The Freeman 1991

THEFREE IDEAS ON LIBERTY 404 What's Your Problem? CONTENTS Lynn Tilton NOVEMBER Accepting personal responsibility for problem-solving leads to success. 1991 406 A Checklist for Healthy Skeptics VOL. 41 Dianne L. Durante NO.11 Learning to approach predictions of environmental doom critically. 410 School for Scandal James L. Payne Federal mismanagement seems here to stay. 412 Art and Representative Govemment William R. Allen and William Dickneider Let consumers and philanthropists determine what kind of art they want. 414 The S.E.C.'s War Against the Theater John Chodes How regulation limits theatrical choices. 416 Corporate Giving: The Case for Enlightened Self-Interest Edward H. Crane Counteracting some destructive trends in American philanthropy. 424 Capitalism: Who Are Its Friends and Who Are Its Foes? Donald J. Boudreaux A casual empirical study. 427 Spending for Spending's Sake John Semmens The intransigence of a bloated government determined to spend more money. 428 The Big Nag Donald G. Smith Is there no escape from bureaucratic badgering? 429 Poland's Flawed Reform Plan Paul A. Cleveland Looking for reasons behind Poland's lagging economic performance. 431 Govemment Funding Brings Govemment Control Gary McGath The real issue behind Rust v. Sullivan. 434 Book Reviews John Chamberlain reviews China Misperceived by Steven W. Mosher. Raymond J. Keating examines The Capitalist Spirit, edited by Peter L. Berger; Jeffrey Tucker looks at Economic Policy and the Market Process, edited by Groenveld, Maks and Muysken; and The Culture ofSpending by James L. Payne is discussed by William H. Peterson. THEFREEMAN IDEAS ON LIBERTY PERSPECTIVE Published by Double Standard The Foundation for Economic Education Irvington-on-Hudson, NY 10533 In October 1990, theAnchorage Daily News and the Anchorage Times, two ofExxon's most strident President of The Board: Bruce M. Evans critics since the 1989 Valdez oil spill in Prince Vice-President: Robert G. Anderson William Sound, reported that Federally funded re Senior Editors: Beth A. Hoffman searchers killed hundreds of birds and animals in Brian Summers Contributing Editors: Bettina Bien Greaves an attempt to bolster the government's case Edmund A. Opitz against the oil producer. The issue has received Paul L. Poirot limited coverage in the national press, and little or Copy Editor: Deane M. Brasfield no comment from animal rights and environmen tal special interest groups.... The Freeman is the monthly publication of A review of the reported facts surrounding this The Foundation for Economic Education, startling, and possibly illegal, use of taxpayers' Inc., Irvington-on-Hudson, NY 10533. FEE, money: established in 1946 by Leonard E. Read, is a nonpolitical educational champion of private property, the free market, and limited govern • The Justice Department determined that, to ment. FEE is classified as a 26 USC 501 (c) get higher damages, it needed a reliable scien (3) tax-exempt organization. Other officers of FEE's Board of Trustees are: Thomas C. tific model to prove that the Valdez accident Stevens, chairman; David H. Keyston, vice killed over 100,000-300,000 unrecovered birds chairman; Paul L. Poirot, secretary; Don L. that they believe floated out to sea. Foote, treasurer. • Justice ordered the Interior Department's U.S. The costs of Foundation projects and services Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) to conduct are met through donations. Donations are in Bird Study No.!. The study consisted of killing vited in any amount. Subscriptions to The Freeman are available to any interested per birds, dunking them in oil, planting them with son in the United States for the asking. Addi transmitters, and depositing them in the water. tional single copies $1.00; 10 or more, 50 cents Once recovered, the scientists could supposed each. For foreign delivery, a donation of $15.00 a year is required to cover direct mail ly [estimate] how many birds drifted away and ing costs. sunk after the spill. • FWS approved a $600,000 contract with a Port Copyright © 1991 by The Foundation for Economic Education, Inc. Printed in the land, Oregon, research company, Ecological U.S.A. Permission is granted to reprint any Consulting Inc., to kill up to 350 birds. article in this issue, provided appropriate • The hired killers shot 250-350 mUITes, scoters, credit is given and two copies of the reprinted material are sent to The Foundation. cormorants, and ancient murrelets on remote Alaskan islands, many of them protected na Bound volumes of The Freeman are available tional wildlife refuges, and returned them for from The Foundation for calendar years 1971 to date. Earlier volumes as well as current is use in the study. sues are available on microfilm from Univer • The Alaska Department of Fish and Game sity Microfilms, 300 North Zeeb Road, Ann killed an equal number of ducks for the same Arbor, MI 48106. purpose, along with 32 deer, 28 harbor seals, The Freeman considers unsolicited editorial three sea otters and minks, and 17 Stellar's sea submissions, but they must be accompanied lions recently listed as a threatened species, to by a stamped, self-addressed envelope. Our author's guide is available on request. further their case against Exxon.... Phone: (914) 591-7230 By way of contrast, the killing of birds by pri FAX: (914) 591-8910 Cover art: © Washington Post Writers Group vate landowners has been taken quite seriously by Justice. In one case, a Springfield, Illinois, res ident was ordered by local officials to "get rid of" 402 PERSPECTIVE unruly pigeons that congregated in his trees. The Don't Judge Motives resident, Mr. Harvey Von Fossan, laid out poison for the birds, which was unwittingly eaten by two By judging our motives rather than our actions, common grackles and a mourning dove, killing we can assuage all guilt over any action orinaction. them instead. An outraged neighbor informed the Everybody thinks his motives are pure and good. U.S. Attorney's office, which prosecuted Mr. Von And on a conscious level, they probably are. Fossan under the Migratory Bird Treaty. The ac That's why motives just aren't the issue. Whatwe tion, one government attorney stated, was "one of do, not what we intend, is what counts. the most important cases" in his office. In aI!0ther On the global level, assessing motives rather case, the government vigorously prosecuted the than actions has led to serious moral distortions. A owner of a million-dollar goldfish farm for killing particularly important example concerns assess birds that were devouring his crop. Both landown ments of capitalism and Communism. ers were found guilty, with Mr. Von Fossan receiv Communism has resulted in the loss offreedom ing a suspended sentence and a fine, and the gold by more nations and the deaths ofmore individuals fish farmer a fine and a jail sentence. than has any other doctrine in human history. Yet -GLENN G. LAMMI because it is perceived as emanating from good Washington Legal Foundation motives-abolition of poverty, greater equality many people refuse to accord it the antipathy that its deeds deserve. Affirmative Action Capitalism, on the other hand, has led to greater freedom and to less poverty than perhaps any other I hold that we blacks ought not to allow our political-economic doctrine in history. Presumably, selves to become ever-ready doomsayers, always it ought to be widely admired. Yet it is often vilified alert to exploit black suffering by offering it up to and even its supporters rarely consider capitalism more or less sympathetic whites as a justification to be a particularly moral system. The reason? It is for incremental monetary transfers. Such a posture based on selfish motives. seems to show a fundamental lack of confidence in Defense of Communism and opposition to capi the ability of blacks to make it in America, as so talism emanate from the same flaw-assessing mo many millions ofimmigrants have done and contin tives, not results. ue to do. Even if this method were to succeed in -DENNIS PRAGER, writing in his quarterly gaining the money, it is impossible that true equal journal, Ultimate Issues (6020 Washington ity ofstatus in American society could lie at the end Boulevard, Culver City, CA 90232) of such a road. Much of the current, quite heated debate over Managed Trade affirmative action reveals a similar lack of confi dence in the capabilities of blacks to compete Over the long run, managed trade has proved a in American society. My concern is with the incon disaster. Lacking both competition and access to sistency between the broad reliance on quotas by modern technology, Eastern Europe was never dis blacks, and the attainment of "true equality." cinlined for delivering computers that were instant There is a sense in which the demand for quotas, museum pieces or cars that belched rotten-egg which many see as the only path to equality for fumes. When the Kremlin announced last year that blacks, concedes at the outset the impossibility the colonies must make their own way in a global that blacks could ever be truly equal citizens. market, hundreds of seemingly productive facto -GLENN LOURY, speaking at the Heritage ries became obsolete overnight. Foundation, quoted in the Spring 1991 -'-PETER PASSELL, writing in the issue of Issues & Views February 13, 1991, New York Times 403 404 THEFREEMAN IDEAS ON LIBERTY What's Your Problem? by Lynn Tilton na market economy, when individuals look their private enterprise recycling program gener within themselves rather than to the state to ated outside money for the university, but it's cut I solve their problems, those problems become landfill fees $30,000 per year. opportunities for success. After all, problems Since BYU was one of the largest users of the aren't solved by laws or by organizations, but by local landfill, this program means that the landfill individuals.

Load more