Both my Bereans colleagues and the many commenters have hit upon a fundamental tension that runs beneath all the talk about whom to vote for this election.  Though they might not have realized it they have been raising the very old and very crucial question of whether a nation needs virtuous political leaders to survive and thrive in the long run, or whether it can rely primarily on its well-designed institutional arrangements to sustain it when individual leaders become unvirtuous.  This question also fits nicely into a Christian analysis, as the term “virtue” inevitably is related to the tenets of special revelation, the Bible.  I am not endorsing a candidate here, but only addressing the issue I raised. The reader will have to make up his own mind in the end.

What is virtue?  Generally it can be defined as a personal quality of character that involves several separate but related elements.  Theologians and ethical philosophers often list several differentiated virtues, some of which have been derived from Greek philosophy and some from Christian theology, and some a combination of the two.  Examples include courage, honesty, faith, hope, love, prudence and others (the list extends to as many as 60 or more virtues).  These characteristics in humans can be expressed or lived mainly privately or publicly.  

It is always interesting to note that historically our own Founding Fathers, but also English writers of the seventeenth century and continental thinkers all were vitally concerned with the virtues.  These writers all extolled virtue as at least desirable and at most necessary for the leaders of a nation.  Of course the exception was Machiavelli, whose many disciples seized on his pragmatism to dismiss virtue in politics.  Fortunately, not everyone became a Machiavellian.  

We would all agree then that virtue is crucial for anyone calling himself or herself a Christian.  And that virtue (or virtues) is defined by the Scriptures.  No one is perfectly virtuous, Christian revelation tells us, and we see that in actual life too.  But we are called to obey God’s commands, many of which relate directly to personal ethics.  Here is where things get interesting.  No human, we already said, is perfect. That includes political candidates and leaders.  Their personal ethics will vary from upstanding to evil and everything between.  But they are never personally perfect.  So then, where do we draw the line on this spectrum and say this person is too unethical?  That itself presents a problem.  Do we separate the personal ethics from the public ethics?  Or do we say that one will always influence the other in ways that are too great to be overlooked?  I will leave that for the reader to decide.  My task is to show the importance and the limitation of virtue.

The importance of virtue in politics is obvious.  Without it, our politicians and officials will inevitably seek to maximize their own welfare at our expense.  The Founders know this, as James Madison wrote in Federalist 51: “If men were angels, no government would be necessary. If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary.”  Men are not angels.  They are in Biblical terms fallen and prone to sin, including various sins that affect others.  Therefore we might expect that with no virtue, we would find corruption, fraud, oppression, injustice, and other sins, committed against those whom public servants are supposed to serve.  Even if we attempt to constrain their sinful behavior through laws and enforcement of those laws, without any virtue even those efforts would do little good.  At some point we must have some measure of virtue, regardless of any other factors.  

But the reader will have noticed that I have been concerned with public virtue, that is, the behavior of actors in their public roles, not their private virtues and vices.  Again, the question is to what extent will we tolerate a degree of private vice as long as it does not “spill over” into public duty?  That seems to be a prime question for Christian voters this election cycle, and it is as usual, not easy to answer.

But what should we do, assuming that public officials are self-interested and sometimes downright selfish, and therefore prone to abuse us the citizens if possible.  Again, James Madison had something to say about that in Federalist 51:

“But the great security against a gradual concentration of the several powers in the same department, consists in giving to those who administer each department the necessary constitutional means and personal motives to resist encroachments of the others. The provision for defense must in this, as in all other cases, be made commensurate to the danger of attack. Ambition must be made to counteract ambition. The interest of the man must be connected with the constitutional rights of the place. It may be a reflection on human nature, that such devices should be necessary to control the abuses of government….This policy of supplying, by opposite and rival interests, the defect of better motives, might be traced through the whole system of human affairs, private as well as public. We see it particularly displayed in all the subordinate distributions of power, where the constant aim is to divide and arrange the several offices in such a manner as that each may be a check on the other — that the private interest of every individual may be a sentinel over the public rights. These inventions of prudence cannot be less requisite in the distribution of the supreme powers of the State.”

Madison here is simply using specific examples to illustrate a larger principle that institutional arrangements can to an extent supply what is lacking in internal virtue.  Political actors can be disincentivized in their potential choices or simply blocked from oppressing the citizen by their sinful dispositions.  And once again, we see this same issue at work in our current election cycle.  Some don’t worry too much about the candidates’ virtue–or more properly, they worry but discount it–and believe various institutional constraints will make the situation turn out well.  Others are deeply troubled about the lack of virtue on the part of all or most candidates for office, and do not believe institutional constraints will really improve things.

And so we have our perennial debate set: Which is more important, virtue or institutions?  Perhaps that is a false choice.  I would argue that both are important, one to provide a truly internalized check on bad behavior, and one that is sincere, the other to “force” sinful people to either act or not act in ways that would harm us through their political actions.  As Christians we of course have to be troubled by both private and public vice and sin.  But should we be troubled to the point that we miss the limits of politics itself?  I just finished reading an interesting book by James V. Schall, once professor of political philosophy at Georgetown University (Reason, Revelation and the Foundations of Political Philosophy LSU Press, 1987).  He made the point that politics is not the be all that ends all, and no one should place it above the highest Good, that is, God, and the affairs of His Kingdom.  If politics gets to define itself, as modern political thought has allowed, then it will tend to consume all other aspects of contemplation and devour even metaphysics, the Bible itself and Christian ideas and practices.  Politics is a temporal good–a good to be sure, but temporary-and should not be elevated beyond its capability.  If we see it that way (and I did disagree with some of Schall’s invoking of Thomas Aquinas too heavily) then we should also see the limitation of any candidate to do what he ought to do or even to try to do what he should not do.  Revelation, the Bible, does and should inform politics, but in the end politics is a pursuit of the world that cannot hope to aspire to the perfections of Christ–as much as we might like that.  The problem is that if it did aspire that way, it would have to come from individuals who themselves are fallible.  How could I trust them to make the best decisions?  If they did make decisions supposedly ushering in some sort of utopia, I believe it would be a false utopia–a dystopia.  Only God Himself could do that perfectly.  
My point, after all that rambling, is that we will have to live with imperfection in the political realm.  Our voting decisions will therefore have to be made with those problems in mind.  I have said it several times, but repeat it again for emphasis.  This is not intended to get you to vote for Donald Trump on the one hand or Hillary Clinton on the other, or for any other candidate–if I had more than two hands.  It is to ask us to think clearly, or rather in a clear-eyed fashion.  In a real sense this world is not our home, but we are called to make it as good as we can for others as God gives us grace.  But we can only do that within the parameters of God’s own revelation.  We cannot remake it into a kingdom on earth.  Nor can we be mislead into seeing all political candidates as “deplorables” unless they too can be used to usher in that kingdom.  Vote, but vote prudently.