Elvert Barnes, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons
I’m sure that most readers are shocked when they learn that a known criminal has been elected to an office of trust in some level of government. (I saw just the other day that a lady with a rap sheet as long as your arm was elected mayor somewhere in the US.) The poster child of this phenomenon was Marion Barry getting elected as mayor of Washington, DC after serving a jail sentence for drug possession.
In his famous book Road to Serfdom, Friedrich Hayek addressed a similar but not quite identical question. In chapter four Hayek explained “Why the Worst Get on Top”. Notice the slight difference in topic. Hayek explained why the worst attained positions of power; whereas, I asked why people vote them into office. If I can explain Hayek simply, it is because only the worst are willing to seek absolute and ruthless control over others. My question takes this one step further and asks why, even though we know that some people running for office are criminals and seek only to reward themselves and lord over the rest of us in unscrupulous ways, why in the world do they win elections?
I have come to the conclusion that voters actually want these criminals in office, because they know that these unscrupulous people will do legally what many voters cannot legally do personally, which mainly is take from some and give to others…in other words steal the property of others and legally transfer that property to the voters. Notice how the voters’ conscience remains unsullied. Why, it’s all legal! Sure, I cannot steal from my neighbor, but government can. My neighbor must pay for all manner of “entitlements” for the “less advantaged”. All very humanitarian, isn’t it? No one ever asks why, if so many agree with this sentiment, one just couldn’t contribute to a private charity as much or as little as he sees fit. It’s no good to claim that voluntary contributions would not raise enough money, because there is no objective way to determine the proper amount of the charitable fund.
Therefore, I seem to be left with the sad conclusion that the voters do not want an honest and honorable person in office, who probably would not stoop to pure theft through taxation. No, the voters actually want a criminal in office who has no scruples for exercising the heady power to take from some and give to others, and receive accolades from “the others” for doing so.
Maybe someone else has a better insight than I.
© Patrick Barron 2026 Website
