===== PAGE 1 =====

THE

[eld

JANUARY 1957
NE

IDEAS ON LIBERTY

The Risk Within . . . . . . . . . Douglas MacArthur 2
“If We Behave Wisely” . . . . . . W. C. Mullendore 4
The Engineer's Obligation. . . . . . Ben Moreell nN
Why Wages Rise

11: Pricing an Hour of Work . . . . F. A. Harper 13
How Poor the Farmer? . . . . . . . Herbert L. Schaller 22
The Morality of Capitalism . . . . . W. H. Chamberlin 24
World Invisible . . . . . . . . . Diogenes 31
Our Four Great Faiths . . . . . . . W.G. Vollmer 34
Equality Re-examined . . . . . . . Reginald Jebb 39
The Mathematical Manpower Shortage. . Henry E. Belden 42
Well, I'll Be Switched . . . . . . . F. A Harper 48
A Reviewer's Notebook . . . . . . John Chamberlain 55

Other Books . . . . . . . . . 58

fy THE FOUNDATION
FLE FOR ECONOMIC EDUCATION, INC.

Irvington-on-Hudson, New York



===== PAGE 2 =====

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===== PAGE 3 =====

DID YOU KNOW?

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largest railroads but, actually, the department of each railroad, Rail-
owners are the 850,000 stock- way Express cannot have any net
" holders of these railroads. Rail- income or surplus. Every dollar of
way Express, therefore, is one of revenueremaining after thededuc-
America’s most widely owned tion of Express expenses goes to
private enterprises.’’ those carriers as payment toward
Of course, there is more to it their costs in hauling express. En-
thanthat. Throughcontractswith  joying no government subsidies,
more than 400 additional private Railway Express must compete,
enterprise carriers — rail, truck, on the basis of service provided,
air and water— Railway Express with all other forms of transpor-
makes available to the shipping tation, public and private.
public a vast, coordinated 380,- Express has to be safe, swift,
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The Public Relations Division

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219 East 42nd Street, New York 17, N. Y.

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===== PAGE 4 =====

General Douglas MacArthur speaks . . .

E APPROACH for the first time The almost incredible destructive-
Wi history an era in which the ness of modern weapons upon civil
industrial tools provided by science communities has brought to all
and technology give promise to mankind the realization that mili-
mankind of satisfaction of his tary force is no longer an exploit-
basic economic and material needs. able method of settling interna-
Poverty cannot be entirely abol- tional rivalries. The victor, if any
ished, but the welfare of all man- such should emerge, would suffer
, I , almost as greatly as the van-
! quished.

: If this nation is ever destroyed,
i he RISK | I unhesitatingly predict it will
: i. not be from external force. Our
i : { own internal hazards, the spon-

taneous combustions arising from

the accelerating complexities of

: modern life‘in an ever-multiplying
| community, are the ones which
give rise to anxiety. They are too

{ numerous for me to attempt to
enumerate, but surely one of the
most dangerous of these is exces-
kind can be raised. Tomorrow’s sive taxation and its sinister by-
standards can make today look like product and offspring — inflation.
a mere start. In the lexicon of government there

It is not my purpose to attempt is no more grim and pertinent
to conceal or minimize in the aphorism than Chief Justice John
slightest degree the difficulties and Marshall’s warning as early as
dangers that beset the national 1819 that the power to tax includes
way. the power to destroy. Indeed, this

The national dangers are both is the weapon that Karl Marx de-
external and internal. Externally, clared was the vital one to dis-
they are those incident to war. place the system of free enterprise
But this contingency I regard as — the system on which our nation
logically only a remote possibility. was founded — the system which

2


===== PAGE 5 =====

1957 THE RISK WITHIN 3

has made us the most prosperous the capitalistic system, and level

people of all history. representative government to
Reasonable taxation is, of sovietism.
course, an essential of govern- Taxation has been the cause of

ment; but when taxation is used more bloody revolutions in the
as a social regulator, it becomes history of government than any
a menace to freedom. When its other one provocation. It precipi-
rate is so excessive that men work tated our own Revolution which
month after month with all that resulted in the founding of the
they earn going to government, it United States of America. The
amounts almost to forced labor. It Boston Tea Party is still symbolic.
practically reduces them for pro- The Biblical story of Christ’s re-
tracted periods to something akin pudiation and expulsion of the tax
to involuntary servitude. It is an tyrants from the temple is still a
unwarranted assumption that a warning. Its excesses and idio-
handful of men, centered in gov- syncrasies hang like a dark cloud
ernment, largely bureaucratic over the destinies of those con-
rather than elected, can spend the nected with this company and
proceeds of toil and labor to every other company in this be-
greater advantage than he who loved land of ours. ° oo
) creates the money. Excessive taxa- ——
dom, can destroy initiative, absorb corporation, July 31, 1956.

THE JANUARY 1957 « Vol.7, No. 1

{ ) Additional copies, postpaid to “The Mathematical Manpower

one address: Singie copy, 50c; 3 Shortage,” “How Poor the

) for $1.00; 25 or more, 20c each. Farmer,” and ‘‘World invisible.”

Permission is hereby granted to Any article will be supplied in

anyone to reprint any article in reprint form if there are enough

A MONTHLY JOURNAL whole or in part (providing cus- inquiries to justify the cost of
OF IDEAS ON LIBERTY tomary credit is given), except printing.

The Freeman is published monthly by the Foundation for Economic Education, Inc., Irvington-on-
* Hudson, N. Y. Anyone may receive the journal regularly upon written request; an annual subscription-

donation of $5.00 or more is a suggestion—not a requirement.

Accepted as controlled circulation publication at Irvington, N. Y. with additional entry at New

York, N. Y. Copyright 1957, The Foundation for Economic Education, Inc. Printed in U. S. A.



===== PAGE 6 =====

Ie ) he

h If We Behave Wisely =

Ww. C. MULLENDORE
Fala
A skeptical appraisal of the con- excited discussion, consternation,
cept that no harm may befall those and much organized, unorganized,
whom the government controls. and determined, if not effective,
opposition. Many in this audience
Tor EXTRAORDINARY and far- will remember thé shocked amaze-
reaching changes have occurred ment with which the New Deal
in this century and particularly in measures enacted by the Hundred-
the past quarter century is not a Day Congress of 1933 were re-
matter of dispute. Insofar as the ceived by those who were aware
argument about them continues, of their meaning.
it is only as to what they mean —
in which direction are they taking The New Deal
us? In this past quarter century, And the Hundred-Day Congress
we have experienced the greatest of 1933 was only the beginning!
depression, the greatest war, the Thereafter, it is true, the Blue
biggest and most prolonged boom Eagle of the Recovery Act, with
in our history. More important its codes and absolute power over
has been the alteration in our polit- labor and industry, was killed by
ical, social, and economic institu- a decision of the Supreme Court.
tions — in our cohesiveness, our be- But, in its stead, there was en-
liefs, our self-reliance, and atti- acted a series of laws giving gov-
tudes toward each other with re- ernment power over labor-manage-
spect to our mutual rights and ment relations, hours, wages,
obligations as fellow citizens and price-fixing, the farms and
fellow human beings. farmers, money and banking,
When. the great mutations in credit and income, rents and hous-
our institutions were proposed and ing, and so forth — powers over
made in the decade of the thirties, the income and savings and lives
there were, as most of you can and livelihood of the people which,
still remember, widespread and in toto, went far beyond the first
Mr. Mullendore, Chairman of Southern California Edison Company, also is President of the
California State Chamber of Commerce, Agriculture and Industry. His unofficial views here

presented are from an address of September 1, 1956, before the Thirtieth Annual Sacramento
Host Breakfast.

4 €


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1957 “IF WE BEHAVE WISELY” 5

Recovery Act. Then the Supreme cence in, even the enthusiastic en-
Court which held the Recovery Act dorsement of, the great social rev-
unconstitutional was designedly olution of the past twenty-three
replaced by a Court, the majority years? What made wrong right?
of whose minds “went along with The answer can be given in two
the Chief Executive,” as he de- words: boom prosperity.
manded. The American people are not so
Yes, during the earlier years much interested in ideology as
there was opposition from those they are in results. They believe
who still believed in the Constitu- in a system which “produces the
tion, in a free people, and strictly goods,” and they seem now to be
limited federal government. And convinced that the new way of
until World War II rescued the life does just that. Most business,
experiment in unlimited govern- political, labor, and educational
ment from its failure to produce leaders also seem to approve the
recovery, the opposition which results and to rationalize easily the
flared up now and then in the Con- conclusion that we are on the high
gress, and in the protests of large road of enduring and ever-increas-
groups of citizens, gave some ing prosperity.
promise that the New Deal would
not become the permanent deal.
Then came the war —the war The new system is one, we are
which 80 per cent of our people assured, which cannot fail be-
did not want to enter, but which cause the government is in con-
we entered just the same. With trol; it has “built-in,” safeguard-
the war and the war powers thus ing stabilizers. “Wise and far-
added to that shift of power to seeing” men, we are told, are both
government which had already spending our money and manag-
been accomplished, such opposition ing our fiscal, debt, industrial re-
to the Revolution and such hope lations, and all other relations.
as still existed that there might “They” are doing all this with
be a restoration of limited consti- such wisdom that never again can
tutional government, largely dis- there be a depression or even a

Arguments for the New Way

appeared. serious recession. If anyone dares
eee » express a doubt, he is hit with
Prosperity Silenced Opposition this clincher: “Why, ‘the gov-

Now what was it that so effec- ernment’ doesn’t dare allow a de-
tively silenced the opposition? pression, because if ‘they’ did,
What brought about the acquies- ‘they’ would lose their office and


===== PAGE 8 =====

6 THE FREEMAN January

their power; and, you know, ‘they’ only the speed at which we are
want to hold on to those.” traveling. They do not reveal the

It is further emphasized that limitations, the weaknesses within
we are now enjoying full employ- and external to the system, the ex-
ment at the highest figure in his- haustion of reserve strength, the
tory; the greatest gross national direction in which we are going,
product; the greatest produc- or the perils of the road ahead;
tivity; the highest wages and 2. Growth is not the equivalent
highest disposable income; the of progress. Progress requires
highest level of sales; the greatest balanced development of produc-
of all capital expansion; the big- tion, population, consumption, and
gest government expenditures, the like — and that we do not have;
federal, state, and local (and we ~~ 3. Desire and need alone do not
can be sure they will get bigger provide the means for their satis-
and bigger) ; finally, here in Cali- faction; production of goods and
fornia in particular, the size and services must come first instead
the rate of growth of the popula- of being called forth by prior crea-
tion, we feel, guarantee both a tion of debt or the printing of
desire and a need for all we can money;
produce. What more proof do we 4. Increased consumption, fi-
want that the new system works nanced by a heavily disproportion-
and is free from the flaws of the ate increase in debt and debt-
old? money, is relatively short-lived
and will not support long-term
capital expansion;

By way of answer, I submit for 5. The enormous public debt is
your consideration the following a burden and not an asset; largely
questions having to do with ele- it represents only destroyed wealth
ments of our present prosperity and not real “savings”;

True or False?

structure. Will you not ask your- 6. American strength, like the
selves privately and candidly, is strength of any nation, must be
it true or false, that: measured by the sense of obliga-

1. The statistical indicators, tion and responsibility—the moral
just referred to (gross national and spiritual vigor —of its citi-
product, etc.), which are relied zens; and this strength is being
upon as conclusive evidence of undermined by:

“sound prosperity,” are like the a. The distintegration of human
~ figures on the speedometer of a relations through the conflict
speeding automobile. They reveal. aroused by the disintegrating


===== PAGE 9 =====

1957 “IF WE BEHAVE WISELY” 7

forces of racial, class, social, cluding murder on the highways;
and economic prejudices and and the increase in mental ill-
envy; health, with its evidence of a grow-
-b. The growing reliance upon ing anxiety and frustration in a
government and consequent population depending more and
loss of self-reliance, self-dis- more upon the manipulations of
cipline, and self-respect, as political power and influence
well as respect for the rights rather than upon honest produc-
of others; tion and performance of the per-
c. The spreading doctrine that sonal obligations upon which all
the majority has only rights rights must rest.
and the minority only obliga- In the fall of 1953, Joseph
tions; Dodge, then the Director of the
d. The redistribution of wealth, Budget, in describing the situation
the confiscation of savings confronting the Eisenhower Ad-
through inflation, the declin- ministration when it took office
ing per capita wealth, and the said, in part:
constant shift of power from

the people to government. The Federal Government has

firmly established the policy of en-
Grim Facts couraging citizen dependence upon it,

I will not burd ‘th and in connection therewith, has
will not burden you with sta- greatly increased centralization of

tistics, but in considering the powers in government and control by
truth or falsity of these questions, government of the affairs of all the
we should face the grim facts of people....
the growing public and private The facts suggest we are in a
debt (now too big for comprehen- costly trap of built-up dollar de-
sion by the human mind); the mands on the government for do-
mountainous tax burden with its mestic purposes, many of them made
inequalities and stimulation of dis- mandatory by existing legislation,
honesty; the serious and growing ©n which there have been imposed
dilution of value of the dollar; the Staggering expenditures for our na-
menacing burden of an unlimited tional security. The source of pay-
. . ment is in taxes or in increased
and unfunded social security pro- overnment debt
gram; the ill-defined, uncertain, & ’
and growing American commit- The record-breaking peacetime
ments in the international field; budget of $69.1 billion together
the increase in both adult and with the appropriations for this
juvenile crime and violence, in- fiscal year, made by the session of


===== PAGE 10 =====

8 THE FREEMAN January

Congress just concluded, when
added to unspent carry-over bal-
ances and new authorizations to
obligate, now confronts the Ameri-
can taxpayer with federal expendi-
tures totaling $143 billion. Ap-
parently we have not escaped from
the “costly trap of built-up dollar

demands,” nor from the policy of:

encouraging citizen dependence
upon the federal government!

Tax Troubles

Some eighty years ago, the
Supreme Court of the United
States in Savings and Loan Asso-
ciation vs. Topeka (22 Law. Ed.
461) declared “to lay, with one
hand, the power of government on
the property of the citizen, and
with the other to bestow it upon
favored individuals... is nonethe-
less a robbery because it is done
under the forms of law and is called
taxation.” Also in those days be-
fore it became legal, and even re-
spectable, to forcibly redistribute
the earnings of some citizens in
order to secure the vote and favor
of others, the forgotten clause of
the Fifth Amendment was as care-
fully adhered to as is another
clause today. I refer to the clause
which says, “nor shall private
property be taken for public use
without just compensation.”

Cameron Hawley in a recent
speech published in the Saturday
Evening Post of July 14, 1956,

under the title, “Our Tax Laws
Make Us Dishonest,” said: “What
we have created is not a good cli-
mate for the souls of men.”

The same may be said of our
present system and the prosperity
structure which it has produced.
And a prosperity structure which
is not good for the souls of men is
dangerous and will fail. False prin-
ciples do not become right and are
not sanctified by a period of boom
prosperity!

Our Responsibility

Finally, to those who ask: Why
discuss this disturbing situation?
I respectfully submit that we have
an inescapable responsibility to
face facts as they are and not as
we wish them to be! We occupy
positions of leadership and influ-
ence in our communities — some
official and others unofficial. We
are exerting an influence either for
or against the order of things now
existing. We are approving both
by words and action the inflation,
the debt creation, the new system
under which our bosses in Wash-
ington take the lead and run the
main show for all of us. We pro-
test when they slow down on
spending, lending, or granting aid
in our special interest areas. We
ask their assistance in getting
higher wages and shorter hours
and .in price maintenance or the
protection of our markets. We pro-


===== PAGE 11 =====

1957 “IF WE BEHAVE WISELY” 9

claim to the world that we have a evitably, it leads to the disintegra-
wonderful prosperity, under- tion of American free institutions,
written and guaranteed by the the destruction of the liberty and
foreign and domestic policies and eventual impoverishment of the
program of our federal govern- citizens.
ment. } I repeat that in this growing
Since we endorse these policies crisis we have an inescapable re-
and programs, and take credit for sponsibility. We cannot evade our
the increased business which they responsibility by insisting that it
foster, we cannot escape responsi- is a job only for the politicians and
bility for untoward results. We that we are exclusively occupied
should remember who got the running our own office or business
blame in 1932 and 1933 —the or farm. We are in on it — whether
“money-changers in the temple,” we mean to be or not. We are en-
the “lords of business,” “princes of dorsing full government interven-
privilege,” the ‘false leaders” tion, not only through our support
whose “greed and speculation mis- of candidates for public office who
led the people and caused the dis- advocate these policies, but also
aster of the depression.” through our active participation
: in programs which implement
policies, such as full employment,
Yet, where is there effective op- government lending and manage-
position in this hour of peril? The ment of money, credit, and other
overwhelming majority of both economic controls which have re-
major political parties seems to ap- placed the free market.
prove the present trend. This is
interpreted as popular approval What Can We Do?
of the dominant policy — that the . We can, at least, as individuals,
federal government should be cease drifting with this current
vested with whatever power is nec- which is carrying us toward so-
essary to attempt to maintain full cialism. We can wake up! We can
employment and an ever-increas- cease joining in the chorus: “Isn't
ing standard of living for the our prosperity wonderful?” We
voters. To this overriding but can use our influence, and insist
futile aim and purpose, the life, that we prefer to return to the
liberty, property, and pursuit of ways of free men. We can, as in-
happiness of the individual is now dividuals, and in our groups and
subordinated. Do we quite realize associations, heed the warning
where this policy is taking us? In- voiced at the recent Republican

No Effective Opposition


===== PAGE 12 =====

10 THE FREEMAN January

Convention by one of the wisest fore, we now find it difficult and
and most farseeing statesmen impolitic to “behave wisely”; but
America has ever produced, former such is the price of delivery from
President Herbert Hoover, when our historic dilemma! This gen-
he said: “If you temporize with eration is charged with the preser-
Socialism in any of its disguises, vation of our free institutions.
you will stimulate its growth and Those institutions are in grave
make certain the defeat of free peril.
men.” We have the strength, the cour-
Addressing a recent industrial age, and intelligence for a return
conference under the auspices of to sanity — to the true road of re-
the State Chamber, Dean Grether, covery and progress. It is not too
of the University of California, late to try, and it is utterly un-
told us of brilliant prospects and worthy of our heritage to admit
potentialities for growth and prog- defeat and drift into socialism and
ress in California and the West its slavery. If we are to turn aside
during the next ten or twenty from our present course, we must
years. But Dean Grether prefaced again and again remind ourselves
and conditioned his prophecy with that the American way is not the
this powerful and significant easy way of drift and dependency;
phrase: “If we behave wisely.” but that it is the way of constant,
It is that phrase which I would cooperative striving for balanced
leave with you as expressing the progress and the preservation of
great fundamental challenge con- our free institutions — while main-
fronting us. As perhaps never be- taining our “Freedom under God.”

eT

OREAST EY LR | Our Duty in Life Insurance

THOSE OF US in the life insurance business must grasp the initia-
tive in this country in leading the fight for sound money. Millions
of American citizens have entrusted their life savings to us for
safekeeping. We have a legal obligation simply to return to them
the number of dollars promised, but we have a moral obligation
to use all our influence to see that the dollars promised have the
purchasing power expected. We cannot discharge our responsi-
bilities by sitting idly by should government adopt policies which
rob policyholders and annuitants of their savings.
RAY D. MURPHY, Chairman of the Board, The Equitable Life Assurance Society

of the United States. From an address to the National Association
of Life Underwriters, September 26, 1956.


===== PAGE 13 =====

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BEN MOREELL

AVING SPENT the last half when Americans looked upon their
century in the pursuit of en- government as their servant whose
gineering knowledge and the prac- duties are or should be restrained
tice of engineering, I venture to to the primary functions of pro-
offer some observations on the tecting the life, liberty, and hon-
engineer’s obligations to society estly acquired property of every
and to his fellow man. individual. As is traditional in the
In these days of ambitious striv- master-servant relationship, the
ing for political preferment, it is people were morally bound to sup-
customary to bid high for the port the government; but, in turn,
voters’ favor. Candidates hold the government was subject to the
forth tempting bait in the form of' people’s commands.
promises of government ‘“hand- Today, as we listen to eager as-
outs” in return for votes. Any pirants for public office, we must
reference to the obligation of citi- conclude that this old concept has
zens to preserve and defend the changed. It appears that many of
. Constitution of the United States, our people now believe that the
or to their duty to strengthen the government is obligated to support
basic principles embodied in our them and, at the same time, that it
Declaration of Independence is should have authority to tell them
conspicuous by its absence. And how to conduct their personal eco-
were a candidate to couple his nomic and social lives.
promises of “something for noth- Does this state of affairs have
ing” with an explanation that, special significance for engineers?
since government produces noth- 1 believe so. No other profession
ing, it must take from someone has profited more from the work
else that which it gives away, he of those who have gone before
would surely raise grave question than have engineers. Starting with
as to his sanity. the invention of the wheel and
This appears to be an inversion proceeding through the long ages
of true values. There was a time which culminate in our present era

Admiral Moreell, Chairman of the Board of Jones and Laughlin Steel Corporation, was wartime
Chief of the Bureau of Yards and Docks and Chief of Civil Engineers of the Navy.

11


===== PAGE 14 =====

12 ) THE FREEMAN January

of jet propelled aircraft, the rec- governments upon the rights of
ord of material progress consti- their own citizens. If, overnight,
tutes a revealing account of the all governments throughout the
debt which we engineers owe to world were compelled by some
our intellectual and professional supernatural power to confine
forebears. ‘their activities solely to the pro-
It is an established fact that the tection of the lives, liberties, and
most productive periods of history honestly acquired property of their
were those when men had the own citizens, the world would be
greatest measure of individual transformed. We would enter upon
freedom. During those periods a period of unbelievable produc-
they had not only opportunity for tivity and prosperity. Even more
_personal development, but also in- important, all international ten-
centive for production, since they sions would disappear. It is only
were permitted to retain a reason- when governments coerce their
able share of the fruits of their citizens into supporting their am-
labor without fear of confiscation bitious schemes on the interna-
by private or public agencies or tional scene that conflicts arise and
officials. wars ensue. :
In general, engineers are prone
to be more concerned with the dis-
- Since engineers are concerned covery of facts than with the dis-
with harnessing the forces of na- covery of the meanings of those
ture to serve the needs of man, it facts as they apply to the develop-
follows that they have a duty to ment of mankind. My plea today is
foster the establishment of condi- that we engineers, who are so
tions conducive to this result, i.e., heavily indebted to our intellectual
conditions which guarantee that forebears, resolve to discharge that
man’s God-given rights to life, debt by contributing to the ad-
liberty, and the products of his vancement of knowledge and the
honest labor are not impaired. This establishment of the climate which
can be accomplished only if engi- permits such advancement, the cli-
neers participate in the processes mate of individual freedom.
of government, vigorously and in For from freedom, we can de-
important degree. . rive peace. And with freedom and
Today the greatest threats to peacewe can go forward to achieve
personal liberties arise, not from life's richest spiritual and material
aggressions by foreign govern- blessings for all people, every-
ments, but from encroachments by where. Ce ee

"The Climate of Freedom


===== PAGE 15 =====

WHY WAGES RISE:

11. PRICING AN HOUR OF WORK F. A. HARPER

In earlier articles in this series, at- unions, with all their political and
tention was focused on the fact that other power, cannot veto the iron
the general level of real wages is de- ceiling that production sets over real
termined by what is produced; that wages.

inflating pay beyond this point raises In this article attention will be
prices but does not raise the worth turned to the problem of pricing
of the wage in buying power; that one’s labors in the market.

Ia > “ es msn SERN [Er

HE lone pioneer’s desire for duces a specialty, selling most of
some meat, some wheat, or a it to many persons and buying his
log cabin is the incentive which varied needs from many other per-
drives him to produce. Antici- sons.
pating his future wants, he pro- Even so, the over-all situation
duces in advance, like a squirrel is the same as for the lone pioneer
which gathers and stores nuts for to the extent that no more can be
winter. And in anticipation of bought than is produced. Despite
years of future use, he makes him- the fact that some goods and serv-
self some tools to aid in his labors ices are exchanged for others,
and in the enjoyment of living. and despite the fact that money
Then having produced these may be used to facilitate these ex-
things, the pioneer is his own sole changes, what is bought still equals
market. In this situation there is what is sold. Just as in one ex-
no pricing problem because there change the buying equals the sell-
is no money and no exchange. ing because the same item sold by
Nothing remains unsold as a re- one person is bought by another,
sult of the seller setting his price so likewise for the total of all trade

too high. in a complex economy, all buying
. equals all selling.
Production Creates Own Market | And this leads to the unavoid-

But we are not lone pioneers. able conclusion that production
We live, instead, in a complex creates its own buying power in a
economy. A person usually pro- free economy. Sales equal pur-

Dr. Harper is a member of the staff of the Foundation for Economic Education.

13


===== PAGE 16 =====

14 THE FREEMAN January

chases and purchases equal sales, wanted of each thing, and no more,
in total for all trade as for a single insofar as is possible. The function
trade. Only if the market is not of price is to discourage production
free, only as freedom to trade is of unwanted items and to encour-
interfered with, is this not true. age production of what is wanted,
to the extent that wants can be
anticipated and production plans
The function of a free price is can be carried out.
to accomplish in a complex economy The lone pioneer has his own
of exchanges what the lone pioneer troubles in this respect, of course.
accomplishes in his separate ex- Perhaps the fishing is not as good
istence — the production of what is as he had expected, or the weather

The Function of a Free Price

EFFECTS OF PRICE FREEDOM

If the price these quantities will be

is fixed at wanted offered traded
4 wv Wr
50c |  |00000|8
ac (00 [0000 [80

Yee TG) 100 (000 [08
Me 0c (1000 [00 [38

toe [10000(0____|8

SHORTAGE



===== PAGE 17 =====

1957 WHY WAGES RISE 15

not good for the corn. Perhaps in 2. More of a thing will be
winter he changes his mind about produced in anticipation of a high
what he wants, wishing he had price than of a low price, progres-
provided more venison and less sively.

corn. Or perhaps his wife wishes From these two rules it can be
the cabin had been fixed up a little, seen how the quantities available
even if it had meant less hunting. and the quantities wanted operate
Or perhaps too much food was like the two ends of a seesaw. A
stored and some of it spoiled. What rising price pulls down the
does he do then? He just blames ‘“wanted” end and pushes up the
himself for his lack of foresight “offered” end. A falling price pulls
and quickly adjusts as promptly down the “offered” end and pushes
as possible so as to go on with pro- up the “wanted” end.

duction and living. Only when the seesaw is on the
} i. level, at the point of the free mar-
Adjustments Facilitated ket price, will there be equality

In a complex economy, similar between what is wanted and what
events occur. But one person can is offered. And this is the only sort
blame another more easily for not of equality that should ever be
having foreseen the weather, or given any economic merit. When
for the change in his wife's wants, individuals are left alone, free to
or something of the sort. But the buy and to sell what they wish at
objective of everyone in a complex the price determined solely by the
society should be the same as if owner-traders of each item, this
he were a lone pioneer — to adjust equality will operate just as water
as promptly as possible and go on seeks its own level. No superplan
with production and living. is needed to force prices either up

That is the task performed by or down to this level. Price will
prices that are free. The accom- find its own level through the in-
panying chart on the effects of numerable decisions of individual
price freedom shows how this takes buyers and sellers.

place, and how an unfree price What any outside force does to
prevents adjustments in economic prices is to push them either above
living. or below this point of equality. The

The two simple ideas behind agent who applies the force is al-
this chart are these: ways an outsider to the deals of

1. Less of a thing will be trade, someone who owns neither
wanted at a high price than at a what is being sold nor what is be-
low price, progressively. ing traded for it. He is an economic


===== PAGE 18 =====

16 THE FREEMAN January

interloper, with or without official Wages Are a Price
title of some sort.

Forcing the price above the
equality point creates surpluses.
The higher the price is pushed, the
greater the surplus. And forcing
the price below this point creates
shortages — more and more short-
ages as the price is pushed down
more and more.

Two forces operate to create a
surplus as prices are forced above
the free market point — consumers
want less and producers bring out
more. And conversely, these two
forces both operate to create a
shortage as prices are forced down.

The purpose of discussing the
function of price in this detail is
because a wage is a price, too. It
is the price of doing work, just as
the price of a bushel of wheat is
the price for that embodiment of
economic service. In both instances,
the owner — in one case the owner
of the wheat and in the other case
the owner of his own time and ef-
fort — is entering the market with
something to sell. And buyers who
want either the wheat or the work
enter the market to buy and thus
satisfy their respective wants.

The laborer as a person is not a
Trade Is Maximized commodity in either instance, but
the time of one and the product of
the labors of the other are items of
sale — both in a like sense.

A worker may work for himself
producing some product he sells on
the market. Or he may sell his pro-
ductive services to another person
who in turn sells the product on

And finally, as to the function of
a free price, it will be noted that
trading will be greatest at the
equality point, a free price. Either
above or below that point trading
is lessened, either because things
are not wanted at-a higher price

or because they will not be pro-
duced and made available at a the market. Or he may work at

lower price. some task like that of a household

So if we accept the fact that eco- servant. . :
nomic welfare is at its best when Since wages are a price, they are
willing trading is at its greatest, subject to all the rules of prices and
we must also conclude that eco- Pricing, the same as anything else.
nomic welfare is greater at the All that has been said about the
free market price than at any other function of price applies to wages
point. If prices are forced away the same as to wheat. There is a
from the point of the free price in point of equality at the free market
either direction, that destroys eco- price where the supply of labor and
nomic welfare. the demand for labor find a balance.


===== PAGE 19 =====

1957 WHY WAGES RISE 17

And there is no other point of price should be set for it, and start
wage-price where this is true. selling at that price. If at the end
As wages are forced either above of the market day you have some
or below the free market point, corn left unsold, you will know it
there will be created either a sur- was priced too high. And if you
plus or a shortage of labor. And could have sold more at the price
there will be less employment you set, you know that it was
either above or below the free priced too low. How else could you
wage point — less labor traded —to know for sure where the right
the extent that higher wages dis- price was? Note that this has
courage those who might want to nothing whatever to do, precisely,
employ help, whereas lower wages with what your wife — the book-
discourage people from wanting keeper — said it had cost you to
available jobs. In one direction produce the corn —a figure that
from the free price, employers of- might be above or below the free
fer fewer and fewer jobs; in the market price.
other direction, fewer and fewer It is the same with selling your
persons want jobs. labor. If other employers want you
at the price you are getting, or
perhaps more, your price on your
Bargaining over wages should services'is too low. If, on the other
have no other purpose, in terms of hand, nobody wants you at the
economic welfare, than to find the price you ask, your price is too
free market price for the labor in- high. And here as with the price
volved. For that is the only price of sweet corn, this figure of a free-
of labor where there is economic price wage for yourself has noth-
equality. It is the only price of ing to do with the cost of produc-
labor where employment will be at ing you; it doesn’t even have any-
a maximum. thing to do with your cost of living,
How can one know whether the which you adjust to your income
free market price has been found? rather than vice versa.
So far as I can see, this can be

Bargaining for a Wage

judged for sure only after the fact, Unemployment

on the basis of the consequences. When wheat is priced above the

Let us first look at the pricing of free market level, the accumulation

some other product. that is unsaleable at that price is
Suppose you are taking your called a surplus.

sweet corn to a consumer market When the comparable situation

to be sold. You guess where the arises among the working force of


===== PAGE 20 =====

18 THE FREEMAN January

a nation," we call it unemployment. about one-third of the “gainfully
This refers to the labor — perfectly employed” of this country were at
good labor — which is going unsold that time “unemployed.” He took a
at the wage-price. job washing dishes in a restaurant

I would define unemployment as at the wage being offered. He con-
involuntary leisure of a person sidered the United States in the
who is willing to work at the free early thirties to be a land of oppor-
market price. tunity.

The only way there can ever Jouvenel would probably say,
really be a surplus of labor, un- with some justification, that if I
wanted at the price, is by some sort were to decline to work at the free
of force being used on wages to market level of wages — whether
keep them above the free market under the pressure of my govern-
price. It couldn’t happen otherwise. ment, as in the thirties, or under
For it seems fair to say that if I the pressure of the labor union — 1
don’t want to work at the best price should more accurately bedescribed
the highest bidder for my services as suffering from power-enforced
is willing to offer me, I am merely leisure rather than unemployment:
preferring idleness to work. And if For voluntary lack of work is not
I thus prefer idleness to work, I involuntary leisure — not unem-
am not really an unemployed per- ployment as I have defined it.
son. My situation is best described Despite this, however, we shall
by saying that employment is just be using the term unemployment
not an object of my yearning, suf- hereafter in the conventional sense,
ficient for me to merit the use of to refer to persons among the nor-
the label “unemployed.” mal labor force who are not, at the

To illustrate differing ideas time, working.
about this problem of unemploy-
ment, let me cite one incident. The The Demand for Labor
French scholar, Bertrand de Jou- The demand for labor is not a
venel, once told me of his coming to fixed thing. There is not an un-
the United States for the first time, changing number of persons
in the early thirties. He had heard wanted for work. The number de-
of the tremendous unemployment manded depends on the wage. I do
here, and was greatly concerned not, for instance, happen to employ
about his future; for when he even one person around my residen-
landed in New York, he had only tial property. The price of labor
eleven cents in his pocket. Yet he available there is too high for my
quickly found work, in a land where need of work to be done. But at a


===== PAGE 21 =====

1957 WHY WAGES RISE . 19

WAGE LEVEL AND UNEMPLOYMENT
Demand Elasticity of 3

EMPLOYMENT INDEX (Full Employment = 100)
150

/
7

4
T_ FULL EMPLOYMENT

UNEMPLOYMENT )

" | 1 1 1 i 1 1 ] ]
150 100 50
WAGE INDEX (Free Market Wage = 100)

lower price for doing work, I would noted students of this subject who
hire one person — at a still lower have studied it carefully — Douglas
price, perhaps two persons; then in the United States and Pigou in
three; and so forth. Britain — both arrived at similar
Some commodities have a type of results.! A consensus of their con-
demand which we call “unity,” clusions puts the demand for labor
where one per cent more of the at something like three or four to
commodity is wanted after the one. That is, a decline of one per
price is lowered by one per cent. ——
And vice versa. Douglas, Paul H. The Theory of Wages.

New York: Macmillan, 1934. p. 501.
Apparently the demand for labor Pigou, A. C. Theory of Unemployment.

is not of this one-to-one ratio. Two New York: Macmillan, 1933. p. 97.


===== PAGE 22 =====

20 . THE FREEMAN January

cent in wages would uncover new level one wants to consider, a one
jobs for three or four per cent more per cent rise in wages will reduce
work. And vice versa. employment by three per cent.
This idea is of tremendous im- Wages about ten per cent above
portance to economic welfare, es- the free market price would mean
pecially under conditions which unemployment of about one-fourth
threaten a depression. I do not of the working force.
know for sure that this three or If wages were to go up about
four per cent is the correct figure. twenty-six per cent, it would unem-
But whatever the exact figure, it ploy about half the working force.
works in the same way. The differ- How can we tell whether the
ence is only in the rate of response, price of work at a given time is too
in new jobs available at differing high? All we have to do is to look
wages. at the unemployment figures, as-
Let us take these Douglas-Pigou suming the figures to be accurate.
figures, leaning a bit on the con- Or one might ask people who are
servative side of their conclusions. not working whether they have
Let us say that the figure is three turned down jobs at the price of-
per cent. What would this mean fered, or whether they are out of
when applied to real life? work because they couldn’t find
any jobs at any price.
Moving in the opposite direction
The accompanying chart of the of wages below the free market
wage level and unemployment price (rightward from 100, on the
shows how unemployment and the base scale) results in the opposite
wage level are related on this three- tendency. More and more people
to-one basis. are wanted for work. But since
At the free market wage of 100 there is full employment at the free
(base scale) there is full employ- market wage, reductions in wages
ment — no unemployment. Every- from that point can cause ‘“nega-
one who really wants to work has tive unemployment” only under
a job. ’ special conditions. New persons
* Now assume that wages are tobe not normally in the working force
forced above the free market level may be pulled into jobs at a wage
(moving leftward from 100, on the below the free market point if they
base scale). Employment declines can be induced to do so under the
— unemployment increases —at a urgency of war, or something like
rapid rate, according to the factor that.
of three. Starting from whatever Overfull employment seldom

Three to One


===== PAGE 23 =====

1957 WHY WAGES RISE 21

happens except in wartime, for two ployment is not exceeded, accord-
reasons. One reason is that wages ing to the newly revised statistics.
tend quickly to bounce upward to Such is the problem of pricing
the free market point, there being work in the market for labor. Such
no potent and effective force in the is the function of freedom in

nation to hold them below that wages. * oo
point for long. This is because E—

wage earners are voters, and they In the next and final article in
do not form unions to keep wages this series, these principles of pric-
below the free market point. ing work will be tested in real life

The other reason why “negative experiences. They will be tested
unemployment” does not last Jong against some historical experience,
is that the labor statisticians soon including the so-called business
conclude that their count of the cycle. They will be appraised from
working force must have been the standpoint of the welfare of
wrong before. So they revise their those in the labor force, of the na-
figures in such a way that full em- tion as a whole.

09% DR. HARPER'S series of articles
h —to be concluded in the February Freeman
Y — is now available as a book of 128 pages,

including tables, charts, and a comprehensive index, all in

large clear type. $2.50 cloth; $1.50 paper; quantity prices on request.

\

THE TWELVE CHAPTERS ARE:

1. Labor Unions 7. Contracting for Progress

2. Productivity 8. The Cost of Being Governed

3. Dividing the Pie 9. Losing Wages Through Fringe Benefits
4. Tools To Harness Energy 10. Leisure and the Better Life

5. Doing What You Can Do Best 11. Pricing an Hour of Work

6. The Lubricant for Exchange 12. Riding the Waves of Business

The Foundation for Economic Education, Irvington-on-Hudson, N.Y.



===== PAGE 24 =====

How Poor the Farmer?

HERBERT L. SCHALLER

GRICULTURAL income may Let’s compare them for a mo-
be down — but it is not on the ment.

verge of disaster. Farmers may be Perhaps one basic difference is
feeling the pinch — but they are the fact that these other business-
not on the edge of bankruptcy. men compete directly with others

Some farmers have gone broke; in their field on a product basis.
others will. But can you name any They buy and sell essentially the
industry where people go into busi- same items in many instances, and
ness for themselves that some of make their profit by better mer-

them don’t fall by the wayside? chandising, greater efficiency, and
Amid all this din and noise over volume.
the farm problem by those who The farmer, on the other hand,

would act the role of savior, one competes almost entirely in his
pitiful fact remains: It is a sad field on an efficiency basis. He
commentary on our intelligence stakes his profit on the fact that he
and our great agricultural indus- can produce better than others at a
try that we have allowed the lower cost per unit, and thereby
farmer to become a mere political profit at the market.

pawn in a game played primarily The end result is that both must

by those who have a selfish interest rely on efficiency of operation to

in the outcome. give them the profit they need.
First of all, who is the farmer? But what happens in farming?

Primarily, he is a businessman. In this business every effort is
He is not much different from his made to keep the inefficient pro-
friends and neighbors who run the ducer still operating. And whom do
local grocery, furniture, clothing, we penalize? The good, efficient,
or other community store. progressive farmer.

ns ——

Mr, Schaller is Editor of Better Farming Methods. This article is from an editorial in the
April 1956 issue. . ) .

_ Pe
PEN. “ia, PE


===== PAGE 25 =====

1957 HOW POOR THE FARMER? 23

These “friends” and “wise coun- happier and better off financially
selors” offer the farmer everything in other occupations. Would any-
from high supports, to cheap one argue the fact that we should
money, to government aid, and have as many other small busi-

what have you. nesses, such as grocery stores, as
And his counterpart, the small we once had?
businessman? When he fails, he Isn’t it about time that we recog-

passes from the scene with hardly nize that we may have been doing
a ripple. He becomes a victim of the farmer an injustice through
his own inefficiency and seeks a liv- our efforts to be concerned about
ing elsewhere. his every welfare?

I can’t recall a subsidy for an in- Let’s be leaders enough to recog-
efficient groceryman. I can’t recall nize the fact that the farm problem
frequent and periodic outbursts of today has become more political
oratorical fire echoing in the halls than agricultural. It has its roots,
of Congress over the plight of such not in the over-all welfare of the
a man. farmer, but in the pot of politics.

Isn't it about time we recognized Then let’s be leaders enough to
the fact that one of the basic prob- admit this fact and concern our-
lems facing agriculture is that of selves with correcting it.

too many farmers? The end result will be greater
Such a statement inhuman? Not benefits to the farmer and the in-
at all! Many of them would be dustry of agriculture. oo

Freedom in Trade

THE LONG RUN ANSWER for Canada may be to reduce tariffs and
to work towards a greater measure of freedom in trade which
will permit our potential customers abroad to earn the necessary
dollars for the purchase of our wheat and other grains, through
the sale of their own goods to this country... It is not enough to
have a high quality product and to assume that buyers will even-
tually have to come seeking it. It must be to their buying advan-
tage to do so. If we can provide that advantage we shall have less
to fear from the somewhat unorthodox methods which others are
now employing and about which we are so critical.

From the October 24, 1956 report of the Searle
Grain Company, Ltd.,, Winnipeg, Canada


===== PAGE 26 =====

The Morality of Capitalism:

JN A AA A ort ae YH Sl Minar = TA A A Se ware bem SAC nee a A SAY AR A ban aman an

ECONOMIC INDIVIDUALISM = FREEDOM = ALL MORAL VALUES.

s -
mn re mars 3 ms Lees “vm — Ata, ron rns sem me re memes Aen ero) reves © a ns a a Sn et + ym wri are em re

- WILLIAM HENRY CHAMBERLIN

HERE is a widespread belief Influential publicists like R. H.

that capitalism, or economic in- Tawney and Harold Laski tried to
dividualism, while it may be neces- dispose of economic freedom with
sary, is morally somewhat disrep- pejorative epithets. Tawney spoke
utable. This has found reflection in of “the acquisitive society.” Laski
the pronouncements of religious characterized historic liberalism—
bodies and of individual religious diametrically opposed to what has
leaders. There are fortunately not passed for liberalism under the
many ministers of religion who New Deal in its economic assump-
disgrace themselves and their pro- tions—as “the philosophy of a busi-
fessed faith as Christians by en- ness civilization.” The true inspi-
dorsing the bloodstained record of ration for historic liberalism came

the atheistic Soviet Union. from faith in human freedom and

But socialism under such beguil- in Locke’s great trinity of natural
ing disguises as “social action,” rights: life, liberty, and property.
“the social Gospel,” “humanitar- Whereas continental socialists

ianism,” and the like has made were generally indifferent or ac-
considerable inroads in church tively hostile to religion, the Brit-
thinking on both sides of the ish Labor party has always in-
Atlantic. The conviction that capi- cluded a considerable number of
talism is contrary to religion and professing believers, especially in
ethics was a strong factor in the the nonconformist churches. They,
rise of the British Labor party and like some of their sympathizers in
"its postwar ‘implementation of a the United States, tried to infuse
far-reaching socialist program, some religious and ethical content
which has beén only slightly di- into the materialistic dogmas of
luted by the conservatives. Karl Marx.

Mr. Chamberlin has examined the evils of collectivism at first hand and is known as author
of numerous books, lecturer, contributor to the Wall Street Journal and many nationally known
magazines. .

24


===== PAGE 27 =====

1957 THE MORALITY OF CAPITALISM 25

Religious warrant was invoked surprised them still more was that
for communism or socialism by there were no armed guards, such
pointing to such examples as the as have been found necessary in
equal sharing practiced by the Soviet collective farms to prevent
early Christians or the dedicated the exploited peasants from steal-
life of St. Francis of Assisi and ing their own grain.

others who deliberately embraced A free economy is in no way
a life of poverty in order to serve hostile to the man who, as the fa-
their fellow men. mous naturalist, Agassiz, once said

Such examples, however, con- of himself, has no time to be rich.
fuse the issue. Under a free econ- Such men, thinkers, scholars,
omy, which always goes hand in scientists, are its pride and glory
hand with free political institu- and enjoy opportunities for de-
tions, no one is denied the right velopment and expression which
to practice personal self-denial or they would never possess under
to engage with others in schemes any form of controlled economy.
of communal living. Paradoxical It may also be noted that many who
as it may sound, an idealistic com- have acquired wealth under a free
munist can live up to his faith economy have given away, wisely
much more easily in a capitalist or unwisely, in one form or an-
society than in the Soviet Union other, most of what the tax collec-
or any other country ruled by com- tor has allowed them to keep.
munists.

For communism is now an en- freedom Comes First
forced system of hierarchical in- The issue is not over the right
equality, maintained by police of the person as an individual or
state methods. There is no tolera- as a member of a group acting
tion in communist countries for under some religious or ethical
the religious impulse which has sanction to spurn wealth and live
been strongest in promoting volun- simply and austerely. The issue is
tary association of groups of men whether there is something in-
and women in dedicated com- trinsically immoral in the capital-
munities. ist system and whether morality

When Soviet agricultural ex- would be advanced by the reshap-
perts visited a kibbutz, or com- ing of this system along socialist
munal farm settlement, in Israel or communist lines. The answer to
they were amazed to find far more both these questions is an emphatic
equal sharing than was customary No. :
in collective farms at home. What The first condition of a moral


===== PAGE 28 =====

26 THE FREEMAN January

order is freedom — the opportunity provoked by the insistence of the
of the individual to choose con- British government on levying an
sciously and voluntarily between excise tax without the authority
good and evil. And freedom, in of the representatives of the
turn, has always been associated American taxpayers.
with the right of the individual The Declaration of Independence
freely and legitimately to own, charges King George III with “re-
possess, and bequeath property. peated injuries and usurpations,
One might paraphrase a famous all having in direct object the
peroration of Daniel Webster's to establishment of an absolute
read: “Liberty and property, one tyranny over these states.”
and inseparable, now and forever.” And violations of property
The emergence of Western so- rights have a prominent place in
ciety from the arbitrary rule of this historic charter of American
monarchs and privileged feudal liberty, along with infringements
lords into states where the govern- of the political, legal, and personal
ment functions are strictly limited rights of the colonists. So one finds
by the rule of law went parallel in the list of grievances which are
with the vindication of the right held to warrant separation from
of the individual to acquire and Great Britain:
own property. This issue looms He [the King] has erected a mul-
large both in the British CivilWar, titude of new offices, and sent hither
which ended the dream of an abso- swarms of officers to harass our peo-
lute monarchy functioning through ple and eat out their substance.

a royal bureaucracy, and in the Cutting off our trade with all parts
American Revolution. Mention the of the world.
British Civil War and one thinks Imposing taxes on us without our

of one of the parliamentary consent.
leaders, John Hampden, who re-
fused to pay an illegal tax, “ship
money,” and later lost his life in The men who affixed their names
one of the battles and skirmishes to the Declaration of Independ-
which finally gave the victory to ence, pledging “our Lives, our For-
Parliament over the Crown. tunes, and our Sacred Honor,” un-

“No taxation without represen- derstood very well the close, in-
tation” was one of the slogans of separable connection between the
the American Revolution; one of right of property and the other
its more picturesque early epi- natural rights of man. It was per-
sodes, the Boston Tea Party, was haps an accident that Locke's

Security of Property


===== PAGE 29 =====

1957 THE MORALITY OF CAPITALISM 27

formula of “the natural right of property be put in the hands of those
life, liberty, and property’ is modi- who have no property, France will
fied in the Declaration of Inde- find, as we have found, the lamb
pendence to “certain unalienable committed to the custody of the wolf.
rights . . . among these are life, --- Lhe nation which will not adopt
liberty, and the pursuit of happi- 2" equilibrium of power must adopt
ness.” a despotism. There is no other al-
But, as is evident from reading ternative.
the Federalist Papers and from
other writings of the Founding
Fathers, most of the leaders of In the Constitution, which still
the American Revolution would stands as the sheet anchor of the
have subscribed to Locke’s view American ideal of liberty under
that the security of property is law, although it has been sub-
“the great and chief end of men’s jected to some severe strains and
uniting into commonwealths.”’ stresses in the last quarter of a
John Adams, perhaps, spoke with century, one cannot find a line that
clearest voice on this subject: would authorize the leveling con-
The moment the idea is admitted ception of equality, enforced by
into society that property is not as the power of government au-
sacred as the laws of God, and that thority. The Declaration of In-
there is not a force of law and pub- dependence asserts that “men are
lic justice to protect it, anarchy and created equal”; but the authentic
tyranny commence. American idea is that this equality
And in discussing the French is an equality only of opportunity,
Revolution, about which he had the right of every man to go as far
almost as many reservations as as his character, industry, and
Burke, Adams again emphasized ability will carry him. It emphat-
the double idea that respect for ically is not that everyone should
property is a fundamental condi- go equally far, with artificial
tion of liberty and that only a handicaps for the more capable
government of limited and divided and industrious, and unlimited
powers can avoid the danger of state aid for those who lag be-
lapsing into tyranny, either of an hind. There is no warrant in early
individual, of the mob, or of an American political thought and
oligarchy: legal enactment for the practice of
Property must be secured, or Pillaging the thrifty for the bene-
liberty cannot exist. But if unlimited fit of the thriftless.
or unbalanced power of disposing Thomas Jeffersoh would prob-

False Banner of Equality


===== PAGE 30 =====

28 THE FREEMAN January

ably have been called a Leftist, if spring for a material development
the term had been known in his unmatched in history; it also pro-
time. But, as his correspondence moted morality by leaving the in-
shows, he fully agreed with the dividual, subject to the restraint
conception of "a natural aristoc- of the law, free to make his choice
racy, as put forth by his political between good and evil.

opponent, John Adams, in the fol-
lowing words:’ As Others See Us.

There is a voice within us, which The most brilliant, lucid, and
seems to intimate that real merit discriminating foreign visitors to
should govern the world, and that the United States, Alexis de
men ought to be respected only in Tocqueville and Lord Bryce — the
proportion to their talents, virtues former observing America in the
and services. . . eighteen thirties, the latter near

Few men will deny that there is a the end of the century — both, on
natural aristocracy of virtues and DPalance, found the moral fruits of
talents in every nation and every the American experiment good,
party, in every city and village. although both were keen and per-
ceptive as to flaws and weaknesses.
Lord Bryce, viewing America with
the background of a widely trav-

J efferson’s agreement with this
view is expressed in a letter to
Adams from Monticello, dated eled Briton, devotes a chapter to

October 28, 1813: “The Pleasantness of American

I agree with you that there is a [Ljfe.” As elements in this pleasant-
natural aristocracy among men. The pess he mentions “the general
grounds of this are virtue and tal-  n,,sperity and material well-being
ents. . . The natural aristocracy I of the mass of the inhabitants,

consider as the most precious gift social equality,” and describes the
of nature, for the instruction, the .
Americans as follows:

trusts and government of society.

And indeed it would have been in- Good nature, heartiness, a readi-
consistent in creation to have formed ness to render small services to one
man for the social state, and not to another . .. seem to be everywhere

have provided virtue and wisdom in the air, and in those who breathe

enough to manage the concerns -of it. : :

the society. So I recently heard of another trib-
It was on this basis of individual ute to America from a much less

opportunity that the American Re- distinguished person, an unknown

public was founded. And this prin- Italian. woman. A European-born

ciple not only provided the main- American professor and his wife,


===== PAGE 31 =====

1957 THE MORALITY OF CAPITALISM 29

motoring through Italy, stopped much attention to the alarming
to pick up an [Italian family prevalence of drunkenness and
stranded by the roadside in the juvenile delinquency. In these
rain. There was nothing about the fields, perhaps, the moral score
car or the dress of the professor with the West is about even.
and his wife to mark them as But where the score is certainly
Americans and they were talking not even is in the immorality that
in the language of their native is forced on Russians, Chinese,
country. But after a time the and other peoples living under
Italian woman said: “You must be: communist rule by the State. It is
Americans. Only Americans would a high crime and misdemeanor in
be kind enough to pick up com- every communist state not to be an
plete strangers as you did.” informer of ‘counterrevolution-
In the United States, as every- ary” activity, even though this
where else, there are bad people may entail the death of a close
as well as good people, swindlers, relative. Both the Soviet Union
hypocrites, - hoodlums, gangsters, and Red China have made heroes
and whatnot. But under the Ameri- of the wretched junior communist
can system of a free economy and who has spied on his parents and
free political institutions there is denounced them to the authorities.
no moral compulsion on anyone to Since the official curtain was
be a scoundrel. People succeed or parted, revealing some of Stalin's
fail morally on their individual crimes, we have it on the highest
merits or demerits. Soviet authority that innumerable
Soviet citizens, including highly
placed communists, have been com-
How very different is the situa- pelled under torture to make false
tion in the countries that have confessions involving themselves
fallen under communist totalitar- and others.
lan rule. No reliable figures are The Archbishop of Canterbury,
available. But, judging from the highest dignitary of the British
reports of many former inmates Established Church, felt no hesita-
of concentration camps, a consider- tion in expressing doubt and dis-
able number of people sent there, may about the British landing in
besides political suspects, are Suez.
hardened and brutalized criminals, But the Patriarch of the Rus-
guilty of such offenses as robbery sian Orthodox Church is an amoral
and murder. Soviet newspapers in robot, obliged to echo in his public
recent years have been devoting pronouncements every lie put out

Crime and Consequences


===== PAGE 32 =====

30 THE FREEMAN January

by his atheistic government, in- amiable of human traits, hatred
cluding the one about United and envy. There has been con-
States employment of germ war- siderable expression of disillusion-
fare in Korea. When the notorious ment by the more thoughtful La-
“Red Dean” of Canterbury or his borites in Great Britain about the
American emulators sound the failure of socialism to bring about
eulogies of the bloodstained Soviet the moral regeneration which they
regime, implacably hostile to all expected. It has been found by ex-
forms of religious faith, they have perience that workers in national-
to answer only to their own reason ized industry do not work harder
and conscience. No one has put or more enthusiastically because
any pressure on them to do so. And the State has replaced the private
they are free to denounce their employer as the boss.

own governments with impunity, The process of pillaging the
to act as conveyors of the incredi- thrifty for the benefit of the
ble falsehoods made in Moscow. thriftless by confiscatory direct

But if any Soviet religious taxation and high “social security”
leader of any faith should call payments—a process that has gone
. down the retribution of a right- much further in Great Britain
eous Providence on a regime whose than in the United States — has not
whole record has been one long led to any earthly paradise, but to
atrocity — from the Red Terror of drab mediocrity and a considerable
the first years of the Revolution, let-down in efficiency and will to
through the starvation of millions work. :
of peasants, down to the massaere The rise of the free individualist
and deportation of the freedom- economy coincided with the decline
loving Hungarians — he would be of old-fashioned tyranny in the
an immediate candidate for the form of the arbitrary power of em-
crown of martyrdom. perors, kings, and princes. The de-
cline of this economy has just as
significantly coincided with the

It may, of course, be argued that rise of totalitarian tyrannies far
communism is not the only alterna- more formidable and ruthless than
tive to capitalism. But one is not the old-fashioned monarchies.
impressed by the moral achieve- ‘The equation, economic individ-
ments of socialism where this sys- ualism equals freedom equals all
tem has partially or entirely come moral values, has‘ never been
into power. Much of its driving proved wrong — least of all in our
force comes from two of the least own time. o.oo

Socialism Also Fails


===== PAGE 33 =====

a ) pe

1 +
LJ — LL

DI1OGENES

HERE are two kinds of truth. memory, and the rest — I know
There is the truth about the nothing.
world which is external to us, the And now suppose that (without
world which we perceive through killing the poor fellow, of course)
our senses, or our senses aided and I were able so to operate upon him
extended by instruments; but there that I could see his brain, his
is another kind of truth, the truth heart, his internal organs. From
about the world which is internal seeing them, I might learn some-
to us and which cannot be seen by thing of how the machine works.
the eye, heard by the ear, nor I might see the heart pumping
measured by instruments. blood through the veins, or watch
I see a man. With my physical the operations of the digestive or-
senses I take him in, a solid, three- gans and the organs of elimination
dimensional object. I note if he is — but again I should know nothing
small or large, tall or short; I note of the man himself.
whether he is young or old; I note Suppose, further, that I could
the color of his eyes and his hair; take segments of his flesh and of
I note whether he is bearded, his organs and his brain and sub-
moustached, or clean-shaven. With mit them to microscopic and chemi-
my ears I hear his voice and assess cal analysis. I might learn a good
its pitch and timber — and so on. deal about the materials which
But, when I have used my physical go to make up the human body,
senses to the full, how much do I but I should be as far away as ever
know of the man? I know nothing from knowing anything about the
except some physical facts about “the invisible man,” of whom the
his body; but of the real man be- body is only one — and that a tem-
hind that body — the compound of porary — manifestation.
emotion, thought, experience, Yet, knowing this truth about a

Diogenes is the pseudonym for a regular contributor to the British weekly, Time & Tide, this
article being from the issue of October 6, 1956.

. . 31


===== PAGE 34 =====

32 - - THE FREEMAN January
Fr human’ being, we do not apply’it-to'™  Senetrating the skies, microscopes.n
the world without, to the physical: which probe ever-deéper into the
universe. We assume that if we infinitely little. .
could push the boundaries of True it is that he has added im-
knowledge of that universe. suffi- mensely to his knowledge of the
ciently far back, we should find the material universe. He has pushed
answer to what Maeterlinck called far back into time and space the
“The Great Secret.” We think that boundaries of the skies, opened up
we should find the why and where- the sub-molecular world, measured,
fore of things, that we should un- weighed, analyzed the different
derstand the meaning of life. forms of matter. He has broken
down the “particle” of my boyhood
into the atom; he has even broken
The thought of earlier ages did down the atom to its constituent
not entertain this delusion; it neutrons and electrons.
knew that man was more than his _ Nor is it to be denied that much
physical apparatus. It thought of of the knowledge which science has
him as a spirit of which the body discovered has been of great prac-
was but the instrument. It saw the tical use. The constant probing of
universe not as God, but as the the physical body has revolution-
garment of God. Man was the ized the art of surgery. The con-
microcosm, of which the universe stant analyzing of various forms
was the macrocosm, but they came of matter has made available a
from the same Hand and it was vast range of medicines.
reasonable to suppose that they We can do all sorts of things with
were constructed on similar prin- matter of which our fathers could
ciples. If there was “an invisible not have dreamed. The impact of
man” behind the visible. man, it the inventions’ made possible by
was reasonable to suppose that be- scientific’ discovery has changed
hind the visible world there was an during my own lifetime the face

The Spirit of Things

invisible one. of civilization — and the pace of
But since the time of Galileo, change becomes ever swifter.
modern man has thought less and On the other hand, it must be

less in these terms. The whole em- admitted that increased knowledge
phasis of scientific injury has of the material world has led to
been on probing the material uni- awful things and to still more
verse. Man has developed instru- dreadful possibilities. Gunpowder,
ments of ever-greater precision, high explosives, the cultivation of
telescopes of ever-greater power of deadly germs for war purposes, the


===== PAGE 35 =====

1957 WORLD INVISIBLE 33

atom and the hydrogen bomb — being merely a highly developed
these must be set against the many form of animal life, when he denies
benefits that in a material sense the invisible man within, he sets
science has brought to the world. strict bounds to the possibility of
If science has made possible more his own psychological and spiritual
abundant material life, it has also development. The materialist
made possible its universal destruc- creates his own blind alley. So does
tion. a materialistic science. It is reach-
But the essential point is that, ing the end of that blind alley to-
with all the answers to all the ques- day. As one bewildered scientist
tions which science has rendered expressed it not long since, “We
available, it has not answered the don’t know where we are.” © ¢ eo

only questions which really matter,
for its only concern has been with EDITOR'S NOTE: Diogenes well em-
the external, material world. In Phasizes the dead end of material-
my car I can travel fifteen times Stic science —the sad fate of the
as fast as Plato could. In a plane I tndividucl who perceives only the ex
ternal, material world. But that is

can travel perhaps a hundred and

. . hardly the end of the trouble, for the
fifty times as fast as Aristotle ever  iiitudes and actions of the material-
did. But the same questions are

- ist also affect others.
there at the end of the journey. Anyone unconscious of the Invis-

In earlier ages men could hear ple — oblivious to that creativity
the human voice only within a dis- which is infinitely beyond self — is
tance of a few score feet; now I logically inclined to believe in his
can hear the voices of men from own omniscience. Thus self-enthroned,
every part of the earth, but they he may dream of a world perfected
tell me much less of what is to the by casting others in his “omnipotent”
point than the utterances of the [little image —even to the point of
wise of old. I may extend the dura- compelling them to act and believe
tion of my life for perhaps a score 5 he does. From such inability or
“of years longer than my fore- unwillingness to contemplate the In-
fathers could have hoped for — but visible and to admit of reality beyond
will it" equal theirs -in quality ? Sci- ones own sensory perceptions, may

.. well stem the growth of authoritar-
ence may plan better cities and iamism. For if a person is aware of
houses, but does it help one iota 43, ny cteries enshrouding even him-
with the mansions of the soul? self, how could he possibly seek to

When an individual man denies control or forcibly direct the creative
that he is more than flesh and actions of others about whom he
blood, when he thinks of himself as knows less?


===== PAGE 36 =====

EpITOR’s NOTE: We're told that more than three million reprints of “Our
Four Great Faiths” had been distributed between its first publication in 1952
and our recent acquaintance with it. The message seems so timely at the
beginning of a new administration, a new year — or even a new day — that
it is presented here for others who might never have seen it, and for those
who want to read it again.

FA IN C7 fi
is

Pr 1

Owe N Oech JEN

W. G. VOLLMER

E LIVE in a land of plenty, cism, nazism, socialism, and com-

in a land of mechanical mira- munism.
cles and great scientific achieve- This Marx-bred philosophy is an
ments. We are the best fed, the anti-God concept of life. It de-
best clothed, and the best housed nounces and smears the God-given
people in the world. Qur vast ma- rights and liberties of man. It de-
terial blessings have no equal in nounces the basic faiths and rights
the long, turbulent history of civi- contained in the Bible, the Decla-
lization. The productive capacity ration of Independence, and our
of our farms, our factories, our Constitution. Under the Marxist
mines is the envy and the hope of idea, man has only one right — the

a free world. right to follow blindly and unques-
Yet, at the peak of our prosper- tioningly the dictates of the State

ity and power, we find ourselves — and to slave and die uncomplain-

beset by fears, by doubts, and by ingly for it.

uncertainties. The situation is a This theory of the all- powerful

frightening one. State is now locked in a death

The seeds of this critical situa- struggle with the concept of free-
tion in which we find ourselves to- dom, justice, and the dignity of
day were planted many years ago man. It is a global struggle with a
by a German named Karl Marx. philosophy which seeks constantly
The teachings of this man long lay and craftily to destroy everything
dormant. But some years ago they © we hold dear. It is a conflict be-
came to life in such forms as fas- tween human dignity and godless

Mer. Vollmer is President of the Texas and Pacific Railway Company.

34


===== PAGE 37 =====

1957 OUR FOUR GREAT FAITHS 35

tyranny, between freedom and too, that all of the great and last-
slavery, between God-given rights ing movements of civilization have
and state-granted privileges. been dedicated to, and founded
upon, Faith in a Supreme Power.
When our Pilgrim Fathers
Thus today we stand at a cross- waded onto the shores of New
roads in the history of our great England, there was no government
nation. The time has come when ready to give them aid or comfort
we must act, not procrastinate; or support. All they had to sustain
when we must lead, not follow; them was a deep and abiding
when we must speak, not listen; Faith. But it was sufficient.
when we must unite, not divide. In those early days the voices of
In this crisis, we have at our the nation’s builders resounded
command the strength, the cour- through the hills with the great
age, and the inspiration which lay songs of Faith. In times of dis-
in the Four Great Faiths of our tress, of danger, of Thanksgiving,

A Time for Faith

Founding Fathers: these ancestors always relied upon
Faith in God faith in God, which they fortified
Faith in Ourselves with faith in themselves, faith in
Faith in Our Fellow Men their fellow men, faith in freedom.
Faith in Freedom Upon these Faiths rests the foun-

Our nation was founded upon dation and the strength and the

these Faiths. The men who signed security of our nation today.

the Constitution, the men — and Most of the world’s two billion
the women — who braved the prai- people have a firm Faith in the ex-
rie and the mountain to pioneer istence of a Supreme Power.
our land lived and died by those Throughout civilization, that
Faiths. But what about us —and Faith has persisted. It has sur-

our Faiths? vived the efforts of tyrants and
dictators to stamp it out.
Faith in God This Faith is woven into the

In searching our minds and foundation and uprights of our na-
hearts for the answer to this ques- tion. It has given us strength when
tion, let us remember that down we faltered, courage when we were
through the ages, Faith in God has afraid — united us when we were
been an all-powerful force in the divided. Recognition of a Supreme
lives of men — that it has been a Power and dependence upon that
never-failing source of strength in Power for guidance is contained in
time of trouble. Let us remember, the Declaration of Independence


===== PAGE 38 =====

36 THE FREEMAN January

and in our national and state Con- Faith in Ourselves
stitutions. So strong was their
Faith in God that our forebears
caused to be stamped on our coins
the words, “In God We Trust.” To
these Founding Fathers, to these
men who signed the Declaration
of Independence and the Constitu- pan pe strong; in terms of fear,
tion, these men who pioneered our 4 then be courageous; in terms

land, this phrase had real mean- ,¢ 4oubt, and then have Faith.
ing. But what about us? Do these ’

words, “In God We Trust,” guide
us, inspire us, strengthen us?

If our country’s future is un-
certain, if we are worried about
tomorrow, then we should do as
our forefathers did! We should Each of us can help revive the
turn again to the Faiths which spirit which built our country by
made our nation great. Our.coun- renewing and revitalizing this
try’s leaders throughout the years Faith in Ourselves. We know that
shared a sure belief in God. In it has paid off in richer, in happier,
crisis and in peace, they placed in fuller lives. We know that it has
their Faith in God’s wisdom, in brought us the greatest outpour-
their own ability to work out their 11g of goods and services the world
problems, in the great justice of a has ever known. We know, too,
free people. that it can bring us peace and

Between the America of yester- Security. Co
day and America of tomorrow The history of our country is
stands our generation. To us has the history of a people with Faith
fallen the duty to preserve the in Themselves. But in recent years
Faith, the Honor, the Strength, Wwe have lost some of this Faith.
and the Glory that is America. So We have started leaning upon the
guided, we will serve best government for aid and for as-
America’s destiny —and the sistance — we have started looking
“world’s. By looking to God, by ded- to the government for the solution
icating ourselves to His teachings, of personal and community prob-
we and our. children can be filled lems. ,
with renewed and strengthened - If we persist in this dependency
Faith. - upon .government, we shall surely

The Scriptures remind us that
“as a man thinketh in his heart,
so is he.” This Biblical admonition
tells us that we cannot think in
terms of failure, and then suc-
ceed; in terms of weakness, and

Our material well-being is ample
proof that we have had Faith in
Ourselves. It is proof, too, that
“the Lord helps those who help
themselves.”


===== PAGE 39 =====

1957 OUR FOUR GREAT FAITHS 37

destroy one of the basic Faiths ago, we must seek the strength
that helped to make our country such Faith in our Fellow Men
free, prosperous, and strong. As yields. We, too, should pledge to
dependence upon the government's each other “our Lives, our For-
ability to solve personal and com- tunes, and our Sacred Honor” in
munity problems increases, Faith working to revive the spirit of
in Ourselves is gradually weakened brotherhood upon which the foun-
and eventually destroyed. dation of our great nation rests.

Faith in our own ingenuity, re- We must renew our Faith in each
sourcefulness, and ability to take other, and in the inalienable rights
care of the basic needs of life is of each other “to life, liberty, and
essential to the preservation of the pursuit of happiness.” The
human rights and personal liber- preservation of the basic Faith —
ties. This kind of Faith in Our- this foundation of brotherly love —
selves is what our forefathers is our duty and our privilege.
handed down to us. It is our re-

sponsibility to preserve it untarn- Faith in Freedom

ished, undiminished. The fourth and last of Qur Four
Great Faiths is Faith in Freedom.
Faith in Our Fellow Men Personal Freedom is the natural

It follows naturally that Faith fruit of Faith in God, in Ourselves,
in God and in Ourselves leads and in our Fellow Men.
directly to Faith in our Fellow Our forefathers believed this.
Men. They believed that Freedom was

Our forefathers possessed this more than an abstract dream.
Faith, too. They lived by it, fought They believed it was a God-given
for it, and died to foster it. They right, not a state-granted privi-
wrote it, too, in the Declaration of lege; and they believed it so deeply
Independence, that all who fol- that they made Freedom an ac-
lowed in their footsteps never complished fact. That is why we
would forget these words: “With have Freedom. That is why we,
a firm reliance on the Protection more than any people in the world,
of Divine Providence, we mutually have been blessed so richly with
pledge to each other our Lives, our so many of the good things of life.
Fortunes, and our Sacred Honor.” Our nation truly has become a
These are the words shaped by land of plenty in a world beset
men who faced the future with a by poverty, hunger, and suffering.
firm Faith in their Fellow Men. Freedom made this possible by

Today, no less than long years releasing the fetters from our


===== PAGE 40 =====

38 THE FREEMAN January

minds. Down through the years Israel into the land of Canaan, pro-
we have been free to dream, to ex- vides an example of what we can
plore, to invent. We have been free do to give meaning to our Faith.
to work, to achieve, to accumulate. At a critical period in the history
We have been free to venture of his people, old Joshua told
—and if we failed —to venture them: “Choose you this day whom
again and again. We have been you will serve, but as for me and
free to spend our money or to save my house, we will serve the Lord.”
it. We have been free to climb Another stirring example that
from lowly beginnings to positions points the way was given us by
of power, honor, and trust. We the great patriot, Patrick Henry,
have been free to rise from rags when he said: “I know not what
to riches. We have been free to course others may choose, but as

enjoy the fruits of our labors. for me give me liberty or give me
But as we enjoy these blessings, death.”
we should remember always that The Faith of our pioneering an-

Freedom can be lost, and that it cestors was a living, vital force.
will be lost if we take it for It was what sustained and guided
granted. Freedom is a sacred trust them as they toiled and fought to
— one which we must protect and lay the foundation and carve the
pass on inviolate, unblemished. It uprights of our nation. To these
is our children’s birthright, ours men and women, Faith was a daily,
to hand on to them and to their hourly substance — a constant
children. source of strength and comfort.
To do this, we must do as those That is the kind of Faith we
before us have done. We must need today to fortify our material
have Faith in God, who answers’ strength. That is the kind of Faith
prayers, Faith in Ourselves and we can have today if we are will-
our work; Faith in our Fellow ing to look to God for guidance,
Men, their courage and honesty; to seek Him in his temple, to follow
Faith in Freedom, its strength and his teachings. That is the kind of
its comfort. But it is not enough Faith we must have if we are to
merely to declare our Faiths. We achieve ultimately “on earth, peace

must give them life and meaning, to all men of good will.” eo oo
by our words, by our works, in our ___
daily lives. Additional copies of this article are

The dynamic Joshua, rugged available upon request to Mr. J. B.

warrior and man of God who was Shores, Director Employee and Public
Relations, Texas and Pacific Railway,

chosen to lead the children of pahas 2, Texas.


===== PAGE 41 =====

REGINALD JEBB

EprTorR’s NOTE: In the October issue of THE FREEMAN, journalist Reginald
Jebb discussed some of the implications of the British Labor party program
outlined in its pamphlet, Towards Equality. More recently Laborite thought
leader and Member of Parliament, Mr. C. A. R. Crosland, amplified the
equality objectives in three long articles which appeared in the magazine,
Encounter. His subtle and closely reasoned arguments afford a foretaste of
the manner in which collectivist aims may be presented to educated readers
of all nations. To help prepare ourselves against such propaganda, we asked
Mr. Jebb to review critically the Crosland essays.

AVING picked “equality” as able — that there are limits beyond

the most appealing aim of which his revolution should not be

the socialist program, Mr. Cros- pushed: “But where, en route, be-
land suggests several approaches fore we reach some drab extreme,
to his objective. He argues the we shall wish to stop, I have no
pros and cons of each approach idea.” So he would start rolling
with a great show of impartiality, a snowball of centralized power,
concluding that all of them have apparently overlooking the fact
merit but that none fully solves that this power feeds upon the
the problem he has posed; needed liberty of individuals and destroys
is a revolutionary change in the their capacity to halt the dictator.
whole fabric of society. In diagnosing the labor-manage-
All this gives an impression of ment and political strife in Eng-
judicial inquiry presented to rea- land, Mr. Crosland emphasizes so-
sonable people, but unfortunately ciological rather than economic
for his argument, his objective of causes. Certain classes have gained
equality is never shown to be prac- income faster than they have
ticable or suited to free human gained social status. And though
beings. Neither equalization of in- the United States is comparatively
comes nor a classless society is a free of rigid class distinctions, he
possibility that could endure. Mr. sees some of the same thing there
Crosland himself admits that ab- in “any nouveau-riche business
solute equality would be intoler- class ... from Texas oil million-

39


===== PAGE 42 =====

40 oo THE FREEMAN January

aires to small shop keepers, now “the best public [private] schools
highly prosperous but socially in- offer not only a superior education,
secure.” but further crucial advantages of
the right accent, manner, and de-
pendability of character. These ad-
To remedy this kind of social in- vantages are a major determinant
equality, Mr. Crosland seeks ways of occupation, and hence of income,
and means to undermine an aris- power, and prestige.”
tocracy of wealth, only to discover Admitting that a private enter-
another obstacle in the form of an prise school does a better job than
aristocracy of talent. And he fears its state-operated “competitor,”
that under freedom of opportunity, Mr. Crosland nevertheless proposes
those who do not succeed may be — for the sake of equality — that
even more resentful than if they private schools be filled with boys
had never been given a fair chance. from the government schools and
So he concludes that the State be required to add state officials
must be doubly careful in arrang- to their boards of management. In
ing differentials in income, taking other words, they would be indis-
into account such psychological tinguishable from government
factors as cause men to envy one schools. If, for equality’s sake,
another. } everyone should enjoy the advan-
He also is concerned with the tages of an educational system
wastes of inequality: “In a strati- created by private enterprise, the
fied society the ruling elite becomes logical method would seem to call
hereditary and self-perpetuating, for removal of education from
and this... must involve a waste government control. But Mr. Cros-
of talent.” Undoubtedly, there isin land’s policy is to kill the goose
all countries a waste of talent, but that lays the golden eggs and sub-
forced equalization will not.-remedy stitute a government fowl whose
that defect. It will only diminish eggs never have come up to stand-
the amount of talent available, ard!
creating more excuse than ever for
rigid and all-embracing state con-
trol. The principle of equality, so
The privately owned and oper- popular among those who are re-
ated schools (called public schools sentful of the success of others,
in England) are especially formi- calls for critical analysis: The
dable obstacles in" Mr. Crosland’s truth that all men are equal has
drive toward equality: In his view, one meaning and one only: All are

Many Reasons for Inequality

Opportunity Guarantees Nothing


===== PAGE 43 =====

1957 EQUALITY RE-EXAMINED 41

equal in the sight of God. From sons according to their work, in-
this it follows in justice that no terests, or tastes; and (2) the
man should be enslaved, and that tendency of some possessing
all should be dealt with equally by wealth, rank, or power to look
the law. But to pretend that all down upon their humble neighbors
are endowed with equal gifts, and treat them as inferiors. The
whether of intelligence, creative first sort of grouping seems both:
power, or physical prowess is, of natural and right for free men
course, absurd. Even under com- while the second is clearly indefen-
plete equality of opportunity, in- sible. But the collectivist, in order
equalities of wealth, prestige, and to bring everything to a dead level,
fame are bound to occur. To at- would destroy that desirable form
tempt to level them flies in the of voluntary cooperation by equat-
face of human nature. Certainly, ing it in men’s minds with the
everyone seeks full opportunity worst kind of snobbery.
for the development of his talents. Mr. Crosland considers with
It is also certain that class snob- some justice that the English are
bery is detestable. But to presume a class-conscious nation. But if he
that bureaucratic government can would probe deeper, he would find
ensure the former or eradicate the that the least class-conscious and
latter is pure fancy. A govern- most independent among them are
ment ought to protect the weak not those who clamor for “equal-
against persecution by the strong, ity,” but those who by their efforts
but strength of character lies ul- have acquired productive prop-
timately in individual effort. And erty, thus enabling them to defy
if men are snobs, they will still be bureaucracy.
snobs in the “drab extreme” of a Freedom, if it means anything,
classless society. implies independence of mind, and
In its drive for a classless so- independence of mind is not
ciety, collectivist thought confuses created through the centralized
two utterly different things: (1) power to organize a flock of equal-
the voluntary association of per- ized sheep. os»

Consent Binds Freely

IT 1S CERTAIN that the most natural and human government is
that of consent, for that binds freely . . . when men hold their
liberty by true obedience to rules of their own making.

WILLIAM PENN, Essay towards the Present and Future Peace of Furope, 1693


===== PAGE 44 =====

The Mathematical
Manpower Shortage

Learning how to add 1s clearly an
important step toward understand-'
ing of higher mathematics. And
perhaps it also is the first step in
mastering the fundamentals of
economics.

HENRY E. BELDEN

HE SHORTAGE of people follow collegiate courses in mathe-
whose education and training matics or science. If an effective
make them suitable candidates to attack is to be made on the problem
enter the scientific field is so well of critical shortages in scientific
known that any citation of statis- and mathematical personnel, it is
tics in this regard would be repeti- going to be necessary to change
tious and redundant. completely the grand strategy of
We hear a great amount of talk the attack. The fire-power must
about the necessity for channeling start at the foundations of educa-
the gifted college student into sci- tion.
ence and mathematics. Such efforts In short, I believe we should
have merit and should actively be start to train the child rather than
pursued, but complete solution to the man. And we must make sure
the problem is not to be found at that the child is well trained.
the college and university level. If this process is followed, we
The truth is that many pupils will uncover the natural talent for
reach the college level with a type scientific and mathematical sub-
of mathematical preparation which jects, which in many individuals is
leaves them sorely unprepared to never awakened or realized, or in
Mr. Belden, nationally known consultant on employee pension plans, also is Manager of the
Southern California-Arizona Branch of The Union Central Life Insurance Company. This article

is from an address at the 1956 Annual Meeting of the Conference of Actuaries in Public
Practice, of which he is a member.

42


===== PAGE 45 =====

-1957 THE MATHEMATICAL MANPOWER SHORTAGE 43

others is finally awakened, but at a selves to the study of mathematics
time of life when to go back and and were the first to advance in
fill the mind with elementals and that science; insomuch that, hav-
fundamentals is distasteful, im- ing been brought up in it, they
practical, or perhaps even impos- thought that its principles must be

sible. the principles of all existing
Pythagoras, who lived in the things.”?
sixth century B.C., was one of the Fuclid’s Elements, first written

first of the Greeks to develop an on papyrus scrolls in about 300
understanding of mathematics. He B.C. and translated into Arabic per-
felt that his knowledge of arith- _haps 1,000 years later, became the
metic, geometry, and philosophy basis of textbooks on geometry in
was so valuable that he would only modern languages. These were in
teach it after swearing his pupils wide general use until the early
to secrecy and obtaining their years of the present century.’
agreement not to divulge the

knowledge to others. Out of this Progressive Education

came the Pythagorean brother-
hoods which were disbanded in
about 532 B.C. because of their re-
ligious and political activity. How-
ever, the importance of Pytha-
goras’ mathematical teachings was
recognized. In the following cen-
tury there was no secrecy about
the mathematics and philosophy
which was being taught to Grecian

There was a time prior to the
rise of Progressive Education,
under the aegis of John Dewey?
and his followers, when mathe-
matics was required in some im-
portant and significant form at
every level of the educational proc-
ess, starting at the elementary
grades and ending at the top as one
of the rigid requirements for a
youth by such men as Socrates and Ph.D. Today the teachers’ colleges

According te Aristotle, who lived
about 150 years after Pythagoras, 2Encyclopaedia Britannica, 14th ed. Vol.

the Pythagoreans “applied them- 18, p. 803.

3Ibid, Vol. 8, pp. 802-3.

Hogben, Lancelot. The Wonderful World
1Encyclopaedia Britannica, 14th ed. Vol. of Mathematics. Garden City Books,

of many of our respected universi-

15, pp. 84-5; Vol. 18, pp. 48-50, 802-4. 1955. p. 33.

Hogben, Lancelot. Mathematics for the ‘Dewey, John. The School and Society.
Million. Rev. ed. Norton, 1947. pp. 26-9, Rev. ed. University of Chicago Press,
30-1, 66-7, 163, 194-6; Wonderful World 1915; Democracy and Education. Mac-
of Mathematics. Garden City Books, millan, 1921; Experience and Educa-

1955. pp. 30-1, 33. tion. Macmillan, 1938.


===== PAGE 46 =====

44 THE FREEMAN January

ties are granting the Ph.D. and the to figure out the answers; could
newer doctoral degrees without add and subtract with reasonable
any requirements in mathematics. accuracy and speed; could do prob-
The status of present-day mathe- lems in long division; could work
matics at the secondary school level out simple percentages and get the
is illustrated by the case of the decimal in the right place; and
mother of a high school student had a basic knowledge of algebra
who wrote to the editor of her and plane geometry? Today any
newspaper to complain that when employer of clerical help knows
her child wanted to study algebra better than to expect a similar per-
and geometry, the teacher and formance from the average re-
principal of the school had advised cently graduated high school stu-
against it on the grounds that such dent. Two or three years after
courses would be of little value in graduation they can do some of
later life. What retrogression since these things with reasonable pro-
the time when Pythagoras taught ficiency, but for the most part they
that mathematics was the basis of have learned how to do the work
all things! on the job and after leaving school.
Perhaps the change is, in part
at least, explained by the following
quotation from an opinion poll In considering the above situa-
used at a “workshop” for teachers, tion I am reminded of something
administrators, and school board I once read about the effectiveness
members at Teachers College, Co- of the ‘quickie’ courses in reme-
lumbia University: dial reading. If the backward
reader can be brought up to
standard by a few weeks of in-
tensive training, why wait until he
is backward to give him the inten-
sive training? In arithmetic, why
be emphasized even at the expense foree our young people to spend
of a reduction in the time given to the time from age 6 to 18 in
the three R’s.” school, only to have them find they
must then intensively study what
If the old arithmetic teaching they were not taught in those 12
methods were so wrong, why is it long years?
that the average high school grad- - In June 1956 the Educational
uate of past years knew his mul- Testing Service of Princeton, N.
tiplication tables without'stopping J., published a booklet, Problems

Why Wait for Deficiencies?

“Geometry and other branches of
mathematics are not valuable for
training persons to think....

“The newer types of school activi-
ties—excursions, art, plays—should


===== PAGE 47 =====

1957 THE MATHEMATICAL MANPOWER SHORTAGE 45

im Mathematical Education. This The report of the Educational
report opens with a quotation from Testing Service then takes up the
the New York Times of June 20, question of “The Learner.” In this
1955: section we find: “According to a
At the grassroots of our society, recent national survey of high
in the schools where our young peo- school seniors, 12 per cent of them
“ple are being trained for their re- had never taken any algebra or
sponsibilities tomorrow, there are geometry; 26 per cent had quit
dry rot and decay which threaten not studying mathematics after only
only the bright economic prospects one year, and another 30 per cent
before us but even our ability to re- pad dropped the subject by the
main strong and defend ourselves. ond of the second year . .. 6 per
We need scientists, mathematicians, cent of the brighter seniors (the
and engineers as never before, yet top 30 per cent on a test of mental

many teen-agers with the ability to lity) d t give eith lzeb
assume such roles are simply not ability) do not give either algebra
or geometry a try and another 41

being given a chance to get the es-
sential training. The statistics make PT cent never get beyond the ele-

plain that great mistakes have been mentary phases.”
made in thousands of communities The section of the report headed

throughout our land. “The Teacher” is so important that
I quote from it at some length:
“One study showed that of 211
prospective elementary school
teachers, nearly 150 had a long-
standing hatred of arithmetic.
“This state of affairs may not
be unrelated to a lack of ordinary
competence with numbers. A ran-
dom sample of 370 candidates for
elementary school positions faced
this question on an examination:
“The height of a letter in a cer-
tain size of print is 14 inch. If the
following are the heights (in
inches) of this letter in other sizes
“This report, based upon a study made Of print, which one is the next
possible by a grant from the Carnegie larger size?
Corporation of New York, may be ob- “(a) 5/16 (b) 1/2 (e) 3/16 (d)

tained from the Educational Testing
Service, Princeton, N. J., for $1.00. 3/8 (e) 7/16

The report continues: “This is a
serious indictment. It charges that
the schools are falling down on an
important part of their job, that
at the very time we are increas-
ingly dependent on competence in
mathematics, many capable young-
sters are denied the training they
need. Recent studies tend to fortify
this conclusion. Complaints from
businessmen emphasize that even
the most elementary skill, facility
in ordinary arithmetic, is in short
supply.”


===== PAGE 48 =====

46 THE FREEMAN January

“Half of the 370 candidates accept the assumption that a teach-
picked a wrong answer. er who has a solid understanding
“There have been numerous of mathematics himself is more
studies of teacher competence in likely than not to develop a similar
arithmetic. If they can be believed, understanding in his pupils. Where
it seems pretty clear that many ele- does such an assumption take us?
mentary school teachers have a In a vicious circle, apparently —
hard time keeping even half a and in reverse — for it has been
jump ahead of their pupils. shown that ‘solid understanding’ is
“ ‘Elementary teachers, for the frequently absent in teachers. Fu-
most part,” according to one ob- ture teachers pass through the ele-
server who has taught them, ‘are mentary schools learning to detest
ignorant of the mathematical basis mathematics. They drop it in high
of arithmetic; high school teachers school as early as possible. They
assigned to teach mathematics fall avoid it in teachers’ colleges be-
in this category also.’ cause it is not required. They re-
“This ignorance is scarcely sur- turn to the elementary school to
prising, for little knowledge of teach a new generation to detest
mathematics is expected, even offi- it.”
cially, of prospective school teach-
ers. In the majority of cases an in-
dividual with ambition to teach in A great majority of the recent
an elementary school can matricu- efforts to combat the mathematical
late at a teachers’ college without manpower shortage have been di-
showing any high school mathe- rected at the collegiate level. While
matics on his record. He can gradu- such activity is good, the problem
ate without studying any college will be solved only if attention is
‘mathematics. And in this condi- directed to mathematics training
tion, he can meet the requirements at every level of education, starting
of most states for a certificate to at the very lowest grades. The col-
teach arithmetic. The certification lege or university student who de-
requirements for high school math cides to pursue a career in science
teachers are only a little stiffer: or mathematics will find he is un-
nearly one-third of the states will able to follow through with the
license them even though they have idea if he has not received and ab-
had no college mathematics at all, sorbed adequate primary and sec-
and the average requirement forall ondary school mathematics. Also,
states is only 10 semester hours. there is low ratio of probability
“In the absence of data, let us that a college freshman will have

Start in lower Grades


===== PAGE 49 =====

1957 THE MATHEMATICAL MANPOWER SHORTAGE 47

any worth-while or serious scien- have mentioned were at their
tific or mathematical desire if his height. These men were very con-
interest has not been aroused at scious of the value of mathematics;
the lower academic level. some thought it was the basis of all

Parents should demand that things. It was not until the Greek
their children receive adequate scholars began to lay their empha-
drill in-addition, subtraction, mul- sis on less important studies that
tiplication, and division and that Greece was overthrown and lost its
old-fashioned teaching techniques power. The present Atomic Age
be returned to usage in the instruc- and its nuclear physicists have
tion of these important elementary proved that the Pythagoreans were
subjects. not so far off the beam in their be-

Greece was the cultural and eco- lief in regard to mathematics that
nomic leader of the world in the “its principles must be the prin-
days when the great teachers I ciples of all existing things.” e »

The Responsibility of Education

IN THAT TERRIFYING NOVEL by George Orwell, 1984, the Party of
Big Brother developed the ultimate in ruthless dictatorship pre-
cisely because it devised the means of enslaving men’s minds. . .
The crowning triumph of its torture chambers was the under-
mining of the disciplines of logic and mathematics, by which
it finally brought its victims not only to assert but actually to
believe that two plus two equals five.

As yet, fortunately, it is only through fantasy that we can
see what the destruction of the scholarly and scientific dis-
ciplines would mean to mankind. From history, we can learn
what their existence has meant. The sheer power of disciplined
thought is revealed in practically all the great intellectual and
technological advances which the human race has made. The
ability of the man of disciplined mind to direct this power effec-
tively upon problems for which he was not specifically trained
is proved by examples without number. This ability to solve
new problems by using the accumulated intellectual power of
the race is mankind’s most precious possession. To transmit this
power of disciplined thinking is the primary and inescapable

responsibility of education.
ARTHUR E. BESTOR, JR., Fducation for 198;


===== PAGE 50 =====

“Well. I'll Be Switched !

—~ at

A bit of speculation concerning human relations.

F. A. HARPER

HOSE OF US who are either past events. We cannot decide that

fathers or mothers, or sons or the Stone Age shall not have been.
daughters,” have doubtless pon- All that can be done in the
dered the problem of posterior ap- direction of undoing the deed ‘is
plications of force as a means of tg replace the former physical posi-
dealing with juvenile misconduct. tion of things, and the like. If

Suppose a child has done some- Johnny ‘has pushed Suzie’s doll
thing he shouldn’t. What should carriage over the bank, for in-
be done about it? Some pretty deep stance, perhaps he can be made to
philosophical problems are in- pring it back. Or if the doll has
volved. They are the same ones heen broken, perhaps he can be
involved in international squabbles made to either patch it up or buy
— even war, where the participants 3 pew one from his candy money
are older and operate in gangs. or penny savings.
But let’s reduce the problem to a Such readjustments do not
Size we can see, based on our OWI really undo the original deed. One
direct experience, so as to avoid indelible consequence is that
becoming befuddled by the sheer Suzie’s feelings have been hurt,

bulls of the battle. with the result that her disap-

The Deed Is Done pointment in Johnny is imprinted
Your child, let us say, has en- upon her mind forever. And
acted a misdeed. neither the patched doll nor a new

The first fact to be realized is one like it quite suffices to replace
that nothing can.undo a deed al- - the object of her fondness before

ready done. That much is sure. It it was marred or ruined.
is not within our power to alter Or to illustrate this point more

Dr. Harper is a member of the staff of the Foundation for Economic Education.

48


===== PAGE 51 =====

1957 WELL, I'LL BE SWITCHED 49

clearly, the life of a dog that has 2. To discourage similar mis-
been killed or a person who has deeds in the future.

been murdered is definitely beyond Let’s consider these two pur-
our power to replace. poses separately.

What else can be done to Johnny
for having committed this mis-
deed? One thing only — you can One who believes in Eventual
apply some sort of retribution. and Eternal Justice in the Uni-
You can do that, or just let the Verse must reject the first of these

Retributive Justice

matter go. two purposes of retribution. He

must refrain from punishment for

Retribution its own sake, as distinct from try-
The form of retribution you ing to prevent repetition.

choose may range all the way from To refrain from posterior appli-

a rebuke, such as a mild scorn of cations for purposes of retributive
disfavor, to something of the vio- punishment really stems from
lent sort. In common parlance, you one’s religious faith. And it is a
may either go easy on him or severe test of that faith, indeed.
beat the tar out of him. The choice For in the heat of parental dis-
will differ among parents, but for approval, it becomes almost irre-
any one parent the selection at any sistible to get in on the act and
one time will probably depend on try to help God a bit; to try to
the adjudged seriousness of the decide for Him what would be a
misdeed or the frequency of its fair potion of gall in this particu-
recurrence. Perhaps the time of lar instance; to apply the potion
day and how tired you are when now rather than to wait for Him
the misdeed occurs will have an to settle the matter in that uni-
influence on your choice; the birch versal accounting of justice in the
rod doubtless is a tool used more Hereafter.

in late afternoons and evenings. If I really have faith in" an
But let such details go. They are Eternal Justice, I cannot logically
not of primary concern here. bow to this temptation. My excuse

Retribution can have only two for doing so would be a claim of
purposes: false authority. Tested in the light

1. To penalize the misdoer for of an Eternal Justice, I would then
a misdeed that has already been myself be originating a misdeed
performed. This is in addition to merely because another has done
forcing him to replace the thing a misdeed, and that makes no
stolen or broken, and the like. sense. I would be starting a chain


===== PAGE 52 =====

50 THE FREEMAN January .

reaction leading to an endless mar- So if misconduct can be dis-
ket for birch rods as a consequence couraged by retribution on the
of the original misdeed: misdoer, can it not also be dis-

So anyone who believes in a couraged in an alert child who
formalized Heaven and Hell, or merely observes the application of
any counterpart thereof, must re- posterior pains on the misdoer?
ject as a valid purpose of retribu- And if that can be made to work,
tion the penalizing of misdoers is it not possible to forestall mis-
beyond the point of repairing dam- conduct in an innocent. child by
age done. On what authority can applying in advance a sample of
I assume that the processes of the retributive process?
retribution have not already been

fully designed, or that I am em- Pre-Punishment

powered to design or redesign ~~ For instance, if George can be
them as part of my life mission? prevented from cutting down a

second cherry tree by the applica-
That He May Fear tion of a bit of force after the

If one rejects retribution for first misdeed, can’t Tom be dis-
its own sake alone, then the only couraged from cutting one down
valid purpose it can have is to try by being allowed to observe
to discourage repetition of the George’s punishment, as a sample
misdeed. of what might be in store for him

Usually these retributive cere- in like circumstances? In fact,
monials are quite private affairs couldn't George have been pre-
between the parent and the child. vented from cutting down the first
Neighbors are generally not in- tree if he had been whipped in
vited to be observers. Why? advance, as an innocent boy, as a
Couldn’t neighbor children benefit sample of what the misdeed would
as observers and also acquire good- hold in store for him? This would
ness that way? Why restrict the be a unique procedure, to be sure,
lesson to one who has already and it opens up quite unlimited
performed the misdeed? Why not opportunities for “retribution in
let its benefits accrue as well to advance,” so to speak. But if one
others, where misdeeds may be assumes that the process truly pre-
contemplated but still undone? vents misdeeds, what is wrong
Perhaps, if the process can attain with such preventive measures ap-
the goal, something is to be said plied to the innocent as well as
for public whipping posts, public to the guilty?
executions, and the like. The deep, philosophical question


===== PAGE 53 =====

1957 WELL, I'LL BE SWITCHED 51

at issue here is whether or not But isn’t it possible, somehow, to
the process attains its objective. "avoid their ever reaching that
Can people be made moral by critical stage?

force? There is no doubt, I sup-

pose, that the conduct of a child Love and Respect

can be altered somewhat by the Now, love — or at least respect —
application of force or the threat is surely a requisite to the child’s
of force; that he can be influenced learning a lesson that will reorient
through the process of fear which his conduct into proper, self-
this engenders. The child can responsible action —moral conduct.
surely be made to act one way, or If a whipping has the effect of
not act another, due to the push of destroying this love and respect, a
fear rather than to the pull of un- most precious and essential start-
derstanding. But since moral con- ing point of the child’s education
duct must be a personal and self- will have been lost.

willed choice based on what the in- It is not easy at such critical
dividual himself deems to be good, times to remember that the child’s
rather than what he fears, then deed seemed to him at that time to
force and the threat of force surely be the right thing to do. It seemed
fails to cause moral conduct — to him that it was the thing to do,
whatever else one may say about that is, as a composite opinion that
it. However much the child’s ac- took into account all considerations
tions may be influenced by re- known to him, together with his
- straint and by the generation of intuitive guides to conduct. To say
fears, it is something other than this is no more than to state an
moral guidance that is being ac- axiom, yet as a tool of thinking it

complished. - tends to escape parents in such
I suspect from my own experi- times of emergency.
ence that when as parents we ap- So the child’s deed — which to

ply a whipping, it is the conse- the parent was a misdeed — simply
quence of having reached a state reflects the child’s tools for deci-
of intellectual bankruptcy at this sion at that time. In differing from
point. We don’t know what else to his parent's decision of the right
do. So our discouragement or ani- thing to have done, it simply
mosity breaks out in this particu- means that the two had different
lar form, with the child directly on tools for judgment. To beat the
the receiving end. tar out of the child because of this

Perhaps there is nothing else to difference of opinion fails to intro-
be done at that stage of events. duce a single new element for ra-


===== PAGE 54 =====

52 THE FREEMAN January

tional choice into the child’s kit-of is for each side to state the facts
decision tools. When again similar and position held by the other side
circumstances arise, the child will — state them to the satisfaction of
surely still think as he did before the other person. Only after that
as to what is the right thing to do. point has been reached are the par-
The. whipping does nothing, basi- ties ready to try to proceed with
cally, to correct the concept that the final step of resolving the dif-
caused the child to behave in a way ference. The only point of present
deemed wrong by the parent. All interest about this procedure is to
that the whipping can do is to in- recognize that both parties have
ject the new ingredients of vio- reasons for their position; that
lence and fear into the child’s kit only after all the facts have been

of reactions. laid on the table for both to see, is
it possible to proceed toward
What Was His Reason? agreement based on reason rather

I once observed a teen-ager han- than on power.
dle a problem in an interesting
way. A younger child had perpe- Who Should Be Whipped?
trated a misdeed, as his elders Now there is an interesting
judged it. The elders, in confer- question to be posed at this point,
ence assembled, were pondering about a difference of opinion be-
what to do about it. Finally the tween the parent and the child. Let
teen-ager said: “Let me try to han- us assume that one of them is go-
dle this. I want to talk with him ing to use force on the other as a
first, and find out why he did it. He means of ‘handling this difference
must have had some reason, and if of opinion. We have already con-
we can find out what the reason is, cluded that the process relies on
we will know where to start to fear rather than on understanding
work.” : and sincere. conviction; that it
This approach seemed to me to probably destroys love and respect
be astute and sound. Why start to on the part of .the. victim. The
work on a problem until we know problem now arises as to which of

precisely what the problem is? the two is to be the victim. Who is
.I am reminded in this connection to be whipped?
of a proposal for resolving argu- Ruses may. be used to decide this

ments. As a starting point, each question, such as seniority rights.
side states.its case and all the facts Or the law of guardianship might
that contribute to the position éach be.-invoked, or something of the
takes on the issue. The second step sort. But behind all these masks to


===== PAGE 55 =====

1957 WELL, I'LL BE SWITCHED 53

the claim of authority looms the all this, why the child should not
real one — superior might. The one whip the parent rather than the
who is bigger as tested by the tools other way around? If the child
of this battle — force — will be the truly loves and respects the parent,
applier; the smaller will be the re- then his having to do this should
cipient. Might rules games of induce sincere regrets for having
might. And so the parent wins the done something that led to this sad
initiative, ordinarily. ending. It would, furthermore,
A common parental observation avoid the risk of losing the child’s
is this: “This is going to hurt me love and respect, to whatever ex-
worse than it does you.” That, I tent there was any originally.
take it, is supposed to convince the The child may not, of course,
victim that he is not, after all, to have any love and respect for the
be the principal sufferer. That is a parent. If this is the case, then a
claim surely lacking in convincing fundamental requisite to educa-
power. On the contrary, it prob- tional influence is totally lacking
ably only induces in the child a anyhow. And a lashing, by itself
further — and unnecessary — loss alone, is surely not the way to es-
of respect for the parent who poses tablish love and respect. So if the
such a porous pontification. parent has failed up to this time
Now let’s take a bit of inventory to gain the love and respect of the
of our analysis. The only valid pur- child, why shouldn’t the parent be
pose for a whipping is to induce lashed for his failure; who better
nonrepetition of misconduct —as to administer the penalty than the
judged by the parent, and in con- child, the victim of neglect?
trast to the child’s judgment at the
time of the deed. The process sub- The Test of Experience
stitutes force for reason. It oper- Before throwing such a strange
ates through fear, and will be no proposal into the ash can, one
more lasting than will be the might try applying it to his own
child’s fear of his parent. This ap- experience as a child. In my own
proach is the antithesis of love and experience, the one and only lash-
respect, and is alien to all that love ing I received was one where — to
and respect can attain. It denies this day — I am convinced that the
education and bars new tools for judge rendered a hasty decision
learning moral self-reliance, by prior to obtaining all the facts in
which the child will make wise the case. The whipping had abso-
choices. lutely no effect whatever, so far as
One may now ask, in the light of I can detect, of helping me to ac-


===== PAGE 56 =====

54 THE FREEMAN January

quire better tools of judgment in totally on gaining enough advance
the future. All it did was to sacri- respect in the eyes of the child so
fice some of that sacred ingredient that guidance can be accomplished
of love and respect, from which out of respect and understanding,
alone can come a positive influence rather than to have to resort to

for the future. force. Failing in this, perhaps the
How about your own experi- battle is lost anyhow.
ences? Did you ever learn any- A complete reorientation of

thing fundamental from the appli- processes of the parental handling
cations of brute force upon your of children in times of misdoing,
posterior? Did you ever gain from along the lines suggested, might
it any love and respect for the in- also be tried elsewhere. It might
flictor? be tried where there are differ-

It would be difficult, I suspect, ences of opinion in larger cate-
to take this step and hand the gories of humanity — even interna-
switch to the child to be used on tional and interracial affairs. In
one of us as a parent. A friend of the face of continuous failure in
mine, on whom I tried a trial run international affairs by the use of
of this reasoning, remarked: “I force, might we not consider a new
think I'll have my wife try it first.” approach even there? Rule by

Of course, there is another alter- sheer might is a doubtful device,
native. And this is to avoid the even from the standpoint of the
process of force entirely; to rely seeming victor.

[oDEAE ©m apnenuy.l A Consequence of Compulsion
3 No. pe N hod 1

WHEN THE LAW, by means of its necessary agent, force, imposes
upon men a regulation of labor, a method or a subject of edu-
cation, a religious faith or creed — then the law is no longer
negative; it acts positively upon people. It substitutes the will
of the legislator for their own wills; ‘the initiative of the
legislator for their own initiatives. When this happens, the
people no longer need to discuss, to compare, to plan ahead; the
law does all this for them. Intelligence becomes a useless prop
for the people; they cease to be men; they lose their personality,
their liberty, their property.

FREDERIC BASTIAT, The Law, 1850


===== PAGE 57 =====

A REVIEWER'S NOTEBOOK =

Ee  __ John Chamberlain = |

HARLES E. Sorensen — ‘“Cast- an American manufacturer had to

Iron Charlie,” as Henry Ford do to make consumer capitalism
called him throughout the forty work was to follow the books of
years of his employment by the a few academic pioneers, such as
Ford Motor Company — was not a Francis Walker and H. C. Carey.
man of theory. Like his boss, this For there, a full generation before
Danish patternmaker from Copen- Henry Ford began tinkering with
hagen had to see things in action a racing car for Barney Oldfield,
before he could proceed to the gen- the American system of economics
eralization. Nevertheless, Soren- is shadowed forth. Ricardo and
sen’s autobiography, My Forty his followers in England had
Years with Ford (W. W. Norton. taught the doctrine of the wage
345 pp. $5.00) offers the clearest fund; they thought the working-
anatomical description of the man was paid out of profits, which
American system of economics implied a perpetual struggle be-
since the publication some thirty tween investor and laborer for the
years ago of Garet Garrett’s The something extra that makes both
American Omen. It is a book that saving and working worth-while.
is worth far more than all the In brief, Ricardo, long before
college texts that have been Marx, taught the doctrine of the
written in the wake of John May- class war. Francis Walker and his
nard Keynes, who did so much to American school said it was not
undercut the American theory of so: The American theory was that
the falling price level by institu- wages were paid out of produc-
tionalizing the opposite — and tion; that if you increased produc-
European — idea of the perpetual tion, selling more and more items
inflationary bias. at less and less per item, the wages

Theoretically, when Charlie and the profits would rise together.
Sorensen went to work for Ford But no one acted on the Walker
in the early days of the century theory until Ford came along.
before Model T was born, all that The curious thing about it, as

55


===== PAGE 58 =====

56 THE FREEMAN January

Sorensen’s book shows rather ir- Michigan to the construction of
refutably, is that Henry Ford Cadillacs. Ford took. the inter-
owed precisely nothing to the theo- changeable unit system out of the
reticians who had gone before him. Detroit air. But mass production
Ford was the true untutored required an automatically timed
genius. What he did was to redis- flow of parts to the right place at
cover all on his lonesome the . the right time, and there was noth-
several elements which were to ing much in the Detroit air to
make mass production and a con- show Ford what to do about this
sumer-oriented capitalism possi- until he hired a man named Walter
ble. He put the several elements Flanders. This wild man, who
together by a process of trial and stayed with Ford only twenty
error, coming up in the end with months, had original ideas about
a perfect model of what had been the arrangement of machines. Put-
dimly apprehended in the acade- ting the interchangeable unit sys-
micians” books. Then, long after tem together with the Flanders’
the first working model of modern notions, Sorensen and others at
capitalism had produced and sold Ford finally came up with the mov-
some thirty million cars, Henry ing assembly line. It was indige-
Ford hired a man named Samuel nous to the Ford plant, but Ford
Crowther to explain the theory of himself did not invent it; he
what had been done. The explana- merely sponsored it—which Charlie
tion, says Charlie Sorensen, was Sorensen says is glory enough.
wholly after the fact, and the fact
itself owed far less to logical
processes than Ford himself In his arrangement of work
wished to believe. Ford might have .saved himself a
lot: of trouble if he had only been
: acquainted with Frederick W. Tay-
The production of interchange- lor who first tried out the tech-
able parts was already an old story niques of time-motion study at the
when Ford began dreaming of a Midvale Steel Company. But no-
cheap car to fit the average Ameri- body at the Ford Company had
can’s pocketbook. Eli Whitney and ever heard of Taylor when Ford
the Connecticut gunmakers had and Sorensen were setting up mov-
been producing rifles and Colt re- ing production lines at the High-
volvers by the interchangeable unit land Park plant in 1913. According
system for years before Henry to Sorensen, Taylor was highly
Leland first applied the principle in surprised in 1914 to hear that the

Assembly Lines

Interchangeable Parts


===== PAGE 59 =====

1957 A REVIEWER'S NOTEBOOK 57

Ford Company “had undertaken to draw the inevitable deductions.
install the principles of scientific Thus the optimistic principles
management without the aid of ex- which had first been set down in
perts.” the eighteen seventies by econo-
It was more trial and error that mist Francis Walker were almost
led Henry Ford on from his inde- accidentally proved in the practice
pendent discovery of Taylorism to of a man who probably never in his
an equally independent adumbra- life heard of Walker.
tion of the theory of consumer
capitalism. When Ford first con-
ceived the desire to make a cheap Henry Ford is famous for his
car for the multitudes, he wasn’t opinion that the greater part of
much concerned about the origins history is “bunk.” But this was the
of mass purchasing power. Pre- opinion of a tinkerer who learned
sumably he had farmers, the tradi- only from his hands and his eyes.
tional dwellers in rural isolation, in It didn’t matter much in the case
mind when he thought of an ex- of Henry Ford, who happened to be
panding market for the Tin Lizzy. a genius. But books have their
When Ford first decided on the $5- place — and it would not have hurt
day for his workers, it was as an if Ford had been able to read the
incentive move. The profits were literature which effectively prophe-
piling up so fast as a result of as- sied his own emergence.
sembly line production that it was The point is worth making these
only reasonable to suppose that the days precisely because Mr. Soren-
Ford labor force would become dis- sen’s story of the origins of the
gruntled if it didn’t share in the Ford system is not bunk. My Forty
vastly increased take. Years with Ford is something that
So the $5-day was instituted as should be read again and again, in
an efficiency lure, not as something workshops, in union offices, in the
to make mass consumption possi- schools, and in whatever rooms pol-
ble. But mass consumption came iticians use when they have oppor-
inevitably in its wake. Ford him- tunity to do a little homework. The
self was soon startled to discover sad thing is that the lesson of the
that he hadn’t provided parking Ford Company, which was elo-
space for cars at the new Highland quently set forth in 1928 in Gar-
Park plant. It was long after his rett’s The American Omen, is be-
men had started driving Model Ts ing forgotten by the very Ameri-
to work that Ford got his literary cans who have profited most from
Man Friday, Mr. Crowther, to its application. Instead of letting

Books Have Their Place


===== PAGE 60 =====

58 THE FREEMAN January

capitalism work its miracles in the on working. It may be surmised
shape of lower and lower prices for that the only reason the past
the consumer as mass production twenty years of inflation haven’t
spins on past the “breakeven” been absolutely ruinous is to be
point, the politicians are commit- found in the triumph of American
ted to the rule that the savings of technology, which has hauled the
the American system belong to dollar back from the abyss by fore-
them, to be siphoned off in taxes. ing a continually mounting plenty.
Wages still go up as unit produc- Sorensen’s book is a first-rate case
tion costs are slashed. But the con- study of how this technology works
sumer no longer gets his share of even in the face of transcendent
the benefit, save as the politician difficulties. It is also an intensely
sees fit to dole it out to him as fed- human study of a man who had his
eral aid to this and that. idiosyncracies and blind spots. Al-

Even so, the Ford system goes together, it is the book of the year.

2 Liberty Hyde Bailey: An In- Bailey's is worthy for several rea-

formal Biography sons.
By Philip Dorf. Ithaca: Cornell Uni- Yor one thing, his unique name
versity Press. 259 pp. $3.50. — Liberty. His grandfather, a Ver-

mont abolitionist of the early nine-
Of the countless people who wan- teenth century, had proclaimed on
der over hill and dale, occasionally the birth of a son: “Call him Lib-
there is one whose course becomes erty — for all shall be free.” And
a path; then a road; then a high- - that name was passed on to the
way. grandson.

The influence of great minds is Liberty Hyde Bailey was an ex-
like that. Many of us were at- treme individualist who exempli-
tracted to Cornell to study under fied the deepest purposes of lib-
one particular man who himself erty. An ordered, command society
had been attracted there to study can never chart the course for
under another man. The other man great minds. All it can do is to
was Liberty Hyde Bailey, one of paralyze them. But under liberty,

the world’s greatest botanists. the work of men like Bailey bene-
Not every biography of a scien- fits us all.
tist would be worthy of note from His was a fascinating life. As a

the standpoint of liberty. But boy, he played with the Indians in


===== PAGE 61 =====

1957 OTHER BOOKS 59

frontier Michigan. Later he be- never recover enough to make the
came the close friend not only of trip, his enthusiasm faded for the
remote plants but also of men all first time. Finally, on Christmas
over the world. night of the ninety-eighth year of

At an early age Bailey laid out his life, there passed away a man
his life’s plan in skeleton form. He who had upheld liberty in science
planned to learn for twenty-five as few have ever done —‘“for all

years, teach for twenty-five years, shall be free.” F. A. HARPER

and then “do what I wish” for

twenty-five years. = The Passing of American Neu-
He entered the third phase of trality, 1937-1941

his plan a bit late. It seems that
when he was forty-five he had re-
luctantly accepted the Deanship at
Cornell, but promised to serve only
ten years. Ten years later he Professor Drummond’s volume de-
walked into a faculty meeting, an- scribes the most ominous transi-
nounced his retirement, and left tion in American history — from
the room. Of this event, one who the loss of the benign neutrality,
was present said: “We were all too international modesty, and pacific
stricken to speak, and I look back inclinations which safely guided
on it as one of the most dramatic our foreign relations for more
experiences of my life.” than a century and kept us free
The end of his great career did from any major foreign war dur-
not come, however, at the three- ing this period, to the fervent
quarter-century mark. Bailey had espousal of world meddling, give
once said in a commencement ad- away, and “perpetual war for per-
dress delivered in his seventy- =~ petual peace.”
third year: “On that day that I This transition should be espe-
lose my enthusiasm, let me die.” cially impressive and appalling to
His continuing enthusiasm is evi- libertarians who are opposed to
denced by the fact that in his state enterprise, inflation, and in-
ninety-second year he was prepar- creasing debt, as it has brought
ing for one of his numerous expe- every one of these in its wake.
ditions to study palms in Africa, The decline of political morals
and to visit fourteen countries. As after a decade and a half of official
a result of an accident in New mendacity in regard to world af-
York, he broke his leg. When he fi- fairs and their domestic aftermath
nally came to realize that he would has led to the toleration of unprec-

By Donald F. Drummond. Ann
Arbor: University of Michigan
Press, vii. 409 pp. $7.50.


===== PAGE 62 =====

60 THE FREEMAN January

edented graft and corruption in tures continue in so-called peace
public life. time. The militaristic system is be-
The economic changes have been ing made permanent as politicians
even more menacing. Military have learned the technique of link-
managerialism, a vast enlargement ing economic “prosperity” and po-
of statism, inflation, rising living litical tenure to the indefinite pro--
costs, currency depreciation, an as- longing of cold and phony warfare
tronomical public debt, and in- and the vast military expenditures
creasingly crushing taxation have associated with it.
been among the penalties exacted . Professor Drummond’s book
of the United States by our inter- tells how we lost our neutrality
ventionism. Our economy is being and the truly peaceful policy which
undermined and our national re- controlled our foreign relations
sources exhausted. and limited our public expendi-
The financial balance-sheet dra- tures for a century and a half, al-
matically underlines the fantastic though he recounts the story with
cost of interventionism. It has approval rather than reproach.
been estimated that the total cost HARRY ELMER BARNES
of our interventionism since 1941
has been in excess of $750 billion = A Carnival of Buncombe
dollars, as compared with all fed- By H. L. Mencken, edited by Mal-

eral public expenditures of $180 colm Moos. Baltimore, Md.: The
billions from 1789 to 1941. Be- Johns Hopkins Press. 370 pp.
tween 1941 and 1953, Roosevelt $4.50.

and Truman each spent approxi- This is not the most profound
mately twice as much as all na- book on politics ever penned, but
tional expenditures down to the it is probably the most fun. There
year 1941. are sixty-nine pieces here, se-

It will be evident that the evils lected by Huntington Cairns from
and burdens brought to this coun- the hundreds of political articles
try by our interventionist Liberals Mencken wrote for the Baltimore
since 1940 vastly exceed the dam-. Sun in the years 1920-1936.
age done to the country through Mencken was at the top of his
the machinations and subversive form during this period, and al-
actions of the communists during though he professed to despise pol-
this same period. itics — apart from its entertain-

Some may seek to brush this off ment value — he would have been
by holding that such is the cost of desolated if kept away from it. He
actual war. But the vast expendi- had a constitutional antipathy to


===== PAGE 63 =====

/
1957 OTHER BOOKS 61

frauds, and his preoccupation with honest, his candidacy is hopeless.”
the gorgeous specimens that This trend appears inevitable in
abounded in American politics dur- a mass democracy where politicans
ing his lifetime brought out some must flatter the mob to get elected:
of his best writing. He was a ‘The first and last aim of the poli-
shrewd reporter who reacted vig- tician is to get votes, and the saf-
orously and wrote with a complete est of all ways to get votes is to
honesty that spared no one. appear to the plain man to be a

This is the second book to be plain man like himself, which is to
published after Mencken's death. say, to appear to him to be happily
The previous one, Minority Re- free from any heretical treason to
port, is a miscellany of warmed- the body of accepted platitudes —
over Mencken written after his to be filled to the brim with the
prime, and better forgotten. A flabby, banal, childish notions that
Carnival of Buncombe, on the challenge no prejudice and lay no
other hand, is the cream of Menck- burden of examination upon the
en’s best. mind.”

It was not the “honest imbecil- This trend in American political
ity” of the ordinary politician that life carries with it two major con-
sent Mencken’s temperature up to sequences: the deterioration of the
103; it was the do-gooder, the two partysystem, andthe decline of
right-thinker, and the forward- the people's liberties. If no candi-

looker in politics — the “resilient, date for high office can get elected
sneaking, limber, oleaginous, hol- by standing on his principles, par-
low, and disingenuous” fellow who ties erected on distinctive political
purveyed ‘an idealism that is principles will tend to disappear.
oblique, confusing, dishonest and This is inevitable, and evidence for
ferocious.” This was the type itis the merging of the two major
which had come to dominate the parties. “Both,” Mencken writes,
American political scene since the ‘have lost their old vitality, all
turn of the century, as Mencken their old reality; neither, as it
viewed it. “One of the greatest de- stands today, is anything more
fects of a democracy,” he wrote, than a huge and clumsy machine
“is that it forces every candidate for cadging jobs. They do not
for office, even the highest, into carry living principles into their
frauds and chicaneries that are successive campaigns; they simply
wholly incompatible with the most grab up anything that seems likely
elementary decency and honor. In to make votes. The old distinctions
proportion as he is intelligent and between them have all faded out,



===== PAGE 64 =====

62 THE FREEMAN January

and are now almost indiscernible.” plain reason: he is the best man in
As for personal freedom, it is the running, as a man. There is no
steadily being liquidated: “Laws ring in his nose. Nobody owns him.
multiply in the land. They grow Nobody bosses him. Nobody even
more and more idiotic and oppres- advises him. Right or wrong, he
sive. Swarms of scoundrels are let has stood on his own bottom, firmly
loose to harass honest men. The and resolutely, since the day he
liberties that the Fathers gave us was first heard of in politics, bat-
are turned into mockeries. ... Be- tling for his ideas in good weather
tween Wilson and his brigades of and bad, facing great odds gladly,
informers, spies, volunteer detec- going against his followers as well
tives, perjurers and complaisant as with his followers, taking his
judges, and the Prohibitionists own line always and sticking to it
-and their messianic delusion, the with superb courage and resolu-
liberty of the citizen has pretty tion.”
well vanished in America...I begin Mencken had his blind spots, and
to see signs that, deep down in some of them glare. But in the po-
their hearts, the American people litical arena he saw clearly. He was
are growing tired of government the outsider viewing his contem-
by fiat and denunciation. Once they poraries with good-natured con-
reach the limit of endurance, there tempt for their excited absorption

will be a chance again for the sort in the shenanigans of politics. {
of Americanism that civilized men Even in his Notes on Democracy, |
can be proud of....” This, written the nearest thing to a political

in 1920, is a tribute to Mencken’s creed, his common sense kept
prescience. On the issue of indi- breaking through to keep him
vidual liberty he never faltered, sane. No political structure or pro-
even when his own freedom was gram has the solidity to bear the
not directly involved. assorted faiths and loyalties which

Mencken could recognize and re- people in the twentieth century —
spect a man when he saw one, even lacking a proper object of faith
if he abhorred the man’s ideas. and loyalty — entrust to it. To the
Thus it should surprise no one that extent that a cure for this condi-
he voted for LaFollette in 1924. tion is possible, A Carnival of Bun-
Mencken affirmed he would go to combe is a long step in the right
the gallows arguing that socialism direction. A new object of faith
was a swindle. Nevertheless, he and loyalty completes the cure, and
stated: “I shall vote for him (La- one is free to look beyond Mencken
Follette) unhesitatingly, and for a for that. EDMUND A. OPITZ



===== PAGE 65 =====

1957 OTHER BOOKS 63

+= Fountain of Justice: A Study tution rests on its rootage in popu-
in the Natural Law lar will represents a comparatively
By John C. H. Wu. New York: late outgrowth in American consti-

Sheed & Ward. 287 pp. $3.75. tutional theory.
These are large topics which do

A statutory law is established by not admit of any easy settlement,
legislative enactment. Whatever and they are of enormous impor-
authority it may have derives from tance to every libertarian. For if
the power of the legislating body any elected body, at the behest of
to enforce it, plus the public opin- some “majority,” may rightfully
ion which approves it. For the le- pass any law it pleases, then a law
gal positivists there is not and curbing the liberty of a minority
need not be any other sanction, but has the same ethical sanction as a
there are philosophies of law which law which seeks to protect it. In
take issue with this conclusion. practice, and perhaps in theory as
Public opinion may be unin- well, this is equivalent to eliminat-
structed or misinformed and the ing ethical considerations from the
legislators wicked men — in which legal field, which is to sanctify
case the statute enacted by the one force.
and approved by the other may be Dr. Wu combines the wisdom of
a vicious and unjust law. But when two social heredities — that of
we speak in these terms, we intro- China and that of the West. He has
duce another dimension into the written a learned but readable
argument — the speculative and pook on the natural law and com-
metaphysical dimension which the mon law background of the Ameri-
positivists seek to exclude. The cap political tradition which pays
idea that eternal and immutable fy] tribute to the theological and
principles are written into the na- religious premises which under-
ture of things and that just laws gird that tradition.
are those which correspond to
these principles is part of the
Higher Law background of Ameri-
can constitutional theory. The con-
cept of “Nature and Nature’s God”

EDMUND A. OPITZ

Any book reviewed in this Book Section (or

as the ultimate sanction for politi- any other current book) supplied by return
cal bodies and their deliverances mail. You pay only the bookstore price. We

. . pay the postage anywhere in the world.
was widely held by the Founding Catal on request

Fathers. The alternative notion THE BOOKMAILER, Box 101, New York 16
that the supremacy of the Consti-



===== PAGE 66 =====

I BA Ar Aa AN re AA RP Ar, CS i Sn hint Sh SAA 2h 2 SAM A © AAS AR) SA © hh b= non

i BRIR IER &

ies ra ~ ’ a
oo TRE y pall {IE Pes J HI ES INNE ESN
. St) SH WJ ty feaitlea PEERY pd
\ KR u NTA, ad Ll Wowpe LENZ Vio 9 I AL SUE I MO
N 3 > : v2. N oA AS ~ rn Se yn Arr ed ey
{ |

THIS MONTH the Foundation for Economic Education is pleased
to announce a new service, which makes available, for those who
cannot see, a limited number of Foundation publications in Braille.

} During the past two years, Mr. Frederick M. Phelps of Spokane,
Washington, a certified public accountant, has been transcribing
copies of Foundation material into Braille. Following a long-
established and inspiring tradition set by other Braille transcribers,
Mr. Phelps has refused to accept remuneration for his services.

Now, through the Foundation, he has made available the fol-
: lowing bound volumes in Standard English Braille, Grade 2, which
1 may be loaned, at no cost, to any blind person who is interested,

¢ for a period of one month:
Blessings of Discrimination.................................... F. A. HARPER
3 A Farmer Fights for Freedom ..................... Cy PETERMAN
N Inflation... F. A. HARPER
. ~The Mainspring of Human Progress... HENRY GRADY WEAVER
3 Not Worth a Continental......................... PELATIAH WEBSTER
R Stand-By Controls.................ccccceveeicevciiiranenn, F. A. HARPER
| Survival of the Species. ..................c...cc.cccoee. BEN MOREELL
N Wards of the Government.................................... DEAN RUSSELL

Also, Property Rights and Human Rights by PAuL L. POIROT is
available in Grades 1 and 1% Braille.

fo

“Iningtovan Hudson, N. Ye, i.



===== PAGE 67 =====

THOMPSON RADIOACTIVE TESTS REVEAL
ENGINE WEAR—POINT WAY TO LONGER CAR LIFE

This sketch shows bow Thompson engineers use atomic energy to measure piston ring

side wear while it is taking place. Radioactive piston rings are installed in a test engine

- . . . as tiny particles wear off, io much the same manner a3 they wear off rings in your

{i } car's engine, they are carried through a highly sensitive scintillation counter which
= keeps 8 continuous record of wear conditions.

RACIO ACTIVE a
BEING TESTED RECORDER,
For WEA rt I =a

RADIO ACTIVE Pode

~ 31
WEAR PARTICLES MARKS DEGREE OF PISTON RING

WEAR ON GRAPH

scInTILLATION |:
COUNTER :

COUNTS THOUSANDS OF TINY  § |,
RADIO ACTIVE PARTICLES TO .
LEARN THE EXTENT OF PISTON ’

RING WEAR «?
J

CIRLULATING
PUMP

HE DAY MAY NOT BE too far away they wear. For example, Thompson is

when the engine in your car will now hard at work studying the side

last twice as long as it does today. weur tendencies in piston rings after

Important progress toward that goal new discoveries about this little-
is being made by Thompson Products known subject resulted from the new A Thompson engineer installs 4 radioactive
cngincers who have uncovered new radio-isotope tests. piston ring in a test cagine using special tools

discoveries in wear patterns of car,

a designed to protect personne! from over.
truck and tractor engines. To do so,

Other tests to follow involve such red I
exposure to dangerous radioactive rays. A

Thompson put man’s most modern vital engine parts as bearings, valves, second engineer closely observes the radiation
“tool”. . . atomic energy . . . to work tappets, rocker arms, connecting rods, count to be sure that safery limicasions are
in new testing techniques. gear teeth and pistons. maintained.
Here's how Thompson does it... This important new development
Engine parts to be studied for wear ~~ YPifies the thoroughness and inge- You can count on
are irradiated in an atomic pile. These nuity of research methods, develop. -
radioactive parts are then placed in a ment skills, and manufacturing facili-
test engine. Tiny radioactive metal ties that have made Thompson Prod- 0 hn
particles, torn loose by wear, are picked ucts one of industry's leaders for more
up by lubricating oil and circulated than 50 years. Today such industries
through a scintillator, a measuring as automotive, aviation, agricultural,
device S50 times more sensitive than appliances, metallurgy, hydraulics, 10 S
a Geiger counter. pneumatics, electronics and many
From these radiation measurements, others count on Thompson. Thompson MANUFACTURLRS UF AUTOMOTIVE, AIRCRAFT,
Thompson engincers are learning how Products, Inc, General Offices, INDUSTRIAL AND LEH CTHONIC PRODUCTS,

parts wear, where they wear, and when Cleveland 17, Ohio. FACTURILS IN SINTREN CITIFS.


===== PAGE 68 =====

FROM A LIBERTARIAN’S LIBRARY

We HAVE one common similarity, and one common necessity if
we are to live and progress. It is that prohibitions against, or re-
strictions upon, the release and exchange of our creative energies
be at the lowest minimum possible.

The universality of the will to live and the requirement that
life and livelihood be protected are conterminous with society. The
responsibility for society-wide protection cannot, in sound organi-
zational practice, be vested in anything less than society. And
where the responsibility rests, there also should rest the authority
to discharge the responsibility.

The law, the book of rules and prohibitions for social admini-
stration, can logically serve only the purpose of deterring man’s
destructive actions for the sake of giving full flower to his creative
actions. Government, within its proper bounds, can be but the
protective servant of all individuals equally against antisocial
marauders.

Selections from Government—An Ideal Concept by Leonard
E. Read. The Foundation for Economic Education, Irving-
ton-on-Hudson, N. Y. 149 pp. $1.50 paper, $2.00 cloth.