Tolkien and Western Government

[Child of the 7th Age]

I am supposed to be racing out the door, but can't resist throwing something into this pot. As was often true with Tolkien, it's possible to identify two contradictory ideals in his writings. Still, if forced to say whether Tolkien was closer to anarchism or benevolent dictatorship/monarchies, I would go with anarchism. Let's review the evidence....

First, there is the ideal at the end of LotR: the establishment of a Reunited Kingdom under a benevolent monarch. Note that this is not a "new" development, but rather the restoration of an ideal from the past. As Tolkien noted, "the progress of the tale ends in what is far more like the re-establishment of an effective Holy Roman Empire with its seat in Rome." While some readers may concentrate on the figure of the "emperor", asking what kind of power that individual wields, Bethberry is right to question that emphasis. Tolkien's real focus is not the figure of the ruler but what that ruler is trying to restore. The tight control of Saruman and Sauron, the machine horrors of Isengard, are to be replaced with a gentler hand.

It's certainly clear Tolkien believed absolute power was inherently corrupting, since the Ring could destroy even those with the best intentions. With this lesson in mind, one of the first steps Aragorn takes is to limit his own authority. What absolute ruler, even a benevolent one, would agree to have parts of his kingdom where he could not even set foot?

Just as Tolkien rejected Sauron's attempt to create a monolithic, machine-driven regime, he disliked the conformity and mechanization that inevitably accompanies nationalism and modernity. Tolkien felt any form of central planning was doomed to failure. The modern democratic state presupposes a huge class of bureaucrats, a group Tolkien considered morally subversive and little better than orcs. Whether or not we personally agree, Tolkien was strongly anti-totalitarian and anti-democratic:

"I am not a democrat, only because humility and equality are spiritual principles corrupted by the attempt to mechanize and formalize them, with the result that we get not universal smallness and humility but universal greatness and pride, till some Orcs get hold of a ring of power--and we get and are getting slavery.

For Tolkien "politics" was a nasty business that inevitably led to an unacceptable concentration of power. It is Denethor rather than Aragorn whom he pinpoints as the possible absolute ruler:

Denethor was tainted with mere politics: hence his failure, and his mistrust of Faramir. It had become for him a prime motive t preserve the polity of Gondor, as it was, against another potentate, who had made himself stronger and was to be feared and opposed for that reason rather than because he was ruthless and wicked......If he had survived as a victor, even without use of the Ring, he would have taken a long stride towards becoming a tyrant, and the terms and treatment he accorded to the deluded people of east and south would have been cruel and vengeful. He had become a "political" leader....

These quotes underline Tolkien's rejection of the modern state, democratic or otherwise. The first is from Mythopoeia and the second in a letter to Christopher, who was fighting in the second World War.

Blessed are the legend-makers with their rhyme
of things not found within recorded time.
It is not they that have forgot the Night,
or bid us flee to organized delight,
in lotus-isles of economic bliss
foreswearing souls to gain a Circe-kiss
(and counterfeit at that, machine-produced,
bogus seduction of the twice-seduced)

However, it is, humans being what they are, quite inevitable, and the only cure (short of universal Conversion) is not to have wars nor planning nor regimentation...All Big Things planned in a big way feel like that to the toad under the harrow, though on a general view they do function and do their job. An ultimately evil job. For we are attempting to conquor Sauron with the Ring. And we shall (it seems) succeed. But the penalty is, as you will know, to breed new Saurons, and slowly turn Men and Elves into Orcs.....Well, there you are: a hobbit amongst the Urukhai.

Tolkien's second ideal was the agrarian Shire. What fascinates me is how the Shire embodies the philosophy of Thomas Jefferson (at least before Jefferson's life became tangled up with politics and slavery). Both Tolkien and Jefferson espoused an isolationist community of farmers, a half republic loosely ruled by a natural aristocracy. The Shire had a mayor or two, a few Watchers and Bounders, an hereditary thain only called upon in time of emergency, but nothing more. Until the arrival of Saruman's henchmen, hobbits did not know the meaning of the word "coercion".

If Tolkien's had a personal political ideal, it lay in the Shire. Since man is inherently flawed, it is best that no single individual or state wield great authority. In an ideal world, an absolute monarch who had no flaws would be the perfect answer, but realistically that situation posed too many risks. In Tolkien's eyes, better the agrarian Shire where no one person exercised control and even the notion of the "State" is non-existent.