The Reactionary Utopian

Underworld and Overworld

August 23, 2007

[Originally published by the Universal Press Syndicate, December 25, 1997]

We're supposed to smirk automatically at the phrase conspiracy theory, as if the very idea of a conspiracy were somehow outlandish and, well, paranoid. But federal prosecutors seem to have made a pretty convincing case that Terry Nichols and Timothy McVeigh conspired to blow up the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City in 1995. At least nobody is suggesting that all the jurors in the two trials were loco.

Today's column is "Underworld and
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The idea of conspiracy is essential to criminal law. It means nothing more than secret cooperation to commit criminal acts. It's implicit in such common expressions as accomplice, organized crime, and getaway car. The alternative is to believe that criminals always act alone. Yes, and musicians always play solo.

Of course there are silly conspiracy theories. That doesn't mean that there aren't also sane and sophisticated conspiracy theories. Those who indiscriminately deride curiosity about conspiracy are often trying to steer our attention away from the possibility of official corruption, the existence of which is pretty well attested.

But the most damaging corruption may not consist in illegal acts. Just as there is a criminal “underworld” that continuously conspires to break the law, you can think of the political process as the working of an “overworld” in a sort of continuous conspiracy to remake the laws to suit itself.

If the widget industry can get tax subsidies by persuading legislators to make laws in its favor, no crime has been committed. And this can be accomplished without gross bribery. Key senators and congressmen may be receptive to the argument that new, high-tech widgets are vital to national defense (and might be manufactured in those honorable gentlemen's states). This patriotic proposal may be transacted over an informal lunch, immensely boosting the profits of the widget industry, and the taxpayer never the wiser.

When there are no limits on what the taxing power may be used for, you are bound to get a whole class of people seeking to have it used in their behalf. What would otherwise be illegal — taking people's earnings by force — becomes legal when a government does it (just as inflating the currency, otherwise known as counterfeiting, becomes “increasing the money supply” when a government does or authorizes it).

The class of people who live and prosper by discreetly arranging to have their larceny legalized is what I mean by the “overworld.” Their ranks include politicians, businessmen, educators, and many others. Because they control the legislative process, they not only don't have to commit crimes, they don't even think of themselves as shady operators.

[Breaker quote for Underworld and Overworld: Continually conspiring to make the law]

[Breaker quote for Underworld and Overworld: Continually conspiring to make the law]

These folks do share certain characteristic attitudes. They dislike “extremism,” by which they mean any political principle that would keep government power and activity to a minimum. They are equally opposed to communism and “cutthroat capitalism” (whose evils they impartially equate with those of communism). They believe in an “affirmative role” for government, “flexible,” “compassionate,” and “adapted to today's needs.” They tout the virtues of “compromise.” They favor “partnership” between government and “the private sector,” because the modern world is so “complex” and “interdependent.” And of course they are scornful of “conspiracy theories.”

Such people always sound reasonable, and they are the type who control the government. If their sense of honor isn't very strong, it would also be hard to catch them doing anything flatly illegal.

They aren't a secret cabal or a closed society. Anyone can join their ranks — anyone who wants to play the angles, to use the government for his own special benefit at the expense of the unsuspecting taxpayer.

An overworld exists in every society, a parasite class that figures out how to get others to work for them while keeping the law on their side. In many societies there are outright lords and slave owners who may directly command their serfs and bondsmen; in a nominally egalitarian society a more devious approach is necessary.

You may be working much of the day to support your neighbor without knowing it. You know that a lot of your income goes to the government, but you don't exactly know where it goes from there. That's how the system is designed to work.

Joseph Sobran

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