R: The Tree of Liberty Must Be Watered with the Blood of Tyrants

Revolution lives at the forefront of the American conscience. Our tumultuous founding has impressed upon our minds the assumption that freedom must forcibly resist the bonds of oppression wherever they may be present. This has manifested itself in many forms—some violent, some not—throughout our history, with the Civil War, civil rights movement, and even the establishment of a right to privacy serving as symptoms of the root cause. This makes the American conservative, then, a sort of walking contradiction: how can a revolutionary patriot be considered in any way a lover of institutions? This debate attempts to flesh out the ethical consequences of revolution and whether it can ever be truly just to wring liberty from a blood-soaked cloth. 

The affirmative directly follows Jefferson’s logic in the Declaration of Independence, claiming that if men institute governments for the purpose of protecting their rights, then men maintain the right to overthrow their government when it becomes destructive of that end. Bloodshed is not an immediate or preferable option for dealing with tyranny, but it must always remain the final option. In this sense, true conservatives ought to view revolution not as a rash decision, but as an extremely calculated one. Beyond the realm of conservatism, it is far more ethical, the affirmative argues, to side with the oppressed in their struggle than with the oppressor. Jesus came to bring not peace, but a sword; we, too, must take up the sword of justice if we are to fully embrace our duty as citizens of our nation and of God’s kingdom. 

The negative relies upon a simple presupposition: that it is better to endure evil than to commit it. This principle spans the Western Canon from Plato to the New Testament, and it serves to show the consequences that poor execution of revolution can yield. The negative does not take a stance of strict pacifism, but they are skeptical of those who jump to violence as an answer to solve their problems. Many of those who wish to water the tree of liberty with blood are doing so to self-aggrandize their own material ends without stopping to consider the immense loss that comes from such drastic measures. On the contrary, those in the negative would recall Jesus’ claim to turn the other cheek, as well as Burke’s belief that a nation is only good when “ten thousand swords” jump to the defense of the innocent and the beautiful, even when it comes in the form of apparent oppression. The negative, distrusting the affirmative’s claims about justice, resists them. 

Is violence ever necessary? Do societies flourish more with constant revolution or constant order? And would it really be so bad if we were all just a little bit more like John Brown?