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autonomous self--offered in this context, as a Supreme Court opinion, as the nearest thing
we have to official public doctrine.
Nor could one ask for a better illustration of how a focus on the autonomous self
necessarily makes loyalty a topic of debate. This is not simply because Casey and
Lawrence, being about abortion and sodomy, deal directly with issues that raise obvious
questions of loyalty. More importantly, it is because the autonomous self, described in
such sweeping terms as the Court's, is simply not compatible with loyalty. To be loyal is,
after all, to recognize a claim upon one's self. It is to recognize that the moral universe
has a shape to it that sets limits on the choices one may properly make. The loyal person,
in other words, cannot consider himself entirely free to "define [his] own concept of
existence, of meaning, of the universe, and of the mystery of human life" in any way he
likes. He could not be loyal if he did not feel himself in some respects obligated, and
thus less than fully autonomous.
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A society (or a political philosophy) that enthrones the autonomous self is
therefore likely to have difficulties with loyalty. So it is not surprising that we do have
such difficulties. At the same time, few of us doubt that some degree of loyalty is an
important component of a good life--for what would life be without love and friendship,
and how could these exist without loyalty? The time is therefore ripe for renewed
reflection on the virtue--if it is one--of loyalty. I hope here to make a small contribution
to such reflection. I propose to examine three quite different works: Shakespeare's King
Lear, Burke's Reflections on the Revolution in France, and G. K. Chesterton's novella,
"The Loyal Traitor."
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All three of these works address the theme of loyalty. And all
three of them contain, or so I shall argue, a similar vision of both why we might want to
Convention