Liberalism, Autonomy, and Moral Conflict Stephen Gardbaum* In this article, Professor Gardbaum presents an account of liberalism in which a particular conception of the ideal of autonomy is an essential and constitutive value. This account, which distinguishes between the liberal state's relative indifference as to which substantial ways of life its citizens choose to adopt and its promotion of choice as the basis on which they are adopted, provides the basis for Professor Gardbaum's distinctively liberal cri- tique of political liberalism and its requirement of state impartialitytoward its citizens' conflicting ideals, including the ideal of autonomy. He argues that by taking the central task of political theory to be that of accommodating the "problem" of moral conflict in society, political liberalism misconceives the essential nature of the liberal enterprise. Such dissensus should be understood less as the problem to which liberalism is the solution than as the characteris- tic product of the liberal commitment to the ideal of autonomy. Accordingly, he contends, political liberalism s attempt to justify liberal political principles without relying on controversialideals fails. Professor Gardbaum claims that freeing the liberal statefrom the false constraint of impartiality permits it to take its duty to enhance choice seriously, which means that autonomy should be promoted as a substantive rather than only as a formal value. INTRODUCTION For much of the last fifteen years, a leading group of political and legal thinkers has conceived of the central task of liberal political theory as accom- modating the moral conflict typically found in modem western societies. Although there are certainly important differences among the members of this group, they share the position that the best and only justifiable conception of liberalism-which has come to be known as "political liberalism"-is one that both takes the lack of consensus on moral ideals to be the fundamental problem of political theory and offers a particular solution to this problem. This solution is to ensure that the actions of the state do not privilege or presuppose the * Associate Professor, Northwestern University School of Law. B.A., Oxford University, 1980; M.Sc., University of London, 1985; Ph.D., (political theory), Columbia University, 1989; J.D., Yale Law School, 1990. For their valuable comments and suggestions I would like to thank Bruce Ackerman, Tim Chris- tenfeld, Laura Coyne, Lawrence Douglas, Larry Lessig, Michael Perry, and Rick Pildes, as well as colleagues in a faculty workshop at Northwestern University School of Law, students in my spring 1995 seminar on contemporary political philosophy, and participants in the University of Toronto Legal The- ory Workshop. I am also grateful to the Bruce R. Gordon Fund for research support.