To the editor:

Former Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. once said, “I like to pay taxes. With them, I buy civilization.” The radical right has said it wants to shrink government down to where it can be “drowned in the bathtub.” Pithy rhetoric, but the fact is government creates quality of life. See how much compassion corporate America has for the people when the chips are down, which they will be, sooner or later. Private interests couldn’t cope with the Great Depression — hence the New Deal.

Those who argue against funding government are in denial of the capability of corporations to become tyrannical. What will prevent them from violating or ignoring basic human rights? How about corporate farms where those who work on them are treated like slaves and there is no Bill of Rights to guarantee basic liberties? I’ve worked around farms and feedlots — some of them approach that now.

Our government, flawed as it may be, was designed as a check against tyranny. It maintains that capacity, but it is rapidly being rendered incapable of maintaining that check — and by people who think they’re fighting for democracy! In reality, they’re fighting for corporate fascism. The fact that the American colonial struggle was against the tyranny of a king doesn’t mean that private tyranny can’t happen here as well.

All that to say that funding education, governmental programs for basic human needs and services, music and the arts, is an essential part of a democratic republic.

Doug Harvey,

Lawrence