===== PAGE 1 ===== THE FREEMAN AUGUST 1967 [000 77 (306) == 5st +» Unless we learn to live by the # A Missouri housewife thinks that courage of our convictions, explains poverty of mind and soul may be more Leonard Read, our short-sighted bow- harmful to an individual than financial ing to expediency will eventually put and material poverty ................ p. 478 us out of business ................. p. 451 b » What does one expect in ‘‘a person of quality’'? Well, try for size the defi- nition offered from the Monthly Letter of the Royal Bank of Canada....p. 481 » John Sparks has something to say, too, about the practicality of business- men who expect the government to do their work for them .................. p. 459 » Despite socialistic trends, suggests . Ed Breese, there are ways an indi- » The fiftieth anniversary of commu- 4,5] can be free, if he tries ...p. 490 nism in Russia affords William Henry X' Chamberlin an opportunity for ap- . . praisal that should be of interest to ** In this third chapter, George Roche anyone who still has a choice examines various social effects of the p. 463 modern manifestations of political POWEY oii p. 493 _ ¥ Aninquisitive student discovers ,» and for a more detailed look at one ® what makes an entrepreneur tick of those interventions, join Milton eens P- 470 Friedman on the subject of auto safety TPT p. 507 1» Speaking of anniversaries, Profes- sor Coleson recalls a few that many 1 John Chamberlain finds his cue in of us have forgotten and reminds us Public and Private Enterprise by Pro- of others free men should cherish fessor John Jewkes of England LA p. 472 POP p. 509 Anyone wishing to communicate with authors may send first-class mail in care of THE FREEMAN for forwarding. ===== PAGE 2 ===== 4 ecndi A MONTHLY JOURNAL OF IDEAS ON LIBERTY AUGUST 1967 Vol. 17, No. 8 LEONARD E. READ President, Foundation for Economic Education PAuL L. POIROT Managing Editor a 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. Tel.: (914) 591- 7230. Any interested person may receive its publications 24 for the asking. The costs of Foundation projects and |! services, including THE FREEMAN, are met through voluntary donations. Total expenses average $12.00 a year per person on the mailing list. Donations are in- vited in any amount —$5.00 to $10,000 —as the means of maintaining and extending the Foundation’s work. Copyright, 1967, The Foundation for Economic Education, Inc. Printed In U.S.A. Addltional coples, postpald, to one address: Single copy, 50 cents; an 3 for $1.00; 10 for $2.50; 25 or more, 20 cents each. E * FE Any current article will be supplied In reprint form upon sufficient de- mand to cover printing costs. Permission is hereby granted to reprint any article from this Issue, providing customary credit is given, except “A Person of Quality” and “Auto-Safety Standards.” ===== PAGE 3 ===== . NN VES OUT OF BUSINESS " HY RUN OURSELVES OUT OF BUSIN ) \ \ / » LEoNgy, E. Reap THE STEEL, USTry, the tile, Pensata or Uneconom;, Practjceg lags, and oj] Mpanjeg, the mak. alreaqy In effect Thus, one myjg. ers o Watche 1 bicycleg, electric take leads to otherg that ay buijlq lampg and 4 St of 4 her rod- intg 4 Whole chain of bag Practjceg ucts ape beget Ng foreign, con - hat really iq happe ng here? " Detitjon, Now any indyg , We know of coy 8, thy capita] every Marging), h h-cogt Produce, and tog)q Mproye 5 Workep'g ef faceg the pr, of failype, But, Ciene And gq e Indugt pia, mor ' on Occasjop, t ArPnegg of for readily len Mselveg ¢ mech. eign Compe; Queeze aAnization t do thers, In jp. ». Many domegt; Prodyce.q to the ustrig)izeq Ountrjeg ¢ find all unjggq th an obtgjp relief, types of pro ctio that require » they dray gethe Search arge , Ounts capita per of 4 remedy, Workep hile therg stil} €pend , What remeqg Meag)y peg first Mostly on raw mg Dowep nd jn Come ¢,, ming ? Doing away With the ight ch nized, high), the rea] auseg of the troupe » €apitalizeq igh €Xpect ” arely Ostly, Such ade-de Client Producti, the ha. Stroying Eviceg tar; Quotas, Nizedq ind ag foreigy €Mmbaryg, pr Posed, ¢ ese he Produce ng Politica) ntiong to com ] ===== PAGE 4 ===== 452 THE FREEMAN August advantage over us in the labor- of this program when the forcible intensive occupations.! transfer of funds from taxpayers But today we find even our to farmers is done by government. highly capitalized industries buck- But one would look in vain for a ling under foreign competition. farmer who would personally use This doesn’t make sense. Never force on other citizens to provide before have we had so many tools himself a living in exchange for and so much capital per worker doing nothing. And it would be as today. And most foreign pro- difficult to find anyone who would « ducers have not come close to us in condone such an act on the part that regard. So, why are they of a farmer. Who among us would giving us such rough competition? ever think of approaching a farm- er in this manner? “Here, John, is $25 for those peanuts you didn’t grow for me this year.” The explanation lies not in what “John” doubtless would refuse foreigners are doing to us but, the $25 if anyone offered it that rather, in what “we” are doing to way. No one but an out-and-out “ourselves.” Some of our pro- thief really believes in feathering ducers are being priced out of the his own nest at the expense of world market. And this is being others. done by an accumulation of costs We have in this single, rela- and. by methods of pricing that tively minor example an irrational- are demonstrably wrong. Further, ity —a contradiction between be- n most of us are quite agreed that lief and action — that costs mil- they are wrong, that is, if we lions of dollars annually. This test our opinions by how we act cost finds its way into increased individually and on our own re- taxes and becomes a cost of doing sponsibility. This is the way to business — the steel business or discover how each of us believes whatever. Multiply this by thou- RA “deep inside.” sands of similarly irrational costs, Take the example of paying running into tens of billions, and farmers not to grow peanuts. we can see why American pro- Hardly anyone seems concerned ducers are more and more plagued about the costs or the desirability by foreign competition. They are TI “Labor-intensive” is a part of the Purdened by increasing costs over y cconomists’ nomenclature. Examples: which they have no control. Baby sitting, picking and culling coffee It seems unbelievable that we beans, activities that do not lend them- . selves to mechanization. could be running ourselves out of Self-Hobbled—We’ve No One to Blame but Ourselves ===== PAGE 5 ===== 1967 WHY RUN OURSELVES OUT OF BUSINESS? 453 business by practicing what all whatever amount you or others of us really believe to be wrong! will exchange freely and willingly. All I wish to examine here is In the second method, the price the irrational aspect of our com- for a good or service is whatever petitive problem. Why this dou- amount can be taxed or forcibly ble standard of morality, believ- extorted from you or others. One ing one: way and acting other- rests on your choice as to how wise? Unless we know where the you use your property. The other answer is to be found, American rests on someone else’s decision as producers will continue to seek to how to use your income and solution in trade-destructive “rem- property. edies” such as tariffs, quotas, em- Coercive pricing is demonstrably bargoes. wrong. A classic example, the one I repeat, our producers are faced among ever so many which I wish with costs over which they have to use to make my point, is the no control, costs arising from ac- strike. While widely used, no one tions that are believed to be believes it to be right. wrong. But they are also con- Strikes have played an impor- fronted with methods of pricing tant role in pricing American that further weaken their com- products out of the market. Yet, petitive position, methods that no all too many persons will stoutly one, “deep inside,” believes to be defend the strike while believing right. If we will examine one of it to be dead wrong. these widely practiced pricing The strike is strictly a pricing schemes that no one believes in, device, a means of raising some we can at least identify where wages above the market rate. the competitive trouble begins. There is no other reason to use } . it.2 Of some 17,000,000 members Coercive Pricing of labor unions in the United But first, what is this irra- States, about a tenth of them tional pricing method? Broadly participate in one or more “work speaking, there are two methods stoppages” each year —an appli- of pricing. One is free pricing, cation of this coercive pricing arrived at in the give and take. of willing exchange. The other is Strikes never accomplish more than to raise some wages at the expense of «arbitrary pricing, founded on the others; they do not and cannot raise the coercive practice of unwilling ex- geen] yase level. See ed Wages ise. by Dr. F. A. Harper (Irvington, change. In the first method, the N.Y.: The Foundation for Economic price for a good or service is Education, Inc., 1957), 124 pp. ===== PAGE 6 ===== 454 THE FREEMAN August measure. The coercion is applied in forcibly preventing others from working at jobs the strikers have vacated and at wages they have rejected. Work stoppage is pro- duction stoppage — costly! This device is viewed with alarm by employers, employees, and con- sumers alike. Yet, it is difficult to find a person, even among em- ployers, who will not concede “the right to strike.” This is an overt concession to coercion as an ap- propriate method of pricing. Doing What No One Approves But how many really believe in this method of pricing? Not even the strikers themselves! For if they believed coercive pricing to be sound in principle, they would never try to satisfy their own wants at lowest possible prices. Instead, they would patronize mo- nopolists only, always shopping for goods that are coercively priced above the market. Anyone who believes the strike or monopoly method of pricing to 8 Ten per cent of union membership is only 2 per cent of the total work force and thus some may ask, “What harm can be done to the economy by these few?” Merely bear in mind that when a small fraction of these 2 per cent strike General Motors, for instance, millions of workers in related indus- tries, even those not unionized, are put out of work. Also, the threat of coer- cion is often quite as potent as the ultimate action would have been. be just and valid would try to find sellers who employ that method. For instance, they would seek a doctor who demands a high fee and insists: “You accede to my demand or I shall no longer attend your ills. Further, I shall use force if necessary to keep any other doctor from attending you.” Do any of us, even strikers, look for such sellers 74 Indeed, not! Instead, all of us, including Mr. Union Leader, shop around for the best quality and the lowest price obtainable. Try to find the person who will pay $100 for the identi- cal suit of clothes that can be bought next door for $50. While we rarely think of it in these terms, all of us try to buy each other's labor as cheaply, not as dearly, as possible. Every penny of the price we pay * for any good goes to individuals ° for wages, rent, interest, trans- portation, storage, or some other productive service. Parentheti- cally, a low-priced good more often than not returns a higher wage than a high-priced good. But this does not alter the fact that, when buying, we seek services at lower, not higher, prices. Nor need we be led astray by 4 Some will claim that the union boy- cott of nonunion goods answers this question affirmatively, Gross inattention to the boycott is compelling evidence that union members do not believe in their own method of pricing. | ===== PAGE 7 ===== 1967 WHY RUN OURSELVES OUT OF BUSINESS ? 455 the fact that all of us try to sell thing is amiss; there is, as we for as much as we can and buy say, “a slip ’twixt the cup and the for as little as possible. This is lip.” at once a natural and commend- We must conclude that foreign able trait when confined to the producers are out-competing peaceful give-and-take of the free American producers because we market. But we do not approve, are practicing what “deep inside” at least in principle, gratifying we know to be wrong. If I may these inclinations by brute force, coin a phrase, we are suffering either in selling or buying. Were from a psychic short circuit. We we to approve coercive pricing, we are failing miserably to reason would witness the grocer forcing from our own moral premises to the customer to pay a dollar for practical conclusions! his can of beans and the customer forcing the grocer to sell his beans for a nickel. Utter nonsense!s Put yourself in the role of So here we are pricing ourselves teacher, charged with thinking out of world markets by adding this through and giving corrective costs we don’t really believe in, instructions. You have finally dis- and over which the producers covered where the trouble is. But have no control, and by pricing what is the remedy? Would you schemes that are demonstrably un- hammer away at the bad econom- sound. And, judging by our ac- ics of coercive pricing? This tions as buyers, we seem to be would be just as futile as explain- unanimously agreed that such ing the bad economics of stealing, pricing is wrong and unsound. that is, of some feathering their Why this distinction between what nests at the expense of others. we really believe and what we Everybody already agrees that daily practice, and more or less coercive pricing and stealing are condone? One would think that bad economics. such a serious waste of resources, We must continue to teach when agreed to as unsound, would sound economics, to be sure. But be easy to eliminate. Why do we When it comes to these particular persist in these practices? Some- troubles we find that the remedies BR lie beyond the scope of economics. 5 Arbitration, which in the final anal- Other disciplines — moral philoso- between 5¢ and $1.00. No one, if properly sociology — must be brought into tested, believes in this kind of pricing. play. The Teaching Problem ===== PAGE 8 ===== 456 THE FREEMAN August What is it the effective teacher personal action. Reason and logic must first learn, and then learn possess probing qualities and have how to explain, if foreign com- no such boundaries; practical con- petitors are not to run American clusions are logical extensions of industrialists out of business? The moral premises. answer, I feel certain, lies deeper Merely observe that millions of than we think. individuals who would not steal or coercively price when acting in Crowd Behavior their own name and on their own Most individuals when acting responsibility will do so when they personally and in their own name act in the name of a collective: — when acting in you-and-me sit- the union, a church, a chamber of uations — are above reproach. They commerce, society, the majority, can be trusted; their word is as and so on. If these people cannot good as their bond. The promises reason from the singular to the men live by are far more honored plural, how can we assume that than breached in man-to-man deal- their personal rectitude is the ings. result of reasoning and logic? It We would like to think that this must be only instinctive or imita- personal rectitude, seen on every tive. hand, is a rationally structured Is the effective teacher con- conduct, that it has its origin in fronted with the utterly baffling the reasoning mind. Has not pure problem of getting people to rea- | logic commended to these people son, to think things through for that fairness, honesty, justice, re- themselves? Even those individ- spect, freedom are essential in- uals potentially able to do so gredients for mutual upgrading cannot make the grade short of a and peaceful living together? self-generated motivation, a hard- A forbidding suspicion: This in- to-come-by initiative. How can ini- dividual rectitude, practiced so tiative be taught? I gather that widely, these moral directives initiative is more inborn or “deep inside,” may, in most cases, “caught” than taught, that it is be more from habit than reason. occasionally picked up by persons No rational and logical mind would when in the presence of exemplars, abruptly fail to function the mo- initiative having a contagious ment numbers are introduced. No quality of sorts. thinking person would condone or Individuals who have the capac- support a collective action that ity to think things through for would be repulsive to him as a themselves and who, at the same ===== PAGE 9 ===== 1967 WHY RUN OURSELVES OUT OF BUSINESS? 457 time, have the gumption, the get- we give to groups of persons. up-and-go, the enterprise to do so, These abstractions can no more appear to be the only ones who bear responsibility than they can can qualify as exemplars and, bear children, or speak, or think. thus, as effective teachers. Third, any action an individual . supports or condones is his action. A Strictly Personal Problem If it be contrary to what lies What is it they must under- ‘deep inside,” it is wrong accord- stand and learn how to explain? ing to his own standards. And to First, that which lies “deep in- hang the name plate of the wrong side” — conscience, if you will —is action on the union or some other exclusively a trait of the individ- collective is only to hide behind ual, never of any organization, in- the cloak of anonymity — like an stitution, collective. Further, its ostrich with his head in the sand. mandates are as close to rightness, The individual's responsibility for soundness, righteousness as is pos- what he supports or condones is sible for any person. Even more: inalienable, as inseparably linked every step in human progress, in- to him as is his psyche, his soul, sofar as man has had a hand in it, his mentality. is a manifestation of that which If American producers are to lies “deep inside.” Progress can cope with foreign competition, the never be ascribed to any corrup- way, I suspect, will not be found tion of conscience! in trade-destructive expedients. It Second, the responsibility for lies in finding and removing the one’s actions cannot be shifted, cer- causes of their present plight. The tainly not to anything impersonal only reason that causal identifica- and incapable of bearing responsi- tion appears so deep is that it’s bility. Unions, churches, chambers new territory, an area rarely ex- of commerce, and the like are of plored. this abstract nature, mere names . The Will to Improve 6 “I suggest that we postulate that ! . the intangibles of truth and beauty, Actually, the remedy is not that human freedom, courage, honor, honesty difficult. It simply calls for (1) do- are the core of the truly basic realities; ing what one believes to be right, and that the supposed realities which . . . we see and touch and feel are really that 18, obedience to what lies only shadows cast by these truly basic ‘deep inside,” (2) avoiding the dynamic forms in their many embodi- gpnare that something other than ments.” From The Symphony of Life by . Donald Hatch Andrews (Lee’s Summit, self can be responsible for what Mo.: Unity Books, 1967), pp. 257-258. one supports and condones, (3) ===== PAGE 10 ===== 458 THE FREEMAN August logically reasoning from what's misleading. For the right answer, “deep inside” to practical conclu- carefully examine personal experi- sions, and (4) the will and the ences; only in these is the truth gumption to reason, that is, to revealed. think things through. Aside from an occasional The fact that few can carry out “boner” in presenting and stand- even these prerequisites to a ing for what's “deep inside,” in- healthy commerce is no occasion tegrity to conscience “pays off.” for discouragement. There are Nor is the reason difficult to find. plenty who can — if they will! Fainter hearts, longing for the If they will! The deterrent is ‘‘courage” they lack, admire and the plaguing thought that if I support those who honestly stand practice what I believe to be right by their convictions. Longing to while others do not, I'll go down do right, but too timid to try it, while they survive. As if every they think of the right-acting per- step toward progress had to be son as their alter ego. Over and taken simultaneously and unani- over again we hear the refrain, mously — like a regiment does the “I'm so glad you said it; that’s goose step. It never has been thus, what I was thinking.” nor will it ever be! Were this the rule, man would still be at the Such integrity requires no un- primitive stage. Every advance in usual courage; only the knowledge human history began with a single that it’s not dangerous to be hon- step by some lone individual est. “To thine own self be true.” toward what he believed to be Anyone aware of the dividends of right and just and sound. such action demonstrates, not Admittedly, it seems risky, even bravery, but wisdom and down-to- dangerous, to follow the dictates earth practicality. Further, he has of one’s conscience when others the key to making what's “deep do not. But is it, really? Hearsay inside” go on outside, the key to reports about what has happened not running ourselves out of busi- to others often are erroneous and ness. ® | meas ON 1000007 | Freedom to Improve ... but the only unfailing and permanent source of improvement is liberty, since by it there are as many possible independent centers of improvement as there are individuals. JOHN BTUART MILL ~ ===== PAGE 11 ===== JOHN C. SPARKS MANY a logical and practical man price changes, and other aspects seems to go haywire in his expec- of competition. tations of government. He will Such great faith in government’s sail right over the philosophy that ability to administer charities, would limit government to the pro- services, and controls would sug- tection of life, liberty, and prop- gest a long string of successes. At erty. When he sees human needs, least, that’s how most businesses he deems it practical to call for gain a clientele. One satisfied cus- government action to relieve pov- tomer is the advertisement to the erty and provide social security, next. When a businessman wants medicare, school lunches, educa- a new office building, he seeks an tion, foreign aid, and other “chari- architect of demonstrated skill in ties.” the design of similar structures. He finds it inconceivable that Professional football managers try business could function without to fill their rosters with experi- such government services as the enced players who show promise post office, highways, monetary of greater success. An entertainer controls, weather reports —and discovers that each round of ap- subsidized electric power, if he plause is the steppingstone toward comes from the region of the Ten- more popularity and demand. The nessee Valley Authority. He also successful consulting firm grows expects “police protection” against on its record for solving perplex- economic adversity, unemployment, ing problems. Mr. Sparks is an executive of an Ohio manu- There is no finer recommenda- facturing company and a frequent contributor tion than prior success — except 459 ===== PAGE 12 ===== 460 THE FREEMAN August where government is concerned. That's a different story, as the record clearly reveals. Compounding the Problem In the area of “charity,” it has compiled a miserable showing of waste and graft. Recipients, who need above all else to regain self- responsibility and self-reliance, are rewarded and encouraged instead to remain dependent. Unwedded motherhood becomes a livelihood. Unemployed persons choose to re- main jobless because of the com- pensation. Educators and parents relinquish their responsibilities toward their children in exchange for state and Federal aid. The something-for-nothing years of the social security program are over. Henceforth, workers would do far better to buy insurance pri- vately — if they had the choice. From medicare may be expected costly and inadequate service, wrapped in red tape and inacces- sible when needed. The government's record for rendering economic service also is deplorable. The monopolized postal service has been unimaginative and inefficient in contrast with other forms of communication. Operating costs rise year after year. Yet, in many respects, the quality of service has declined. Part of the rapid cost increase is paid directly by “captive” custom- ers, the nation’s postal users, through higher postal rates. The remainder is “out of sight” in the government’s accounting records, adding to the taxpayer's burden. Another economic service by a combination of municipal, county, state, and Federal governments is the network of highways across the nation. And to come across one of the completed stretches of the new interstate highways is a trav- eler’s delight. Have we an excep- tion here —- government successful at something other than policing? Before passing judgment, consider the alarming increase in the high- way death toll. The super high- ways have seen super collisions and super holiday casualty re- cords as well as super traffic jams. The word is out in Los Angeles and other cities: Avoid the free- ways when large numbers of mo- torists are likely to be using them. The government has made quite a fuss about the safety of private- ly manufactured automobiles. Imagine the furor over traffic con- gestion and highway fatalities if the roads were privately owned and operated! But hardly anyone ever thinks about that possibility. If we did, we might dream of the convenience and safety of a high- way system under competitive pri- vate enterprise rather than a gov- ernmental monopoly. Government also has monopo- ===== PAGE 13 ===== 1967 IS IT PRACTICAL? 461 lized the business of money and takings is ordained with govern- credit, with a sorry record of mental power, he so often becomes booms and panics and depression— a hobble to progress? Why the dif- and endless inflation. But where ference between the success he is the “practical” man with an was and the failure he becomes? alternative monetary system? There is a difference — of this there can- be little doubt — but When Government Plays what is that difference? Call the a Handicappers Role difference self-reliance. Call it self- Another governmental role ac- responsibility. Call it incentive to cepted in blind faith by the practi- achieve a greater reward. Call it cal man is that of the handicap- a fear of not succeeding. Call it a per, arbitrarily adjusting the vol- burning desire to serve customers untary agreements that have been better than does a competitor. Call reached in the market place. In it any or all of these. A business- 1966, Florida orange growers had man places his savings and per- a bountiful harvest, a surplus situ- sonal effort on the line, betting he ation from which the U. S. De- will succeed. He must rely upon partment of Agriculture hastened himself; success or failure is his to rescue them. But the price sup- personal responsibility. If he does port program, based on use of not attract enough customers, he orange juice in the school lunch will not obtain a satisfactory in- program, afforded little help. Fi- come and may even lose his sav- nally, the processors wisely cut ings. He risks all this on his out of the government program ability to serve others and achieve with a sales campaign to sell or- in return the financial and psy- ange juice at lower prices. Early chological rewards of profit and results indicate success; consump- satisfaction. The ‘private owner- tion is running 20 per cent heavier ship spur is two-fold and very real than in the previous year. Juice — fear of failure, and pleasure of processors and consumers, in this success. instance, have found a way around Now, put this successful busi- the government’s good intentions. nessman in government office, and May it serve as a lesson to all who he will have to operate without place their faith in the “practi- those incentives. There is no cality” of government relief! penalty involved for the lack of This poses a provocative ques- self-reliance unless gross neglect tion. Why is it that when a man of duty or misconduct occurs. of proven ability in private under- Government seldom permits the ===== PAGE 14 ===== 462 THE FREEMAN August existence of competition. Conse- Sarnoff will ever emerge from the quently, there is no need to per- ranks of government employees. form well in order to attract more It is not a matter of selecting the customers. Nor is there any com- “right” persons for government pelling reason to perform effi- jobs. It is a matter of selecting the ciently. There is no competitive jobs that government is competent standard with which to compare to perform. The organization de- results. With what private postal signed to defend people lacks the system can one compare the gov- disciplines and incentives for suc- ernment’s performance? There is cessful business operation. So let's always the taxpayer to cover defi- be truly practical. Let the police cits. force attend to its appropriate de- The profit incentive makes the fensive functions. And let economic difference. In the absence of that services be performed in open com- incentive, it seems most unlikely petition by responsible individuals that a Henry Ford, Thomas Edi- with a proven capacity for such son, Charles Kettering, or David service. @® | ome AS ®F LIBERTY | Herbert Spencer MARVELLOUS are the conclusions men reach once they desert the simple principle that each man should be allowed to pursue the objects of life, restrained only by the limits which the similar pursuits of their objects by other men impose. A generation ago we heard loud assertions of “the right to labor,” that is, the right to have labor provided; and there are still not a few who think the community bound to find work for each person. Compare this with the doctrine current in France at the time when the mon- archical power culminated; namely, that “the right of working is a royal right which the prince can sell and the subjects must buy.” This contrast is startling enough; but a contrast still more startling is being provided for us. We now see a resuscitation of the despotic doctrine, differing only by the substitution of trade- unions for kings. For now that trade-unions are becoming univer- sal, and each artisan has to pay prescribed monies to one or another of them, with the alternative of being a non-unionist to whom work is denied by force, it has come to this: that the right to labor is a trade-union right, which the trade-union can sell and the in- dividual worker must buy! ===== PAGE 15 ===== COMMUNISM WILLIAM HENRY CHAMBERLIN After | Fifty | Years scientifically or- v THE YEAR 1967 marks the fiftieth tional rule of the Czars by a much anniversary of two events of world more ruthless, importance, the consequences of ganized dictatorship of a single which are still very much with us. political party — more accurately, One event was the United States by the top leadership of that party. decision to intervene in World War Russian communism has experi- I, following the German declara- enced many changes in methods of tion of unlimited submarine war- administration and in governing fare. The other was the seizure of personnel. Most of its founding power in the vast Russian Empire fathers perished in Stalin's para- by a small disciplined band of ex- noid purges. However, two basic treme revolutionaries, then known principles have survived intact. as Bolsheviks, now more descrip- Lenin is supposed to have said that v« tively designated as communists. there could be any number of po- The first put the United States on litical parties in Russia — provided a merry-go-round of European and that the Communist party was in world power politics, easy enough power and all the other parties in to mount, but costly to ride and jail. This is an excellent descrip- hard to get off. The second re- tion of how the Soviet Union is x placed the authoritarian, tradi- governed. Stalin, writing in the of- Mr. Chamberlain, Moscow correspondent for ficial party newspaper, Pravda, on the Christian Science Monitor from 1922 to . 1934, is author of the definitive two-volume November 26, 1936, spelled it out history of the Russian Revolution and numer- ous other books and articles on world affairs, plainly: 463 ===== PAGE 16 ===== 464 THE FREEMAN August In the Soviet Union there is no basis for the existence of several parties or, consequently, for the free- dom of parties. In the Soviet Union there is a basis only for the Commu- nist party. There is no toleration for oppo- sition parties; and organized dis- senting groups within the Commu- nist party are also strictly forbid- den. The consequence is that ef- fective decision-making power is concentrated in the hands of a very few men, sometimes one man, at the head of the party organization. Total Control The other permanent principle of communism in practice is that the government, in one form or an- other, undertakes to manage the whole economic life of the country. In the first phase of the Revolution all private property, except for personal belongings, was confiscat- ed and nationalized. After an early period of chaos, all factories, mines, railways, public utilities, and stores were placed in charge of a host of state bureaucrats. At first the peasants were left more or less undisturbed on their small twenty-acre farms, following the confiscation and dividing of the estates of the large and medium landowners. But 1929 marked the beginning of a process lasting over several years and carried on with the utmost brutality. Peasants were subjected to such measures as wholesale deportations to forced labor and one politically organized great famine, They found their in- dividual possession of land abol- ished and themselves regimented in collective farms; what they raised and what they received for their produce were determined by the government. Communism was an outgrowth of World War I. And world war led to an extension of the area under its control. By 1945, communist power prevailed in a large number of formerly independent states in Eastern and Central Europe. Stalin had once declared: “We donot want a foot of foreign soil; we shall not yield an inch of our own.” But he might more accurately have said: “We do not want a foot of foreign soil, except Estonia, Latvia, Lithu- ania, Poland, Hungary, Czechoslo- vakia, Bulgaria, Roumania, Yugo- slavia, parts of Finland, East Ger- many.” At least, this was how the polit- ical map of Europe looked shortly after the end of World War II. Yugoslavia, to be sure, broke away to the status of an independent state in foreign relations, although it retained the one-party system and a somewhat modified form of state control of the economy. These were not, as the Russian had been, spontaneous revolutions, arising out of the miseries and dislocation oe ===== PAGE 17 ===== 1967 COMMUNISM AFTER FIFTY YEARS 465 of war. Communism was imposed There are still pronounced dif- on Eastern and Central Europe ferences of opinion, judgment, and from without, by the tanks and emphasis in writings about the bayonets of the Red Army. Soviet Union. But the facts are China, on the other hand, experi- now well established, and some enced pretty much what happened broad conclusions may be stated in Russia in 1917. Eight years of with confidence. exhausting war with Japan, accom- panied by Japanese occupation of the largest Chinese cities, had cre- First, communism, as it has de- ated a situation in which the power veloped in Russia, is a tough, dur- and authority of the nationalist able system, which cannot easily government, under Chiang Kai- be overthrown, either by a palace shek, were gravely undermined. In- coup or by erosion from within. flation had almost destroyed the One need only look at the historical value of the Chinese currency and record. The governing system set many Chinese — mistakenly, as up by Lenin has survived numer- they realized too late — believed ous threats: that communism could be no worse than existing conditions and might bring some improvement. In the first years of the Soviet Endurance of the System » Prolonged civil war; + Allied intervention, although on a halfhearted and ineffective state, created by the communist scale; revolution of November, 1917, the * Two major famines; system was so new, so untried, that « A German invasion that led at there could be the widest differ- one time to the occupation of a ences of opinion about its future large part of European Russia; prospects. Majority opinion in the West was most impressed by stor- ies of terror, violence, hunger, and general misery. But a minority clung to the hope that communism would provide an answer to the problems and frustrations of mod- ern society. So varied were reports » The savage struggle to bring the peasants under the yoke of the collective farm; + Several periods of distress and general shortage and misery un- common even by Russian stand- ards (the years of civil war and economic collapse, 1917-1921, the of observers returning from Rus- time of forced collectivization, sia that it was hard to believe they 1929-1933, the years of war with were speaking about the same Germany and postwar recon- country. struction). ===== PAGE 18 ===== 466 THE FREEMAN August This was due to the formula The chances are there would be of government worked out, con- few open dissenters. sciously or unconsciously, under Lenin. It was further modified by Stalin and was imitated to a con- siderable extent by the fascist dic- Second, communism has only tators, Mussolini and Hitler. What been able to function as a going this amounted to was rule by a concern by adopting some of the combination of unlimited terror methods which its advocates vio- and unlimited propaganda. The lently denounced in what they people who were not convinced by called the capitalist system. The the propaganda were intimidated old communist ideal, “From each by the terror, by the knowledge according to his ability, to each ac- that there was no means of organ- cording to his need,” has been con- ized effective resistance. signed to the mothballs. Extensive- Free men who are accustomed to ly copied are the incentives of a the expression of diverse views wage and salary system, with find it difficult to understand, even higher pay for higher skills. Dif- to imagine, the power concentrated ferences in food, dress, and stand- in the hands of the Soviet totali- ards of living are sharper in the tarian state. Suppose the govern- Soviet Union than in the West, es- ment in this or any Western coun- pecially so because there is much try controlled every printed or pub- less to go around. licly spoken word, directed the Such egalitarian experiments as policy of every newspaper and equality of wages and the limita- magazine, used the theater, the tion of the pay of communists to movies, the youth organizations as the standard of a skilled worker instruments of propaganda, dic- have been discarded as impractical. tated what should be taught from In recent years there has even kindergarten to university, em- been an attempt, with little success, ployed radio and television as its to gain some of the recognized ad- mouthpieces, forbade the importa- vantages of the free market system tion of foreign newspapers and without instituting its essential politically questionable books from component, private ownership. De- abroad. Suppose, in addition, that spite communist propaganda to the anyone suspected of disloyalty was contrary, the transfer of economic liable to arrest and banishment to ownership has been, not to the hard and disagreeable work in workers, but to bureaucrats who some remote part of the country. are less concerned with the inter- Survival Depends on Use of Some Capitalistic Practices ===== PAGE 19 ===== 1967 COMMUNISM AFTER FIFTY YEARS 467 ests of the workers than in mak- The consequences of national- ing a profit for the state. izing all shops and service indus- tries have been equally disastrous: indifference to the customer, poor Third, after fifty years, commu- quality, absence of initiative in nism has emphatically failed to making improvements. To be sure, prove itself a superior productive there have been striking advances system in comparison with an econ- in the quantity of industrial out- omy based on individual ownership. put, in scientific accomplishment, Lenin and his followers took over and especially in the exploration a huge country, so rich in natural of space, in the spread of education, resources as to be almost self-suffi- in certain modernizing changes in cient. Five decades later, the Soviet urban life. living standard is one of the lowest But Russia under any system in Europe, much lower than in the would have achieved substantial United States and Western Europe, progress over half a century. It even lower than in such satellite was experiencing a rapid economic states as East Germany and Czech- growth in the decade before the oslovakia. outbreak of World War I. Many Nor is there any reason to be- projects of which Soviet publicists lieve that in the foreseeable future like to boast were on engineers’ the Soviet Union and other com- drawing boards before the Revolu- munist-ruled countries will achieve tion. The Soviet Union should be or approach the ideal proclaimed compared, not with Russia in 1917, by Stalin and Khrushchev: to over- but with Russia as it might other- take and outstrip America. The wise have been in 1967. Judging agricultural record of the country from pre-Revolutionary trends, the under collective farming is a dis- noncommunist Russia of 1967 grace. Quite recently the Soviet would have shown substantial econ- government found it necessary to omic and social progress, less spec- make large purchases of grain in tacular than the Soviet in some the United States and other for- fields, but better balanced and more eign countries, whereas prerevolu- conducive to the comfort of the tionary Russia had been a large ex- average citizen. porter of wheat. Removing the au- tomatic incentive of private owner- ship from Russian farming was After fifty years, there is no in- like taking an irreplaceable dy- dication that communism could namo from a machine. win majority support in any coun- No Proof of Superiority Maintained by Force ===== PAGE 20 ===== 468 THE FREEMAN August try without the use of force, vio- lence, and terrorism. Voluntary movement is almost always away from, not toward, communist-ruled countries. There have been two waves of migration from Soviet Russia, involving hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of peo- ple. One was immediatély after the Revolution; the othex! was after World War IT when many Russians who had been forcibly or volun- tarily evacuated from the Soviet Union during the time of German invasion chose not to go home. The part of Germany under Soviet oc- cupation, quaintly called the Ger- man Democratic Republic, lost some four million of its citizens to prospering, free enterprise West Germany. Then the communists set up a penitentiary wall in the di- vided city of Berlin and an elabo- rate, closely guarded system of barbed wire entanglements and booby-traps along its entire fron- tier to prevent this continuous wholesale flight. Hong Kong is packed with refu- gees from communist China. In the divided countries of East Asia, Korea, and Vietnam, it is the same story: a stampede to get away from communist rule. There has also been a large exodus of voluntary exiles from Poland and other satellite lands of Eastern Europe. Among millions of “defectors,” refugees from communism in many lands, one recent case arrests at- tention. It is the flight from the Soviet Union, first to India, then to Switzerland, of Svetlana Alli- luyeva, daughter of the formidable dictator, Josef Stalin, and her later appearance in the United States. Seeking the freedom of expression she was denied at home was a dra- matic blow to the Soviet system in world public opinion. The wheel, in her case, had come full circle. In April, 1917, Lenin left Switzerland, where he had found political asylum, to lead the communist revolution in Russia. Exactly fifty years later Stalin’s daughter had returned to Switzer- land — a refugee from the regime founded by Lenin and consoli- dated, built up, shaped in every detail by her own father. Serious Problems Persist Fifth, the United States and other noncommunist countries have their problems, big and small, political, economic, and so- cial. But it would be an error to imagine that, merely because they have devised effective means of suppressing open criticism and discussion, the rulers of commu- nist countries face no difficulties and problems of their own, In China, there has for months been an obscure but evidently bit- ter state of near civil war be- tween supreme dictator Mao Tse- “HM ===== PAGE 21 ===== 1967 COMMUNISM AFTER FIFTY YEARS 469 tung (whose “thought” is recom- Our Danger from Within mended as the panacea for all Sixth, what does communism, ills) and some of his closest asso- half a century after it was ciates. The consequences are still launched as a system of govern- uncertain. There is more outward ment in a large country, mean appearance of stability in the So- for the United States? If the viet Union. But Lenin’s and Sta- United States will hold to the lin’s heirs have not found the principles of economic individual- answers to two questions of para- ism, communism is not and never mount importance. will be a challenge in the sense of They have not found a means providing a better life for more of tranferring political power in people. Nor is there any serious peaceful and legitimate fashion. threat of military conquest; the The quiet, unquestioning handing predictable suicidal consequences over of supreme authority from of a nuclear clash are the best as- a President or Prime Minister to surance that such a clash will not the representative of another party take place. that has been victorious at the The danger to the advanced in- polls would be ludicrously impos- dustrial societies of the United sible under Soviet conditions. As States, Canada, Japan, and West- a result there is constant rivalry, ern Europe is from within, not tension, intrigue, in-fightingamong from without. Intensification of the few men at the sources of the trend toward omnicompetent political and economic power. government, drying up of the And, as the Soviet economy gets sources of future investment out of the primitive stage of try- through excessive taxation, throw- ing to produce as much as pos- ing more and more of the burden sible and faces the need to make of supporting the unfit and the investment choices, even to pay unproductive on the producing some attention to consumer tastes, part of the population threatens the lack of a substitute for the to erode and finally destroy the free market system becomes more incentives to hard work which and more painfully apparent. The help to make an individualist free market presupposes free en- economy so superior to a collec- terprise and private ownership; tivist. If America will live up to and efforts to obtain its benefits its better historic ideals, it can where these elements are lacking face the challenge of communism are foredoomed to failure. undaunted and unafraid. @® ===== PAGE 22 ===== AN A STAND ONE of the forgotten men of our age is the entrepreneur, the indi- vidual who, on his own initiative and judgment, at his own risk, goes into business for himself. The agonies and ecstacies of these un- organized iconoclasts have usually been ignored by press, politicians, and public, including myself. But a chance encounter with one of these otherwise forgotten individ- vals has given me a feeling of em- pathy with an entrepreneur. He sat next to me on my flight back to Detroit from Kennedy In- ternational, a trimly-built gentle- man about 45 years of age, with gray hair and gold-rimmed glasses. We began conversing on the AFTRA strike, then in its second day. I found my traveling compan- Mr, Warmbicr is a student at Michigan State University. 470 DONALD WARMBIER ion to be the owner of an advertis- ing agency, a self-made man who through long years and hard work secured for his firm numerous ac- counts for the producing of TV and radio commercials. This pro- duction had been halted by the strike, however, and his firm was experiencing losses. He told me of those losses, incurred because of an unforeseeable strike to which he was not a party, without re- sentment, as if the bearing of such risks were a part of the standard operational procedure of his pro- fession. And so it is. For the en- trepreneur works without senior- ity, tenure, or unemployment com- pensation, deriving income when his firm earns profits, suffering if it doesn’t. And while that day’s news- paper accounts of the AFTRA strike told of the wages foregone ¢ “a ===== PAGE 23 ===== 1967 A STAND OF ONE’S OWN 471 by the striking employees, the Kentucky, and how much more dif- losses of an entrepreneur went un- ficult punitive taxes made it. “The mentioned. government takes 60 per cent of Our discussion turned to Eng- my income,” he said. Here was the land, from where my companion type of man politicians put out of had just returned after the produc- their minds when they endorse tion of several TV commercials. soak-the-rich taxation, the entre- England seemed to him a stifling preneur of self-made means who and suffocating place, in spite of must overcome such onerous bur- the recent creative outbursts of dens if he is to succeed. popular music there. He saw the We were approaching for land- current flow of British talent into ing as I asked my companion a final the music and entertainment fields question: Why, with all the unfore- as a direct consequence of the dry- seeable risks, the personal losses, ing up of other forms of entre- and the burdens of government preneurial opportunity. Heavy pro- taxation, did he decide to go into gressive taxes have left entertain- business for himself, to become an ment one of the few fields in which entrepreneur? The answer came budding entrepreneurs can acquire quickly, without pause for thought, the seed capital needed to launch as if he were stating a self-evident new ventures. axiom: “I’d rather run a popsicle My companion recalled his own stand of my own than work for climb from a tar-paper shack in some government bureau.” @® I[DIEfAYSOIN 008ERTY | The Business Climate “BUSINESS” is a product of civilization and it cannot exist for long in the absence of a specific constellation of conditions, chiefly moral, which support our civilization. The economic ingredient in the constellation is, as we shall see, free competition. But free competition cannot function unless there is general acceptance of such norms of conduct as willingness to abide by the rules of the game and to respect the rights of others, to maintain professional integrity and professional pride, and to avoid deceit, corruption, and the manipulation of the power of the state for personal and selfish ends. WILHELM ROEPKE, Economics of the Free Society ===== PAGE 24 ===== POST MORTEM ON The Lister EDWARD P. FORGETTING anniversaries can be embarrassing. This time, almost everybody’s face should be red, except mine. We just overlooked the centennial of one of the truly outstanding events in human his- tory. Now we’ll have to wait an- other hundred years to celebrate right, It's the principle of the thing that bothers me, not just a teacher's sadistic urge to flunk everyone for forgetting some date that I happened to remember. One hundred and two years ago this month an unknown Scottish surgeon made one of those funda- mental discoveries of the ages, one to be ranked along with the discovery of fire, the wheel, the smelting of metals, electricity, Dr. Coleson is Professor of Economics at Spring Arbor College in Michigan. 472 Centennial COLESON and atomic energy. But for the work of Joseph Lister and other well-nigh forgotten benefactors of mankind, many of us would have died in infancy as millions of others have died over the millen- nia of human history and as mul- titudes continue to die in the backward areas of the world even today. Truly, it may be said that ‘never were so many indebted to so few for so much.” What makes the oversight par- ticularly exasperating is the fact that other anniversaries have been remembered. You will recall that in June of 1965 a popular maga- zine featured Napoleon on the sesquicentennial of Waterloo. Al- most everyone celebrated the vic- tory of Wellington and Blucher over the “Little Corporal,” except ===== PAGE 25 ===== 1967 POST MORTEM ON THE LISTER CENTENNIAL 473 the French who saved their fire- brate. Every day must be the cen- works for the nine-hundredth an- tennial of something or other. niversary of 1066 last fall. It Some of these events, recent and seems that de Gaulle was more remote, are noteworthy, too. For interested in William the Con- instance, 1964 was the nineteen- queror’s victory at Hastings than hundredth anniversary of Nero's in one of Bonaparte’s few defeats. slum clearance project, prelude to Of course, the way to avoid for- urban renewal at Rome — and getting those important anniver- Nero didn’t have to pay the fiddler saries is to plan ahead. Mark the since he furnished the music him- calendar early and start getting self. Whatever one may think of ready for the celebration. I had the ancient worthies and rascals, been telling classes for several clearly we cannot remember all of years that the centennial was com- their doings. But why we choose to ing. You know, “year after next” remember some and forget others the hundredth anniversary will be is a mystery. And certainly there upon us and the entire world will are far-reaching consequences of rise up in gratitude and pay hom- these decisions as well as other age to those pioneer “men against choices we make. Edward Gib- death” whose researches have bon warned us long ago: saved millions of lives over the century. Imagine my disappoint- tinue to bestow more liberal applause ment when August of 1965 rolled j, their destroyers than on their ben- around with little visible recogni- factors, the thirst of military glory tion that there was anything spe- will ever be the vice of the most ex- cial about that month. I checked alted characters.2 the date in the library and even consulted my family doctor. The former confirmed the correctness of my timing, but the latter had Now I am not suggesting that noted no special excitement in the we erase those rascals from our medical journals or among the pro- history books — Alexander, Nero, fession. Evidently, they had for- Napoleon, and a host of others — gotten, too. but simply that we give useful and It is natural that we be selec- respectable people equal time. tive about what we choose to cele- Take my hero, Joseph Lister, for . . . as long as mankind shall con- “Equal time’ for Benefactors of Mankind 1 This is the title of a book by Paul 2 Edward Gibbon, The Decline and de Kruif, better known for his Microbe Fall of the Roman Empire (Modern Li- Hunters. brary edition), Vol. I, p. 6. ===== PAGE 26 ===== 474 THE FREEMAN August Lister directing use of carbolic acid spray in one of his earliest ‘‘antiseptic’’ surgical operations. (Bettmann Archive) example. Here we have all the ele- because fatal infections developed ments of a good story, minus the in the overwhelming majority of sadistic and gruesome which the incisions. Groping, he stum- should interest no one. His activ- bled upon the writings of a ities may have saved more lives French chemist, one Louis Pas- than some of those conquerors de- teur, and surmised that wounds stroyed, which should give him a would heal without infection if fair claim to fame. His is the clas- those mysterious micro-organisms sic success story of how persistent Pasteur had studied could be ex- effort triumphs over the apathy cluded or killed. His methods were of the masses and the opposition crude and unpleasant, but sound in of misguided but well-meaning principle, truly one of the few people. He was a surgeon in those revolutionary developments in his- tragic days after the discovery of tory. No doubt, many now reading anesthesia in 1846 made surgery these lines owe him their very common because it stilled the cries lives. The last century in surgery of the patients but more deadly has seen but the refinement of his ===== PAGE 27 ===== 1967 POST MORTEM ON THE LISTER CENTENNIAL 475 technique. As Dr. Victor Robinson change their ways. For years they says, ‘Joseph Lister's manifold had prided themselves on their labors may be read in the volumes dirty operating coats. The filthier of his Collected Papers, but his the better, since a great accumula- lifework is summed up in a tjon of dried pus and blood indicat- phrase: he made surgery clean.” ed a wide practice. But their pa- In our preoccupation with detail tients died up to a hundred per and trivia today, we lose sight of cent. Indeed, a famous surgeon of the importance of sound principles the time once remarked that an as a point of departure. English soldier on the field of Now, for the date of this epoch- Waterloo stood a better chance making discovery. After a great than a patient — let us say victim amount of groping, Joseph Lister _ on an operating table in a hos- tried his new idea on a compound- pital. It was even urged back then fracture patient on August 12, that hospitals be abolished since 1865. Few days in human history they were so obviously fatal. Lis- have been so fateful for mankind ter sought to change all this and or so unnoticed then and now. His produced evidence that he was method was bewilderingly simple. more than another charlatan or He just sterilized his instruments quack of which there had been with carbolic acid and had it too many already. But it took sprayed over the incision as he time for his ideas to catch on. We operated. The standard treatment pyman beings have a right to be for compound fractures with open cautious since we have lost our wounds back then was immediate way on many a detour over the amputation, which proved fatal in ages. But it does seem that we many cases. Lister saved not only might catch on faster than we do the patient’s limb, but perhaps al- 4t times. 80 his life. Other operations in the The next crucial date in the ensuing months were equally suc- ganitary revolution of a century cessful. ago was the meeting of the British Medical Association in August of 1867 — a centennial we might yet Lister should have been hailed commemorate in lieu of the one forthwith as the greatest surgeon we forgot August 12 a couple of of all time. But the doctors, like years ago. Lister read the only pa- the rest of us, were reluctant to per worth hearing on August 9, "3 Victor Robinson, The Story of Med- Put his contemporaries did not ap- icine, p. 423, preciate the fact until long after- Slow Acceptance of New Ideas ===== PAGE 28 ===== 476 THE FREEMAN August ward. Lister was not dramatic, be- its greater abundance for all. Like ing by no means an orator; and the medical revolution of a hun- the other surgeons gave him a dred years ago, industrialization rough time in the question-and- has been a great boon to a lot of answer period following his pre- rather ungrateful people who take sentation. But his ideas won out their blessings for granted and and rather speedily, too, once the forget how their improved stand- movement got under way. ard of living became possible. We cannot help the fact that Worse still, these benefactors of our fathers caught on slowly, but mankind are not simply forgotten we could remedy our own pervert- as was Joseph Lister. The good ed sense of values that glorifies they have done is disregarded, and the vicious and forgets the con- the “growing pains” of the new structive. One could rewrite the industrial era they helped to history book with profit, emphasiz- usher in are magnified out of all ing the beneficial, and passing proportion and even distorted to briefly over the tragedies of the make over these captains of indus- ages. And I would like to nominate try into deep-dyed villains. And for honors a host of solid citizens strangely, all of this is done by who worked for the betterment of intellectuals who enjoy all the mankind in medicine, in industry, fruits of those pioneering efforts in agriculture, and wherever else and clamor for more, while they men and women have labored, continue to vilify those who made however humbly. it possible. Certainly, it would be appropriate as part of the bicen- tennial celebration for Watt and Since we forgot the great surgi- Arkwright that we set the record cal centennial, perhaps it would straight on the so-called “Indus- be well to sit down with the his- trial Revolution.” As an introduc- tory book and the calendar to tion to this study, may I recom- start planning ahead for the next mend the book, Capitalism and notable anniversary. May I sug- the Historians, edited by F. A. gest a “double-header” coming up Hayek.t It is about time we cor- year after next: the bicentennial rected some of these misconcep- of the patenting of Richard Ark- tions. wright’'s “automated” spinning — wheel and James Watt's improved 4 University of Chicago Press. Also . available from the Foundation for Eco- steam engine. Here we have the A . ; ‘ nomic Kducation, Irvington-on-Hudson, genesis of the industrial age with New York, $1.75. Some Anniversaries for the Future ===== PAGE 29 ===== Id 1967 POST MORTEM ON THE LISTER CENTENNIAL 477 Be Ready for 1976! For those who like to plan a little farther than just two years ahead, may I point out that 1976 will soon be upon us. This is also a double bicentennial, since this is the anniversary of both the Dec- laration of Independence and the publication of Adam Smith’s Wealth of Nations. Rather inter- estingly, there are already some hardy souls getting set to cele- brate the latter. One such organi- zation is the “Invisible Hand So- ciety,” recently formed for this purpose. With Adam Smith, there is al- so some correcting to do, as his disciples are so painfully aware. Perhaps a story will best illustrate the problem. Several years ago I decided to quit taking my Wealth of Nations in small, secondhand doses; so I set out to buy a copy of Smith’s masterpiece for myself. I went to the local bookstore but the book was not to be found, al- though Marx’s Capital was quite conspicuous. A few weeks later I tried again in a much larger city. Still no Smith, but there was Marx once more. Some months later I looked through the big bookstore of one of the state universities with the same luck. Always there was Marx but never Adam Smith. Finally, I ordered a secondhand copy through a bookstore in Chi- cago.’ It would appear that Adam Smith’s ideas have been as com- pletely mislaid. The prominence of Das Kapital suggests still another anniversary. In 1983 is another twin centen- nial: the death of Karl Marx and the birth of John Maynard Keynes. Now, if present trends continue, it is quite possible that communism may complete the con- quest of the world by force of arms and subversion by 1983 — just in time for Orwell’s 1984. But I have faith that this will never happen. There are powerful fac- tors working against communism today, such as mass disillusion- ment around the world, particular- ly in those countries that have had firsthand experience with the vicious system. Communism has promised much but has delivered little, except terror, poverty, star- vation, and death. Quoting Lin- coln, “You can’t fool all the people all the time”; and a host of people have long since caught on. If we would just clear our own minds so that we could present a construc- tive alternative, this could be the psychological moment for a great revival of freedom. @® 5 I note, with pleasure, that several inexpensive editions are again in print today, The Foundation for Economic Education stocks the 2-volume Dutton edition, at $4.50. ===== PAGE 30 ===== Poverty of WHAT? DONNA THOMPSON NEWSPAPERS and magazines have been filled with articles about the war on poverty. But it seems that these analysts think of poverty only in terms of money income, The government is trying to pro- vide income of a certain amount in the belief that, with material poverty obliterated, the individual can have all the good things in life and live happily ever after. The popular impression seems to be that the individual cannot amount to anything in the world if he is poor financially. Appar- ently it has been forgotten that the great of the world have climbed to the heights from hovels, half- starved, perhaps, but undeterred from the things they desired. That is where our modern think- ing stumbles. The dictionary de- fines poverty as “a quality or state of being poor, any deficiency in what constitutes richness. Poor Mrs. Thompson is a housewife and free-lance writer in Southwest Missouri, 478 —as poverty of soil or ideas. Pov- erty, a stronger word than poor, is the state of being in need.” In need of what? Money, yes. But not money alone. We need a war on poverty of moral principle, poverty of character, poverty of ideas, poverty of ambition, pov- erty of courage, and poverty of determination. I have been reading the life of Hans Christian Andersen. His father was a cobbler. His mother washed clothes in the river to help make a living. He was poor in this world’s goods, hungry and cold, poorly dressed, and unedu- cated. But rich, very rich in ideas, in dreams, in courage, determina- tion, and faith in God. Poor clothes and hunger could be endured as he reached to become a great nov- elist, playright, and spinner of fairy tales that have delighted children around the world. Abraham Lincoln, reading by firelight and candlelight, with ill- i) ===== PAGE 31 ===== 1967 POVERTY OF WHAT? 479 fitting clothes and no formal edu- have — not abundance, but enough cation, asked nothing of any man. — who go to church and send their He wanted a chance and made it children to school, whose pride will for himself. not permit them to ask for help The pages of history reveal and, if offered, will push the offer great actors, writers, lawyers, art- away with the answer, “Let me ists, ministers, politicians —the do it. I can do it for myself. I list is endless. They were poor. don’t need any help.” They were hungry. But they I once knew a boy who was achieved because they were rich working his way through college. in many ways. He had no money, but he was de- termined to go on to medical school. “Medical schools cost a lot of We need to change our view- money,” I said. “I don’t see how point. It is well to clean up the you can do it financially.” The Nature of Growth slums. It is well to try to find work I'll never forget the way he for people who will work, It is a looked at me or what he said. wonderful thing to provide an ed- “I’ve wanted to be a doctor ucation for people who want it. since I was a little boy. The old But let us not mislead ourselves. country doctor in our town used Those who are poor in" worldly to take me with him on his calls goods will not be stopped if they in his horse and buggy. And I'm are rich in character, moral fiber, going through medical school and courage, and ambition. They will become a doctor if I have to live develop the talent God has given on a sack of peanuts a day.” them and nothing will stop them. He became a very successful I do not mean that everyone surgeon. He had started poor in has the divine spark of greatness. money, but rich in dreams and But any individual can help him- determination. He would not be self become a responsible, desir- stopped. able citizen — not rich, but with Even the Great Master himself enough — honest and law-abiding was so poor that he told his if he so desires. Look at the lead- friends, “The Son of Man hath ers in your own community, many not where to lay his head.” But of whom from poor beginnings his words have endured for two have risen above their surround- thousand years, his life an exam- ings. And among your neighbors ple of wealth of spirit, of courage, are many others who live in small- of character. Each can achieve er houses and work for what they the goal that is set for him — if ===== PAGE 32 ===== 480 THE FREEMAN August he is rich in those spiritual quali- lightenment, learning, is the sum ties which defy the bonds of ma- of information conserved by civ- terialism. In the soul and mind ilization. To learn is to gain knowl- of man lies the richness of his edge or understanding by study.” life. Not what he wears or where And you can study by candle- he lives, but how he lives and light, as did Lincoln, or by a glow- what he is. ing electric light. You can study and learn on the street, in the field, in the factory, anywhere, if In the War on Poverty, the there is desire and will. The world word education is mingled with of learning, of knowledge, is open that of material advantage. For- to those who want it. mal education is of great value moneywise. It is also the key that Poverty in a sense is a physical will unlock many doors. But edu- and material condition to be over- cation may be acquired without come; but men also must fight going to college. The dictionary the war on poverty of spirit, pov- defines education as “the imparta- erty of ambition and determina- tion or acquisition of knowledge, tion and courage, the poverty of skill, or the development of char- our minds. “Knowledge is power.” acter as by study or discipline. It is time men stopped thinking Education is the general and for- only in terms of financial and ma- mal word for schooling, especially terial poverty and began to fight in an institute of learning. But this poverty of the soul. If the knowledge, that which is gained latter is conquered, the other will and preserved by knowing, en- take care of itself. @® The Desire to Learn WEAS BO 20005774 Pauper’s Purpose? BECAUSE it is my social function to supply the world as well as I can with a certain thing, therefore I dread the world’s being so well supplied with it that I shall be able to get little or nothing for supplying more. It is impossible to exaggerate the importance of this consideration, or the penetrating and intimate nature of its bearing on every aspect of the social question. PHILIP H. WICKSTEED, Tha Common Sense of Political Economy “i ===== PAGE 33 ===== A CEI ICI IE COC IC IE ICDC CIE IR IC ICICI SIC ICI VN | ok el SC DIE ICICI CIC IAC ICT A Person of Quality EVERYONE'S LIFE is spent in the pursuit of self-fulfillment, but not everyone reaches his objective. The man or woman who succeeds is a person who has realized in time that satisfaction does not arise merely from being good at some- thing, but also from being a cer- tain kind of person. Such a person is not content to dedicate his life to small purposes. He has quality in his ambition. He does not strive to amass stuff to feed his vanity, but does his best to become somebody who is esteemed. He wishes to be, not merely to appear, the best; for this is the mark of quality. The person of quality realizes that there is something beyond success: it is excellence. One may be successful in the eyes of the world without touching the Golden Fleece of excellence, for excellence Reprinted by permission from The Royal Bank of Canada Monthly Letter, April, 1967. PC IK Re IC I ET Ta Te SE CIE is in the person and is not con- ferred by the greatness of the office he holds. It is typified in what the goddess Athene said of Ulysses, that in him “deed and word notably marched together to their deliberate end.” It is people of excellence who build greatly and lastingly. Egypt had millions of people living on the world’s most fertile soil and Athens had 200,000 living on a rocky plain, yet the Egypt of that day is remembered for Cleopatra while Athens is imperishable in the minds of men. Our idea of excellence cannot be limited to this, that, or the other area of human activity. Excellence is a thing in itself, embracing many kinds of achievement at many levels. There is excellence in ab- stract intellectual activity, in art, in music, in managerial functions, in craftsmanship at the work- bench, in technical skill, and in human relations. 481 ===== PAGE 34 ===== 482 THE FREEMAN August Only by being a person of the laws and court to judge you, and highest quality that it is possible these persuade you to be what you for him to become can a man at- would like to seem. Character is tain happiness, because happiness having an inner light and the cour- lies in the active exercise of his age to follow its dictates: as vital powers along the lines of Shakespeare put it: excellence in a life affording scope for their development. He must, . - - to thine own self be true, of course, be competent, but ex- Ae ant follow, as the night cellence rises above that. Thou cant not then be false to Character any man. We mass-produce almost every- People need something to be- thing in this country, but we can- lieve in. Scientific discoveries may not mass-produce character, be- shake the world, but principles of cause that is a matter of personal behavior give it stability. identity. It belongs to those who To have a set of principles is have found the part they are to not at all to become a starry-eyed play; who are doing the work for dreamer, but a person who knows which they are best endowed; who simply and convincingly what he are satisfied that they are fill- is here for. There are certain ing a vital need; who are meeting things one has to believe in, or their obligations and standing up civilization will die — permanent to their tasks. truths which, though they have Such people willingly learn their roots in the far past, are whatever they need to know to important for the present. perform their role; they discipline Finally, in this array of the com- their passing impulses so as to ponents of quality, consider great- keep them from getting in the way mindedness. Here is the ornament of proper performance, and they of all the other virtues. It makes do their jobs better than is needed them better, and it cannot exist just to “get by.” without them. A person who has Character is a positive thing. It once perceived, however tempo- is not protected innocence, but rarily and however fleetingly, what practiced virtue; it is not fear of makes greatness of spirit, cannot vice, but love of excellence. be happy if he allows himself to Character takes no account of be petty or self-centered, or to fall what you are thought to be, but short of the best that he has it in what you are. You have your own him to be. ===== PAGE 35 ===== 1967 A PERSON OF QUALITY 483 Craftsmanship man or woman whose obsessive There are sound standards of dream is not improvement toward craftsmanship in every calling — excellence but escape from actuali- artists have to meet them, as do ties and responsibilities. Such peo- carpenters, lawyers, stenogra- ple must feel unwanted, unused, phers, operators of bulldozers, sur- and purposeless, and that is one of geons, business managers, and life’s greatest sufferings. stonemasons. Every honest calling, It is the anguish of empty and every walk of life, has its own sterile lives, far more than any elite, its own aristocracy, based economic condition or political in- upon excellence of performance. justice, that drives men and wom- The person of quality will take en to demonstrate and demand delight in craftsmanship, whether instead of studying and earning. he be building a birdhouse or writ- The man of quality will wish ing a novel or planning a business to have his journey through life deal. He is impelled by his prin- leave some traces. Captain James ciples to do well habitually what Cook, whose voyage of discovery it is his job to do. That means carried him to Canada’s West patient thoroughness. Coast in 1778, said: “I had am- This is not, as some avant-garde bition not only to go farther than people would have us believe, anti- any man had ever been before, pathetic to expressive individual- but as far as it was possible for ity. Craftsmanship is a means to- a man to go.” John Milton said ward competent expression rather he was prompted to “leave some- than a brake upon it. It does not thing so written to aftertimes as imply a sophisticated as opposed they should not willingly let it to an imaginative approach, nor die.” Charles Darwin wrote in his slick work as opposed to clumsy autobiography that he had made work. It does mean that here is up his mind to make a contribu- attention to details, fundamental tion to his subject. integrity in the work, and evi- These men sought and found dence that the workman knew problems to be solved. They were what he was doing and carefully positive. It isn’t enough to be applied his skill to the task. against error and ignorance: that leaves the impression that error : and ignorance are the active forces To seek quality in his work and in the world while we are a form- his life a person must have a less mass opposing them. Instead substantial motive. One pities the of denouncing or denying what Motive and Ambition ===== PAGE 36 ===== 484 THE FREEMAN August others bring forth as the truth, great men offer their own truth. A motive needs to be a sincere, deeply felt, urge to find meaning in life — relevance, significance, and usefulness. Without such a goal, life becomes drab and hum- drum. The man of quality lifts his head above the crowd to see a horizon fitting his abilities. He teaches his imagination to play with future possibilities, and bends his back to the immediate task that will contribute toward their coming true. There is noth- ing paltry about the man who is struggling, not to be great or to hobnob with the great, but to be greater than he is. Some people are misled from their search for personal quality by skepticism. They encourage themselves to say: “Why should I do any more work than is neces- sary to get a passing mark or the going rate of pay?’ People are not roused to seek excellence by ease or pleasure or any other sug- ar-plum. Perhaps there are some who are content to try for noth- ing more than being units in an assembly line, but even they must have moments of uncasiness in which they regret the oppor- tunities they have spurned to be- come something better. To push up from colorless medi- ocrity toward superiority is the way of the person of quality. All safisfying human life proceeds along this line of action — from below up, from minus to plus. To be successfully what we are, and to become what we are capable of becoming, is true ambition. In choosing an aim, we should make sure that the ultimate value of it will offset the inevitable dis- comfort and trouble that go along with accomplishment of anything worth while. Success has terms which must be met. It demands that we sacrifice secondary things, however delightful they may ap- pear, and that we are prepared to get some splinters in our hands while climbing the ladder. Sense of Values This, of course, requires that we develop a sense of the values of things. Every thoughtful person who has reached the age of twenty or twenty-five will realize that his mind has produced for him a cer- tain set of views as to the condi- tions of life and the purpose of his existence. These should be re- viewed from time to time, and re- vised upward in the light of ex- perience. A sense of values is a personal thing, not to be measured by a yardstick common to all humanity. In applying it to our special cases we learn to tell truth from false- hood, fact from opinion, the real from the phony, and the beauti- ‘4 ===== PAGE 37 ===== 1967 A PERSON OF QUALITY 485 ful from the tawdry. We develop fore which at the end we shall be consciousness, enabling us to dis- summoned to tell what we have criminate the quality of things. done with our talents, there is al- We learn that everything is worth ways the looking glass in which what its purchaser will pay for it, we are our own judges. and we ask before making a Most people would benefit — al- choice: “What is the price?” though it seems to be an old-fash- This is a question of deep seri- ioned idea —by having a little ousness, and sometimes it demands book in which they kept notes of courage in the asking and in the their aspirations. Marcus Aurelius answering. Finding the point at Antoninus, Roman emperor for which a value begins to totter is twenty years, kept one. After at- an authoritative guide as to how taining almost the highest form of high you really rank it. human existence, the union of Look for the major character- statesman and philosopher in one istics, without being misled by the man, he left to us a book of medi- unlimited number of peripheral tations. It is a collection of max- and secondary features. If you ims and exhortations written when are weighing the value to you of he felt especially alone and needed a color television set against that bracing up to keep him on the road of a chrome-encrusted car, that is he had chosen. simple and there are few factors; Such a practice will help us to but if you are measuring the value pass safely through the processes of an extended education against of surmise, guess, dim instincts, the immediate attractiveness of a embryo conceptions, partial illumi- job, you can reach a reasonable nation, and hypothesis, into cer- decision only after considering the tainty and conviction. conditions under which you wish to live far in the future. What is the Things Needed paramount thing? To elevate your Among the things needed by the thinking above the immediate and person in search of excellence are consider what is best in the long these: a wide view, curiosity, cour- run. age, self-discipline, enthusiasm, In making choices one needs to and energy. have a concern for excellence and Having a wide view does not a devotion to standards. There is only include seeing things near real pleasure in setting standards and far in proper perspective, and then living up to them. Even though that is very important. It if there were no Grand Assize be- requires broad training in funda- ===== PAGE 38 ===== 486 THE FREEMAN August mental principles. Specialization is This process gives you faith in vitally important in the modern the validity of your judgment, world, but it is unfortunately true which is the backbone of courage. that for many individuals speciali- What do Commencement speakers zation is a dead end rather than mean when they repeat, year after an avenue to deeper and broader year: “Education is a lifelong understanding. The person seek- process”? Every youth already ing excellence will realize that this knows, as he walks down the plat- need not be so, and he will respond form steps with his diploma in to the challenge to prevent its hand, that he must keep on learn- happening to him. ing. The key positions in all walks What the speakers mean is of life will go to those who are something beyond keeping up with educated broadly, in a balanced the techniques of one’s profession, way. Only they have the depth of business, or craft. They have in judgment, the sense of proportion, mind the attributes needed to sur- and the large-minded comprehen- vive errors, to keep marching on sion to handle big affairs. a road that seems to be without One needs the curiosity to look end, to rise above disappointment below the surface of things. It is and distress, to lie awake at night curiosity that has led to every staring at broken hopes and frus- scientific advance, and through it trated plans and at a future that man has risen to the high level of seems wholly dark — and to get up philosophy and the meaning of in the morning and go about their things. business with determination. All Curiosity is followed by re- of these are part of education. search. You get hold of an idea To pursue his course with suec- and nurse it to life with persistent cess a man needs a strong sense of patience. You separate your key personal stability, and part of the thoughts from a hundred and one process of maturing into excel- irrelevancies. You sift through a lence is that of substituting inner haystack and find the pin, but you discipline for outer. Tolstoy wrote do not stop there. You look closely in one of his letters: “There never enough to see the Lord's Prayer has been, and cannot be, a good inscribed on the head of it. That life without self-control.” little extra piece of applied effort Nothing will protect us from counts mightily in turning curi- external pressures and compul- osity into something that is re- sions so much as the control of warding. ourselves, based upon ideals form- ===== PAGE 39 ===== 1967 A PERSON OF QUALITY 487 ulated by ourselves. Much is said law, and the scholarly domain. To- in praise of endurance, and indeed day, everyone needs all the rele- much should be said, because be- vant education he can absorb so ing able to bear up manfully under as to be able to cope with the com- stress and hardship is a great ac- Dplexities of life and of his job. complishment. But self-control is Capability must be changed by different: it is not continued re- application and work into indubit- sistance but actual mastery. It able performance. As one of the enables us to say “yes” and “no” earliest Greek poets said: “Before to other men, not prompted by the gates of excellence the high blind obedience to a code, but with gods have placed sweat.” All ex- assurance derived from a con- ecutive work, all research, all in- scious evaluation of relevant al- telligent work of every sort, is ternatives. based on directed diligence, on Only an imaginary line sep- lively movements, on getting one arates those who long for excel- idea on the rails and springing lence and those who attain it, and another. enthusiasm is the quality needed to carry one over the border. This Sources of Inspiration means having interest, zeal, and There are several sources from a strong feeling of the desirability which the person seeking quality of success. Enthusiasm provides in life draws inspiration: school, the perseverance that overcomes home, the church, and experience. impediments both real and imag- Intelligence needs information inary. on which to work and the tools One obstacle in the way of prog- with which to work. Everywhere ress is resistance to change. We in the world there is emphasis on must develop a sense of the pulse- education. The underdeveloped beat of this changing life. We countries need elementary educa- need to observe what’s going on tion urgently, and in our own around us and filter it through a country every step forward in in- layer of common sense so as to dustry and science raises the re- decide in what direction and to quired standard of higher edu- what extent we have to alter cation. course. Some wake up to the possibili- At the beginning of the century ties and needs in their final high the only people needing advanced school year, or when they come education were those who were up against the increased demands going for medicine, the ministry, of freshman year in university: ===== PAGE 40 ===== 488 THE FREEMAN August they are unfortunate people upon whom the realization does not dawn until they have put aside their graduation gowns and rubbed shoulders with the worka- day world. Every child’s home should pro- vide a stimulating and instructive environment. Young people need to be exposed there to a context of values in which high performance is encouraged. When a prominent businessman was complimented by a fellow-commuter on the scholar- ships won by his two sons, and was asked for the secret, he re- plied: “We just show them that we expect it of them.” The child has an advantage when his parents qualify them- selves and exert themselves to make him familiar with books, ideas, and conversations — these are the ways and means of intel- lectual life — so that he feels at home in the House of Intellect. To succeed, parents need to pull themselves into the mainstream of current knowledge. They may do so by reading, by attending lec- tures, by taking correspondence courses, or by forming community or neighborhood study groups. Only so can they fulfill adequately their children’s need for an aware- ness of intellectual values and ed- ucational goals. Parents are assisted by the churches. All of the great religions have enunciated principles of con- duct, and have established congre- gations in which these principles are taught. Practical experience is more harsh than school and home. It is ruthless, but effective. We need not merely to learn things by chance or under compulsion but to develop the ability to extract the broadest meaning from our obser- vation of the how and the why of things. One of the most valuable human rights available to the per- son seeking excellence is the right to correct errors revealed by ex- perience. Canada’s Obligation This is a good time to scrutinize the virtues taken for granted in our society. Do they need to be restated, revised, and encouraged? William James told students of Stanford University in 1906: “The world . . . is only beginning to see that the wealth of a nation con- sists more than in anything else in the number of superior men that it harbors.” The obligation upon Canada is to honor the qualities in men and women which are most necessary to the continued vitality of our country. A democratic, equali- tarian society does not find it easy to applaud the superior individual. It fears that by praising one it belittles another, and that some- d RN ===== PAGE 41 ===== \ 1967 A PERSON OF QUALITY 489 how seems to be undemocratic. Every person of quality gives something of advantage to his country, but before the country can appreciate these gifts, it must learn this: a society only produces great men in those fields in which it understands greatness. Quality and excellence must be inspired by people who expect high per- formance of themselves as well as others. There are five million young people in Canada’s schools and universities. Among them are sev- eral future prime ministers, a gov- ernor general or two, many pro- vincial premiers, hundreds of members of parliament — all the men and women who will be gov- erning Canada far into the twenty- first century. There are also the industrialists, financiers, and busi- ness people who will manage the country’s business. There are the professional people who will look after health, education, law, and religion. The Best Thing The best thing to give an under- graduate at this time is encour- agement toward development of quality and inspiration in his search for it. The best wish we can give the graduate is capacity for continued growth. Inability to appreciate the need for personal devotion to the idea of excellence, either individually or through those we might stimu- late toward it, may bring on that saddest state of intelligent beings: regret for what might have been, when it is too late to take another path. The question is relevant to every person: “What is my con- tribution toward quality going to be?” There is no need to become cast down if we do not at once attain the super-best. It is a good thing to strive for excellence, but we must realize that the best possible is not too bad. Most of life is lived by batting averages, not by perfect scores. The research scientist does not ex- pect that every hypothesis he sets up will prove out. The financier does not expect that every invest- ment will return a maximum div- idend. People live by making plans and by putting forth efforts that are, so far as they can see, in line with the results they want. Then they revise their plans and im- prove their performance as ex- perience dictates. We need fear only one failure in life: not to be true to the best quality we know. There is a certain satisfaction in trying, even if we do not suc- ceed perfectly. As Robert Brown- ing put it in “Rabbi Ben Ezra”: What I aspired to be And was not, comforts me. ===== PAGE 42 ===== THOSE of us accusto red to boast- thoughtful Americans when I was ing, “It’s a free co try I” have a boy half a century ago. some disturbing facts to face. But I now find little trace of The free country we've known these concepts in the day-to-day was founded on recognition of the practices of the community. To a right of the individual to “life, frightening extent, the principles liberty, and the pursuit” (not upon which America was founded guarantee) “of happiness.” We are giving way to the opposite were taught to believe in the principles of socialist statism. In- right of every man to the prod- stead of servant, government is uct of the labor of his hands and increasingly welcomed as master. the creativity of his mind. We In theory, of course, individuals respected private property and the still control government by means owner’s freedom of use, subject of their elected representatives. to minimum community safe- But the representatives more and guards. We considered govern- more take the fact of their elec- ment to be the ‘servant of the tion as a mandate to rule and people,” with limited powers as govern the people. delegated by individuals. Such, I The picture thus printed is dark. believe, was the typical view of But is it accurate? For perhaps —_— a large majority of my fellow Mr. Breese has taught Industrial Manage- citizens, it is. Why, then, is my ment at Georgia Tech and headed the Deo- partment of Humanities at Embry-Riddle own thinking and way of life so Acronautical Institute in Florida, A . . he 1s a freelance writer, oar At present changed except in minor and 490 ===== PAGE 43 ===== 1967 1 CAN BE FREE 491 nonessential details? Why have I factor for me. And I have not not become socialized along with starved as yet, or come close to it. the state, the social mores, and I act upon the assumption that the majority of my fellows? I am responsible for my own care There seems to be only one and welfare. I think my fellows logical answer. Somehow, I have do not owe me a living — nor do managed to continue living as a I ask or expect them to provide free man because there is some- for me. I try to make my own thing within me which demands opportunities. it. The free life and free thought I do my best to stay out of are so strong that I cannot and debt. I don’t want anyone to hold will not compromise either. a mortgage on me or on my ac- What does that mean? What en- tions. titles me to make such a state- I believe that private enterprise ment? Let me see if I can answer. can better solve any problem than My answers may not be yours, and can a bureaucracy, even when the they may not serve you. But they problem is a public and collective are my honest answers. They have one. I see many examples where kept me free as an individual. this is so, but will cite only one: Perhaps they have helped some the massive achievements of Al- who have known me. coholics Anonymous in contrast to governmental efforts at Pro- First of all, I have kept the hibition. habit of free thought and critical analysis. Whatever I read or hear I waste no time or effort in I submit to the test of certain futile “revolts” against those questions. What motives are be- things which I cannot control. I hind the words? What are they step free of these things as much intended to mean? What is their as possible. As an individual, I real meaning for me? I act upon cannot destroy the system of gov- the answers to these questions. ernment regulation of business; I try to place myself in posi- but I can try to avoid positions tions where my personal freedom where these controls affect me. If is at a maximum. I have always, I do not ask or accept favors of by instinct, I suppose, chosen government, I need not be bound those jobs which give me a max- by the conditions under which imum of personal freedom. This, these are granted. rather than financial return or I support by voice and vote prestige, has been the determining those elements in government with ===== PAGE 44 ===== 492 THE FREEMAN August which I most nearly agree. I write see that day. It will come, because and speak in support of the prin- it must, ciples of freedom. I hope to be What ¢s important is that I con- heard, but whether or not I am tinue to think as a free man and heard is less important to me than do the best I can to live by those the fact that I speak. principles in which I believe. For I do not resign from society. In me, of course, there is really no World War II, I served as a ser- other choice. I must be that which geant of the A.A.F. I would never I am. burn a draft card. I try to live as In a time of growing statism, I a free man within the society of cannot force a return to limited which I am a part. I believe that, government. But I can limit the in the long run, the power of ex- power of government to control ample will count for something. and affect me. I can refuse to I want to be ready when the compromise my principles in ex- failure of socialism is generally change for a handout. I can prac- recognized. When that time comes, tice my beliefs in my daily living free men will be needed. But it and be happy in so doing. I can is not vital to me that I live to think free, walk free, and be free. ® | IDEAS OR n0aagy | First Comes Understanding CORRECT ACTION automatically follows understanding — the only route to correct action. Nothing else will serve. If this process seems hopelessly slow, there should be the sustaining faith that liberty is in harmony with truth, and with the intended design of the human social order. Truth is immortal, despite the defeats that it seems to suffer along the way. Truth has a power that is no respecter of persons, nor of the numbers of persons who may at any time be in darkness about truth. Truth has a power that can- not be touched by physical force. It is impossible to shoot a truth. The lover of liberty will find ways to be free. P. A. HARPER, Liberty: A Path to Its Recovery ===== PAGE 45 ===== GEORGE C. RocHE III POWER 3. SOCIAL EFFECTS SUCH CONCEPTS as humanity, man- kind, society, or mation are all modern in their origin. Ancient and medieval men tended to view man as an individual unit. They usually thought of larger collec- tions of men as being merely larger numbers of single individ- uals. Thus, such words as mankind or society did not, until modern times, convey a difference in meaning, but instead implied only a difference in quantity. It is in- structive that our modern patterns of thought now give such words as society or humanity or nation a new meaning, no longer con- nected directly with the concept of the individual. What modern society seems to have forgotten, in the words of Frank Chodorov, is that, “Society are people.” Within the traditional Western framework of Natural Law, our forebears have generally recognized a realm of spiritual value, beyond the laws of natural science and beyond the trappings of society. It is this recognition of the spiritual dignity of the indi- vidual person which gave birth to the concept that each individual had certain rights which no other man or collection of men would be justified in violating. Modern society, acting in the name of “the people,” has been in- creasingly willing to override such guarantees of individual freedom. In the process, absolute power has steadily replaced absolute rights: Having agreed that the majority should prescribe rules which we will 493 ===== PAGE 46 ===== 494 THE FREEMAN August obey in pursuit of our individual aims, we find ourselves more and more subjected to the orders and the arbitrary will of its agents. Signifi- cantly enough, we find not only that most of the supporters of unlimited democracy soon become defenders of arbitrariness and of the view that we should trust experts to decide what is good for the community, but that the most enthusiastic supporters of such unlimited powers of the ma- jority are often those very admini- strators who know best that, once such powers are assumed, it will be they and not the majority who will in fact exercise them.! Just as it is true that the fate of a book is dependent upon the reader, it is equally and pain- fully correct that the meaning of a political idea stems from the group which appropriates it. The meaning given to “democracy” and the application of the tre- mendous power unleashed by the new definition of ‘popular rule” have paved the way toward an exercise of power never dreamt of before modern times. Yet, 50 to 76 years ago, those most en- thusiastic concerning modern de- mocracy believed that all dangers from power were past, since the power of the future, represented by the concentrated power of the modern state, was to be used only 1 F, A. Hayek, The Constitution of Liberty (Chicago; University of Chicago Press, 1960), p. 116. in the advancement of the material interest of the common man. State and Society Some astute observers, such men as Nietzsche and Burckhardt, were warning as long ago as the mid-nineteenth century of the dangers stemming from the new mass-man and the new mass-state. Social critics of our own time, of the stature of Wilhelm Roepke and Ortega y Gasset, have pointed to more and more signs of the dangers inherent in the central- ized modern state. Meanwhile, the consolidation of power in the new dispensation has steadily ad- vanced: The present disposition is to liqui- date any distinction between State and Society, conceptually or institu- tionally. The State is Society; the social order is indeed an appendage of the political establishment, de- pending on it for sustenance, health, education, communications, and all things coming under the head of “the pursuit of happiness.” In theory, taking college textbooks on econom- ics and political science for au- thority, the integration is about as complete as words can make it. In the operation of human affairs, de- spite the fact that lip service is ren- dered the concept of inherent per- sonal rights, the tendency to call upon the State for the solution of all the problems of life shows how far we have abandoned the doctrine of “| ===== PAGE 47 ===== 1967 POWER: SOCIAL EFFECTS 495 The tendency to call upon the State for the solutions of all the problems of life shows how far we have abandoned the doctrine of rights, with its correlative of self-reliance. FRANK CHODOROQY rights, with its correlative of self- Once such checks upon the ex- reliance, and have accepted the State ercise of power have been re- as the reality of Society. moved, all the internal vitality and Such a system gives far too freedom within such a society are little to man’s freedom or person- open to destruction in the name of ality. The state swallows the indi- “order.” Soon the preservation of vidual. Even if such centralization “order” or the pursuit of the were efficient in the satisfaction ‘greatest social good” is identi- of human wants, which it is not, fied with whatever action the the means used to achieve the end wielder of centralized power deems would still be unacceptable simply suitable. Resistance against the because they are incompatible exercise of such power comes to with human freedom. be viewed by society not as an ex- Even more dangerous, perhaps, pression of human individuality is the risk that the very concept of and free choice, but as an assault freedom itself can become so mis- upon the public good, a erime of used and distorted within such a the selfish individual against the society that no individual dare lay selfless community. claim to any rights or dignity hav- ing a higher source than the so- The Authoritarian Personality ciety in which he lives. At that A new type of personality soon moment, the guarantees developed comes to the forefront in such a by Western civilization to protect society. Many who would tend to the individual from the arbitrary go largely unnoticed in a freely exercise of power have in effect all competing society soon begin to been swept away, no matter what exercise centralized power to in- label that society might give it- vade the market place and the pri- self. vate sector in an attempt to ma- "2 Frank Chodorov, The Rise and Fall of nipulate individual decisions to Society (New York: Devin-Adair, 1959), achieve “social goals.” In a society Pp. Xix - XX. in which officials wield such tre- ===== PAGE 48 ===== 496 THE FREEMAN August mendous power, they come to oc- the mass of people. In the older cupy a larger and larger place in era of kings and aristocrats, few the public eye and in their own self- men had the slightest hope of esteem. achieving a share of power. But The exercise of power thus be- in a modern society in which any comes a gratifying and expansive man is a potential wielder of experience. The wielder invariably power, many who should and per- flatters himself that he is under- haps do know better will still taking a tremendous burden “for allow the exercise and extension the good of” those over whom he of power on the assumption that exercises power. The legend of they themselves are capable of the Grand Inquisitor, who felt he wielding such devastating and cor- had taken upon himself “the curse rupting force. It is from this com- of the knowledge of good and plicity in the crime of power that evil” to achieve the happiness of modern democracy especially suf- “thousands of millions of happy fers, since so many among us be- babes” has been re-enacted time lieve that to achieve the good so- and again throughout human his- ciety we need only “throw the ras- tory, with ever-increasing fre- cals out” and replace them with quency in our age. Such wielders “good men,” men who would wield of power soon lose themselves in power properly. their dedication to “service,” for- getting their underlying motiva- The Intellectual tion of self-aggrandizement. In all One of the groups within society probability, Napoleon was sincere especially at fault in the encour- in his famous remark to Caulain- agement of the accumulation and court, “People are wrong in think- exercise of power has been the ing me ambitious — I am touched “intellectual.” Seldom has the case by the misfortunes of peoples; I been stated more clearly than want them to be happy and, if I by the distinguished journalist, live ten years, the French will be George S. Schuyler: happy.” Further, the manner in which It unfortunately has become fash- the modern state opens the e ionable for the artist in modern so- e mo 8 PENS The €Xer- iiety to quibble over this issue of cise of power to men of ambition freedom. He says on the one hand from various walks of life tends (nat he prefers a society which em- to make the exercise of that phagizes physical security for all power and, indeed, its further ex- (which necessitates in technological tension, all the more acceptable to civilization a degree of regimenta- ===== PAGE 49 ===== 1967 POWER: SOCIAL EFFECTS 497 tion which endangers freedom). At unchecked power of labor unions, the same time he properly wants a backed by coercive political legis- society where he is free to write, lation, has been used against pri- paint, and compose as he wills. He (gate property, the general public, fails to recognize that the artist is and, above all, the union members so influenced by the society of which 4}. oves. The ill-concealed pres- he is part, that he cannot remain . f . sures exerted by centralized power ree when all else is controlled. . through the large and growing The error of the intellectuals of . the West for the past two centuries numbers of regulatory agencies has been advocating a society actu- and “administrative” legal deci- ally slavish but paraded as freedom. Sions have left private property This means, then, that along with and the businessman literally at free art (and indeed the very basis the mercy of forces beyond either for it) must be free political insti- his comprehension or his control. tutions, free economic enterprises, The levels of taxation within our and a society free of onerous re- gnsiety closely circumscribe the strictions. range of choice for the individual The tragedy of so many intellec- citizen in the disposal and use of tuals in the contemporary world is . that while opposing extreme forms his property. The end result of the use of power is always the same: of totalitarianism, they are them- . Jae selves half-totalitarian; that is to curtailment of individual and so- say, they express a desire for a cial freedom of choice. society which is half-controlled, half- Examples of unchecked power regimented, half-planned, part capi- infringing upon the private sector talist, and part socialist. This and the individual within. our own strange hybrid they will find (in- gociety could be multiplied almost deed, have found) to be a Franken- ij qefinitely. How does it happen stein monster which, romcally they {hat such extensions of power and ating? great responsibility for cre- curtailments of liberty have taken place with little or no public out- Unchecked Power cry? The answer is a painful one for the friends of man: most peo- ple are unaware of liberty and its benefits. Indeed, if the loss of free- dom and the expansion of power is sufficiently gradual, it seems that 3 George S. Schuyler, Black and Con- the citizens will not rise in pro- servative (New Rochelle: Arlington test. The conversion of the pri- House, 1966), pp. 319-320. vate sector into the public sector, However the centralization of power may have come about, its existence and its exercise are pain- ful realities in our society. The ===== PAGE 50 ===== 498 THE FREEMAN August The artist is so influenced by the society of which he is a part, that he cannot remain free when all else is controlled. GEORGE S. SCHUYLER of the individual's power to make sole agent and the only arbiter of decisions into the state’s power to that happiness; it provides for their coerce decisions, has proceeded security, foresees and supplies their more gradually here than in the necessities, facilitates their pleasures, French Revolution, the Russian manages their principal concerns, di- Revolution, or the Fascist experi- rects their industry, regulates ‘the ments of Italy and Germany. Yet descent of property, and subdivides hd (] . their inheritances: what remains, such accumulation of power and but to spare them all the care of attrition of liberty, however un- thinking and all the trouble of spectacular its progress, has been living? under way in this nation. Thus, it every day renders the ex- The process whereby power has ercise of the free agency of man less come to dominate our society was useful and less frequent; it circum- outlined well over 100 years ago scribes the will within a narrower in Alexis de Tocqueville's oft- range and gradually robs a man of quoted warning: all the uses of himself. The principle of equality has prepared men for Above this race of men stands an these things; it has predisposed men immense and tutelary power, which to endure them and often to look on takes upon itself alone to secure them as benefits. their gratifications and to watch After having thus successfully over their fate. That power is abso- taken each member of the community lute, minute, regular, provident, and in its powerful grasp and fashioned mild. It would be like the authority him at will, the supreme power then of a parent if, like that authority, its extends its arm over the whole com- object was to prepare men for man- munity. It covers the surface of so- hood; but it seeks, on the contrary, ciety with a network of small com- to keep them in perpetual childhood: plicated rules, minute and uniform, it is well content that the people through which the most original should rejoice, provided they think minds and most energetic characters of nothing but rejoicing. For their cannot penetrate, to rise above the happiness such a government will- crowd. The will of man is not ingly labors, but it chooses to be the shattered, but softened, bent, and ===== PAGE 51 ===== 1967 POWER: SOCIAL EFFECTS 499 guided; men are seldom forced by thirty years ago and were abso- it to act, but they are constantly re- Jutely unknown to the young peo- strained from acting. Such a power ple of sixty years ago. As the does not destroy, but it prevents ex- state accumulates this power, it istence; it does not tyrannize, but it tends to rationalize its position, compresses, enervates, extinguishes, using its newly acquired controls and stupefies a people, till each na- as a tool by which the “social tion is reduced to nothing better than a flock of timid and industrious Penefits” of the new order are ad- animals, of which the government is vertised. the shepherd. There are occasional outbursts I have always thought that servi- of protest as this process develops. tude of the regular, quiet, and gentle Even many of the advocates of kind which I have just described centralized authority are currently might be combined more easily than glarmed about the dangers im- is commonly believed with some of plicit in the new Federal Data the outward forms of freed om, and Center. They recognize that a Fed- that it might even establish itself . under the wing of the sovereignty of eral government with a computer- the people. ized source of complete informa- tion concerning every citizen is Acceptable Power? indeed a potentially powerful agency, but they are really only complaining about an increased governmental efficiency. Whether or not the material was gathered in a single place, and whether or not it was computerized, the fact is that the central government has long had such information avail- able to it. In effect, many advo- cates of enlarged governmental powers are now complaining be- cause the government appears closer to the exercise of those powers. As the state thus accumulates all power unto itself and increas- ingly absorbs the private and the individual sector, a tendency to acquiesce in the situation seems to develop among the people. We can see this process at work in our own society in the tendency of each new generation to accept an ever-widening area of govern- mental involvement in the lives of its citizens. Today’s young people are willing to accept displays of governmental power which were anathema to the young people of The Growth of Power 4 Alexis de Tocqueville, Democracy in What sort of a centralized an- America (New York: Alfred Knopf, Inc., p Vintage Books, 1958), Vol. II, pp. 336- paratus has grown up for the ex- 337, ercise of this new power? In the ===== PAGE 52 ===== 500 THE FREEMAN August 89th Congress alone the extension has phrased it in The Future of of “domestic aid” programs was American Politics: fantastic: James Reston has re- ported “twenty-one new health pro- its present scale has politicalized vir- grams, seventeen new educational tually -all economic life. The wages programs, fifteen new economic peing paid most workers today are development programs, twelve political wages, reflecting political new programs for the cities, sev- pressures rather than anything that enteen new resource development might be considered the normal programs, and four new man- Workings of supply and demand. The power training programs” (New prices farmers receive are political York Times, Nov. 22, 1966). In prices. The profits business is earn- this single area of “domestic aid” Ing are political profits. The savings programs, these new additions people hold have ‘become political ibute to some startling totals: SAVINGS, since their real value 18 contri \ subject to abrupt depreciation by some 170 Federal aid programs political decisions. currently enacted into law, fi- nanced by over 400 separate ap- What are the prospects for free- propriations within the Federal dom within such a totally polit- budget, administered by 21 sep- icalized society? The unlimited arate Federal departments and Power of coercion present in a agencies, assisted by over 150 society so tightly tied in economic Washington bureaus and over 400 bonds has been plainly stated by regional offices. Power? Yes, in- one of the modern theorists of deed! Multiply these statistics by the total state, Leon Trotsky: “In the other areas of government in- a country where the sole employer tervention in taxation, in land iS the State, opposition means ownership, and in its far-flung death by slow starvation. The old regulatory activity, controlling our principle, who does not work shall business, communications, food not eat, has been replaced by a supply, money supply, transporta- new one: who does not obey shall tion, housing, and nearly every oth- not eat.” er aspect of our lives, then add the The threat to liberty produced additional forays proposed into by Tocqueville’s predicted “ener- our educational system and virtu- vation” and Belloc’s ‘“Servile ally every other area of the pri- State,” because of the insidious vate sector, and you have a form- quality of such gradualist, amel- ula for total political control. iorative, “humanitarian” regimes, The result? As Samuel Lubell may be most dangerous of all. The expansion of government to ===== PAGE 53 ===== 1967: POWER: SOCIAL EFFECTS 501 Power becomes absolute when it becomes the agency through which society chooses to solve its problems. There are many | signs that such a choice has been made in our own society. Liberty is increasingly weighed that such a choice has been made in the balance against equality in our own society. Not only has and is found wanting by those the accumulation of power pro- who offer themselves as “friends ceeded dangerously far in our gov- of the people.” One of these ad- ernmental structure, but, perhaps vocates of the new order, Gunnar far more dangerous, the rationale Myrdal, has written in An Ameri- justifying that accumulation of can Dilemma: power has made great progress i i ng the individuals composin In society liberty for one may among the indivi omp g mean the suppression of liberty for our society ". . others . . . In America . . . liberty What is in store for a society often provided an opportunity for in Which power has become so the stronger to rob the weaker. centralized? Against this, the equalitarianism in The social hierarchy is in ruins; the (American) Creed has been per- the individual members are like peas sistently revolting. The struggle is ghelled from their pods and form a far from ended. The reason why pumerical whole composed of equal American liberty was not more dan- glements. The state is the beginning gerous to equality [in the early days and end of organization; it must of the nation] was, of course, the apply itself to the task with the open frontier and the free land. highest degree of authority and at- When opportunity became bounded tention to detail. But is that to say in the last generation, the inherent that there are no longer any priv- conflict between equality and liberty ileged persons? There are indeed; flared up. Equality is slowly win- but as regards the state they are no ning. . .- longer privileged as men, preceding its authority. They hold their priv- ileges in and from the state.5 Such a centralized authority soon comes to take upon itself Absolute Power Power becomes absolute when it becomes the agency through which iety chooses to solve its b soc Do 00 0 S80 . 5 Bertrand de Jouvenel, On Power pro lems. There are many signs (New York: Viking Press, 1949), p. 175. ===== PAGE 54 ===== 502 THE FREEMAN August the power of totally reordering ties, his dignity, and his personal- society. The concept of law is ity sacrificed to the new abstrac- stripped of a higher meaning and tion of collective power. Bureauc- utilized as an enabling act for the racy and the statistical evalua- achievement of that total reorder- tion of mass-man become the new ing of society. To do all, power means of social sacrifice, making must be master of all. burning at the stake appear in- Soon such a state recognizes no efficient by comparison. authority beyond itself. All func- What Dostoevsky’s Grand In- tions, public and private, all ac- quisitor achieved through author- tions, no matter how individual, ity and mystery, the scientists of are subject to mass control as a Huxley's Brave New World part of the exercise of total power. achieved through scientific control of life forms. More recently, in Such is totalitarianism in its es- Skinner's Walden Two, behavioral sence. It is not merely an oppressive psychology updates the latest vi- regime; indeed, in principle, it does sion of the controlled society, not have to be particularly oppres- suggesting that, with sufficient sive at all, at least not to large .qitioning the individual will sections of the population. What is be so free of frustration or the involved is something much more . . necessity of decision as to be fi- fundamental. The old-fashioned des- ct eters pot demanded obedience, taxes, and nally free of the responsibilities of manpower for his armies. The totali- freedom. The new society which tarian regime wants much more: has arisen in conjunction with the “It’s your souls they want,” as some- modern centralization of power one once put it, referring to the has brought with it the tools of Nazis. It’s total possession of the mass-conditioning necessary to whole man they want; and they will pring about such a perverted view brook no rivals in engaging man’s ,¢ «fr.eadom.” loyalties, hopes, and affections.® The New “Individual” Does Power Truly Corrupt? The living man, the individual with a source of dignity which earlier societies had viewed as transcending the state, is sched- uled to have his creative capaci- Even while such concentrations of power and such a conditioning process rob the individual citizen of his liberty, thus destroying the individual's creative capacity and in effect penalizing both the 6 Will Herberg, “Christian Faith and Totalitarian Rule,” Modern Age, Winter, individual and his society, the 1966-67, p. 69. greatest corruptions of all are ===== PAGE 55 ===== 1967 POWER: SOCIAL EFFECTS 503 likely to occur in the very institu- citizenry which tends to regard tions and men called upon to ex- the technical and social achieve- ercise this vast new power. The ments which it sees around it as subjection of other men’s wills to something stemming from the ex- a man’s purposes, no matter how ercise of centralized power, rather well intended, is even more dan- than from the personal efforts of gerous to the power wielder than highly-endowed individuals. At to those over whom the power is that point, the mass-man comes to exercised. Coercion begets coer- identify himself with the state and cion, producing a greater and becomes as corrupted by power as greater necessity for the applica- those who themselves exercise that tion of centralized power in society power. In such a society, so com- since it simultaneously disrupts pletely divorced from the creative: the private sector and justifies its capacity of the individual, the own extension to solve the prob- way is paved for a social decline lems stemming from those dis- of great magnitude. ruptions. A man cannot stoop to using coercion against another ; N power, man without allowing the corrupt- Power into will, will into appetite; ing influences of that power to 4,4 appetite, an universal wolf, work its corruption upon him. g, doubly seconded with will and Then everything includes itself in However politically necessary such power, interventions into the private sec- Must make perforce a universal tor of society may appear to the prey, ardent collectivist, the potential And last eat up himself.7 wielder of such power must first of all make an ethical choice to violate the decision-making dig- Once Natural Law and a decen- nity of another individual, thus tralized society are no longer ac- arrogating power to himself over cepted as the bulwarks of the pri- the lives of others in an ethical Vate sector, soon power, appetite, area where individual conscience and will begin to find every area should be supreme. of society a proper sphere for a A power-oriented society tends further extension of coercive au- to become more and more mono- thority. Intervention is piled upon lithic, producing an enmassment intervention and power both en- which removes all decision-making courages and feeds upon the strife further from the individual citi- “7 william Shakespeare, Troilus and zen. Such a society produces a Cressida, Act I, Scene 3. The Destruction of Society ===== PAGE 56 ===== 504 THE FREEMAN August between factions of society as Surely we witness the results of they struggle to prosper through such thinking in our own time. the intervention of power in favor Every conceivable crime and fail- of their particular group. As the ure in our society is attributed exercise of coercive power grows not to the individual but to some steadily greater and steadily more failure or another of society to damaging to society, the strife be- care properly for the individual. tween factions to benefit from the With Dr. Johnson, we might ad- exercise of that power becomes mit, “We cannot pry into the equally destructive to the fabric hearts of men, but their actions of a true society. Thus, the exer- are open to observation.” Surely cise of power is in the last anal- the observation of an increasing ysis antisocial, destroying the so- number of the actions of men in ciety in which it occurs. our time would indicate some fail- The individual citizen within ing in their innermost being. The such a society, already stripped of statistics are distressing: Crimes any higher dignity which does not against property have increased emanate from the state, is offered (relative to population) by over an illusory social welfare, the 300 per cent in the past twenty promise of better things to come, years.Crimes against persons have for his acquiescence in the new doubled in the same period of system. All man’s ills are now tobe time. Even these alarming statis- solved by the passage of the proper tics do not reflect the wide accept- law, by the proper use of coercive ance of public immorality in areas power. not categorized as crime. The sub- sidized illegitimacy of the Aid to Dependent Children program or Such a society, abandoning in- the wide acceptance of cheating dividual dignity and responsibility on so many college campuses are for self in return for the promises only two of many such symptoms of the new collective ethic, tends of moral decline. to breed a new form of social be- The steadily growing trend ing. If the individual is not re- toward moral failure seems to ad- sponsible for self, then a society vance at the same rate as the old- formed of such individuals is also er ideal of self-responsibility con- not responsible. The way has been tinues to decline: paved for a new ethic of total ir- The American has never been a responsibility on the part of in- perfect instrument, but at one time dividual members of that society. he had a reputation for gallantry, Irresponsibility ===== PAGE 57 ===== 1967 POWER: SOCIAL EFFECTS 505 mmm en ey | It is as though the quality of responsibility had atrophied. | JOHN STEINBECK | which, to my mind, is a sweet and dals who had destroyed the Roman priceless quality. It must still exist, Empire had come from outside the but it is blotted out by the dustcloud gystem, while America’s Huns and of self-pity. The last clear statement vyundals would be engendered of gallantry n my ~Sxperience I within the American system by eard in a recidivist state prison, a our own institutions. place for two-time losers, all lifers. In the yard an old and hopeless con- ganeration of Zeros? viet spoke as follows: “The kids come : . CL up here and they bawl how they As self-responsibility within our wasn’t guilty or how they was Society has atrophied, what sort framed or how it was their mother’s of a nation have we become? One fault or their father was a drunk. social critic, Philip Wylie, has de- Us old boys try to tell them, Kid, for veloped the idea that we are be- Christ’s sake, do your own time. Let coming a nation of nonpersons, us do ours.” In the present climate engaging in “nothing education,” of whining self-pity, of practiced “nothing readership,” “nothing sickness, of professional goldbrick- citizenship,” “nothing art,” and ing, of screaming charges about |, . «a . whose fault it is, one hears of very nothing music.” He describes our few who do their own time, who take society as a “generation of zeros,” their own rap and don’t spread it produced by an educational sys- around. It is as. though the quality tem which avoids the creation of of responsibility had atrophied.8 any “trauma” for the individual student, from which all competi- tion, all discipline, and all possi- bility of low grades have been re- moved from the student’s path. He cites television as the creator of a generation of nothing read- Something of such disastrous social results was predicted over 100 years ago by the British his- torian, Lord Macauley, when he warned that the twentieth century woud be 2s sas pr A a ers. He cites the current student for the Roman Empire, with the population who all too often are difference that the Huns and Van- for nothing and who often assume 8 John Steinbeck, “America, Where no role or responsibility mn their Are You?’ Chicago Tribune, Nov. 20, Society except that of criticism 1966. and nihilism as nothing citizens ===== PAGE 58 ===== 506 THE FREEMAN August and eventually nothing persons. Yes, power does corrupt, a fact He finds the total absence of crea- amply borne out by the Bobby tivity in much of modern art as Bakers who increasingly inhabit a demonstration of nothing art the seats of power. Yet such men and levels much the same charge are nothing more or less than a against modern music. He cites mirror held up to the citizenry of the noninvolvement of the mem- America, a mirror all too graphi- bers of our society, people who cally depicting the moral decay of are unwilling in case after case qur society. Professor Ortega y to offer aid or even call the police Gasset has predicted the final re- in times of crisis, as for example gylt of such decay: in the Kew Gardens, N. Y. mur- . i ill der of a woman, witnessed by The result of this tendency will be . . ] fatal. Spontaneous social action will some thirty-eight people who did be broken up over and over again not want to become “involved.”? by State intervention; no new seed Thus the history of unrestricted will be able to fructify. Society will power is again borne out. When have to live for the State, man for the centralized power of the state the governmental machine. And as, reaches a certain point of concen- after all, it is only a machine, whose tration, the society it governs will existence and maintenance depend tend to disintegrate. Individual on the vital supports around it, the action, the spark of creativity, and State, after sucking out the very human charity, all decline as the marrow of society, will be left blood- exercise of power becomes the less, a skeleton, dead with that rusty . . death of machinery, more gruesome dominant solution to all problems. than the death of a living organism. Voluntary human action is in- . " Such was the lamentable fate of creasingly destroyed in preference gncient civilization,10 ® for coerced human action. S— ——— 10 Albert Jay Nock, Our Enemy, the 9 Philip Wylie, “Generation of Zeros,” State (Caldwell, Idaho: Caxton Publish- This Week Magazine, Feb. 5, 1967, ers, 1946), p. 151, Dr. Roche, who has taught history and philosophy at the Colorado School of Mines, now is a member of the staff of the Foundation for Economic Education. The next article, concluding this series, will concern the prospects for dealing with the threat of power. ===== PAGE 59 ===== Auto-5Safety Standards MILTON FRIEDMAN Now that the furor over car safety 3. Failure to compare alterna- has subsided, it is instructive to tives. The basic issue before Con- consider some little-noticed as- gress was safety, not requiring pects of the Federal legislation it automobile manufacturers to build produced. their cars in specifled ways. Yet, so far as I know, there was no discussion whether $1 billion a year would contribute more to safety if spent in this way than if spent in other ways —on im- proved highways, or driver edu- cation, or better enforcement of speed limits, or more intensive investigation of causes of auto accidents. 1. Cost. The recently issued safety standards will raise the cost and hence the price of new cars. According to some estimates, consumers will pay about $1 bil- lion a year extra. Suppose Congress had been asked to appropriate this sum for the identical safety equipment, raising the money by a special excise tax on automobiles. Would Congress have enacted this pro- posal as readily as it enacted the safety legislation? Yet, the two are identical except in form. 4. Who will set the standards? The National Traffic Safety Agen- cy has already been criticized for yielding to the demands of manufacturers in drawing up its 2 Delegation of power to tax. final safety standards for 1968 Congress has been jealous of its cars. Mr. William Stieglitz re- prerogative to impose taxes. Time signed as consultant to the agency and again it has rejected proposals on roughly these grounds. Such that the President be granted dis- complaints will be even more jus- cretion to alter tax rates. Yet, in tified in the future — though the this case, as in other similar cases, complaints themselves may be- Congress has delegated to an ad- come less shrill. ministrative official near-absolute How else can it work out? power to decide how large a tax Safety standards are a peripheral to impose. matter to most car owners. A 507 ===== PAGE 60 ===== 508 THE FREEMAN August Ralph Nader may get them or the extra cost will be more of a burden politicians aroused enough to pass on them than on U.S. producers a law; but once the law is passed, because they sell a much smaller the consumers will return to som- fraction of their output in the nolence, from which only an oc- U.S. Beyond this, it will become casional scandal will reawaken clear to the agency — staffed as them. The car manufacturers are it must be by men trained in the in a very different position. They U.S. industry and in daily touch have billions. at stake. They will with it — that our cars are really assign some of their best talent safer and that the way to promote full-time to keep tabs on the safety is to require foreign cars standards. And who else has the to meet American specifications. expertise? Sooner or later they The result will be a sheltered will dominate the agency — as, market for U.S. producers — and despite well-publicized tiffs, rail- higher costs to U.S. consumers roads and truckers have domi- that have little to do with safety nated the ICC; radio and TV net- requirements. works, the FCC; physicians, state medical licensure boards; and so with, the standards may well make on. cars safer. But, as administrative 5. Effect on competition. Several rigor mortis sets in, they will soon small specialty-car manufacturers glow up product improvement, so have already complained that com- that a decade from now cars may pliance with the new safety re- well be less safe. Reduced com- quirements would put them out of petition will reinforce this ten- business — the 1931 Ford that one dency. In addition, the higher company replicates has less glass price of new cars will raise the in total in its windshields than average age of cars on the road. the windshield wiper standards 7. An oft-told tale. Time and require the wipers to clear! No again, laws passed to protect the doubt, special exemptions will be consumer have ended up by re- granted to these companies. But stricting competition and so do- how shall we ever know about the ing the consumer far more harm innovations that might have been than good. Is it too much to hope made, or the companies that might 4. (0 of these days we shall have been established, without 13: thig Jesson before we enact this additional handicap? a new law rather than after? The effect on foreign producers —m—— will be even more important. Any ey oenisain. June 3, 1967. Re- 6. The effect on safety. To begin ===== PAGE 61 ===== A REVIEWER'S NOTEBOOK JOHN CHAMBERLAIN ~~ Public and Private Enterprise IN ADDITION to being a good econ- the Jacksonian revolution in Amer- omist, John Jewkes, the eminent ica and the movement toward free Professor of Economic Organiza- trade in England. Far from “dis- tion at Oxford, is a man with an appearing” in the eighteen thir- exquisite taste for historical irony. ties, “diversity” and “freedom” His Public and Private Enterprise were just about to take off on the (University of Chicago Press, grand flight that was to make the $2.25), which is made up of his nineteenth century such a wonder- Lindsay Memorial Lectures given ful period. What Professor Jewkes at the University of Keele, invokes is intent upon establishing is to Alexis de Tocqueville at the begin- show that Tocqueville was right in ning. But it is not to hail the retrospect if wrong in prospect, for many prophecies of that remark- the world previous to the eighteen able Frenchman which happened thirties —the world of mercantil- to come true. Rather it is to quote ism and emperors who said ‘“U’etat, from one of Tocqueville's rare his- c'est moi” — was indeed a world in torical mistakes. which diversity had a hard strug- “Everywhere,” so Tocqueville gle. For just about a hundred-year said of the eighteen thirties, “the span after 1830, history was to re- State acquires more and more di- verse itself. But now, as Professor rect control over the humblest Jewkes laments, Tocqueville's members of the community, and a words might correctly be applied. more exclusive power of govern- “Everywhere, and not merely in ing each of them in his smallest Socialist countries,” says Jewkes, concerns. . . . Diversity, as well as “that part of the national income freedom, are disappearing day by taken in taxation; of the working day.” population employed by the State; . This was written at the time of of capital expenditure incurred by 509 ===== PAGE 62 ===== 510 THE FREEMAN August public authority, have all been on tors were trained, the earnings of the increase over the past thirty or doctors themselves, including the forty years.” existing doctors, would fall. It is Professor Jewkes does not expect conceivable that the total earnings a powerful reversal in social and of all doctors might decrease. political thinking that will change Would the rate of return on invest- things. All paths, he says, “seem ment in education then be consid- to lead to wider government re- ered negative?” sponsibilities.” Professor Jewkes This is the sort of dryly ironical doesn’t like the contemporary in- skepticism that pervades Profes- tellectual atmosphere, but the note- sor Jewkes’s book. He doesn’t like worthy thing about his Lindsay the accent on using the schools to lectures is that they don’t tangle solve problems that seem to demand head-on with prevailing dogma. In- immediate attention. For when a stead of affirming fundamental doc- drive is on to educate more people trine, Jewkes suggests a rather in, say, industrial design or the pragmatic cost-effectiveness ap- commercial use of foreign lan- proach to affairs. He speaks of the guages, the stress on specifics may lessons to be drawn from “the case- ‘tend to drive out of the curricula by-case method.” those broad subjects of study which And so, without any fanfare no one can defend as having direct about basic principles, or the phi- relevance for economic expansion losophy of freedom, we get down but which contribute much to gen- to Professor Jewkes’s cases. eral intelligence and the instinct for orderly living without which economic achievement would be in- Education is one thing that con- conceivable.” cerns Jewkes. He wonders about Jewkes likes generalists. But not the “rate of return” to the com- when the generalists are conform- munity from the push to eradicate ists. “University education, even the college drop-out problem. The at its best,” he says, “tends to cost-effectiveness of trying to bring about conformist thinking; force-feed the expansion of uni- for Universities cannot operate versity training is questionable. without standard tests and proce- Says Jewkes, “A person who is dures.” Jewkes has no good answer trained as a doctor instead of be- tothe problem of battling conform- coming, say, a carpenter will pre- ity, but he does at least raise the sumably show higher earnings in question “of providing leisure and consequence. But if many more doc- resources by which the young can Jewkes on Education ===== PAGE 63 ===== 1967 | PUBLIC AND PRIVATE ENTERPRISE 511 ’ learn in their own ways and pursue Jewkes inspects in his dryly .iron- A their eccentricities.” ical way. He concludes that a free | Curiously, he is very skeptical of national service paid for largely the value of spending huge sums out of general taxation “not only on “research and development.” discourages people from paying “If we take the United States privately for their medical services “alone,” he says, “where the sta- but leads them to be content with a tistics are most complete and where service of lower quality than they research expenditure has reached might otherwise have been pre- astronomical levels, the annual per- pared to pay for.” centage rate of growth in indus- Professor Jewkes does not at- trial production is not higher than tack the prevalent idea that “the it was half a century ago. The num- outstandingly successful new func- ber of patents taken out in that tion of government in our time has country have not been increasing.” been the maintenance of full em- Jewkes wonders at the fact that ployment.” Instead, he remarks on “Japan, which shows the most im- the “happy-go-lucky fashion” in pressive rate of economic growth which governments have accepted in recent years, has not engaged in this new responsibility. “Persistent research and development on any inflation” has been one result of extraordinary scale.” On the basis carelessness. Government interven- of Jewkes’s evidence one would tion to wipe out “massive unem- ~ have to say that endowing a young ployment” may justify itself to man with funds and sticking him Jewkes “on the critical counts,” in a fancy laboratory is not neces- but the “recent efforts of govern- sarily the way to enable him to ments positively to engineer eco- “pursue his eccentricities’ in a nomic growth have been among fruitful manner. their most palpable failures.” \ The conclusion to be drawn from Professor Jewkes on the subject of A Case for the Free Market education is that the state might Instead of going minutely into pay less attention to it without any the failures of government-fos- adverse effects on the body politic. tered “growthmanship,” however, But Jewkes doesn’t belabor the Professor Jewkes ends his lectures point. by making a case for the “free mar- ’ } ket as a strong civilizing influence.” Other Governmental Failures He thinks capitalist publishing has The cost of a National Health done more to civilize people than Service is another subject which anything that socialists have done ===== PAGE 64 ===== 512 THE FREEMAN August anywhere. The paperback book, he colour has been fostered all over points out, “was devised and has the world by the opportunity of been spread over great markets by amateur activity and experiment - men looking for private gain. The through the cheapening of the cam- interest in great music has been era.” . stimulated in recent years by many If our young are really looking inventions but especially by the for a man who questions all the long-playing record and refined de- clichés, Jewkes should be their vices for reproducing sound, which prophet. He is not as flashy a were invented in the laboratories of phrase-maker as Galbraith, but he commercial firms and widely dis- is a far more effective critic of tributed by many firms in vigorous what has become the new “conven- competition. The sense of form and tional wisdom.” @® THE FREEMAN on Microfilm Microfilm copies of current as well as of back issues of THE FREEMAN may be purchased from Xerox Univer- sity Microfilms, 300 N. Zeeb Road, Ann Arbor, Michigan 48106.