===== PAGE 1 ===== IDEAS ON LIBERTY NOVEMBER 1962 “Take One Flat of Tomato Plants...” . . D.M. Westerholm 3 The Transfer-PaymentsNet. . . . . . H.P.B. Jenkins 9 Principles of Taxation . . . . . . . Dean Russell 10 The Defamation of the American Tradition . Clarence 8. Carson 13 Lost Freedom — lllusionor Fact? . . . . JohnC. Sparks 23 The American System and Majority Rule . Edmund A. Opitz 28 A Modern TeaParty. . . . . . . . Gordon Conklin 40 On Responsibility . . . . . . . . RogerB. Cooley 41 The Social Security Program . . . . . Paull. Poirot © 45 A Miracleat Stake . . . . . . . . LeonordE. Read 57 Books: A.J. N:Manofletters. . . . . . . John Chamberlain 59 Other Books . . . . . . . . . . 63 fn THE FOUNDATION FLE FOR ECONOMIC EDUCATION, INC. Irvington-on-Hudson, New York AY ===== PAGE 2 ===== OUTSTANDING ADVANTAGES FOR SAVERS COAST FEDERAL SAVINGS JOIN the more than 100,000 savers who hold individual, joint, trust, or corporation savings accounts at Coast Federal and get these important advantages: SAFETY—Assets over half a billion dollars—America’'s third largest association. Strong reserves and high ratio of cash and government bonds to assure withdrawal of savings immediately on request. HIGHEST EARNINGS consistent with safety. Accounts opened by the 10th of the month earn from the first. SAVE-BY-MAIL CONVENIENCE — Airmail postage paid both ways. Prompt, efficient service on all transactions. MEMBER — Federal Savings and Loan Insur- ance Corporation, Federal Home Loan Bank. T FEDERAL SAVINGS “ ‘3 JOE CRAIL, PRESIDENT Coast Federal Savings, Department “H" 9th & Hill Los Angeles 14, Calif. (Please check-mark as desired.) 1. [J] t enclose (J check, TJ] money order, to open a 2. 0 Please send information savings account in the following name or names: on Coast Federal Savings and Loan Association. Name Address City Zona State ===== PAGE 3 ===== NY 62 Essays,— 36 Authors (7 This latest volume of the ESSAYS ON LIBERTY series (448 pages, indexed) contains selected writings from The Freeman and Notes from FEE beginning with July 1961 through May 1962. Cloth, $3.00 Paper, $2.00 The Set — all 9 volumes Cloth, $22.00 per set Paper, $15.00 per set Order from: THE FOUNDATION FOR ECONOMIC EDUCATION, IRVINGTON-ON-HUDSON, NEW YORK MEMO: To Businessmen ENTER FEE'S 1963 BUSINESS FELLOWSHIP PROGRAM Invite a college professor (or several) to study your business. It should improve the understanding of young men and women coming out of our colleges. For details, write to W. M. Curtiss THE FOUNDATION FOR ECONOMIC EDUCATION, IRVINGTON-ON-HUDSON, NEW YORK ===== PAGE 4 ===== THE eeman A MONTHLY JOURNAL OF IDEAS ON LIBERTY NOVEMBER 1962 Vol. 12, No. 11 LEONARD E, READ President, Foundation for Economic Education PAuL L. POIROT Managing Editor THE FREEMAN is published monthly by the Foundation for Economic Education, Inc., a non- political, nonprofit educational champion of private property, the free market, the profit and loss system, and limited government, founded in 1946, with offices at Irvington-on-Hudson, New York. Any interested person may receive its publications for the asking. The costs of Foundation projects and services, in- cluding THE FREEMAN, are met through volun- tary donations. Total expenses average $12.00 a year per person on the mailing list. Donations are invited in any amount—§5.00 to $10,000—as the means of maintaining and extending the Foundation’s work. Copyright, 1962, The Foundation for Economic Education, Inc. Printed In U.S.A. Additional coples, postpald, to one address: Single copy, 50 cents; 3 for $1.00; 25 or more, 20 cents each, Permission Is hereby granted to anyone to reprint any article in whole or In part, providing customary credit Is given, except ‘A Modern Tea FYE Party.” Any current article will be supplied in reprint form If there are enough inquiries to justify the cost of the printing. ===== PAGE 5 ===== D. M. WESTERHOLM “Take One Flat of E Tomato Plants—-" Hk; IF TELEVISION, newspaper, and ra- cult to give a calm, clear explana- dio comments have caused your tion of a process about which you youngster to ask occasional highly feel anything but calm; and sec- embarrassing questions about such ondly, this whole subject of agri- assorted small gems as price sup- cultural price control is an untidy port programs, parities, subsidies, mixture of both physical and in- and surplus commodities, I would tangible factors, some of which first like to extend a sympathetic can be explained to a child by using welcome to the Puzzled Parents familiar examples, and some of Club. And then I'd like to tell you which cannot. Finally, you don’t about a wonderful little tomato- easily explain just one part of an patch, octopus. The establishment of a Now, maybe you have had better parity leads to a price control, luck than we had in answering which leads to crop control, which “What's a parity?” by words alone leads to a subsidy, which often — in which case your membership leads to a surplus, which has to be in the P.P.C. is hereby cancelled! stored; all of which increases gov- We ruefully discovered that quo- ernment spending and debt, which tations from the dictionary and increases inflation, which influ- long explanatory chats just ences the original parity — and weren’t getting us anywhere ex- brings us right back to the P.P.C.! cept into further confusion, We wrote for help to an uncle For one thing, it is mighty difi- who has been a ruggedly inde- Mrs. Westerholm is a Registered Nurse, house- pendent, modestly successful wife, and student of liberty of Inglewood, farmer for some fifty years. We California. . Illustration: A. Devaney, Inc., New York suspected Just a touch of sarcasm 3 ===== PAGE 6 ===== 4 THE FREEMAN November when his answering letter opened The next morning, with a light with: “Can’t be much help to you heart and a long hoe, he started in- right now, since I'm smack in the dustriously preparing the bed middle of setting out my last crop which would grow the tomatoes, of summer subsidies; but when I which he would sell to the neigh- finish up — at parity, naturally — bors, for money which would pur- I'll sit down and write you all about chase the new baseball mitt — it. In triplicate copies, of course. which as far as he was concerned In the meantime, if you're tired was the real reason for this crazy of sanity, try farming. ...” little tomato-patch, anyway. Per- We chuckled in appreciation of fectly simple and logical. And his wit, but then took a second about two blisters and one sun- reading and saw part of a real an- burned nose later, he was ready to swer peeping out of the sarcasm. start setting in the plants. Obvi- We had a fair-sized back yard, and ously, the time had come. So out an empty bulb-bed that was lying we went, and called for a Rules and fallow for the summer; so we'd Regulations Recess. just follow that snide advice about farming — on a miniature scale. Our ten-year-old son thought it Right there in the warm sensi- a great idea to have his own gar- ble sunlight, we proceeded to ex- den plot, together with the pro- plain that our neighborhood could ceeds thereof, and cheerfully be reasonably expected to consume agreed to follow whatever rules only a certain quantity of toma- and regulations we might set up. toes. Now, if too many tomatoes After much serious study he de- were produced in the neighbor- cided upon a crop of tomatoes. The hood, he would have to sell his local nurseryman was happy to tomatoes at a lower price, in order supply him with a flat of brave to entice people to buy his instead young plants — following due cross- of someone else’s. This in turn ing of palms with silver — and even would force the other tomato- gave him helpful detailed advice growers to lower their prices to about their planting and care. (I compete with him — the same had offered the lad an agricultural grade tomatoes having little indi- loan, at a modest 4% per cent in- vidually to recommend them to the terest, but the little tight-wad had buyer, other than price. If these saved enough out of his spring prices went low enough, some of chore money to cancel out that the tomato-growers might actually potential lesson in economics!) lose money. Since we didn’t want Subsidized Acreage Control ===== PAGE 7 ===== 1962 “TAKE ONE FLAT OF TOMATO PLANTS =" 5 such a catastrophe to occur, we While he worked, we talked. He could permit him to plant only a asked how the money to pay these certain portion of his “acreage” in subsidies was obtained; and the tomatoes. We call this crop control. answer, that it came from all of us (We carefully staked off the last by way of taxes, was received in three feet of the bed.) However, thoughtful silence. A few more being a benevolent “government plants went in, and after a long agency,” we would pay him in cash look at the marked bed, he had an- for this portion of his crop which other question. How had we de- we were not allowing him to plant. cided how much of his patch to (We solemnly handed him three stake off; and how much to pay one-dollar bills.) And this, we in- for it? formed our amazed son, was what was known as a subsidy. Statistical Complications He looked at us. He looked at We admitted that for the sake the staked-off part of the bed. He of example we had just guessed at looked at the three crisp bills in his his three-foot area, and three- grimy hand. Finally he ventured, dollar subsidy; but that the actual “0.K. So you're the government government employed many agent, and you don’t want too trained experts who arrived at the many tomatoes grown; but it various figures concerning the dif- wouldn’t be fair to make me just ferent commodities and localities give up part of my own crop for involved. They too made guesses, free—so you pay me for it. but much more educated ones than Right?” ours — based on population, previ- “That is reasonably correct,” we ous annual consumption rates confirmed. (clear back to 1910!), rainfall “And that’s what a subsidy is?’ figures, long-range weather predic- “In essence, yes; although it’s tions, present market trends, and not done quite as directly as this. so on. Then they correlated all of A subsidy is simply a grant of this agricultural data with the money.” statistical records regarding na- “Well, it doesn’t make much tional average industrial wages, sense to me!” he stated. cost-of-living estimates, and cur- “How true,” we murmured. rent purchasing power of the dol- He went back to work, carefully lar. By manipulating these two sets setting each tiny green plant in of figures carefully, they arrive at place and pressing the rich soil a final total price which is supposed firmly around the tender roots. to equalize the pay-per-hour of the ===== PAGE 8 ===== 6 THE FREEMAN November farmer to that of the industrial parity prices every year. We worker. This final figure is what agreed. He pursued the thought we call parity. that this involved an awful lot of Ideally, if all the educated salaries, and since these were gov- guesses were correct, there would ernment salaries, that meant that be just enough tomatoes grown to they were paid for out of taxes fill the actual demand; and the from everybody — not just farm- prices received by the farmers ers. We agreed. He concluded mus- would total out at the end of the ingly that this somehow didn’t year to yield them as much pay seem altogether fair. Again we per hour as industrial workers re- agreed. ceived. (Based on a purchasing power ratio established during the Surplus Commodities 1910 [1909-1914] period.) The plants grew so well, and so In short, parity literally means thick (perhaps because he had set equality; so to achieve parity, you all the seedlings out in less space juggle predicted production and than they were intended to fill), predicted consumption — and bal- that he had to start thinning them. ance the difference with subsidies. It is not a pleasant task to destroy “Does it work?” asked my something you have nurtured and bright-eyed son of the soil. protected and assisted to attain “Well, now that you mention it growth; but he did the job effi- —no.” we replied. ciently, knowing that all of the “Oh brother!” he moaned. “Let's plants would suffer if not enough go have lunch!” space were provided for growth And so we did. expansion and sun penetration. As The days passed, the sun shone, he discarded the extra plants, he the weeds were routed, the water gave many a glance of pure disgust flowed, and the plants grew. The at that bare, wasted end-section! stakes were set, and cord support- And then another possibility oc- lines were strung. Everywhere ex- curred to him. What if these plants cept on that starkly bare, rather re- grew more tomatoes than the ex- proachful last three feet. As the perts had figured? How could the plants grew, so did the talking. parity be maintained then? “The Cat” opined that since there Ah, yes, a good question. “Too are so many different crops grown much” is called surplus. “Prod- — not just tomatoes — it must ucts” are called commodities. Put take an awful lot of experts to them together and you have an- figure out all of those different other one of those original terms ===== PAGE 9 ===== 1962 “TAKE ONE FLAT OF TOMATO PLANTS —"’ 7 with which we were so plagued — would have to supply some form of the surplus commodity. additional subsidy to bring that What can one do with too many annual farm profit up to the parity tomatoes? If they go on the open level, anyway. No matter how you market, prices will automatically figure it, it is going to cost money; drop — following the old and irrev- which means either increased ocable law of supply and demand. taxes or increased national debt — But if prices drop, it would also which will increase inflation. put those final profit figures at the end of the year at some point lower The Point Sinks Home than established parity. And ac- It took quite a bit of digesting cording to the experts, if parity is to get this all assimilated; but not maintained, farmers won’t bless his heart, he managed it. have enough money to buy the stuff “But, wait a minute! If you pay the city industrial workers make; me more money for my surplus and if the industrial workers can’t tomatoes, I'm just going to have to sell enough of their products to pay it right back by a bigger tax make enough money to buy farm on the money I make. Right? So, I produce, why everybody will go still won’t have gotten up to par- broke — and that’s called a depres- ity, because I won't really end up sion. with any more money to spend!” Now, the government could buy “That’s almost the way of it, the extra tomatoes. But then they son. But to take it all the way, you must either destroy the tomatoes, must remember that these subsi- which is virtually the same as dies are paid for from public simply destroying the public funds funds, and will have to be replaced with which they were purchased; by taxing everyone — not just the or they must be processed and tomato-growers.” stored, which is quite an expensive He pondered this for awhile, little procedure in itself, when ac- and then came up with a rather complished on a national scale! neatly thought-out solution. An alternative would be to apply a “Seems to me that everybody price control; but this would leave would be better off if they just the farmer still holding all those quit using all those experts, forgot extra tomatoes — because the pub- about parity, let me grow my toma- lic will purchase extra amounts of toes like I want to, and left it up a product only if the prices are to me to take care of my own extra low enough to be particularly tomatoes. Gee whiz! Nobody made tempting. So, the government me grow too many! And look at ===== PAGE 10 ===== 8 THE FREEMAN November all the money the government taught our son nearly all there is would save. They could maybe to know about this one lone phase lower everybody's taxes, and that of economics; but he has a much way we'd all have more to spend.” better understanding than he had “Sounds fairly sensible,” we previously — and so do we. We hope agreed, “but, what if you went this understanding may be helpful broke some season?” to him in the years to come. One “Well, geeeee! Everybody takes commodity of which we never have chances — on losing a league game, a surplus is knowledge! or going out of business, or break- Right now, we are all up to our ing a log _ ox growing too ed eyebrows in tomatoes. Even the tomatoes. That's just the way the three-year-old is doing her gallant little old cup-cake crumbles! May- small best to help Brother with his be you can’t win ’em all. You just lus! Th iohb . do your best.” And with that, he surp'us: Lhe neighbors are Inun- ! dated in a flood of juicy plump red went back to work tying up his vines. And I went into the house globes. But when anybody says and started cheerfully reviewing anything about the incomprehensi- recipes for tomato relish! bility of agricultural support pro- All of this is why I spoke at the grams, we just grin and say: “Look start about a wonderful little — first you take one flat of tomato tomato-patch. Of course, it hasn’t plants....” @® Old Saw Revised Before events the economy churned a penny saved was a penny earned — but now inflation’s made its dent: that penny’s worth but half a cent. JIM McCGOLDRICK ===== PAGE 11 ===== THE TRANSFER- PAYMEN TS NET or — FISCAL EDUCATION IN THE ELECTRONIC AGE ) When gusty winds had herded clouds Across the setting sun, Old Kaspar turned the fire up And oiled his rabbit gun, While Peterkin and Wilhelmine Warmed up the allegoric screen. They watched a giant trailer truck That stood with flashing lights Amid a snarling traffic jam And people locked in fights, Until a thousand folks or more Went in and out the trailer’s door. “What's going on inside that door?” The little children cried. “They run a Net Computer there,” Old Kaspar soon replied. “It shows how much your neighbors give Toward the wealth on which you live.” “For many years,” said Kaspar then, “A lot of folks have tried To live on economic wealth Their neighbors would provide. They’ve sought to win a life of ease By voting grants and subsidies.” “What’s made them mad.” asked Peterkin, “And started all the fights?” “They’re feeling underprivileged And cheated of their rights. When that computer shows their net, Their taxes top the sums they get.” “I think it’s mean,” cried Wilhelmine, “To make those people fight!” “A few contusions,” Kaspar smiled, “May help them see the light. When they cool down, they may have learned That wealth is sweetest when it’s earned.” H. P. B. JENKINS Economist, Fayetteville, Arkansas 9 ===== PAGE 12 ===== TAXATION DEAN RUSSELL COMPULSORY military service in Whether or not I like the idea of our nation is based squarely on the compulsory military service, at democratic principle that every least I can understand the princi- person is obligated to serve his ple on which it is based; for the country equally and to the best of idea of equal treatment is, of his ability. We American people course, the heart of the democratic would not tolerate the idea that concept. But I cannot find any one soldier should be compelled to principle in morality, economics, serve ten times longer than an- or political science to justify the other soldier merely because the progressive income tax. first one happened to be a better Economically, it is about as gunner. logical as paying half-time (in- But when it comes to economic stead of time-and-a-half) for over- support for our government and time work. Or paying less instead nation, that principle of equal of more for increased production. treatment is rejected. Our system Morally, the progressive income of progressive taxation is based tax seems to be based mostly on squarely on the idea that some this idea: “They earn more money persons shall pay 70 per cent of than we do, we outnumber them, their incomes while other persons So let's vote to have the govern- shall pay only 20 per cent, or even ment take it.” no income tax at all. The more you Politically, our current proce- earn, the more you must pay to dure is clearly a total departure government out of each additional from the principle of taxation on dollar of income, which this nation was founded. Dr. Russell recently rejoined the staff of the There 18, however, a theory and Foundation for Economic Education to devel- practice of taxation that is in op and direct the FEE School of Political . . vs Economy. harmony with democratic princi- 10 ===== PAGE 13 ===== 1962 PRINCIPLES OF TAXATION 11 ples and that will still raise the person with a $10,000 home — not enormous amounts of money our five or six times as much merely government now spends. It is pro- because he owns more property portional taxation. That is, each than his neighbor. Sales taxes are person shall pay the same rate — also in proportion to purchases. 10 per cent, 20 per cent, 30 per The social security tax is a com- cent, or whatever tax rate the peo- bination of equal and proportional. ple vote for. The democratically se- The tariff tax has always been in lected rate shall apply equally to proportion to the amount im- all incomes, whether large or small, ported. And so on. If the tax rate were 20 per cent, for example, the person with a Graduated Rates — taxable income of $100,000 would 4A New Principle in Taxation pay $20,000 — and the person with But with the adoption of the a taxable income of $5,000 would Sixteenth Amendment in 1913, a pay $1,000. heavily discriminatory system of Under proportional taxation, it taxation was accepted by the is true, of course, that the rich American people. Some persons man would still pay more money now pay no income tax at all on than the poor man. But at any their earnings.. Others pay 20 per rate, each would then receive equal cent and 40 per cent. And a few treatment under the law, in both pay as much as 91 per cent on the war and peace. That is, each con- upper brackets of their earnings. script would serve the same time Since discrimination in any area in the army, regardless of military usually brings with it certain un- ability; and each taxpayer would foreseen problems, it is hardly sur- be subject to the same rate of prising that this tax discrimina- taxation, regardless of economic tion has produced certain unfor- ability. tunate results. For the long run, Actually, proportional taxation certainly the most unfortunate re- is traditionally American. While sult is revealed by the accusation the principle of absolute equality of officials of the Bureau of In- has sometimes prevailed, the ternal Revenue (as well as by at “equality of rate” or proportional least two Presidents of the United principle has usually been fol- States) that we American people lowed. Taxes on real and personal are increasingly becoming tax property are current examples. The crooks. That’s why they advocate person with a $20,000 home pays that the tax on interest and divi- twice as much in taxes as does the dend income, along with wages and ===== PAGE 14 ===== 12 THE FREEMAN November salaries, should be withheld at the plants, instead of being spent for source. That's why special ma- nonproductive items as is done by chines are now being designed to government, Thus if the persons catch the millions of us who, it is who earn the money could spend it claimed, are cheating on our tax as they wish, the result would be returns. more production, jobs, and in- If it is true that we are rapidly comes — and also more tax revenue. degenerating into a nation of law- Be that as it may, it is a fact breakers, perhaps we should ex- that the amount of total govern- amine again the laws we violate so mental revenue that comes from flagrantly. Perhaps we should give personal income taxes in excess of serious thought to the old idea that 25 per cent of earnings is small the only possible way to insure re- indeed — less than 5 per cent. Thus spect for the law is to pass only itis clear that the principle behind laws that receive the automatic our endorsement of the progres- respect and compliance of more sive features of the income tax is than 95 per cent of the people. For not based on the necessity for gov- obviously, no law is really enforce- ernmental income. The progressive able if as many as 5 per cent of us income tax appears to be based deliberately and consistently vio- primarily on our current and in- late it; there just aren’t enough creasing mania for compulsory jails to keep us in, or enough police equality in the economic area. to put us there. Thus we use our hard-won voting Several reputable economists equality (one man, one vote) to have argued that a flat tax rate of support a system of gross in- 20 per cent to 25 per cent would equality in taxation (one man 20 bring more, not less, revenue to per cent, another man 91 per cent). government. They argue that al- The issue facing the American most all of the money now taxed people in this area of progressive away above that rate would be taxation is clearly not fiscal; it is invested in new equipment and a moral issue. ® | omoas ®N 1 0BERTY | John Stuart Mill IT 1S ALSO IMPORTANT that the assembly which votes the taxes, either general or local, should be elected exclusively by those who pay something for the taxes imposed. Those who pay no taxes, disposing by their vote of other people’s money, have every motive to be lavish and none to economize. ===== PAGE 15 ===== t — LH p= p us Fo CH bl fe CLARENCE B. CARSON MANY OF THE DEPARTURES from If such a modern Rip Van the American tradition came with Winkle had launched inquiries to dramatic swiftness in this century. discover the sources of these A Rip Van Winkle who went to changes, he might not have been sleep in 1910 and woke again in satisfied with the answers he re- 1935 would have discovered many ceived. Undoubtedly, most of those of his fellow citizens strangely de- whom he contacted would have pendent upon government, the pointed out, impatiently, that con- Constitution in many ways inop- ditions had changed, that there erative and grumblings about such had been war and depression, that restraints as it still imposed, nu- the old opportunities were no merous laws of a character with longer available, Had he insisted which he was unfamiliar, and a upon knowing what happened to tendency to venerate leaders and American ideals, institutions, cus- to belabor those who appealed to toms, and traditions, he would the past. Surely, he would have probably have been dismissed as concluded that a revolution had an odd fellow who could not adjust taken place, or that he had awak- to new times and new ways. ened in the midst of a revolution. Yet my imaginary character is At the least, assuming that he was not too different from a good many a perceptive man and not too cir- Americans of the recent past and cumspect in his pronouncements, today. Awaking from their private he would have declared that the concerns and indifference (sleep), American tradition had been sub- they are discovering a transformed verted. America with mounting tendencies I } at odds with the tradition that Grove City College, Pennsyivania | *°¥ ** they had known. One of our con- 13 ===== PAGE 16 ===== 14 THE FREEMAN November cerns in this condition, under- nor covert design, for much of standably, is to find out what hap- their work was presented openly pened. and argued directly. Indeed, some The most appealing — and in of those who prepared the way for some ways most comfortable — ex- collectivism in America apparently planation is that the tradition was had no intention of nor knowledge undermined, destroyed, and re- that they were doing so. The effect placed by alien infiltration and of an action, however, is not al- communist subversion. Some his- tered by the intent of the actor. torians dismiss this conception Before the American tradition cavalierly by calling it the con- was replaced, it was discredited. spiracy theory of history — imply- Odium was attached to it, and feel- ing somehow that such a notion is ings were marshaled against it. disreputable on the face of it. Un- This was no easy task to accom- questionably, there has been and is plish. There is every reason to be- a communist conspiracy. It is lieve that at the beginning of this demonstrable, too, that many ideas century Americans at large were of non-American origin have been firmly attached to constitution- propagated here. But such ex- alism, government by law rather planations attribute too much ef- than by men, individual liberty, fectiveness to communists and fail voluntary group activity, limited to account adequately for the mas- government, and personal inde- sive help they have had from non- pendence. communists. It glosses over, too, Yet, ‘‘American” became a the really difficult task of recov- tainted word for many people in ering liberty and individualism, the course of time. Several years for it ignores how deeply en- ago, Karl Shapiro, writing in The meshed in thought and ways col- New Republic, referred to the lectivism has become. “American way of life” as a “nau- seating expression” which meant Discredited by Scholars to him “the material life, the wor- My contention is that much of ship of the scientific mentality, and the work of subverting — I use the the belief that Americans are the word in the rare sense of “to un- best people on earth.” A single in- dermine the principles of; cor- stance of lynching is apt to call rupt” — the American tradition forth denunciations of the “Amer- was carried on by ‘respectable’ ican’ penchant for swift and vio- thinkers, writers, and scholars. I lent justice. Should a board of cen- attribute to them no evil motives sors fail to license some obscene ===== PAGE 17 ===== 1962 THE DEFAMATION OF THE AMERICAN TRADITION 15 movie, it would be just another liberty to publish our thoughts and horrendous example of that latent opinions. Voluntary choice of Puritanism in America which has church membership is more cer- reared its ugly head once more. If tainly a part of the “American way a businessman were to question of life” than is scientism. Consti- spending for foreign aid, he might tutionalism is much more deeply find himself used as an example of American than is materialism. The that béte noire of the “liberals” — Constitution-makers took great the selfishly acquisitive American care to guard the individual who stems in a long line from that against falling prey to the bent of vulgar preacher of penuriousness, his neighbors to force him into Benjamin Franklin. “American- conformity. Charity, both individ- ism” is sealed off by quotation ual and organizational, is as much marks from too close a contact American as is acquisitiveness. with it by the cognoscenti, who Why then, in all fairness, does might otherwise be contaminated. “American” not call to mind vir- Why, it is proper to ask, should tues as well as vices? an expression such as the ‘“Ameri- can way of life” be distasteful to Literary Denigration any American? Why should The major reason is rather clear “Americanism” be used to refer to to me. There was a large-scale as- the failings of some Americans? gault upon the American tradition Why should we have to flinch carried out earlier in this century. when we encounter the word Amer- Probably the most direct attack ican, fearing from experience the was carried on in literature — in denunciation of the “Ugly Ameri- stories and essays, but denigration can” that will follow? appeared more subtly in philoso- Let us admit that some individ- phy, history, political science, and uals have used Americanism as a theology. But the point can be cover for unwise and wrongful made by calling attention mainly acts on occasion. Grant, too, that to what went on in that field known Americans taken one with another technically as literature. The hey- have many faults. But why should day of this defamation came in the the vices of Americans be that | 1920’s, though some came before which is conveyed by “American”? and after. Is the summary lynching of law H. L. Mencken, the sage of Bal- violators more American than trial timore, was likely the most unin- by jury? Surely, censorship is less hibited of the defamers in the central to our tradition than is the 1920’s. He not only pointed up the ===== PAGE 18 ===== 16 THE FREEMAN November vices and failings of Americans, in the so-called Anglo-Saxon type but he identified them with the of man? I may answer at once that American tradition. In the fourth two stick out above all others. One volume of his vigorous Preju- is the curious and apparently in- dices, Mencken asks: “What, then, curable incompetence — his con- is the spirit of Americanism? I genital inability to do any difficult precipitate it conveniently into thing easily and well... . The other the doctrine that the way to as- is his astounding susceptibility to certain the truth about anything fears and alarms — in short, his . is to take a vote on it, and hereditary cowardice.” Even free that the way to propagate that inquiry would appear to be a truth . . . is with a club. This wholly non-American thing. “Thus doctrine . . . explains almost every- the battle of ideas in the United thing that is indubitably Ameri- States is largely carried on under can, and particularly everything strange flags, and even the stray American that is most puzzling to natives on the side of free inquiry men of older and less inspired have to sacrifice some of their na- cultures. . . .” tionality when they enlist.” Of Puritanism, Mencken As for religion, “the average claimed, “There is only one honest American is a prude and a Metho- impulse at the bottom of Puritan- dist under his skin. . . . Save in ism, and that is the impulse to a few large cities, every American punish the man with a superior community lies under a sacerdotal capacity for happiness — to bring despotism whose devices are disin- him down to the miserable level of genuous and dishonourable. . . .” ‘good’ men, i.e., of stupid, coward- The Boobus americanus is taught ly, and chronically unhappy men.” by ‘“oafs from the farms and vil- “New England,” he declares, “has lages of Iowa, Kansas, Vermont, never shown the slightest sign of the Dakotas, and other such back- genuine enthusiasm for ideas. It ward states. ...” began its history as a slaughter- Few could match Mencken in the house of ideas, and it is today not pithiness of his language, but easily distinguishable from a cold- others shared his scorn for things storage plant.” American, Frederick L. Allen may Mencken expressed an undis- have penned the classic statement guised contempt for those who of the position in his ever-popular settled America and gave it its book, Only Yesterday, first pub- basic culture. “What are the char- lished in 1931. “The typical Amer- acters that I discern most clearly ican of the old stock,” he says, ===== PAGE 19 ===== 1962 THE DEFAMATION OF THE AMERICAN TRADITION 17 “had never had more than a half- him as the rough, ready, aspiring, hearted enthusiasm for the rights iconoclastic, creative, courageous of the minority; bred in a pioneer innovator his admirers paint him. tradition, he had been accustomed He is a bagman. He is a pedlar. He to set his community in order by is a shopkeeper. He is a camp- the first means that came to hand follower. He is a bag of aggressive — a sumptuary law, a vigilance wind.” committee, or if necessary a shot- George F. Nieberg almost gun.” Van Wyck Brooks, long-time achieved a Mencken pitch in his chieftain of literary critics, calls description of the American in an the “traditional drag” of our cul- article in The Forum published in ture “the main fact of American 1931. “I lean toward the heresy history’ — writing in 1922. “If our that the typical American citizen writers wither early,” he said, “if is, at best, an unpleasant go-getter, they are too generally pliant, pas- a professional back-slapper going sive, acquiescent, anaemic, how through his dumb-show always a much is this not due to the heri- bit fearful of his job, of what peo- tage of pioneering, with its burden ple will say, of his wife — and of of isolation, nervous strain, exces- himself, To this heresy I will add sive work, and all the racial habits another: that it is impossible for that these have engendered?” him to live like a civilized man, as Sinclair Lewis, a champion de- it is impossible for him to die like flater of the American ego, con- one.” More, “his blind, unwavering tributes this description of what faith in ‘success’ stories, patent he considered to be the most typi- medicines, political platforms, his cal American — the businessman, a bootlegger’s word of honor, and Mr. Jones. (Although this is taken his boss’s stupidity borders upon from an introduction to Babbitt fanatical fervor.” that was not published at the time, Robert Herrick, in 1931, said it is just the sense of what was that there “have been many in- told dramatically in the novel.) stances. ..of American brutality, “Mr. Jones himself . . . votes the American tyranny, American in- Republican ticket straight, he tolerance, which have reverberated hates all labor unionism, he be- around the world.” Katherine F. longs to the Masons and the Pres- Gerould published an article in byterian Church, his favorite au- Harper's in the same year, in thor is Zane Grey, and in other which she associated American- particulars noted in this story, his ism with gangsterism, in an at- private life seems scarce to mark tempt to explain the alleged popu- ===== PAGE 20 ===== 18 THE FREEMAN November larity of Al Capone. “It is not be- animated by a socialist or commu- cause Capone is different that he nist ideology. I cite them as ex- takes the imagination: it is be- tremes of what was a general cause he is so gorgeously and typi- tendency of defamation. One cally American. . .. Of course he writer says, “The United States is was born in this country: could not peaceful: its very geographic anyone but a native American existence and its expansion in tem- have adopted so whole-heartedly perate North America is the result American principles of action? An of a consistent policy of the immigrant would have taken years slaughter of weaker peoples . . . to assimilate our ideals; whereas and the expropriation of their Caponc was born to them. . . . property.” V. F. Calverton de- There are analogies for Al Capone clares: “Unfortunately, however — among the American immortals.” and if there is any single explana- Writers left hardly an aspect of tion of why America has had no American behavior undenounced. great writers to compare with In a volume of diatribes on Ameri- those of Europe, this is it—no can life published as Civilization traditions in America have ever in the United States, Elsie Clews been very genuine or very original, Parsons attacks our sex mores. She and never very long-lived. . . .” claimed that “the lack of warmth The above are but a sample of in personal intercourse which the defamations of the American makes alike for American bad tradition. In the article alluded to manners and, in the more intellec- earlier by Karl Shapiro he inad- tual circles, for cheerlessness and vertently gives part of the explana- aridity is due... to failure of one tion of why the “American way of kind or another in sex relations.” life” should be a “nauseating” ex- This failure she ascribes to the pression to him. Calling up the “confusion between parenthood names of the major American and mating,” which she says the poets of the twentieth century, French handle admirably. It should Shapiro points up how they were be pointed out that these critics ‘“anti-American-way-of-life.” Of frequently compared Americans T. S. Eliot, he says: “His entire unfavorably with Europeans. literary output constitutes a con- In 1931 a book called Behold demnation of American material- America was published containing ism, economic greed, and cultural the most thoroughgoing assaults vacuity.” Ezra Pound “is the most upon the tradition. In this book, scurrilous critic of American life most of the essays were obviously in the twentieth century.” Edgar ===== PAGE 21 ===== 1962 THE DEFAMATION OF THE AMERICAN TRADITION 19 Lee Masters “laments the corrup- worthwhile must surely have been tion of pioneer stock and the hy- sneaked in somehow from foreign pocrisy of smalltown American lands. Nothing properly denotable life.” Robinson Jeffers is described as the American tradition could as ‘chief of the self-avowed ene- be worth preserving or even ex- mies of American society and amining. civilization. His attacks on Ameri- Judging from what they said, can materialism and the American these writers were moved to this savagery of character have become denigration by diverse aims. Some synonymous with his poetry.” The of them were unhappy about the list is longer, but the point unenthusiastic reception accorded emerges: American poets heaped to artists and the arts in America. abuse on their country. Others wanted to awaken their As to the major novelists of the countrymen to a more sensitive ap- 1920’s, Henry S. Canby calls at- preciation of “higher things.” So- tention to the “dogged discontent cialists and communists were un- of Ernest Hemingway, the mystic doubtedly trying to arouse social- morbid discontent of William consciousness and prepare the Faulkner, the strong lyric discon- ground for their ideas. Besides, it tent of Willa Cather, the sharp has been fashionable in literary scoffing discontent of Sinclair circles for some time now to dis- Lewis. . ..” He points out that he cover decay and disorder every- could easily extend the characteri- where, and to describe it in lurid zations to the major dramatists. detail. But we are all too aware of the The importance of this defama- continued vulture-like dissecting tion lies, however, not in the mo- of America that still goes on tives of those who did it but in its among popular dramatists. general impact upon Americans. H. L. Mencken, for instance, had A Diversity of Objectives no other national loyalty than to If destruction of belief in the America, if he had that. In his American tradition was their aim, mellower moods he expressed ad- writers had done their work well. miration for the Constitution and They had portrayed the tradition the Founding Fathers. But bread as one of narrow-minded Puritan- cast upon the waters may return in ism, of low caste Anglo-Saxons, of strange ways, for once the tradi- intolerant busybodies, of rural tion had been undermined the rea- oafs and hayseeds, and of vulgar son for which it had been done democrats. Whatever was good and could become separated from it. ===== PAGE 22 ===== 20 THE FREEMAN November Once a writer's words are pub- structive task in the 1920’s. The lished he loses control over the rust of their doubt entered into uses to which they may be put. the iron of our tradition and con- Nor was it their numbers that tinued to weaken and immobilize gave these literary denigrators so it long after the writers modified much import. Their importance their assault. stems rather from the role of Fully to appreciate the sweep of writers in modern society. Litera- the assault it must be viewed as ture is the vehicle for public memo- coupled with a much more subtle ries, the means by which ideas are and broader attack. Philosophers usually spread, the device by which such as William James and John many creative men present their Dewey worked to undermine the visions, the source of many of our belief in a fixed reality. As they mental images and conceptions. succeeded, the belief in natural One may go to a play only to be law which had been at the heart of entertained, but carry away with the American tradition crumbled. him a residue of notions which the Frederick Jackson Turner, the author has implanted in his drama. historian, emphasized the chang- “Smart” people imitate the pro- ing and pragmatic character of claimed leaders; those who would American historical development. profess to be “in-the-know” spread J. Allen Smith and Charles A. the ideas. Beard took positions which helped to discredit the American Consti- Assault in Depth tution. Biographers “debunked” Literature can be, and often is, men who had been heroes to earlier the means for the expression of Americans, Justices Oliver Wen- the noblest ideas men have held, dell Holmes and Louis D. Brandeis the vehicle for preserving and emphasized the evolutionary char- continuing the heritage of a peo- acter of law and the importance of ple, the source of the epigrams by changing conditions. which people carry with them The climax of the defamation their stout beliefs. But it may also of the American tradition—coming be used to undermine the tradi- 1 Tt should be made clear that all tion, to defame the heritage, to criticism is not of this character. “Con- . structive” criticism—that which criticizes erode away the faith of a people, practices which fall short of the ideal and to blacken the reputations of can have a salutary effect in preserving those who would uphold them. a tradition. But the criticism to which I have called attention was destructive — Many who were reckoned to be undermining the traditions and ideals great writers performed this de- themselves. ===== PAGE 23 ===== ~ 1962 THE DEFAMATION OF THE AMERICAN TRADITION 21 as it did in the 1920’s and early no accident, and the full import of 1930’s — could hardly have been the defamation is revealed in what timed to achieve greater effect. It was substituted for the American just preceded a convulsive and rev- tradition. Reformers had for many olutionary period in world history. years been spreading their ideas The United States — and much of about “positive” governmental ac- the rest of the world — was hit at tion, about the need for leaders, about this time with a lengthy and about the necessity for govern- debilitating depression, and was mental action. They may have shortly plunged into the interna- made little impact during most of tional disorder of the late 1930’s the 1920's, but their efforts were and 1940’s. In other words, it was intensified once the depression a time of trial and of searching for came, reviving hope for the accept- something firm amidst swift and ance of their ideas. The following unexpected change. titles published in the crucial years Traditions could have cushioned just before 1933 suggest the tenor our fall and buoyed us up in crisis. of this material: Charles A. Beard, They might have steadied and re- “The Rationality of Planned Econ- assured us when trouble came. omy,” America Faces the Future, Herbert Hoover tried, for example, published in 1932; Rexford G. to direct Americans to the faith Tugwell, “The Principle of Plan- of their fathers, to the virtues of ning and the Institution of Laissez- individual initiative, to the moral- Faire,” American Economic Re- ity of private charity, but his view, March 1932; Stuart Chase, dress reminded one of the despised A New Deal, 1932; J. A. Hobson, Puritan, he talked too much the Poverty in Plenty, 1931; Chester “hypocritical” language of rugged Davis, “Toward Planned Har- individualism and exuded the odor vests,” Review of Reviews, 1933; of the discredited businessman and H. L. Hopkins, “The War on Dis- materialism. Casting about for a tress,” Today, 1933; and many faith in their time of troubles, others. Americans were loathe to take up a soiled tradition, Fellow Travelers They found a faith, however, Back of the above material lies faith in men rather than law, another phenomenon of consider- faith in government rather than able moment. At the very time that personal independence, faith in the American tradition was being groups and collectives rather than shattered by defamers, American the resolute individual. This was travelers were giving glowing re- ===== PAGE 24 ===== - 22 THE FREEMAN November ports of another kind of society. izations. The defamation of the In a recent issue (Summer 1962) American tradition preceded and of American Quarterly — a schol- prepared the way for the abandon- arly publication with no apparent ment of much of that tradition. axes to grind — Lewis S. Feuer The subversion of American ways tells of “American Travelers to was not so much the work of some the Soviet Union 1917-32: The secret conspiracy as it was the re- Formation of a Component of New sult of open assaults. Whatever the Deal Ideology.” intention of denigrators, they had By 1932, according to Feuer, the set the stage for reformers who leaders in pragmatic thought had wished to change the character of come “to regard the Soviet Union American society. Many of the as a model of the experimental changes came swiftly —as in the method in social practice. The “Hundred Days” of the New Deal, whole conception of a ‘social ex- but they were made possible by periment,” the whole notion of years of work preceding them. planned human intervention into social processes to raise the wel- Those who are concerned today fare of the people, had become in the recovery and revitalization linked in the minds of America’s of the central American tradition intellectual and social leaders with should be better fitted for the task the practice of the Soviet Union.” by knowing how it was under- This linkage he ascribes to the mined. It has not been uncommon “work of a small number of several to interpret the departure from the hundreds of travelers to the Soviet American tradition in the 1930's Union during the previous dec- as a consequence of its failure in ade.” Among those so enthralled its hour of trial. Yet in view of were Rexford G. Tugwell, Paul the above evidence, we may doubt Douglas, Stuart Chase, Jane whether the established American Addams, Robert M. LaFollette, ways were tried very vigorously or W. E. B. DuBois, and Sidney Hill- shunted aside as already discred- man, among others. Mr. Feuer sup- ited. At any rate, in view of the ports his statements with refer- large-scale defamation that took ences to the published writings of place, the revival of the American these “travelers,” along with il- tradition will require the rehabili- luminating quotations. tation of its premises one by one, Some of the processes of social each examined on its own merits change in this century emerge and supported by deep thought and from the above facts and general- massive evidence. @® ===== PAGE 25 ===== lL JOHN C. SPARKS SOME MONTHS AGO, one of the net- conservative gentleman did a com- work telecasting companies origi- mendable job, but the cause of nated a special program to depict freedom was scarcely advanced. a current issue of importance to The interviewer could have served the nation. Its announced objec- the useful purpose his employers, tive was to seek out the truth for the telecasting company, had held the edification and better under- out to the television public — ex- standing of the American public, ploration of conservative ideals. at least those viewing the pro- Instead, he put on a “clever,” en- gram. Unfortunately, the method tertaining, but uninformative of approach was similar to that show. used in debates — trying to con- The debater tactic is used in found the opposition rather than many situations, with the same enlighten the audience. A promi- purpose in mind — to shut out the nent conservative was inter- opposition! Do not be dismayed if viewed. Each question was posed someone has tossed the “who has so as to prevent or cloud a logical, lost his freedom” question your coherent answer, starting with way, and you fumbled it. The same the opening question by the in- kind of cunning question can terviewer, “Do you really know cause the most articulate and well- someone who has lost his freedom informed exponent of any cause in America?” to fumble. It is not so much that Under the circumstances, the answers are unavailable, but that SE the explanation of any serious Mr. Sparks is a business executive and past subject cannot be undertaken suc- president of the Canton, Ohio, Chamber of . Commerce. cessfully in an atmosphere of 23 ===== PAGE 26 ===== 24 THE FREEMAN November closed minds, and particularly however, he also noted that later within the time limits required generations, neither prizing nor for TV programs. To allow your- comprehending the blessings of self to be harassed before the freedom, would likely enslave public in a panel or personal in- themselves. terview, where one side is armed The early days of our country with emotion and clever retort, bear out his point, for the under- while you seek to explain a seri- standing and love of freedom and ous, thoughtful subject, hardly the abhorrence of its opposite, affords the proper portrayal the government tyranny, were clearly freedom philosophy deserves. in the minds and hearts of the citizens of this new nation. They To Throw Off-Balance so jealously guarded their inalien- The purpose of the question, able rights that the first central “Who has lost his freedom?” is government was given practically to momentarily unbalance the ad- no governing powers. Later revi- vocates of a free society who have sion brought the Constitution, spoken, written, or read millions with stronger powers placed in of words about, and personally the hands of the central govern- discerned the danger of swollen ment. But the chief area of con- powers of government. It implies tention — how to keep government that there i3 no problem at all and in check — was of consuming in- makes those concerned about free- terest to the citizens, for they dis- dom appear shallow and misdi- trusted power in the hands of rected in their efforts. It is an government! And any government attempt to end an argument or was suspect — kingdoms, despots, discussion by refusing to recog- or those managed by elected rep- nize that an issue exists. resentatives of the people! Let us reflect on this question History records repeated ex- that has been posed. Unless items amples of people who forcibly of value are inventoried regularly, removed the yoke of oppressive they evaporate or erode without government, only to gradually lose our becoming aware of their re- their liberty as they ceased to un- duction, or even their complete derstand and appreciate it. disappearance. An ancient Greek The nature of freedom demands writer observed that freedom has exceedingly great understanding, its best recognition among the sacrifice, and valor to win it, and generations of people who had almost always such effort occurs thrown off authoritarian rule; only after the people experience ===== PAGE 27 ===== 1962 LOST FREEDOM — ILLUSION OR FACT? 25 the miseries concurrent with its Freedom is the absence of coer- absence. The nature of freedom cion. Continued effective coercion also demands continued under- can come only from government, standing and vigilance to keep it. the collective group, as it goes be- As yet, no people in history have yond its proper defensive function successfully retained their free- of being a policeman and a soldier, dom. By nature, it is elusive, diffi- A direct result of government's cult to win, and easy to neglect overstepping these proper bounds while it slips away. It is little is that individuals have lost many wonder that a person can be mo- of their rights of decision. One mentarily stunned when asked to could fill pages without completely identify lost freedoms or to point covering the millions of interfer- out some person who is no longer ences in the market place every free in the United States. day. Few, if any, items exchanged are entirely free of government So Many Ways To Be Wrong manipulation. Note the far-reach- To specifically detail the lost ing effect on manufacturing costs freedoms of any one person is as by federal and state laws govern- time consuming and as difficult as ing employer-employee relation- trying to prove the earth is ships in the matter of wages, spherical by proving it is not the overtime pay, minimum rates, un- shape of a string, stick, hoop, box, employment taxes, industrial in- tube, ad infinitum. It is sufficient surance, and compulsory bargain- to know that each person has na- ing. Note the effect on costs of tural rights — from God — to de- processing foods when the govern- fend his person, his liberty, and ment artificially buoys up prices his property. The only moral pur- of certain agricultural products pose of a collective organization and pays to keep farm land idle. is to efficiently provide this de- These are but a few of the mar- fense. And testimony abounds in ket-place shackles. Before the in- the mountainous volumes of laws dividual ever reaches the market recorded in our various levels of place, however, he has been de- government that the collective or- prived of much of his property. ganizations have not confined He no longer has the right to de- their activities to the defensive cide how to spend a large portion function. Personal freedom means of the income he_ earns. Federal to have the right to direct one’s income tax removes a greater per- life as he chooses while conceding centage of choice than the tax everyone else the same right. percentage would seem to indi- ===== PAGE 28 ===== 26 THE FREEMAN November cate. For example, if the federal poned permanently due to poten- income tax takes ‘‘only” 20 per tial savings being drained off via cent of one's income, it might taxation. The desire of a person appear that an 80 per cent free- to support religious, education- dom of choice remains, apparently al, and cultural institutions is ample. severely curtailed for the same But this is not a true picture! reason: that portion of his income Much of this remainder is re- available after first paying taxes quired for food, clothing, housing, and supplying his personal and medicine, basic insurance protec- family needs is too small to effec- tion, and transportation, nearly tively support charitable projects. all of which are considered by Of course, there are some areas most people, in one degree or an- of choice not subject to shrinkage other, as basic economic essen- from taxation for they involve tials. After acquiring these items little or no economic prerequisite. and paying taxes, little is left, as But many worthwhile material many persons will sadly attest. and nonmaterial goals can be This latter small percentage may achieved only after adequate fi- be more truly indicative of the nancing has been supplied through small amount of economic choice savings by the individual. remaining to a person. Has he lost his freedom? He has! If anyone doubts this, let him The Cream Skimmed off try to spend 100 per cent of his And it is that all-important income as he pleases (except that area of decision, lying beyond the required for proper government effort expended for the acquisi- defense functions). Let him dis- tion of basic economic essentials, regard the laws on employment, in which a person is often dis- farm prices, education, compul- tinguished from another. This has sory old-age ‘‘saving,” and gov- been the target area of the ad- ernment charity. Let him refuse vocates of progressive income tax, to give financial support to those removing choice by removing the activities of government beyond economic companion of choice— the scope of policeman and soldier. savings. For instance, investment His doubts about his loss of free- choice becomes possible only when dom will quickly vanish. capital for risk purposes can be While it is saddening to witness saved. The traditionally American the gradual removal of the free- decision to go into business for dom of choice from the individual, oneself is often delayed or post- it is even more tragic to see that ===== PAGE 29 ===== 1962 LOST FREEDOM — ILLUSION OR FACT? 27 many persons have not taken the When the real meaning of free- time to understand and to realize dom is understood by enough that it is taking place. They have thought leaders, nothing will deter not learned that progress stems its progress — not even the tactics from a great many individual of those “liberals” who seek to achievements occurring only when firm up their weakening position men are free from the coercive ac- by the pretext that no one has lost tions of their fellow men. his freedom. @® IDEAS ON LIBERTY Democracy and Mob-Rule S0 WHEN they begin to lust for power and cannot attain it through themselves or their own good qualities, they ruin their estates, tempting and corrupting the people in every possible way. And hence when by their foolish thirst for reputation they have created among the masses an appetite for gifts and the habit of receiving them, democracy in its turn is abolished and changes into a rule of force and violence. For the people, having grown accustomed to feed at the expense of others, and to de- pend for their livelihood on the property of others, as soon as they find a leader who is enterprising but is excluded from the honors of office by his penury, institute the rule of violence; and now uniting their forces massacre, banish, and plunder, until they degenerate again into perfect savages and find once more a master and monarch. ... And for this change [for the worse] the populace will be responsible when on the one hand they think they have a griev- ance against certain people who have shown themselves grasp- ing, and when, on the other hand, they are puffed up by the flattery of others who aspire to office. For now, stirred to fury and swayed by passion in all their counsels, they will no longer consent to obey or even to be the equals of the ruling caste, but will demand the lion’s share for themselves. When this happens, the state will change its name to the finest sounding of all, free- dom and democracy, but will change its nature to the worst thing of all, mob-rule. POLYBIUS (2057-7125 B.C.) The Histories ===== PAGE 30 ===== IT 1S standard journalistic pro- venerable Founding Fathers? cedure to divide the world into two, Take a random sampling of our camps. The Soviet bloc comprises citizenry and ask them to explain one camp, whose member nations what they mean when they declare are run along totalitarian lines. that this is a free society. ‘“Amer- The non-Soviet bloc, by contrast, ica is free,” most of them would is called The Free World. The say, “because The People in free United States, it is conceded, is a elections choose their own leaders. prime example of a free society, And then, by letter writing, lob- and so this nation has assumed bying, and delegations to Wash- ington, The People make their opinions y felt in the determi- nation of policy. Furthermore, our JAVIER [(CIAWN| SVESIVEM| political leaders are not selected from . among a few aris- ard Mlyjority Fide tocratic families; here anybody can run for political of- EDMUND A. OPITZ fice, and most any- body can become President. And if leadership of The Free World. The People do not like the govern- And not without reason, when the ment they chose in 1960, they need matter is viewed historically. The not revolt; all they have to do is eighteenth century thinkers who convince a majority of voters to conceived and launched the Amer- their way of thinking and they’ll ican System envisioned a society get the government they want.” of free men, and however ques- The simple man in the street and tionable some of our current be-' the sophisticated reader of “lib- liefs and practices may be, we still eral” weeklies may have little else honor their memory. But does to- in common, but they share a day’s popular notion of a free so- touching faith in the sovereignty ciety have anything in common of The People. with the model erected by the Now suppose I am not in sym- TE—— } pathy with some part of the na- The Reverend Mr. Opitz is a member of the . staff of the Foundation for Economic Education. tional government's program — not 28 ===== PAGE 31 ===== 1962 . THE AMERICAN SYSTEM AND MAJORITY RULE 29 so farfetched an assumption — ways of protecting society against and I utter some criticisms of it. the action of majorities. They I get a standardized reaction. The knew that “The Majority” is a customary response is: “The Peo- technical term in politics, custom- ple are entitled to get from gov- arily meaning “a minority on the ernment whatever a majority of make.” If democracy is a system them want: from schooling, to job of government in which every citi- insurance, to cheap electricity. zen is equally represented, and Would you deny them these bene- where policy is determined by fits? Most people favor social se- sampling majority opinion, then curity, and under our system of the Founding Fathers tried to government where The People are circumvent “democracy” —in this sovereign they should have it. Are sense — and succeeded. you opposed to majority rule? A rather silly European Social- Don’t you believe in democracy?” ist, presumably with this in mind, The unspoken assumptions un- referred to our Constitution as derlying these questions are some- ‘very nearly a plot against the what as follows: “The voice of common people.” The real intent The People, expressing itself of the document was quite the op- through majority opinion is, in a posite: it was to protect the com- democratic society, the final de- mon people — which includes just terminer of policy, and the ulti- about all of us — from political ad- mate sanction for political con- venturers. Our forebears had ex- duct. A society is free to the ex- perienced the tyranny of mon- tent that the majority will is not archs, but they had no intention frustrated. This is what it means of accepting a majoritarian tyran- to live in a democracy.” Such is ny in its place. “An elective des- the rationale for much of today’s potism is not the government we politicking. Let us try to evaluate fought for,” wrote Jefferson in it in terms of American political 1781. theory and experience. The end they fought for was Co individual liberty within the Constitutional Safeguards framework of a moral and legal These assumptions — about the order, and to this end they cre- desirability of permitting major- ated a number of antimajoritari- ity will free rein—were not shared an institutions. The Senate is one by the men who drafted the Con- instance. One senator in my state stitution. To the contrary, these of New York represents about men worked overtime to devise 8,000,000 people; in the state of ===== PAGE 32 ===== 30 THE FREEMAN November Washington, one senator repre- derstands by a democracy in which sents about 1,400,000 people. The majority opinion rules directly lucky people of Nevada have one and unfettered. It might be in- senator for every hundred thous- structive to examine portions of and of them. Whatever one’s reac- our historical background in or- tion to this, he cannot call it equal der to better understand this situ- representation. ation. The people who adopted the Appointment of Senators Constitution as their organic law To emphasize further the un- were well qualified to make it democratic nature of the Senate, work: they knew political theory; the Constitution provided that its they were experienced with colo- members be appointed by the leg- nial charters, compacts, and self- islators of the various states, not government; and their religion elected by the voters. We amended conduced to individual liberty. the Constitution to change this These qualifications have been procedure. largely lost among us — although The Constitution declared that they might be restored. But until the President would not be chosen a restoration occurs, we as a peo- by mass vote. The legislature of ple will probably continue to re- each state was to determine the sort to the expedient of “majority manner of choosing electors who, rule” to sanction any governmen- in turn, would meet and select a tal action an actual minority of President. The idea was to insu- the voters wants. late this office from the popular will. Qualified Draftsmen And then there is the Supreme One hundred and seventy-five Court. Theoretically, a bill might years ago, in the spring of 1787, have the unanimous support of a body of delegates met in Phila- the voters, be passed into law by delphia. They represented twelve the Congress, and then be thrown of the thirteen colonies, Rhode out by the Court on the grounds Island abstaining. By September of unconstitutionality. they had drawn up the Constitu- Additional examples might be tion and signed their names to it, cited, but enough has been said, I and beginning in October three think, to indicate that the federal young men wrote a series of 85 republic designed by the Founding articles urging the adoption of Fathers is miles away from what this document by the states; Ham- the average American today un- ilton was thirty, Madison thirty- ===== PAGE 33 ===== 1962 THE AMERICAN SYSTEM AND MAJORITY RULE 31 six, and Jay forty-two. The series in January 1776, and Americans was nearing completion when the bought about 100,000 copies with- papers were collected and issued in a few weeks. in book form as The Federalist. Many colonists were at home in This book has long been recog- the realm of ideas, and thus were nized as a classic in political phi- ready, when the time came, with losophy, and the document whose a rationale for liberty based on an virtues it expounded, The Consti- acquaintance with its literature as tution of the United States, is still far back as Greece, Rome, and Is- — nominally at least —the law of rael. the land. The first Congress under A significant number of the the new Constitution met at New colonists were learned in history York on March 4th, 1789. and political theory, but Ameri- The men who drafted our basic cans were not a bookish people; political document and set a new they were experienced in self-gov- government in motion represented ernment and at home with char- a people who were exceedingly ters and compacts. When the alert intellectually and politically. Founding Fathers sat down in There was a population of some Philadelphia to draw up a new three million along the Atlantic constitution, the American adven- seaboard in the latter part of the ture was already 180 years old. In eighteenth century, largely rural. other words, about as much time But they were readers and think- had elapsed between the settle- ers, as well as farmers and arti- ment in Jamestown in 1607 and sans, as the following instances the Philadelphia Convention as be- show. Blackstone’s famous Com- tween Philadelphia and ourselves. mentaries appeared between 1765 These men were anything but and 1769, and 2,500 copies sold in novices in practical politics. What America before the Revolution. had their experience taught them? Adam Smith wrote his Wealth of Nations just as the Revolutionary Chartered by the Crown War was getting started, in 1776, During the 1500's, individual and despite the preoccupation of adventurers like Sir Walter Ra- Americans with their own prob- leigh conducted colonizing efforts lems in this time of trouble, sev- at private expense, but in the eral thousand copies of the book 1600's companies were chartered sold here shortly after its publi- by the English Crown to establish cation in England. Tom Paine colonies and carry on trade. The wrote his pamphlet, Common Sense, famous East India Company was ===== PAGE 34 ===== 32 THE FREEMAN November organized in 1600, and was prob- Established Church in England, ably the model on which the Vir- seeking here a haven where they ginia Charter of 1606 was framed. might worship God according to It was this Charter which created their own convictions. They did the London and Plymouth com- not believe in, nor did they prac- panies which led to the settle- tice, what we have come to call ments at Jamestown in 1607 and “religious toleration.” Theoriz- Plymouth in 1620. We need to ings about the “rights of private take a careful look at these com- conscience” would have fallen up- mercial corporations for coloniza- on deaf ears; the freedom they tion for, in structure and func- sought was freedom to worship as tion, they were models used by the they chose, not every man’s free- colonists in their political experi- dom to do as he pleased. They ments. were not easy-going people, nor This fact has been noted by were they easy to live with; but Charles A. Beard in his book, The perhaps it took a certain kind of Rise of American Civilization. Re- fanaticism to make the ocean voy- ferring to the Virginia Company, age in the first place and, in the Beard writes: “Like the State, it second place, to survive in an ex- had a constitution, a charter is- tremely hazardous situation. sued by the Crown . . . like the State, it had a territorial basis, a Puritan Tradition grant of land often greater in This “hardshell” aspect of Puri- area than a score of European tan and Separatist religion has no principalities . . . it could make discernible political significance; assessments, coin money, regulate history bears witness to hundreds trade, dispose of corporate prop- of crusading faiths for which the erty, collect taxes, manage a treas- adherents were willing to suffer ury, and provide for defense. Thus and, upon occasion, to persecute. every essential element long after- But there were two peculiarities ward found in the government of of the Puritan religion which did the American State appeared in have a direct bearing on Ameri- the chartered corporation that can political theory and practice — started English civilization in its covenant theology and its con- America.” (p. 37) gregational polity. Let me quote These chartered companies were the words of a scholar, R. L. also missionary enterprises. The Perry, referring to the Mayflower colonizers who came to these Compact: shores were Dissenters from the “The document represents the ===== PAGE 35 ===== 1962 THE AMERICAN SYSTEM AND MAJORITY RULE 33 application to the affairs of civil pended on the powerful and unre- government of the philosophy of , mitted assertion of that claim. All the church covenant which was Protestantism, even the most cold the basis of Puritan theology. This and passive, is a sort of dissent. theology found in the Scriptures But the religion most prevalent in the right of men to associate and our northern colonies is a refine- covenant to form a church and ment on the principle of resist- civil government and to choose ance: it is the dissidence of dis-- their own officers to administer sent, and the protestantism of the both religious and civil affairs. Protestant religion.” Each member of the congregation had a vote in the election of of- The Natural Law Concept ficers, and each congregation was As a corollary of this religion considered as independent and au- the Founding Fathers posited a tonomous of every other and not higher law —the Natural Law or subject to the authority of any the Moral Law — to which the laws centralized church hierarchy.” of men ought to conform, Men Edmund Burke delivered his might create statutes or legisla- great speech on “Conciliation with tion, but the Natural Law is dis- the Colonies” in 1775. Speaking of covered, not created; it is a law the influence of the colonists’ re- superior to the will of human gov- ligion on their will to resist he ernors, and legislation is just or said: “Religion, always a principle unjust as it conforms to or vio- of energy, in this new people is no lates Natural Law. The Natural way worn out or impaired; and Law is largely unwritten, but the their mode of professing it is also down to earth parts of it are one main cause of this free spirit. found in the Common Law, in “the The people are Protestants, and of idea of immemorial rights of Eng- that kind which is the most ad- lishmen,” and in the various char- verse to all implicit submission of ters written to implement these mind and opinion. This is a per- rights from Magna Carta on suasion not only favorable to lib- down. erty, but built upon it. . . . the So much for the men and the po- dissenting interests have sprung litical ingredients at their finger- up in direct opposition to all the tips. They were acquainted with ordinary powers of the world, and political philosophy and experi- could justify that opposition only enced in the art of governing. on a strong claim to natural lib- Their Dissenter’s faith disposed erty. Their very existence de- them to individual liberty, and in ===== PAGE 36 ===== 34 THE FREEMAN November the Natural Law they had a device shall be the extent of rule? Once to limit arbitrary rule. This was we have answered this one prop- their equipment, and then they erly, a workable device for choos- were given an opportunity, unique ing personnel is easy to find. Ma- in history, to draw up the funda- jority opinion, as determined by mental rules for a society in which balloting, is one such device. But men would be free. One of them, to use majority voting in order to James Wilson, wrote: “The United determine the proper scope and States exhibit to the world the boundaries of government is to first instance, as far as we can confuse the categories. The an- learn, of a nation, unattacked by swer our forebears gave to the external force, unconvulsed by do- question: What shall be the extent mestic insurrection, assembling of rule? is that of classic Liberal- voluntarily, deliberating fully, and ism. It is the function of govern- deciding calmly, concerning that ment, they said in effect, to act as system of government under an umpire who enforces the which they would wish that they agreed upon rules. Let govern- and their posterity should live.” ment administer justice among The exuberant Patrick Henry men and otherwise keep hands off; went even further. Cried he: “We men will be free then to adminis- are, Sir, in a state of nature!” ter their own affairs. When gov- ernment keeps the peace by curb- What Shall Be Government's Scope? ing peacebreakers, men may go and Who Shall Rule? freely about their productive and In short, these men were in a creative pursuits, cooperating and position unprecedented to ask and competing with one another as to answer the two fundamental polit- each.of them seems best. ical questions. The primordial po- In giving this sort of an an- litical question is: What shall be swer, the Founding Fathers broke the extent of rule? or What is the with a long and powerful Euro- proper scope of government in so- pean tradition. The alchemists had ciety? The second question is: sought for a philosopher's stone Who shall rule? or What devices which would transmute lead into shall we employ to choose person- gold; but the thing which really nel? The answers of the Found- haunted the mind of Europe ever ing Fathers constitute a political since Plato was the search for a breakthrough, a new departure in philosopher-king. Plato's words government, are found in Book V of The Re- The first question is basic: What public: ‘Until philosophers are ===== PAGE 37 ===== 1962 THE AMERICAN SYSTEM AND MAJORITY RULE 35 kings, or the kings and princes of the next king will be better than this world have the spirit and his predecessor. power of philosophy, and political The Americans scrapped this greatness and wisdom meet in one, machinery, lock, stock, and barrel. and those commoner natures who Government, they said in effect, is pursue either to the exclusion of necessary in human society, but the other are compelled to stand unless it is limited and kept under aside, cities will never have rest control, it is capable of doing from their evils — no, nor the hu- great harm. And human nature is man race, as I believe — and then such that, if power situations are only will this our State have a pos- deliberately created, the worst sibility of life and behold the light men will gravitate toward them, of day.” and such good men as are given The idea is an intriguing one arbitrary power will tend to be and, judging by the record of his- corrupted by it. Therefore, keep tory, it is irresistibly fascinating government limited to the admin- to most people. The idea is simple istration of justice and the de- and easy to grasp, and there is a fense of life and property and you sort of Gresham’s Law at work at deprive it of its propensity for the mental level which rules that evil. Each man will then be free complicated ideas are killed off by in society to realize his highest the simple, just as bad money potential. drives out the good. What sounds Such, in briefest outline, was simpler than the suggestion that the early American answer to the the human situation would be im- primordial political question: mensely improved by first creat- What shall be the extent of rule? ing elaborate and powerful gov- ernmental machinery, capable of running society and doing wonder- The second question has to do ful things for The People, and with the choice of personnel. Once then finding the wisest and best you decide to limit government to men to operate this mechanism? policing functions, how do you go This ancient dream of giving the about selecting men for the jobs? wisest and best men unlimited Four such devices are available. political power in order to accom- The first is determination by plish enormous good has night- bloodline: If your father is king, mare possibilities; the dream goes you’ll be king when he dies, and sour periodically, and the subjects your son will rule in your place. who get it in the neck hope that The second is determination by, Selection of Policemen ===== PAGE 38 ===== 36 THE FREEMAN November lot — drawing straws — used for a person who tells us that majority considerable period in Athens. rule should reign everywhere if Third, is the device of aristoc- he believes that the majority in racy, where a few families com- this country has the right to de- prise the ruling caste, as in Ven- cide for everyone what church we ice. The fourth form is the one should all be forced to join. He that seems natural to us: Impose will answer in the negative, and a few qualifications for the privi- in disavowing this logical infer- lege of voting, and then by ballot- ence from his position he has im- ing let the voters freely choose plicitly admitted that majority their representatives, the candi- rule should not be permitted to up- date who gets the majority of set certain principles — the prin- votes being the winner. This is ciple of religious liberty, in this the proper place to use majority instance. In so doing he also ac- rule, in dealing with the second of knowledges, in sort of left-hand- the two main political questions. . ed fashion, that majority rule is The primary question, What not itself a principle. Majority shall be the extent of rule? can be rule is a mere device, a means for answered or resolved on the basis accomplishing certain ends, but of intellectual and moral criteria not others. So when someone asks, only —not by counting noses. No “Do you believe in majority rule?” scientist would suggest that the we must render the question in- validity of the germ theory of dis- telligible, as follows: “Do I be- ease, for example, should be de- lieve in majority rule to do what?” termined by an opinion poll; and similar considerations apply to Imposter Terms” disputed questions in history, psy- Our language contains many chology, mathematics, and else- “imposter terms” — to use old where. There is no difference of Jeremy Bentham’s label — and the opinion on this score; every schol- jargon of politics is particularly ar agrees that disputes in his field rich in examples. “The People” is are to be settled by laboratory ex- one example of an imposter term. periments, by field tests, or by People obviously exist, but “The reason and logic —in short, by People” is a fiction introduced weighing the relevant evidence. into a discussion to mislead. So The only exception to this rule whenever you hear anyone refer is in this sector of political sci- to “The People,” put your hand on ence. But even here, every scholar your wallet, Likewise, when some- leaves himself a loophole. Ask the one sounds off about “The Public” ===== PAGE 39 ===== 1962 THE AMERICAN SYSTEM AND MAJORITY RULE 37 or “The Majority.” “The Major- regarded as an affront to The Peo- ity,” as mentioned earlier, is a ple and an impediment to major- politician’s or a ‘“liberal’s’” way of ity rule. Such a view is fatal to meaning “A Minority.” A so- liberty and to peace. called majority is really a numeri- cal minority manufactured and Respect for the Individual manipulated by a small group of The authors of the Constitution determined and unscrupulous men. had a high regard for the individ- Majorities for or against this or ual citizen. He had, in their view, that measure are often manufac- certain inherent rights derived tured at will. This procedure goes from his Creator, which it was on today and it has gone on for a the function of government to re- long time. More than a century spect and protect. When govern- ago the Columbia University pro- ment was thus limited, it con- fessor of political science, Francis formed to the Natural Law, those Lieber, wrote: “Woe to the coun- norms of liberty, equality, and try in which political hypocrisy justice which are part of the na- first calls the people almighty, ture of things. But with the rise then teaches that the voice of the of skepticism as to the very ex- people is divine, then pretends to istence of anything but man-made take a mere clamor for the true rules, another sanction had to be voice of the people, and lastly gets found to rationalize political up the desired clamor.” might. Thus was majoritarianism The philosopher, according to invoked, and under its guise, an old joke, is a blind man in a things have been done to individ- dark room looking for a black cat uals which they would never have that isn’t there; the theologian, tolerated from any monarch. For on the other hand, finds the cat! the antithesis of majoritarianism The people of Europe searched in is the principle of individual lib- vain for a philosopher-king, but erty, and to secure individual lib- never found him; we of the mod- erty our Constitution placed vari- ern world have found our philos- ous checks on majority action. opher-king, and his name is The The inclusion of such checks de- People, expressing itself through rives from the conviction that majority rule. Government, in this each man has certain inherent view, ig identified with The Peo- rights which it is the duty of gov- ple; and when this belief is ac- ernment to secure, so that even as cepted, any constitutional device a minority of one he has immu- designed to limit government is nities which no numerical major- ===== PAGE 40 ===== 38 THE FREEMAN November ity may invade. No majority had idea that majority support deter- the right, under our original sys- mines the ethical rightness of an tem, to impose its religion on any act on the grounds that this is the minority, or impair its freedom of kind of thing each individual de- utterance or deprive it of prop- cides for himself. erty. But under the new dispensa- This implies that there are as tion “The Majority” is almighty. many valid ideas of right as there All it has to do is gain control of are persons, and denies that there government and then it has a le- is any such thing as right per se. gal cloak behind which a minority But if there is no right per se, it of the nation uses the govern- cannot be wrong for majorities to mental machinery to work its will do as they please! If there are no on the rest of the society. Accord- norms or principles as part of the ing to the theory of majority rule, nature of things, then man-made the governmental machinery is assumptions are all we have to go always “up for grabs” for just on. Man-made assumptions are not such a purpose. self-operating; they must be made to operate by the weight of a suf- Limits to Majority Rule ficient number of people who want Majority decision at the polls to make them work — just as a is an excellent way of choosing water wheel is turned by the personnel for political office, but it weight and force of the water fall- is a violation of the moral law ing on it. Tomorrow, the contrary for the majority to vote away any man-made assumptions can be man’s freedom. The majority may made to work in just the same have the power to do this, but the fashion, by the weight of majority right to this action it never has. opinion. Such a situation is un- But here we hit an obstacle, for in avoidable unless the universe ex- speaking of “the right” we have hibits a qualitative dimension, assumed the real existence of an ethical in its own right. independent moral principle, im- plying that something may be Objective Standards of Morality ethically right or ethically wrong We do not adopt a free-wheel- whatever its measure of popular ing attitude in questions of arith- support — or lack of support. But metic. We do not, that is to say, this is the very concept which has advise every man to decide for fallen into general discard, even himself what the answer to two among convinced antimajoritari- plus two will be for him. This is ans. Some of these abandon the because we take it for granted ===== PAGE 41 ===== 1962 THE AMERICAN SYSTEM AND MAJORITY RULE 39 that the constitution of things is discarded, and we attempt to such that there is only one valid makeshift without standards. So, answer to two plus two; namely, desperately trying to find some four. And if the ethical dimen- basis for making moral decisions sion of existence is not so con- —as an alternative to the naked stituted that certain things are rule of arbitrary might — our right and certain things are contemporaries are driven to the wrong per se, then let us frankly expedient of majority rule. acknowledge the fact and give up But majority rule is not a moral the moral approach altogether. In principle, and the attempt to use which case, majoritarianism it as such won't work — any more makes a modicum of sense, than it would work to try to weigh Human beings, however, are things by the foot or yard or cal- called upon to make moral deci- culate length in terms of pounds. sions just because they are hu- It is a waste of time to try to man beings. But moral decisions mix incompatibles, but it is a safe can no more be made in the ab- bet to assume that we'll continue sence of ethical standards or with this useless effort until we norms than things can be weighed restore ethical norms and princi- without such units as ounces and ples to their rightful place in our pounds. Large numbers of people lives, and then proceed to build have lost touch with principles; our social and political structures the old ethical standards have been into conformity with them. @® The Downward Road IT APPEARS we are descending the ladder of human values. First we attack the morality of honest effort because it has reaped materialistic rewards. Second, we put aside the educational and spiritual values of doing well the little menial or unpleasant tasks that must be done. Third, we advance the false theory of entitlement regardless of how one has loafed and mismanaged personal affairs. The pages of history clearly point out that these are the roads to human deterioration. RALPH E. LYNE, Taylor, Michigan ===== PAGE 42 ===== GORDON CONKLIN THE NIGHT was bitterly cold out- pounds sterling for every ship side Faneuil Hall, but the angry I did not build in my shipyard. voices inside its walls were turn- - “So now these damned hot- ing the air a heated blue. Only heads piously talk ‘principles,’ the day before, a group of men saying that taxation without rep- dressed as Indians had thrown resentation is wrong. If they three shiploads of tea into the don’t like the setup, why don’t Boston Harbor, an act now dis- they just stay out of the program cussed at this meeting of busi- instead of acting like a bunch of nessmen. The Hall stilled as an schoolboys and ruining the deal authoritative figure mounted a for the rest of us? Besides, every- chair and began speaking. one else is being subsidized by “Those sophomoric nuts have funds drawn from the Stamp Act, ruined our colonial image,” he the Sugar Act, and the Town- said. “Didn’t they know that the shend Act — why shouldn't we tax to be raised on that tea was have our share?” to be used to pay subsidies to A tall man sitting quietly businesses that were overproduc- amidst the hubbub addressed the ing? Only a week ago I talked speaker: with the Lord High Commissioner “Mr. Winthrop, you have four and he assured me that I would sons, do you not?” receive, from tea tax funds, 500 “Why, yes. But what's that got — to do with this?” Mr. Conklin is Editor of the American Agri- ” ” . culturist. This article is reprinted by permis. I assume,” the questioner went sion from their September 1962 issue. on, “that you have always ad- Illustration; The Bettmann Archive, Inc. 40 ===== PAGE 43 ===== 1962 MODERN TEA PARTY 41 vised them to leave the painted Smythe, you'll be bringing reli- ladies at Ye Olde Ramshead’s Inn gion into this thing. I suppose alone.” you'll be comparing these irres- “Get to the point, man!” Win- ponsible show-offs to Martin throp roared. “Of course, I've Luther when he drove nails into always told them that!” a cathedral door.” “But, Mr. Winthrop, you and “No,” Smythe replied. “I'm no I don’t need the research of Pro- theologian — and I don’t think the . fessor Kantsay at Harvard to comparison is very apt anyway. know that adultery is quite com- But I'll back the men that jumped mon. Are you, then, ready to those tea ships and did something abandon a principle and recom- dramatic to call attention to the mend to your sons that ‘since violation of a basic principle. everyone else is doing it’ they’d “I'd like to debate this some better get their share before it’s more,” he continued, “but I've got too late?” to go. A friend of mine asked me Livid with rage, Winthrop al- to be sure and bring him the best most choked as he grated out a horse I own. Maybe you know reply: “The next thing we know, him —name’s Revere.” @® bE) N RESPONSIBILITY ROGER B. COOLEY BY A NARROW MAJORITY, my fel- various meanings. Some say that low students at a small liberal it applies solely to individuals, arts college recently voted for whereas others speak of “corpo- adoption of an academic honor rate” and “institutional” respon- code emphasizing student respon- sibility. Some see it as the very sibility. foundation of competitive private Responsibility, however, has enterprise, while others think pri- —_— vate businesses must be forced to Univers of Crease Sree ti’ usdhes 8 the be responsible through “social” ===== PAGE 44 ===== 42 THE FREEMAN November legislation. And in the campaign acceptance of it does not occur un- for an academic honor code, some less the individual is allowed to students obviously thought re- make mistakes. It is by succeed- sponsibility to be the basis for ing or by making mistakes that truth, honesty, and integrity, each person gains the sense of his while others considered it a “free own ‘inner-direction,” his own academic ride” for those who elect unique place in the universe, a to cheat. At any rate, the term is chance to be a strong contributing vague and often misunderstood by member of society. today’s students, and their at- Now, how does the academic tempts to establish academic re- honor code fit this basic truth — sponsibility through various honor that responsibility can only be ex- systems are apt to be shallow and ercised by each individual? The misdirected. code recognizes “the rightful privilege [for the student] of full Reserved to Individuals exercise of his honesty and in- A first principle of responsi- tegrity in the fields of academic bility is that it is reserved to in- endeavor. . . .” But it then goes dividuals. It cannot be exercised on to provide for the apprehen- on behalf of any other person. To sion of academic cheaters by their be responsible is to recognize one’s peers: “Every student is morally own part in a given situation; no bound to report an infraction of other person can rightfully take the Code.” In short, the professor the praise or blame for that part; is relieved of his duty of proctor- there is no way of “taking the ing exams, but the students must responsibility for another's ac- carry on in his absence. Each tions.” must be a watchdog over his fel- Responsibility is acquired as an low students. essential part of the growth proc- In case of cheating, the student ess. Children are taught that acts reporting the infraction is first have consequences and that all ac- required to offer the cheating stu- tions are governed by the results dent a chance to turn himself in. they yield. Thus, the child learns Then, he must check with the to gauge his behavior to his wants Academic Board to make sure the and to become a responsible in- offender has confessed. This may dividual. Responsibility does not seem to place responsibility on the arise out of the actions of others. individual student, but, in reality, Its exercise is solely the result of it puts the burden on his class- individual trial and error, and the mates who have to watch him. The ===== PAGE 45 ===== 1962 ON RESPONSIBILITY 43 student is still proctored. Only the risk-taker in business who ex- the proctoring authority has been ercises responsibility of the high- changed. est order in the decisions that Giving the individual the op- govern the future of his business. portunity to assert his respon- Upon his shoulders rests the suc- sibility is sound procedure, but cess or failure of his enterprise. to make each individual the keeper And the combinations of respon- of his neighbor's responsibility sible entrepreneurial actions in makes a mockery of the whole the business world make for a concept. sound economy. Governmental at- tempts to control these decisions Aversion to Guaranteed Life only decrease the efficiency of A second characteristic of re- free enterprise and destroy in- sponsibility is its aversion to se- dividual initiative. The tragedy is curity. Responsibility wants no that many businessmen also have part of “the guaranteed life.” The succumbed to the lures of the wel- individual who has everything fare state and advocate further provided for him rarely develops government intervention to pro- a high sense of responsibility, mote economic growth. “Why This is not because someone else doesn’t the government do some- is exercising responsibility for thing about labor unions?” “Why him but because his productive doesn’t the government improve actions are needless in an environ- the public school system?” “Why ment that makes him secure. For doesn’t the government protect example, a student's responsi- Americans from foreign competi- bility under the academic honor tion?” code will not be enhanced one The road to government guar- iota by substituting his peers as anteed security is the road to proctors in place of faculty proc- ruin, for when the few begin sup- tors. The student’s honesty is still porting the many, the few ulti- guaranteed by an authority. He mately join the many. The system need not practice honesty as a collapses. Rome was not built in a responsible person, but has his day. Nor did it fall in a day. Its honesty guarded through coercion. foundations were eroded by the The difference is plain. Coerced quest for security, while individ- honesty gives the individual stu- ual responsibility and initiative — dent security but deprives him of which were its real builders — responsibility. ceased to find expression in the This analysis can be applied to play and frivolity of the Roman ===== PAGE 46 ===== 44 THE FREEMAN November bureaucracy. Truly, individual re- seems only to mean that each sponsibility and “social” security must watch his fellow students to cannot exist side by side. The ex- see that they do not cheat and be istence of one always spells the careful himself, that he does not death of the other. get caught cheating. Has this given the student more freedom — the opportunity to exercise in- A third characteristic of re- creased responsibility? What sponsibility is that its most mean- about his peers? Are they freer ingful expression occurs under with him as their proctor than conditions of maximum individual they were with a faculty proctor? freedom. If the individual is to Anyone who claims the human be free to plan his life in his own right of choice in his own affairs way, he must accept his role as a and destiny must also assume the responsible human being. responsibility for his actions. Looking again at our honor Freedom of will for the individual code, we can see that it affords no cannot exist apart from the as- new grant of freedom to the stu- sumption of individual responsi- dents. It only transfers authority bility. The two are inseparable, to them in academic matters, and and a denial of one negates the cannot be said to increase individ- other. ual student responsibility. When The fight for freedom, academic the code says, “Every student is or otherwise, is first of all a fight on his honor to fulfill the obliga- for responsibility. And where bet- tions and responsibilities which ter to pitch the battle than at the the code places upon him,” it level of the student honor code? Maximum Individual Freedom | wees ON] veeany | “It All Depends On Me” THERE ARE ADMIRABLE potentialities in every human being. Believe in your strength. . . . Learn to repeat endlessly to yourself: “It all depends on me.” ANDRE GIDB ===== PAGE 47 ===== TWENTY-FIVE YEARS OF TRIAL AND ERROR “ S0CIAL SECURITY PAuL L. Poirot THIRTEEN THOUSAND beneficiaries it might not seem important what of the Anthracite Health and Wel- happens to the Anthracite Health fare Fund were advised early in and Welfare Fund or to its rela- 1954 that future pension and tively few beneficiaries. But that death benefits would be cut to is not to deny the force of the half their former rate. Retired blow to certain individuals. Nor miners thus found that insecurity should it obscure the lesson for may be the penalty for reliance every other person in the United on a poorly funded promise. States. Lack of current revenue The income for the pension to maintain the promised rate of fund was declining, due to a steady benefits is the disaster in store drop in hard coal production — for the beneficiaries of any poorly from 69 million tons in 1930, to funded pension‘ plan, whether it 81 million in 1953, to 19 million be privately or “publicly” financed. in 1960. This happened during a Some advocates of broadened period of general industrial ex- social security coverage viewed pansion simply because labor, the collapse of the anthracite fund capital, and managerial ability as further evidence of the need to could be more profitably employed expand the federal program, But in the production of something such a conclusion is unjustified. other than hard coal. The pension The failure of the security pro- fund royalties, added to the price gram for hard coal miners stands of coal, are, in effect, a special as a warning against every prom- tax upon a product which has to ise that rests upon a questionable compete with other fuels for a claim to the property or future market outlet. productivity of other persons. From a national point of view, There are no competitive indus- 45 ===== PAGE 48 ===== 46 THE FREEMAN November tries in the United States today ing ownership equity in produc- which have been guaranteed a tive private property. Such prop- prosperous future. No company, erty enhances personal produc- nor any industry, controls the tivity, which helps to satisfy hu- buying whims of consumers or the man needs. forces of competition. The open Possible gains from the use of market allows individuals and more and better tools far out- even whole industries to fail —if weigh the risks of possible loss of and when capital, labor, and savings. Knowing this, most managerial resources are either American citizens would stand in pushed or pulled toward more stanch defense of rights to pri- attractive employment opportuni- vate ownership and control of ties elsewhere. property if the issues were clearly Investment of savings in pro- drawn. Yet this deep-seated sub- ductive private enterprise is the conscious respect for property traditional method of achieving rights may be overridden at times retirement security in the United by the highly humanitarian and States. Successive generations of emotional appeal of an illusion farmers have worked to build such as the social security idea. ownership equity in land, build- ings, equipment, and livestock, fi- No Safety in Numbers nally to retire upon the income Much of the popularity of the which younger farmers would of- social security program, as it has fer for the use of that accumu- been operating in the United lated capital. Other persons have States, rests upon the false prem- achieved old-age security through ise that it is a form of old-age ownership of rental housing, busi- insurance with death benefits for ness facilities, and other produc- survivors — just like annuities or tive property that has value be- life insurance policies sold by pri- cause someone else has use for it. vate insurance companies. Many It is true that ownership of employees who pay social-security property involves the risk of loss. taxes apparently believe that they The property may wear out, be are putting away a savings fund destroyed, or otherwise lose its and that any promised retirement value, affording less security than benefits will simply be a part of the owner expected, Yet the econ- their own savings coming back to omic progress so well demon- them. They seem to believe that strated in America attests to the the promise of a pension under advantages of saving and build- the program is quite as secure ===== PAGE 49 ===== 1962 THE SOCIAL SECURITY PROGRAM 47 and has as much value as the pros- paid was $1,435, matched by his pect of future income from per- employer to bring their total to sonally owned and controlled pri- $2,870. He and his wife now would vate property. And the experience collect at the rate of $190.50 a of some of the early beneficiaries month; so it would be almost 15 leaves the impression that here is months before he got back as a far less costly thing than pri- much as he and his employer had vate insurance coverage — almost paid in taxes. like something for nothing. By what twist of logic or of Suppose a man, aged 50 at the morality does any person expect time the program began, had paid to get back several times the bene- the maximum tax from 1937 until fits for which he has paid? At his retirement in 1952. In those whose expense, and why? Many of 15 years he would have paid $489. the 16,000,000 people now receiv- His employer would have matched ing social security old-age benefits that amount, bringing their com- established their legal eligibility bined total to $978. Under the law with far less than the maximum at that time, he and his wife tax payments just mentioned. Is could have begun collecting at the it any wonder that some persons rate of $102.80 a month, thus re- look upon it as a great insurance ceiving within 10 months more bargain? than he and his employer had paid in social security taxes during the Not Like Insurance 15 years. Yet, his life expectancy The truth, however, is that so- would have been about 13 years. cial security is not insurance at So, he's probably still living and all in the economic sense of the still collecting — but not from any word. The value of private old-age fund that he himself had helped or life insurance protection stems build. from the insured person’s owner- Or, suppose he had been only 40 ship equity in productive prop- when the program began, and had erty. But the payment of one’s so- paid the tax at the maximum rate cial security tax entitles him to no for 25 years until he retired at more ownership equity in prop- the end of 1961. The tax has been erty than does the payment of a increasing, from 1 per cent on liquor tax, tobacco tax, gasoline $3,000 of wages in 1937 to 3% per tax, income tax, property tax, cent on $4,800 in 1962 — from $30 sales tax, luxury tax, poll tax, or the first year to $150 in 1962. But any other kind of tax. in 25 years the most he could have In the case of Nestor v. Flem- ===== PAGE 50 ===== 48 THE FREEMAN November ming, the United States Supreme A bond is a form of indebted- Court on June 20, 1960, clearly ness or a liability on the part of ruled that social security is not the person who issues it. It is the insurance upon which a deported asset of the person who holds it alien could collect, even though he for redemption. The distinction had paid the tax. Secretary Flem- between an asset and a liability ming declared in his brief on the involves the question of who owes case: “The contribution exacted what to whom. under the Social Security plan is If a private insurance company a true tax. It is not comparable holds a government bond, that is to a premium promising the pay- an asset. It would be absurd for ment of an annuity commencing the company to issue and hold at a designated age.” bonds of its own, claiming them Unlike private insurance, the as an asset, for they would also protection afforded by the social be a liability. The solvency of the security program rests upon the social security fund is not affected, willingness and ability of govern- one way or the other, by its hold- ment officials to authorize future ing of bonds as evidence that the appropriations from future tax government is indebted to itself. revenue, The so-called fund has not been invested in productive Redemption Through Taxes property. In place of the money A governmental promise is a collected to go into the fund, there promise, whether backed by a are receipts saying in effect that bond, or by a social security ac- the government used that money count, or by a whole pyramid of to meet current operating ex- promises, one upon another. To penses of one kind or another. cancel or destroy the bonds held These government bonds held in in the social security fund would the fund can only be redeemed in not change anyone's equity in any- valuable goods or services as any thing. The government's promise other government bonds are re- of a pension has value only be- deemed — by future levies against cause the government holds the the private property and produc- power of taxation — not because tive efforts of individuals. Who it issues bonds or makes promises. can say now what the real value The validity of social security of a government bond will be to claims against future taxpayers the next generation of taxpayers would not be changed if there who may be asked to redeem it in were a thousand times as many goods and services? bonds in the fund as at present — ===== PAGE 51 ===== 1962 THE SOCIAL SECURITY PROGRAM 49 or if there were no bonds in the of taxation. And the social se- fund at all. curity program is a part of that Inasmuch as the redemption destruction of private enterprise values of all government bonds, in America. social security benefits, and other That harsh decision back in government promises of future de- 1954, which halved the returns to livery are contingent upon the beneficiaries of the Anthracite future collection of taxes, it must Health and Welfare Fund, was be seen that each added bond or forced by the fact that declining promise tends to weaken the fi- productivity necessarily means a nancial position of the govern- lower standard of living. Likewise, ment. There is a limit to the tax when the day comes that Ameri- burden future generations will be can taxpayers will no longer toler- willing and able to bear. ate a tax burden which robs them of incentive to produce and earn and save, then someone must bear Actually, the mushrooming of this sad news to social security government promises of future de- beneficiaries: “Lack of tax rev- livery is a form of current taxa- enue precludes our fulfillment of tion — a method of dipping into the poorly funded promises of pre- private savings — commonly known vious administrations.” The most as inflation. When the govern- probable political solution will be ment sells one of its bonds, or col- to let inflation eat away the value lects the social security tax, it ob- of the promised pension dollars. tains a given amount of real pur- In other words, the dollars may chasing power from individuals. be paid as promised, but benefi- The dollars with which the gov- ciaries will find little security ernment eventually redeems its value in those weakened dollars. promises lose purchasing power in It may be argued, of course, proportion to the volume of such that no aspirant for political of- outstanding promises. Meanwhile, fice would dare renege on such all other promises payable in dol- promises to the old folks. But, lars, including the dollar obliga- eventually the citizens who work tions contracted by individuals, for a living may resent having also lose their purchasing power. their earnings treated as the This encourages private spending property of the government. Per- and discourages saving and pri- sons paying social security taxes vate capital formation. Inflation is are certain to outnumber those a subtle and destructive method receiving benefits at any time in The Inflation Tax ===== PAGE 52 ===== 50 THE FREEMAN November the foreseeable future. If the ma- the form of steel-mill seizures or jority of voters should decide that nationalization of the railroads, social security isn’t worth what have convinced themselves that it costs, politicians will have no government control of property choice in the matter. affords better old-age security than could be attained in any A Threat to Property Rights other fashion. Those who urge expansion of One other feature of the social the social security program seem security program tends to conceal to assume that American citizens the nature of its threat to prop- are no longer interested in the erty rights. The payroll-withhold- preservation of private property — ing of the tax makes it difficult the protection of the human right for the individual to recognize to own and control the use of that that it is his own property which which one has produced. This is is being taken from him. If the not to suggest that social security wage earner isn’t even allowed to is the only threat to private prop- see his money, how can he see that erty in the United States. There he might have used those with- are many others. But this threat holdings to purchase property is unique in that it encourages the which could yield him a retirement victim to believe that he still re- income? tains some kind of a personal claim The deception is aggravated, of or right to repossess property course, by the employee's impres- which the government has taxed sion that half of the cost is com- away from him. ing out of the pocket of his em- If rats destroy 6% per cent of ployer. But the employer is ob- a man’s property, he sees that it liged to treat those matching con- is a loss of property and not a sav- tributions as part of the cost of ings program. Yet somehow it is labor, If that 3% per cent were presumed to be a form of saving not taxed out of his pocket, then when the government takes and competition would have drawn it consumes the property. Or else it out anyway, either in the form of is presumed that the government higher current wage rates to em- actually does store and save the ployees or in the form of lower property taken in the name of so- prices to consumers. So the net cial security. Either presumption, result is that the employee, in of course, is entirely without basis reality, stands the burden of the in fact. Yet, some persons, who full social security tax, including will strongly resist socialism in the share he might have thought ===== PAGE 53 ===== 1962 THE SOCIAL SECURITY PROGRAM 51 the employer was paying. The so- and the employee each to bear cial security program is not a half of the amount. By January 1, method of soaking the rich to 1962, the total tax had risen to help the poor. Social security is a 6% per cent, which is still low feature of the broad socialistic in contrast with some of the pre- pattern — a special feature de- vailing corporate and personal in- signed to get at the private prop- come tax rates. It may be recalled, erty of the man who works for an however, that the early advocates hourly wage. of income taxes also scoffed at the idea that such taxes could ever Earning Power Is Private Property amount to as much as 10 per cent Far too many American citizens of a person’s income. The ironic have taken the attitude that de- truth is that federal income tax fending private property is the rates have “progressed” upward rich man’s job; let him worry to take as much as 92 per cent about his property rights! But of personal income in some in- such a shortsighted view misses stances. the vital point that an individual's A further truth is that a tax of earning power is also a form of 6% per cent of taxable payrolls private property, particularly to barely begins to cover the poten- be cherished and defended by tial claims which are accumulating those who own nothing else. To under the social security program. endorse a principle which allows Latest plans call for successive the government to tax away in- future increases until the rate creasing proportions of privately reaches 9% per cent on taxable owned property is to forfeit the payrolls in 1968. By then, there only chance man has for inde- is likely to be one person over 65 pendence, To the extent that gov- years of age for every five of ernment can take a man’s prop- those younger persons who are erty, including his wages and supposed to be productively em- other current earnings, it can con- ployed — and taxable. Will 9% per trol his life. The person who de- cent of the wages of five persons sires freedom is obliged to limit — 46% per cent of an average the scope and power of his gov- wage — be enough to keep one per- ernment. son comfortably in retirement? The social security tax was ini- A tax of 9% per cent of $4,800 tiated in 1937 at the compara- comes to $444 a year. Any reliable tively low level of 2 per cent of an insurance agent can tell you that employee’s wages, the employer would buy a sizable chunk of old- ===== PAGE 54 ===== 52 THE FREEMAN November age insurance from his company ness” which reports a debt of —particularly if you happen to be more than a quarter of a trillion a young person. For a premium of dollars and which seems deter- $444 a year from age 20, a man mined to operate at a deficit — the can secure from private com- United States government. Little panies a life annuity averaging wonder that participation is com- about $220 a month after he pulsory! reaches 65. This is in contrast to Those who enjoy diversion talk the monthly benefit of $127 prom- about putting the social security ised through social security. Even program on a straight pay-as-you- the government actuaries have go basis. This is supposed to mean acknowledged that a new entrant that current benefits would be is scheduled to pay $1.69 in social paid entirely out of current rev- security taxes for every $1.00 enue, with no pretense at building promised in benefits. When buy- a fund to cover outstanding com- ing government security, it's not mitments. But the program, in ef- a good deal to be a young person. fect, has always been on a pay-as- . you-go basis, Anyone who believes Compulsory Security that his social security tax money There is a certain plausibility has been tucked safely away as in in the rationale that persons most a personal savings account is only likely to be dependent in their old deceiving himself. age should be obliged to help foot the bill during their productive Fully Funded years. Such reasoning, of course, The alternative to a pay-as-you- presumes it is the government’s go program would involve govern- responsibility to relieve the con- ment disbursement from goods sequences of poverty. From such previously collected and stock- plausibilities, individuals are piled as “public property.” This drawing the conclusion that they seems to be the alternative fa- have a right to retire at age 65, vored by persons who want a with no further personal respon- fully-funded program. sibilities for earning a living, If If such a stockpile were ever this is accepted as a general prin- attempted, the magnitude of the ciple, then how does a society stop problem may be seen in the fig- short of complete socialization? ures of private life insurance in Compulsory social security the United States. An ordinary forces a person to invest a por- rate of return on the total volume tion of his earnings in a “busi- of assets owned by all life insur- ===== PAGE 55 ===== 1962 THE SOCIAL SECURITY PROGRAM 53 ance companies would yield only say that social security is like pri- enough to provide about two and vate life insurance! a half million persons with a regu- ] lar monthly income of $100. At To Relieve the Pain least seven times that number of It is not an insurance program persons in the United States are at all; it is a method of taxation. aged 65 or older. Instead of “premiums,” the re- Do persons who urge the gov- quired payments are designated ernment to cover 17.5 million old as social security taxes. That is no folks with a fully-funded social se- secret. Yet there remains some- curity program understand the thing peculiarly deceptive about implications of such a proposal? this particular method of tax col- The fund for such a program — lection which seems to give satis- assuming a monthly pension of faction to many of those who work $100 — would have to yield an-an- and pay the tax. Nowadays a di- nual income of nearly 21 billion rect tax that can be recognized as dollars. In effect, that would mean such by the taxpayer is a rather government ownership and control crude and repulsive thing. Prop- of about 700 billion dollars worth erty owners have been taxed so of the property which previously heavily that many of them dislike had been under private ownership the tax collector — a situation — that much property in addition which can lead to all sorts of po- to what the government already litical complications. Where the owns or controls. In that sad citizens have grown accustomed event, it is doubtful that there to the idea of private ownership would be any property income of property and the right of a left for private use; the govern- man to the product of his own ef- ment would have claimed it all. forts, it is not politically expedient Mr. W. Rulon Williamson, the for the government to insist upon first Actuary of the Social Se- too much direct taxation. The ma- curity Board but no longer in that jority won’t stand for it. Politi- post, estimated in 1961 that po- cally, the government may dig tential payments to living OASI heavily into the property of the taxpayers and their family de- wealthy few. But just let it try to pendents amounted to $1.5 tril- tax heavily those citizens who con- lion — of which the ‘“on-paper” stitute a voting majority! If the Trust Fund would cover little government expects to take a very more than 1 per cent. Yet, some high proportion of national in- persons still have the audacity to come, it usually will search for ===== PAGE 56 ===== 54 THE FREEMAN November methods more ingenious than di- fits” from the welfare state ex- rect taxation. And the social se- cept through proportionately curity tax is loaded with inge- heavy taxation of wages and sal- nuity. aries. When a government scrapes the Wage Earners Must Pay bottom of the barrel of personal Government has become very savings and private property, expensive in the United States, then its final recourse is to the currently taking more than a daily production of those who third of the total national income. work for a living. The promise of When government was less ex- social security is like an anes- pensive, it was possible to finance thetic which temporarily relieves it through property taxes or levies the pain of those workers whose against the income from property. earnings are being taxed away. But that is no longer true. Less But if the patient regains con- than one-sixth of the national in- sciousness, it will be to discover come of the United States is de- that the operation took something rived from the returns to capital; from him which was vital to life the other 85 per cent represents and liberty — destroyed some of the price paid for labor and man- his potential as an individual, agerial talent. Therefore, it is leaving him more dependent upon clear why the government seeks government than before. ways and means of taxing wages. There is no denying that social Even if there were no promises of leveling has a strong emotional social security benefits, barely half and humanitarian appeal, not only of the other costs of government for those who feel weak and de- could be met out of a total con- pendent, but also for many who fiscation of the income from pri- feel strong and noble. And few vate property. The only thing left will deny the virtue of helping to tax is the current productivity those who want and need assist- of those who work for wages and ance. But if any person would re- salaries. tain the freedom to determine his True, the social security pro- own needs in life, he must equally gram is not the only reason why defend the freedom of every man the government finds it necessary to determine in his own way how to tax wages. But let no one de- to help others. The political or ceive himself that there is any coercive route to security is not way of financing the social se- entirely a primrose path of some- curity program and similar “bene- thing for nothing. What starts ===== PAGE 57 ===== 1962 THE SOCIAL SECURITY PROGRAM 55 out as a popular pastime of soak- market, and not its displacement ing the rich turns into a program by governmental controls, is the of taxing everyone who works for only route to the kind of personal a living. And as socialism ad- security which makes for harmo- vances, the weak and dependent nious social relationships. find themselves competing with A feeling of personal security the youthful and strong who also depends upon something more have been driven by hunger to the than the legal guarantee of a public trough. Such competition in handout in time of need. Security sheer desperation is far more is an attitude not necessarily sat- ruthless than that which is some- isfied by an “equal share” or even times frowned upon in the open by an abundance of material market. When people lose respect goods and services. To be truly for the lives and property of one secure is to be without cause for another, then the weak and de- anxiety, and that kind of security pendent may expect to be early stems from the mind of an in- victims of murder and theft, dividual who knows that he has . done his very best with what was A More Hopeful Choice properly his own. Such security is If the less productive members fed by one’s respect for the rights of a society truly seek security, of others to life and property, a let them rally to the defense of respect upon which is based one’s the freedom of choice and free- own claim to those rights. dom of action of those who work Though older persons may not for a living and who are person- serve well in the armed forces, or ally productive. Let them volun- in defense plants, or in the vari- tarily deal with one another in a ous other activities incidental to market place kept free of compul- the support of big government, sion. Such voluntary trading di- that need not preclude their being rects the instruments of produc- loved and respected as individuals. tion and the means of economic That is not sufficient reason for a security into the hands of those law which tends to put an end to most capable of serving all man- individuality and its expression at kind. It promotes mutual respect age 65. If the young men and for life and property. It stimu- women of today’s generation have lates every individual to develop lost a sense of love and respect for his own talents to their maximum their aging parents, that is some- productivity. It encourages saving thing which the government can- instead of squandering. The free not restore through its devices of ===== PAGE 58 ===== 56 THE FREEMAN November compulsion. That is a form of in- tive efforts. It is possible for an security which must be borne by individual to honor and respect parents if they have failed to others who are tolerant of his teach their children to respect the freedom to choose. But rare in- sanctity of the individual and the deed is the individual who can ex- rights to life and private property. tract love and honor from others The same time-weathered code by compulsory means! of ethics which advocates honor- Such things as love, respect, ing one’s father and mother rec- honor, and justice in the relation- ommends respect for the life and ships between persons are meas- livelihood — the private property urable and meaningful only to the — of others. To violate any part of extent that individuals voluntarily that code destroys the meaning of reject an opportunity to dislike, the rest of it. Society cannot en- disrespect, dishonor, or deal un- force a law which guarantees se- justly with others. And old-age curity to the aged by denying the security also falls into that cate- producer the right to the product gory. Since a weak person cannot of his own efforts. The best that force a strong person to help him, society can do is to give the in- it would seem wise to put the ap- dividual a chance to honor and re- peal on some basis other than spect his elders. This means al- coercion. This means retrieving lowing the individual his choice the responsibility for old-age se- concerning the use to be made of curity from the hands of govern- his own life and his own produc- ment. @® IDEAS ®N LIBERTY | Moral Failure THE DESTRUCTION, by whatever means — human stupidity or de- liberate design, political corruption or public apathy, parental neglect or juvenile ridicule — of those moral standards which have sustained men through the ages will, I am sure, spell the doom of the American republic. The story of the “Garden of Eden” is more than a fable. Im- portant segments of mankind have been there many times. In each instance, the breakdown of moral standards because of man’s unwillingness to take the responsibility of maintaining them was one of the principal contributing factors limiting man’s length of tenure in the “garden.” HAROLD N, YOUNG, Liberty and Responsibility ===== PAGE 59 ===== LEONARD E. READ THE CONSTITUTION of the United and misrepresentation, when it is States and the Bill of Rights more limited to invoking a common jus- severely limited government than tice — then there is no organized government had ever before been force standing against the pro- limited in the history of the ductive or creative actions of citi- world. And there were benefits zens. As a consequence of this that flowed from this severe limi- limitation on government, there tation of the state. occurred a freeing, a releasing, of Number One, there wasn't a creative human energy, on an un- single person that turned to the precedented scale. government for security, welfare, This was the combination or prosperity because government mainly responsible for the “Amer- was so limited that it had nothing ican miracle,” founded on the be- on hand to dispense, nor did it lief that the Creator, not the state, then have the power to take from is the endower of man’s rights. some that it might give to others. This manifested itself among To what or to whom do people the people as individual freedom turn if they cannot turn to gov- of choice. People had freedom of ernment for security, welfare, or choice as to how they employed prosperity ? They turn where they themselves, They had freedom of should turn — to themselves. choice as to what they did with There was another benefit that the fruits of their own labor. flowed from this severe limitation But something happened to this of government. When government remarkable idea of ours, this revo- is limited to the inhibition of the lutionary concept. It seems that destructive actions of men — that the people we placed in govern- is, when it is limited to inhibiting ment office as our agents made a fraud and depredation, violence discovery. Having acquisitive in- 57 ===== PAGE 60 ===== 58 A MIRACLE AT STAKE November stincts for affluence and power I would like to suggest to you over others — as indeed some of that the extent to which govern- us do — they discovered that the ment in America has departed force which inheres in govern- from the original design of in- ment, which the people had dele- hibiting the destructive actions of gated to them in order to inhibit man and invoking a common jus- the destructive actions of man, tice; the extent to which govern- this monopoly of force could be ment has invaded the productive used to invade the productive and and creative areas; the extent to creative areas in society — one of which the government in this which is the business sector. And country has assumed the respon- they also found that if they in- sibility for the security, welfare, curred any deficits by their inter- and prosperity of our people is a ventions, the same government measure of the extent to which force could be used to collect the socialism and communism have wherewithal to pay the bills. developed in this land of ours. @ The foregoing is an excerpt from the set of two LP record- ings by Mr. Read, three sides of which deal with the Essence of Americanism — the gift of freedom, the loss of freedom, the rescue of freedom. The fourth side describes a series of sug- gested answers to various Clichés of Socialism. This set of two records may be ordered from The Foundation for Economic Education, Irvington-on-Hudson, New York, at the special introductory price of $5.00. ===== PAGE 61 ===== A REVIEWER'S NOTEBOOK JOHN CHAMBERLAIN A i! N. /, MAN OF LETTERS TO THOSE of us who cut our intel- Nock, of course, had been a lectual eyeteeth in the early nine- Single Taxer, which seemed to teen twenties, Albert Jay Nock’s some of us to be neither here nor Freeman was a great liberator. It there in a country in which an was not that one necessarily per- abundance of land was traded on ceived 2 marked degree of clarity the open market and thus could about fundamental philosophy be- hardly be engrossed. But the hind it, for its contributors in- Single Tax was Nock’s means to cluded socialists and planners an end. The end itself was the free along with Single Taxers and free- use of energy, the exercise of wheeling libertarians. The sense one’s God-given rights without of gay exhilaration that pervaded coercion by the state. it, however, suggested that the editor was a self-starter — and The Growth of Ideas when, in the middle of the nine- How had Nock’s ideas been teen thirties, Nock published his formed? Where, in a period of Our Enemy, the State, his devotees collectivist drift, had he gotten were blessedly open to entertain his education? In his own Mem- the idea that Mr. Roosevelt's New oirs of a Superfluous Man Nock Deal was basically a trap. In re- indicated a rather clear line of trospect one could see that The progression: he had, as he said, Freeman had been the great con- studied Greek and Latin, which servator of the idea of voluntar- had given him historical insight ism: even its hospitality to social- into the reasons for the rise and ist writers was to be understood decline of the two great ancient as a civilized gesture to the First civilizations; he had been led to a Amendment. Nock as editor had profound contemplation of Mr. had his basic point of view — but Jefferson’s theory that where the aside from that he was willing to state could do something for you, let well-written arguments pro- it could do something to you; and ceed. he had, after reading Henry 59 ===== PAGE 62 ===== 60 THE FREEMAN November George, and Herbert Spencer's obviously experience rather than The Man vs. the State, been skep- reading that brought Nock even- tical of Lincoln Steffens, Fred- tually to his mature way of look- eric Howe, Robert M. La Follette, ing at things. and other early twentieth century reformers who proposed an in- First, a Reformer crease in state power in specific In the beginning of his journal- fields that needed ad hoc atten- istic career, which started when tion. It was all a very neat and he was some forty years old, Nock orderly education as Nock out- was more of a statist reformer lined it. than he preferred, in later years, Well, the Memoirs of a Super- to remember. As his son Francis fluous Man remains a great essay points out, he was capable of writ- in self-understanding, but with ing in September of 1914 that the publication of Selected Letters “private gifts” of parks and play- of Albert Jay Nock, collected and grounds to a city tended “to blunt edited by his son, Francis J. Nock the city’s sense of duty and cor- (Caxton, $4), it becomes apparent rupt its self-respect.” Parks, so that Nock, in writing his intel- the Nock of 1914 thought, “should lectual autobiography, remem- be municipal institutions in a com- bered the grand contours and plete sense, — a public investment tended to forget the bumps along that the city puts its money into the way. The interesting thing because it is very much worth- about these letters, many of them while to do 80.” Whatever one written to Ruth Robinson, the il- may think about the distinction lustrator of Nock’s Journey into between buying park land out of Rabelais’s France, is that their tax money and taking it for the author, like most of us, had to feel municipality as a gift from an in- his way toward a mature theory dividual, the Nock who made the of the proper limits of govern- distinction was certainly not pon- mental power. Nock’s reading of dering Jefferson’s theory that if the Greek and Latin classics, of the state could do something for Jefferson’s writings, of Spencer you, it could by the same token do and Henry George and Gumplo- something to you. Parks, when wicz and Franz Oppenheimer, may they are not the result of free have been taken in orderly pro- gifts, are made by exercise of gression, but the meaning of what eminent domain — i.e, forcible he read had seeped in at highly seizure by the political authority. irregular intervals. And it was One would have thought that ===== PAGE 63 ===== 1962 A.J.N.: MAN OF LETTERS 61 Nock, as a Jeffersonian, would He had heard that the New Eng- have favored acquiring parks land stockholders in Calumet and through voluntary bequest. Hecla, “first cousins... [to] the Again, when Nock went to visit copperhead snake,” had “made the city of Milwaukee during his 1,600 per cent profit year after journalistic tours in 1913 and year” by exercising “as absolute 1914, he hoped to learn good rights as any feudalistic power of things about “them way-up social- the Middle Ages.” This, he wrote ists” who had captured the munic- to Ruth Robinson, was enough to ipal government. It seems to make one “wonder whether it was have been this visit to Milwaukee a good thing to hand over our nat- that started Nock’s disillusion- ural resources to private develop- ment with what the reformers of ment.” Lincoln Steffens’s generation were Well, when Nock finally arrived doing. In a letter to Ruth Robin- in Calumet in the middle of a bliz- son he wrote that “chasing up the zard in January of 1914, he found record of the socialists all day” that “conditions of labour have had been “a discouraging job.” been shockingly misrepresented.” Though he looked diligently for a The mine manager, it turned out, record of accomplishment on which was a fine fellow, the townspeople to base “a few good words,” he ‘‘are a fine set.” Both sides to the discovered that the socialists had controversy over wages ‘treated “played politics as diligently as me as well as one could possibly be anybody” and “worked the spoils treated, and I saw no distress or system for about all it was worth.” violence except one little mess on a His final sad words about the streetcar I was on.” So, instead of Milwaukee socialists were that blasting the mine owners of Cal- “they talked themselves out of of- umet as he had expected to do, fice.” Nock left northern Michigan feel- Nock’s disappointment with Mil- ing that “there is plenty to say waukee under municipal socialism about the situation, giving every- did not complete the education body full credit all around, with- that would lead him to become the out telling. . . horrid falsehoods.” foremost advocate of voluntarism It was while covering stories of his generation. Moving on to- for the reforming and muckrak- ward Calumet, Michigan, on his ing magazines that Nock really journalistic wanderings, he ex- got his libertarian education. The pected to make out a case against facts of life gradually illuminated the owners of the copper mines. the theory he found in the liber- ===== PAGE 64 ===== 62 THE FREEMAN November tarian books. What he saw in Mil- thoritarian; he has the slave-men- waukee, in northern Michigan, in tality and can’t be happy out of Detroit, and in Cleveland was servitude, a natural-born New eventually supplemented by a jour- Dealer, you know, utterly lovable nalistic experience in Europe dur- and devoutly given to all good ing the early years of World War works, y’understand, but a ding- I. When the time to start The busted fool like your friend H. . .. Freeman had rolled around, Nock The cat, on the other hand, has was writing (to Francis Neilson oodles of self-respect and is bung- in November of 1919) that “social- full of dignity. He . . . has no il- izing industry means nothing but lusions about the social order. increasing the number of your The greatest good of the greatest shareholders.” In good Henry number does not interest him. He George fashion he appended a few takes no stock in any scheme of words about “economic rent” de- enforced cooperation... So one is vouring “socialized industry just bound to respect the cat, though ag it devours capitalist industry.” one may not like him . . . It is the But he was no longer capable of vestiges of the early Socialism blaming the capitalists for the and authoritarianism still at work woes of the world. within your Unbewusstsein which sets you against the cat. Have you Cats and Dogs and Liberty noticed that his friends are always The Nock letters, whether they the great libertarians, Mark are to Ruth Robinson or Brand Twain, du Pont de Nemours, ete., Whitlock or H. L. Mencken or Paul and that it is the individualist lib- Palmer, show the “educable’” man erty-loving peoples with whom he in action. And it was always an is ace-high, the Belgians, French, amused and amusing man who al- Moors, Chinese? There is reason lowed events to confirm or reject in all this.” his theories. Nock did not believe This would hardly do as a Ph.D. in banging people over the head to thesis on the influence of animals convince them. His letter to Ber- on history, for the Chinese, de- nard Iddings Bell in June of 1944 spite respect for the cat, went shows the Nock whimsy at its most communist anyway. But it was playful. “As against the dog,” he Nock’s way of bringing principles wrote Bell, “I am in favour of the to the attention of a correspond- cat, having had largely to do with ent. Nock never stood on a soap both in my time. The dog is na- box, which is one reason why his ture’s prize collectivist and au- voice is still heard. @® ===== PAGE 65 ===== 1962 OTHER BOOKS 63 p THE ULTIMATE FOUNDATION duct at the substitution of a more OF ECONOMIC SCIENCE by desired state for a less desired Ludwig von Mises (D. Van Nos- that would prevail if he were not trand Company, 148 pp., $4.50). to interfere.” The above quotations are from the new book by Ludwig von THE SCIENCE OF ECONOMICS has Mises, world renowned author of been erected, step by step, on a Human Action and a dozen other foundation of such simple, but books no economist should ignore. fundamental, premises as the fol- His latest volume not only probes Reviewed by Percy L. Greaves, Jr. lowing: the basic roots of all human ac- “The characteristic feature of tion, but also exposes the ill- man is action . , . purposive ac- founded basis of some key falla- tion . . . conscious behavior. . .. cies that now stand in the way of To act means: to strive after human progress. ends, that is, to choose a goal and “Economic progress,” as Mises to resort to means to attain the writes, “is the fruit of the en- goal sought.... deavors of the savers, of the in- “Actions are directed by ideas, ventors, and of the entrepre- and ideas are products of the hu- neurs.” Where there is no infla- man mind, . .. Theory . . . is the tion or credit expansion the “pro- search for constant relations be- gressive accumulation of capital tween entities or, what means the and the improvement of techno- same, for regularity in the suc- logical methods of production that cession of events. ... Causality it engenders would result in a . . is a priori not only of human progressive drop in prices. . . . thought but also of human action. The amount of goods available for ... Cognizance of the relation be- consumption would increase and tween a cause and its effect is the the average standard of living first step toward man’s orienta- would improve, but these changes tion in the world and is the intel- would not be visible in the fig- lectual condition of any successful ures of national income statistics. activity. . . . “The concept of national income “Man meditates about the con- entirely obliterates the real con- ditions of his own self and of his ditions of production within a environment, devises states of af- market economy. ... The ‘na- fairs that, as he believes, would tional income’ approach is an suit him better than the existing abortive attempt to provide a jus- states, and aims by purposive con- tification for the Marxian idea ===== PAGE 66 ===== 64 THE FREEMAN November that under capitalism goods are worry about an unfavorable bal- ‘socially’ produced and then ‘ap- ance of trade or payments. propriated’ by individuals. It puts “In the market economy the things upside down. In reality, the better people are forced by the production processes are activities instrumentality of the profit-and- of individuals cooperating with loss system to serve the concerns one another. Each individual col- of everybody. ... In its frame the laborator receives what his fellow most desirable situations can be men — competing with one another attained only by actions that bene- as buyers on the market —are fit all the people. The masses, in prepared to pay for his contribu- their capacity as consumers, ulti- tion.” mately determine everybody's rev- Among the other myths that enues and wealth. ... What pays Mises smashes is the anarchists’ under capitalism is satisfying the dream of a peaceful society with- common man, the customer. The out any government. He points more people you satisfy, the bet- out that “man alone among all ter for you. living beings consciously aims at “This system is certainly not substituting social cooperation... ideal or perfect. There is in hu- for the law of the jungle. How- man affairs no such thing as per- ever, in order to preserve peace, fection. But the only alternative it is, as human beings are, indis- to it is the totalitarian system, pensable to be ready to repel by in which in the name of a ficti- violence any aggression, be it on tious entity, ‘society,’ a group of the part of domestic gangsters or directors determine the fate of on the part of external foes. Thus, all people.” peaceful human cooperation, the This little book deserves to be prerequisite of prosperity and civ- read and inwardly digested by all ilization, cannot exist without a who seek enlightenment on the social apparatus of coercion and economic and political problems compulsion, i.e.,, without a govern- of our times. If it is, economics ment.” will again be taught in our col- Mises also explodes once more leges, and mass media will present the still popular myth that “one a more realistic interpretation of man’s gain is necessarily another world events. Political interfer- man’s loss.” This Mercantilist doc- ences with the moral actions of trine, traceable to Aristole, is still men will gradually disappear, the basic fallacy of many protec- while living standards will ad- tionists, as well as those who vance by leaps and bounds. ® ===== PAGE 67 ===== That Rovolution in Economics! (known as Neoclassicism) Are you open minded; have you capability of changing your mind when presented with decisive evidence? 1. Do you believe that the total cost of something determines its price? If so, you are probably lost still in the confused reasoning of the classical econ- omists. Graduate to being a neoclassical economist. See Essay V, The Ultimate Standard of Value. 2. Or do you believe that one element in cost (that one element only, namely, labor — the activity of a workman) determines prices? (As in the case of Number 1, many businessmen will say YES, but they may add a hesitant “but . . .” However, it is Karl Marx who is the leading exponent of this theory, that one form of cost determines prices, namely, that form which consists in labor. But Marx was wrong on this. The answer to the question is NO, the “labor content” of cost does not determine either value or price. See Essay IV, Unresolved Contradiction in the Marxian Economic System. Substitute reading this for Marx’s Das Kapital, which you may not be able to understand anyway; and save yourself much time. 3. Do you think Kennedy has won, or will win, the steel price controversy? For the answer to that question, read Essay III, Control or Economic Law?. This essay poses the problem and answer whether business monopolies, labor monopolies, legislatures, presidents, kings or dictators can overwhelm economic law. 4. Words instead of reality! Economics has been afflicted, as other sciences, with ideas which have no substance. What, indeed, qualifies some- thing as an economic good? Schopenhauer de- clared, “Truth is in the depths.” Bohm-Bawerk probes the depths in regard to what is and what is not, an economic good; read Essay II, Whether Legal Rights and Relationships Are Economic Goods. 5. Who are among the greatest Neoclassicists? What are their ideas? For the answer, read Essay I, The Austrian Economists. SHORTER CLASSICS OF BOHM-BAWERK 392p. $7.50 1962 Five Essays Order from: Dept. B, LIBERTARIAN PRESS, South Holland, Illinois, U.S.A. ===== PAGE 68 ===== - — 3 ” a 4 > - = oT 5 = w © = wy g S — ® © ww» — eS 2 o = a on OO - = OD ~~ [= TE o © ® oO 1 = = ® [= “ © a 2 [>V] - @ on g 3 o = ® 23 gS = 9% SS fw FT © A - am 2 3 ~~ 7 ® mm = OO ® = wn I