Aragorn’s Tax Policy

              I don’t like George R.R. Martin. I’ve never read one of his books, nor have I seen or heard much about him (outside his legendary commitment to not finishing his series). In truth, I haven’t even watched much of the show based on his books, having started years later than most and then hearing that the ending would make it a waste of time. No, my distaste for the widely respected author is based on a single quote,

“Ruling is hard. This was maybe my answer to Tolkien, whom, as much as I admire him, I do quibble with. Lord of the Rings had a very medieval philosophy: that if the king was a good man, the land would prosper. We look at real history and it’s not that simple. Tolkien can say that Aragorn became king and reigned for a hundred years, and he was wise and good. But Tolkien doesn’t ask the question: What was Aragorn’s tax policy? Did he maintain a standing army?”

It may seem, on the surface, a reasonable question. We in the modern day do love to take a purely utilitarian view of stories, asking similar questions of them long after the time and context of their creation has passed from our short memories. But this particular criticism, I think, is symptomatic of a larger illness. We no longer consider “wise and good” to be particularly desirable traits in a leader, and we almost universally dismiss them as requirements.

1.      The Argument for Personal Morals

You see, reader, it seems to me (an amateur, anonymous writer on someone else’s blog) that this sentiment is reflected all too often in our actual choosing of leaders world-wide. We no longer care about the personal morals of our national leaders, only if they profess to support our personal morals. While that may, on the surface, seem like the human race still values morals, all it really reveals is that we like the idea of morals. To decry one leader for their personal morals while propping one up for their official morals, is itself hypocrisy.  

That is, of course, one of the points Tolkien made with this very character. Faramir and Aragorn (at least for the duration of books 4-6) were set up as the opposites of Boromir and Denethor. All were high-born Numenorian rulers, all had spent their lives trying to defeat Sauron. What differed was not so much their methods, but their morals. Denethor believed that in order to keep Sauron from gaining power, he (Denethor) must gather as much of it to himself as possible. He professed to be the defender of the Free Peoples, all while gathering more and more under his direct authority. The erosion of the moral core of the House of the Steward can be seen in moments when both Boromir and Denethor seem to begrudge the happiness and freedom of others when they fight and die for it. This reveals an internal, or personal, moral state. They were no longer fighting against Sauron purely for the freedom and peace of lands beyond their own, and as such they no longer found joy when greeted with such things.

Now this is not to say that they were inept rulers. Indeed we get quite the glimpse of Denethor’s military policy leading up to the siege of Minas Tirith. We see a well maintained and regulated errantry system, carefully planned and documented shifts for guards to cover 24hrs a day, rationing of food that is so complete it even limits the food available to the top rulers of the realm, and a corps of wainriders that are able to get the women and children out of the city with minimal notice. Much allusion, too, is made to the tactical and strategic acumen of Boromir, who for a very long time held the outmost defenses against a much larger force. Indeed, I would say that if today’s populace had to choose a leader they would choose Denethor, as he had the experience and the policies that seemed most likely to lead to victory.

Let’s turn now to the example of Aragorn and Faramir. Aragorn’s parallels to Denethor begin immediately. He is the Chieftain of the rangers of the north. This small and dwindling remnant of the Numenorian empire dwells in the lands around the Shire and Bree constantly defending it from threats coming from both north and south. What’s more, they do it at great risk to life and limb, as well as under threat of total extinction as they are small in number. When they do venture into towns or villages, they are almost universally met with distrust, and often with total contempt from the people whom they defend in secret. This bit of context is key. Denethor, and through him his people, have already begun to begrudge the people they defend purely for living far away and unwittingly benefiting from Gondor’s fight with evil. Aragorn expresses a gratitude for the very existence of the people who know and despise him, purely because suffering is so alien to them (through his work and his people’s) that they cannot even conceive of what they are defended from. Faramir too, is lauded less for his keen mind for tactics and more for his morals: “I do not love the bright sword for its sharpness, nor the arrow for its swiftness, nor the warrior for his glory. I love only that which they defend.” This quote makes it clear that Faramir could never begrudge a free people their freedom because of its cost.

The point is this: despite their policies, tactics, and professional (or professed) morals Denethor and Boromir both lacked the internal (or personal) moral fortitude to defeat Sauron. Boromir succumbed to the call of the ring (i.e. the seduction of power) and Denethor became so morally bankrupt that he went insane, attempting to burn himself and his son alive.

This, like all works of a mind like Tolkien’s, can be readily applied to our own world. It is meant to warn the reader that policy, even officially adopted morality, will inevitably turn to immorality if the one adopting or enforcing the policy is personally immoral. The oft touted American political adage of “I wouldn’t want him to date my daughter, but he knows how to run the country!” is self-defeating. Any seemingly moral policy imposed by a morally bankrupt individual is simply gilded immorality.

2.    The  Appeal to Solomon

Having made the case as best I can for the necessity of a strong moral code to the ruling or administration of a nation, I’ll now move on to address how it can be translated to government. After the Ring is destroyed, Aragorn (now King Elessar) begins the administration of his realm. Avid readers of Tolkien’s work would know that Aragorn was raised in Rivendell as the foster son of Elrond, one of the oldest and wisest figures in Elvendom at the time. It would be reasonable, then, to assume that he received a noble’s education. We see throughout the story that he has many hallmarks of such a tutelage: he speaks several languages, is well instructed in history and folklore, and has a mastery of the political subtleties of his day. Having said that, it is still an assumption. Why? Because that is not the facet of Aragorn’s person that Tolkien chooses to give us post-coronation. Instead, Tolkien (quite intentionally) returns to the subjects of wisdom and morality, preferring them over intellect and policy.

During the first few days of his rule, King Elessar presides over the case of a guardsman named Beregond. Beregond’s charges (to which he willingly confessed) were abandoning his post, murder of a fellow guardsman, and spilling blood in a hallowed place. Beregond’s story is, by this point in the narrative, well known to the reader. He had learned from the Hobbit Peregrin that Denethor had gone mad and was having wood and oil brought to burn himself and his son Faramir alive. Beregond, being one of the men under Faramir’s captainship, was terrified for his beloved lord. After much agonizing and at the request of Peregrin, Beregond leaves his post to try and save Faramir, his captain. Arriving at the doors to the tombs, he pleads with the door warden to lock the doors until Gandalf can come and, hopefully, restore sanity to Denethor. The warden refuses, adhering rather to the policy of his lord, and Beregond slays him in order to hold the door against the servants who would return with the wood and oil.

King Elessar hears this story, and as King must pass judgement. Here we get another brief look into the law (or policy) of Gondor as Elessar states that all these things separately warrant Capitol Punishment. But Tolkien uses this as a chance to show how when a ruler possesses a strong internal moral code, the official moral policies are elevated instead of corrupted (one could say the morality is 24 carats as opposed to gilded). Elessar pronounces judgement; Beregond is to be banished from Minas Tirith, never again to return to the city where he was born, and where he had served his whole life. Instead, he was to dwell in Ithilien, the place Elessar had given Faramir as a fiefdom. There he would be the head of Faramir’s guard and live in honor. This is Tolkien’s illustration of a wise and moral leader. In this appeal to Solomon Tolkien, in effect, answers Mr. Martin’s question before it is asked. Elessar’s wisdom, and his internal morality, allow for both justice and mercy, without one diminishing the other. These qualities that we so quickly dismiss in our modern governments are in one sense the foundation of a just and free nation, and in another the very qualities that allowed Tolkien to even conceive of such a resolution for his narrative thread.

This single example illustrates the different ways of understanding laws. One is to say that the law determines what is moral. Under such an interpretation Beregond would have been executed for his actions. This is the kind of thought that gives rise to the “lawful but awful” action. The other way of understanding law is that it is meant to protect us from immoral acts, whether we are the victim or the perpetrator. Using this lens, we can see how a ruler’s internal morality acts to warm the cold hand of the law. In this view nothing “lawful but awful” can be allowed to exist, as law is intended for protection rather than direction. This example serves as an illustration of Elessar’s strong internal morality. Furthermore, it serves the basic function of all examples, to provide a logical base from which we can make conclusions about other similar issues, such as tax law.

3.      A Short Literary Critique of Historicalism

Lastly, I want to address the claim that “We look at real history and it’s not that simple”. The simplest answer that I would give to this is that history is not art. It certainly can often read like a great epic, and the stories contained therein have their own morals and teachings; but history is not trying to make a point. History’s main goal is to teach itself. It is a subject in se. The Lord of the Rings, while conceived as an alternative history for our world (taking place on our own Earth but in a time period of Tolkien’s own creation), was meant to be a folk-myth. These mythical histories are not subjects in se, rather they are meant to convey some value or teaching particular to the people who gave rise to the myth.

As such it is silly to criticize its elements from the viewpoint of history. The mythical character of Aragorn/Elessar is clearly intended to pass on lessons to the descendants of his own people (the Germanic and Saxon people as Tolkien meant it to be) rather than to provide a lesson in history. It is for this reason we don’t see an account of Saruman’s invention of black powder, we simply see that he has developed it and focus rather on the effect it has on warfare. These mythical moments are not, and were never, intended to pass on concrete historical facts. Instead, they were intended to give the next generation a sense of the hardships their forebearers had overcome, and what’s more, the lessons they learned in overcoming it.

It should, then, seem clear that the application of a cold historicalism to this story will necessarily leave one wanting, the same way that you would find yourself wanting if you went to a BMW Dealership to buy groceries—they simply are not meant to provide what you are looking for. You are in the wrong place; the dealership is not selling the wrong thing.

Lastly, a fundamental rebuke of Mr. Martin’s question. How many examples of policy are required to satisfy this objection? As mentioned earlier in the essay, the primary function of an example is to provide data by which the reader may extrapolate how other situations will be resolved. We have already covered the example of Elessar’s criminal justice policy. In that system we see elements similar to the American system: we have strata of offenses (these crimes each bear their own punishment), aggravating circumstances (the murder was committed on holy ground) and mitigating circumstances (the murder was committed in order to prevent a murder suicide). We also see that instead of the crimes automatically imposing their connected sentence, the King carries sentencing authority like a modern-day judge. This is the basis of the modern legal practice of Sentencing Guidelines. The question, then, becomes: how many examples are required?

Having seen a multifaceted example of Elessar/Gondor’s penal code, why do we need to know his tax policy? If we had both the example of the penal code and a tax policy, would Mr. Martin still want to know the policies on a standing army? If provided those two additional policy examples, why not simply wonder what his stance on Gondorian fishing rights was? This criticism that Mr. Martin has leveled simply does not stand up. It is akin to reading a book on zoology and complaining aloud that it was woefully underdeveloped on the topic of physics. That is simply not what the book is teaching you.

4.      Closing Remark

Myths are historical, but they are not history. Tolkien uses his myth to impart on his readers the importance of maintaining a strong system of internal morals, and requiring that their leaders do the same. He repeatedly makes the point that the policies of the learned and mighty are in the end insufficient to defeat this great evil they face. Instead, it is personal morality of the simple that allows for triumph over evil. This is not a pie-in-the-sky fantasy, rather it is a warning. The moment we abandon goodness for greatness, we fall to evil.