Guest blogger: Wisconsin might be an omen for the public employees of Illinois
The confrontation between freedom and power has an indeterminable history. One hundred and fifty-two years ago, John Stuart Mill, in his famous essay, On Liberty, examined the “struggle between Liberty and Authority… between subjects, or some classes of subjects, and the Government” (Mill 1). A question he might have asked today is, what should be the limits of power that legislators have over their constituents, such as public employees, when some of these lawmakers’ decisions border on political despotism?
How can public employees guard against such arrogance, self-interest, prejudice, and prevarications? In a democracy, there must be dialogue, for “[the] silencing of discussion is an assumption of infallibility” (17). This revival of absolutism today forecloses the right to be heard and exiles truth from being openly canvassed.