THE PALEOCRAT TRIBUNE

John Medaille of The Distributist Review has written an excellent piece on Mises and the attempt of  various Catholics and conservatives to baptize him as one of their own.

NOTE: The comment section is a must read.

Attacking the freedoms of speech and the press is dangerous business. This is especially true for those of us hoping to make a name for ourselves in journalism. The idea of a journalist writing against these freedoms sounds about as absurd as a man making a verbal case against breathing, with his ability to argue the point being conditioned upon the very thing he is arguing against.

It was all the better, then, that Pope Leo XIII wasn’t a journalist. In his 1888 encyclical “Libertas Praetantissimum” (On the Nature of Human Liberty), the pope dealt with the these so-called freedoms of speech and of press. Almost 100 years after the U.S. Bill of Rights had declared them to be recognized as both natural and divine rights belonging to men, the pope denounced them (or how they had become popularly understood and applied) as absurd and dangerous to the common good and the wellbeing of the State.

Of these two freedoms he said,

“[23] It is hardly necessary to say that there can be no such right as this, if it be not used in moderation, and it is pass beyond the bounds and end of all true liberty… it is absurd to suppose that nature has accorded indifferently to truth and falsehood, to justice and injustice.”

In the same section of Libertas he goes on to say that material should be prudently propagated throughout the Sate, leaving public authorities with the power to repress those things made up of lying opinions, vices which corrupt the heart and moral life, as well as anything that may be considered ruinous to the state.

Were only this to have been written today. The American media, and presumably the majority of modern American Catholics, would be in a foaming frenzy! Politicians would simply add this to their already long list of issues where avoiding ”the right thing to do” is their top-priority. Partisans and pundits would squabble over where truth and justice begin and where falsehood and justice end. Talking heads would be preaching doomsday to liberty as their ability to say whatever they want about whoever they want whenever they want is placed on the chopping block. And let’s not forget the corporations and advertisers! For the first time in many years they would have to admit that their brand isn’t number one, but rather comes in a close third. To say that America would be flipped upside down would be an understatement.

But the American media has no reason to fear, for American Catholics take Catholic Social Doctrine as seriously as Hollywood takes Macully Kulken. Still, for those Catholics few and far between who cherish the social teaching of Mother Church, this poses plenty of difficult questions requiring our serious consideration.

Links to other encyclicals related to this topic:

Christianae Reipublicae (On the Dangers of Anti-Christian Writings)

Vigilante Cura (On Motion Pictures)

Miranda Prorsus (On the Communications Field: Motion Pictures, Radio, and Television)