The British government murdered a toddler.

Hyperbole?

Perhaps.

But we will never know. The government refused to allow Alfie’s parents to take him out of Alder Hey Children’s Hospital. In fact, government agents surrounded the hospital just in case Tom Evans and Kate James decided to try to spirit the child away.

Alfie was 23-months old. He was admitted to Alder Hey Children’s Hospital in Liverpool in December 2016 after he suffered a series of seizures. Doctors diagnosed him with a degenerative neurological condition. Eventually, doctors at the hospital gave up saving the boy. His parents wanted to fly Alfie to a hospital in Rome for further treatment. Italy even gave the toddler citizenship in order to facilitate his transfer. It wasn’t going to cost the British government a dime. But officials at the government-run hospital said, “No!” declaring it wasn’t in the best interest of the child.

The hospital went to court to obtain an order to remove the child’s life support. In other words, the state set the wheels of “justice” in motion to kill a 23-month-old child against the will of his parents.

Let that sink in for a second.

Doctors and government officials argued that the child was in a semi-vegetative state and that further treatment was not only “futile” but “unkind and inhumane.” Alfie’s parents disagreed. Ironically, the child lived several days after the state pulled the plug. Even that wasn’t enough to sway government officials. Alfie was not allowed to go to Rome. But he was allowed to die.

Was the government right? Would keeping Alfie aliv havee gone against his best interest? I suppose that’s open to debate. But we face a more fundamental question: Why is it any of the government’s damn business?

Statists will argue that parents sometimes make bad decisions. That’s true. But so does the state. The problem is the state gets to back up and enforce its bad decisions with guns.

When the rubber meets the road, the state believes it owns both you and your children. At one point, High Court Justice Hayden said, “Alfie is a British citizen” who “falls therefore under the jurisdiction of the High Court.”

Wrong.

Alfie is a child of God. Alfie is a citizen of God’s kingdom. He falls under the jurisdiction of the Almighty. And God saw fit to place Alfie in the care of Tom Evans and Kate James.

Somebody has to have the final say – for better or worse. That should be the parents, not an institution rooted in violence and coercion that views individuals as mere cogs in its collective mechanism. They may pontificate about “the best interest of the child,” but politically connected lawyers in black dresses owe their allegiance to the state. It’s the state’s best interest they represent, not any individual. If it means killing a kid or two along the way – so be it.

Police blocking the hospital entrance served as the iconic image of this whole fiasco. They were going to keep Alfie inside even if they had to crack some skulls to do it. The state decreed Alfie was to die, and by-God he was going to die safe and sound in an English hospital.

The authorities even threatened those who might get a little too vocal about their displeasure. The Merseyside Police issued a statement.

“Merseyside Police has been made aware of a number of social media posts which have been made with reference to Alder Hey Hospital and the ongoing situation involving Alfie Evans.I would like to make people aware that these posts are being monitored and remind social media users that any offences including malicious communications and threatening behaviour will be investigated and where necessary will be acted upon.”

I’m certain each of those police officers viewed him or herself as a faithful public figure. I don’t. I view them as accomplices to murder. But they did offer their sincere condolences after the kid died, calling it a “sad loss.”

For a moment, the mask fell off and we got to see the true nature of the state. It is coercion, force and violence wrapped up in an official veneer. We dress the enforcers in fancy uniforms and drape the judges in robes. We wave the flags and sing the anthems. But underneath, it’s just brutes with guns imposing some kind of mythical collective will.

The state killed Alfie. He may well have died anyway. But we’ll never know. The enforcers had their way.