Very many, if not most, historians seem to have reached the consensus that the description
of the twentieth century is best stated as the war and welfare century.
The century is the bloodiest in all of history.
Over 170 million people were killed as a direct result of the wars, with 10 million being
killed in World War I, 50 million killed in World War II.
And it is significant that in regard to the 50 million killed in World War II that 70%
were civilians. This was mainly the result of the bombing of cities by Great Britain
and America. This number of deaths does not include the estimated 6 to 12 million killed
by Stalin before World War II and the several millions killed after the war by Stalin when
When Roosevelt and Churchill delivered to him one-third of Europe in the settlement
conferences, George Crocker's excellent book, Roosevelt's Road to Russia, goes through each
of these settlement conferences, such as Tehran and Yalta and the others, and shows how Roosevelt
and Churchill enhanced Communism in Russia and in China through deliberate concessions
which strengthened Communism drastically while Nazism was being extinguished in Germany.
It is inconceivable to me that America could join with Stalin as an ally and promote World
War II as the good war against totalitarianism. The war and American aid made Soviet Russia
into a super military power which threatened America and the world for the next 45 years,
delivered China into communism and made it a threat during the same period of time.
The horror of the twentieth century could hardly have been predicted at the beginning
of the nineteenth century, which saw the eighteenth century end with the creation of the first
classical liberal government in the world, the United States of America.
It was a government founded upon the blueprint and a written constitution which allowed very
few powers into a central government.
It protected individual liberties from even the vote of the majority.
It provided for the ownership of private property, free speech, freedom of religion, and basically
a free market economy with no direct taxes.
Both political factions united behind the first administration of President Washington
to proclaim a foreign policy based upon non-interventionism and neutrality in the affairs of other nations,
which remained a dominant political idea of America for over 100 years.
These ideas of classical liberalism began to spread into the old world of Europe and
erupted, however, into a different type of revolution in France, although in the name
also of liberty.
The new ideal, however, adopted in the French Revolution was that of equality, and it attempted
to abolish all monarchy throughout Europe.
The ideas of classical liberalism were twisted and distorted in this process, but nevertheless
were spread in a distorted form by force throughout Europe, thereby giving it a bad name in many
countries, especially in Germany. The 19th century, however, remained in practice, largely
a century of individualism, material progress and relative peace, which allowed great progress
and Science and Technology and Industry. However, the intellectual ferment during the middle
of the nineteenth century and thereafter was decidedly towards collectivism. In about 1850,
the great classical liberal John Stuart Mill began to abandon the ideas of classical liberalism
and to adopt socialism as did many, many, even most other intellectuals. After the brief
The Franco-Prussian War of 1870-71, Bismarck established the first welfare state in Germany.
From this point up to the First World War, most German intellectuals began to glorify
the state and collectivist ideas. They ignored one lone voice in Germany, a lyric poet by
the name of Holderlin, who died in 1843. He made a classic statement, which was, quote,
What has made the state a hell on earth has been that man has tried to make it his heaven.
Hegel and Fichte come to mind in regard to that statement.
Finally, the greatest tragedy of Western civilization erupted with World War I in 1914.
It may be the most senseless, unnecessary, and avoidable disasters in human history.
Classical liberalism was thereby murdered in that war and virtually disappeared and was replaced by
collectivism which reigned both intellectually and in practice throughout the remainder of the 20th
century. The ideas of socialism began to take over the governments of the world following World War I.
Socialism, however, was not initially a mass movement of the people but was instead a movement
created by intellectuals who became important parts of the government ruled by those collectivist
politicians. While I could quote from numerous political and intellectual leaders throughout
the war and welfare century, I've chosen one who summed up the dominant political thoughts of the
entire 20th century in one short paragraph. He was the founder of fascism. He came to power
In a law in 1922 in Italy, Mussolini stated, quote,
Fascism believes neither in the possibility nor the utility of peace.
War alone brings up to its highest tension all human energy and puts the staff of nobility
upon the peoples who have the courage to meet it.
It may be expected that this will be the century of authority,
A century of the left, a century of fascism. For the 19th century was a century of individualism.
And he puts a parenthesis here and says, liberalism, I always mean, by liberalism, I mean individualism.
Parenthesis closed. He says, it may be expected that this will be the century of collectivism
and Hence the Century of the State. For fascism, the growth of empire, that is to say the expansion
of the state, and its opposite, is a sign of decay and death." This statement bears
closer scrutiny because it dramatically states some of the dominant and guiding principles
of the entire twentieth century. First, it states that peace is not the goal and is not
War is not to even be desired by the governments of collectivism. Secondly, it states that
war is the primary goal and is to be desired for several reasons. One is that not only
is it a noble activity, but it reveals a true courage of man. It unleashes creative energy
and it causes progress. Moreover, war is the prime mover to enhance and glorify the state.
War is the principal method by which collectivists have achieved their goal of control by the
few over the many. In other words, they seek to create war for the purpose of implementing
their ideas.
Number three, he states that individualism, which was a philosophy of the 19th century,
is to be abolished, and specifically collectivism is to rule the 20th century. Finally, Mussolini's
Today's statement is that fascism is recognized as a variation of other forms of collectivism,
all being part of the left as opposed to the right, which is individualism. It was not
until the red decade of the thirties and the appearance of Hitler that leftist intellectuals
and the media began to switch fascism from the left to the right and put it on the political
Social Spectrum as an opposite, in opposition to what the, quote, good forms of collectivism
were, which they said were socialism and communism.
They were merely rival gangs in the same neighborhood.
But after Hitler arose in Germany, socialists opposed fascism as extremism on the right.
The founder of fascism clearly realized that all of these collectivist ideas, socialism,
and Communism belonged on the political left and were opposed to individualism on the right.
So fascism is not an extreme form of individualism and is, without a doubt, a part of the left
or collectivism. The ideals upon which America was founded were the exact opposite of those
expressed by Mussolini and other collectivists on the left.
So why was America in the 20th century not a bulwark for freedom to oppose all of these
Why didn't the American ideas of our founding fathers dominate the 20th century? Why didn't
the ideas combat the left and make this the century of American freedom, instead of making
it the war and welfare century? It was certainly not because America was conquered by some
foreign enemy by the force of arms. We must begin to look for the reasons of how and why
America abandoned its principles of its founders and allowed this tragedy to occur. We must
determine why America became influenced by leftist thoughts and the ideas of empire,
the ideas of glorification of the state. How did America itself become an empire and an
interventionist in World War I and World War II and help create the war and welfare century?
We can begin by examining a quote from one of the main leaders of America in the 19th
century, and I think the answer will become apparent. This statement was made by a prominent
American politician in 1838. Quote, At what point shall we expect the approach of danger?
By what means shall we fortify against it? Shall we expect some transatlantic military
Every giant to step the ocean and crush us at a blow? Never. All the armies of Europe,
Asia and Africa combined with all the treasure of the earth could not by force take a drink
from the Ohio or make a track on the Blue Ridge in the trial of a thousand years. Abraham
Lincoln is the author of those words and he concluded his statement with the following
If destruction be our lot, we must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a nation of
free men, we must live through all time or die by suicide.
Lincoln himself became the principal instigator of America's suicide. It was not a foreign
foe that conquered us, but it was a war that the American government won, which ended the
and the Dreams of the American Founders.
How the leftist intellectuals have never revealed to the American people the real cause or the
real effect of the American Civil War, and instead have proclaimed it as a noble war
to free slaves and therefore worth whatever cost had to be paid.
In fact, it was a war to repudiate the ideas of a limited central government, and it moved
America towards a domestic empire which led inevitably to a foreign empire several decades
later. We see many photographs of Lincoln toward the end of the war which seemed to
show the strain from the war. However, I think the strain was due mainly to the fact that
by the end of the war he understood that it had been an unnecessary war and that he had
acted to secure the economic domination of the north over the south. At the end of the
After the war, President Lincoln stated, quote, As a result of the war, corporations have
been enthroned, and an era of corruption in high places will follow, and the money power
of the country will endeavor to prolong its reign by working upon the prejudices of the
people until wealth is aggregated into the hands of the few and the republic is destroyed.
I feel at this moment more anxiety for the safety of my country than ever before, even
in the midst of the war.
Other key individuals recognized the real effect of the American Civil War.
One of these was the great historian of liberty, Lord Acton, who wrote to another prominent
American, Robert E. Lee, immediately after the war.
And Lord Acton stated, quote, I saw in state rights the only availing check upon the absolutism
of the Sovereign Will, and secession filled me with hope, not as to the destruction, but
as to the redemption of democracy. Therefore I deem that you are fighting the battles of
our liberty, our progress, and our civilization, and I mourn for the state which was lost at
Richmond more deeply than I rejoice over that which was saved at Waterloo. General Lee replied
in a letter dated December 15, 1866 with a careful analysis of the results of the Civil
War. His letter contained these words, quote, I can only say that I have considered the
preservation of the constitutional power of the general government to be the foundation
of our peace and safety at home and abroad. I yet believe that the maintenance of the
rights and authority reserved to the states and to the people, not only essential to the
The adjustment and the balance of the general system, but the safeguard to the continuance
of a free government, I consider it as the chief source of stability of our political
system, whereas the consolidation of the states into one vast republic is sure to be aggressive
abroad and despotic at home, and it will be the certain precursor of the ruin that has
has overwhelmed all those governments which have preceded it."
Lee clearly saw the growth of empire at home and the loss of freedom to Americans and the
destruction of the original ideas of our founders. He also saw that the domestic empire would
lead to an empire abroad. Consolidation of power into the central government is the basic
It is the basic idea of the Constitution attempted to avoid. After the creation of the domestic
American empire and the Civil War, and then after the next three decades, and at the beginning
of the 20th century, America repudiated its 100-year-old foreign policy and started the
The Spanish-American War, allegedly to free Cuba from Spanish tyranny. But as we now know,
the original and ultimate purpose was to take the Philippine Islands away from Spain in
order to provide coaling stations for trade with China, which was considered by many American
economic interests to be essential to America's progress. McKinley ordered the ships sent
to the Philippines at the same time he sent the battleship Maine to Cuba and instructed
the American Navy to support the Philippine rebels against their Spanish rulers. McKinley
asked Congress to declare war because he said the Spanish sank the battleship Maine. But
we know today that the explosion occurred from within the ship, just as the Spanish
had said, and therefore could not have been done by Spain. In the Philippines, the native
rebels were successful in throwing off their Spanish rulers and were aided in their effort
by the American Navy. As soon as they were successful, McKinley ordered the American
guns turned upon the rebels and murdered them by the thousands and thousands and snatched
that island away from them and made it an American possession, which McKinley ruled
as a military dictator without any authority from Congress. Next, without any authority
from Congress, he sent 5,000 Marines into China to help put down the Boxer Rebellion,
America joined with other European nations in seeking the spoils of China and thereby
sacrificed America's integrity and any right to be called a leader for freedom in the world.
Next came the greatest tragedy of the twentieth century, which was America's late entry into
World War I. America's entry drastically changed the balance of power of the original contenders
in that war and resulted in the horrible treaty of Versailles, which paved the road to World
War II. America's entry into World War I was a natural result of the so-called progressive
movement, which worshiped democracy per se. It was this so-called progressive movement
which in one year, 1913, brought on monumental changes in the name of attacking the rich
for the benefit of the poor. First, the Federal Reserve system was created allegedly to control
All the rich banks, but instead concentrated power into the hands of an elite few unelected
manipulators.
Second, the 16th Amendment allowed the income tax, and it was alleged that the amendment
would only attack the rich.
However, in the First World War, the tax was raised and expanded and has become the most
oppressive feature of Americans in the 20th century.
And today causes the middle class, Americans, to work approximately five to six months a
year before they earn one penny for themselves.
The third change was the Seventeenth Amendment, which allegedly was to give power to the people
by letting them elect U.S. senators rather than state legislatures.
The Founding Fathers had devised this system of state legislatures, electing U.S. senators,
in order to protect the states and give the states the power to restrain the federal government.
Progressive movement also promoted the personification of Isabel Paterson's humanitarian with a guillotine
by electing President Woodrow Wilson, a naive and idealistic egomaniac who took America
into World War I so that he could take a part in creating the League of Nations and help
help design the new order, new structure of the world.
Wilson also allowed the House of J.P. Morgan to become the exclusive agent for British
purchases of war materials in America. Later, he further allowed Morgan to make loans and
extend credit to the Allies. And eventually, Wilson caused the U.S. government to assume
all of the Morgan debt, relieving Morgan of the debt, and then issued Liberty bonds so
The inability of Great Britain and France to repay the Morgan loans, which were now to the United States, also played a major factor in Wilson's decision to enter that war.
It was also a major factor in causing the Treaty of Versailles to impose such harsh terms on Germany to repay Great Britain and France for war damages.
As war fever spread and the war drums beat, few people paid attention to such editorials
as appeared in the commercial and financial journal which stated, quote, It is needless
to say that we shall support the government, but may we not ask one to another before the
fateful final word is spoken? Are we not by this act transforming the glorious republic
that was, and to a powerful Republic that is to be. Must we not admit that we are bringing
into existence a new Republic that is unlike the old?" Wilson, like President Polk and
Wilson before him, made it appear that the alleged enemy started the war by firing the
first shot. German Embassy had warned Secretary of State Brian that the British ship the Lusitania
and was carrying illegal weapons and was therefore a proper target for submarines to sink.
Secretary Bryan tried to get Wilson to warn American citizens not to sail on the ship,
but Wilson refused to do so because he saw that this was an opportunity where a loss
of American lives would present him with an apparent reason for entering the war.
After Wilson failed to give this warning, Bryan resigned as Secretary of State and over
100 Americans were killed when the German submarine sank the Lusitania.
After World War I ended, and much like the regret expressed by Lincoln at the end of
the Civil War, President Wilson looked back to the harm that he had brought on America
and saw part of the true nature of World War I. In an address in St. Louis, Missouri, September
In 1919, President Wilson stated, quote, Why, my fellow citizens, is there any man here or any woman or is there any child who does not know that the seed of war in the modern world is industrial and commercial rivalry? This war, in its inception, was a commercial and an industrial war. It was not a political war, end quote. It is sad to contemplate the loss of liberty caused by
By the victorious wars we have fought, when you look back and see that almost all of them
were unnecessary to defend American liberty and were largely economically instigated,
in so many instances the President provoked the other side into firing the first shot
so as to make it look like the war was started by America's enemy. Not only did Pope Lincoln,
McKinley and Wilson do it, but later Roosevelt would do it in regard to Pearl Harbor and
Johnson would do it in regard to the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution for Vietnam. It is not
truly a study of history to speculate on what might have happened if America had not entered
World War I. But I think that these are some very reasonable, even probable, consequences
if America had not entered. First, almost certainly there would not have been a successful
Bolshevik revolution in Russia and Communism would not have overthrown the government and
and giving communism its birth in the huge nation of Russia which allowed communism to
spread worldwide.
Secondly, a negotiated treaty between an undefeated Germany and an undefeated France and Great
Britain, but all of them severely wounded, would have prevented the debacle of the Treaty
of Versailles, which was the greatest tragedy of World War I. A treaty instead by those
before Defeat would have been negotiated with co-equal partners at the table, similar to
the way the Congress of Vienna settled the Napoleonic Wars in 1815 and 1816, with France
actually sitting at the table represented by Taleran. And a sincere effort was made
to promote peace by that treaty rather than cause war in the future. Treaty of Versailles
excluded Germany and Russia and declared Germany solely guilty for causing the war and saddled
without her was tremendous payments for war debts and took away much of Germany's territory.
The Treaty of Versailles paved the way for Hitler, whose support came from the German
people who wanted to throw off this tremendously and obviously unfair Treaty of Versailles.
Without the rise of communism in Russia and Nazism in Germany, I do not believe that World
War II would have occurred.
Because of our special royal guest from Austria, I want to add one footnote here about the
Settlement of World War I as it related to the Habsburg Monarchy. In an excellent book
entitled Leftism Revisited by Eric Kuhnelt-Leedon, he reveals that President Wilson probably
was unaware of the wisdom of Disraeli's words, quote, The maintenance of the Austrian Empire
is necessary to the independence and, if necessary, to the civilization and even the liberties
of Europe. The book points out that President Wilson had as one of his main foreign policy
The American Representative is a confirmed socialist preacher by the name of Rev. George
Davis Herron. Hapsburg Monarchy petitioned Wilson to negotiate a separate peace treaty
in February of 1918, long before the war ended, and sent as its representative Prof. Heinrich
Lemauche to meet with American Representative Rev. Herron. They spent two days together,
and Prof. Lemauche revealed a plan to create a federated political body in which was entirely
in keeping with one of Wilson's 14 points, which would allow individual nations and ethnic
groups to be accorded the freest opportunity of autonomous development.
The book then states, quote, During the night, Heron began to wrestle with his temptation
as Jacob wrestled with God near Yorba. By morning he knew he had gained complete victory
over himself. LaMarche had been nothing but an evil tempter. No, the Habsburg monarchy
must go because the Habsburgs as such were obstacles to progress, democracy and liberty.
Had they remained in power, the war would have been fought in vain.
The book continues with an interesting event relating to Reverend Heron after his travels
in Europe. And he wrote a letter to the socialist Norman Thomas in 1920 and stated, quote,
The Bolsheviks were bad, but the future civilization of Europe is coming out of Russia and it was
It will at least be an approach to the Kingdom of Heaven when it comes, end quote.
The leftist bias and bent of the Wilson administration and its representative becomes crystal clear.
There are many important lessons that the 20th century, the war on welfare century could
teach us.
I want to talk about two of those.
One of those is summed up by Bruce Porter in his excellent book entitled War and the
Rise of the State.
So, throughout the history of the United States, war has been the primary impetus behind the
growth and development of the Central State, just as Mussolini said that it would be.
Continuing, it war has been the lever by which presidents and other national officials have
bolstered the power of the state in the face of tenacious popular resistance. It has been
and the Wellspring of American Nationalism and a Spur to Political and Social Change.
The same lesson is contained in a warning issued by the great champion of liberty and student
of American democracy, Alexis de Tocqueville, who warned America in the early part of the
nineteenth century that, all those who seek to destroy the liberties of a democratic nation
ought to know that war is the surest and the shortest means to accomplish it."
He was talking about victorious wars, not wars that you lose.
A second lesson is that democracy per se will not protect our freedom or individual liberty.
I have heard college students ask the question, why did the Greeks who invented democracy
remain so critical of it?
Well, the answer, of course, is that without proper restraints and the limitation of powers
as provided by the American Constitution, a democracy can be just as tyrannical as a
single desperate. F. A. Hayek made this point when he stated, quote,
There can be no doubt that in history there has often been much more cultural and political
freedom under an autocratic rule than under some democracies. And it is at least conceivable
that under the government of a very homogeneous, doctrinaire, majority democratic government
might become as oppressive as the worst dictatorship."
We should learn from the war and welfare century that the greatest discovery of Western civilization
was that liberty could be achieved only through the proper and effective limitation on the
power of the state. It is this limitation upon the state which protects private property,
Free market economy, personal liberties and promotes a non-interventionist foreign policy.
And this is what will bring peace and prosperity instead of war and welfare. But it is not
democracy per se which protects freedom. Too many people living in democracies are lulled
into believing that they are free because they have the right to vote and elections
are held periodically. If you take the draft as an example, I think you would find that
If the draft were proclaimed by a sole monarch, people would revolt and disobey. However,
in a democracy, when the politicians vote for it, the people comply and still think
they are free. The fall of the Berlin Wall and demise of the Soviet Empire do not assure
us that collectivism is dead. In fact, I predict that the next assault on freedom by the new
leftist intellectuals will be through a democratic, probably a religious movement, or at least
is one which is not anti-religious. Many, maybe most Americans who opposed communist
Soviet Russia were convinced that it was wrong and evil because it was atheistic and godless
and not because of its political and economic ideas. I think the new collectivist monster
will be dressed in different clothes, advocating equality, justice, democracy and market socialism.
It will be more important than ever for intellectuals of the future to have a correct understanding
of the philosophy of freedom and the philosophy of the free market in order to fight collectivism
in the twentieth century. It will take a new intellectual to do that. It will be more important
than ever for Americans to understand why Ludwig von Mises in his book Omnipotent Government
stated the following, quote, Durable peace is only possible under perfect capitalism,
hitherto never and nowhere completely tried or achieved. In such a Jeffersonian world
of the unhampered market economy, the scope of government activities is limited to the
protection of lives, health and property of individuals against violence or fraudulent
and Regression. All of the oratory of the advocates of government omnipotence cannot
know the fact that there is but one system that makes durable peace, a free market economy.
Government controls lead to economic nationalism and this results in conflict. The meaning
of a free market which Mises states will allow us to have peace and prosperity is one where
where the economy is free of government control, but also where economic interests do not control
government policy, especially foreign policy, as has been the case in the 20th century.
The highest risk for war is where various economic interests are able to control foreign
policy to promote those particular economic interests rather than the well-being or liberty
of the nation as a whole.
The Mises Institute is working to promote the ideas of Mises, Hayek, Rothbard and many other
true believers in individual freedom. These are the ideas that can make the 21st century
one of peace and prosperity rather than war and welfare. That is why the Mises Institute
is so important to the future of America and to the world. Thank you.
Thank you very much.