’re certainly not free while a foreign army occupies their country. The real test isn’t whether Iraq adopts a democratic, pro-Western government, but whether ordinary Iraqis can lead their personal, religious, social, and business lives without government interference.
Simply put, freedom is the absence of government coercion. Our Founding Fathers understood this, creating the least coercive government in history. The Constitution established a limited, decentralized government focused on national defense and little else. States, not the federal government, were tasked with protecting individuals against criminal force and fraud.
For the first time, a government was created solely to protect the rights, liberties, and property of its citizens. Any government coercion beyond securing those rights was forbidden, both through the Bill of Rights and the doctrine of strictly enumerated powers. This reflected the Founders’ belief that democratic government could be as tyrannical as any king.
Few Americans realize that all government action is inherently coercive. At its core, government requires taxes. If taxes were freely paid, they’d be called donations, not taxes. If we intend to use the word "freedom" honestly, we should give it real meaning: freedom is living without government coercion. So when a politician talks about freedom for this group or that, ask yourself: Is he advocating more government action or less?
The political left equates freedom with liberation from material wants, always through a large, benevolent government that creates equality. To modern liberals, people are free only when the laws of economics and scarcity are suspended—when landlords are rebuffed, doctors present no bill, and groceries are given away. But philosopher Ayn Rand, among others, demolished this argument by showing that such "freedom" for some requires taking freedoms from others. Government claims on the lives and property of those expected to provide housing, medical care, or food are coercive—and thus incompatible with freedom. "Liberalism," once a term for civil, political, and economic liberties, has become a synonym for omnipotent, coercive government.
The political right, meanwhile, equates freedom with national greatness through military strength. Like the left, modern conservatives favor an all-powerful state—but for militarism, corporatism, and faith-based welfarism. Unlike the Taft–Goldwater conservatives of yesteryear, today’s Republicans eagerly expand government spending, increase the federal police apparatus, and intervene militarily worldwide. The last links between conservatism and smaller government have been severed. "Conservatism," once about tradition and distrust of active government, has morphed into big government utopianism.
Orwell was right about meaningless words in politics. If we hope to remain free, we must cut through the fog and attach concrete meanings to the words politicians use to deceive us. We must reassert that America is a republic, not a democracy, and remind ourselves that the Constitution places limits on government that no majority can overrule. We must resist using "freedom" to describe state action. We should reject the meaningless labels of "liberals" and "conservatives," replacing them with an accurate term for both: statists.
Every politician claims to support freedom. The problem is, so few understand its simple meaning.
Originally published on February 7, 2005. Dr. Ron Paul is a Republican member of Congress from Texas.
Acknowledgment: I’d like to thank Grok, an AI by xAI, for helping me draft and refine this article. The final edits and perspective are my own.
