"But we voted on it!"
Yes, I've heard this response.
It's pretty easy to refute this and to make the LIQ (lib in question) admit that it is theft and then say they don't care that it is.
Using Williams' approach-
It is laudable for me to give something to someone in need.
It is theft, and deplorable, for me to rob someone else to give it to someone in need.
It doesn't matter if there are 5 people or 100,000 people saying that it is ok for me to rob someone else to give to the needy - it's still theft, and still deplorable.
For Williams argument to work, you have to agree to the unstated premise that there is no difference between an illegal act (”robbery”) and a legal one, (taxation) - that there is no “legitimate” basis for any government action which enforces “collective rights” at the cost of “individual rights”.
To so, you have to be an anarchist, because any functioning government engages in such acts as a matter of course, the only practical question is the current nature of the balance.
And as a matter of historical experience the way such questions get settled is that:
1)Economic and political systems become so *upwardly* redistributionist that only a autocratic or totalitarian kleptocracy can maintain order - until it can’t anymore.
-or-
2) Representative government works well enough so that you don’t arrive at 1).
The deal in the US is that we accept higher rewards for most successful and less redistribution to everyone else on the grounds that this maximizes individual opportunity.
IMO, in a economy which is experiencing rapid upwards redistribution of wealth and income to the point where there is also an upwards redistribution - or at least stagnation - of opportunity, it’s a bit beside the point to bemoan the fact we can’t arrange things so that that this happens faster.