Benevolent Despotism

"Would you tell me please, Mr Howard, why should I trade one tyrant three thousand miles away for three thousand tyrants one mile away? An elected legislature can trample a man's rights as easily as a king can."
--Benjamin Martin (The Patriot)

I found this article from 1947 interesting from at least three standpoints:

1) Liberals then and now. The classic concept of liberalism concerns the struggle of individuals to assert their liberty against authority. Those who call themselves liberals today (equally applies in 2010 as it did in 1947) believe in increasing the authority of the state at the expense of individual liberty. Classical liberalism is suspicious of government and seeks to restrain its power. Today's liberals look upon the citizen with suspicion and upon governments with approval.

2) All men are created equal. This passage from the Declaration refers to equality under the law. Our founding was a departure from history. Under the rule of authority, which has dominated civilization over 5000 yrs, people of different social status are treated differently under the law. Our legal system continues to exhibit tendency to substitute justice based on class distinction for equality under the law.

3) Dilemma. The author nicely states the dilemma facing many of those who call themselves liberals today. Quoting,

"Sincere, modern liberals do not deliberately desire to set up an authoritarian government. All they want to do is to improve the lot of mankind. They want everyone to be decently housed, decently fed, decently clothed, and they are willing to give government unlimited authority to accomplish desireable ends. They wish to override individual liberties only when individual liberties hinder government in accomplishing results which they approve. They want government to be powerful to do good without being powerful to do harm."

The author goes on to note the weakness of 'benevolent despotism' (nice tag) is that there's no guarantee that benevolence will stick, and he cites late 1800s Germany as an example. I'd go further to note that history indicates that such a state has never persisted.

Power, corruption, and incompetence that accompany the redistribution of resources by the state inevitably break this design economically.