THEFREEMAN IDEAS ON LIBERTY

FEATURES 132 The America We Lost by Mario A. Pei How the spirit offreedom was superseded by the search for security. 134 Fallacies ofUncritical Multiculturalism by Tibor R. Machan Many cultural differences are far from benign. 136 The Rise of Government and the Decline of Morality by James A. Dorn As the State burgeons, virtue recedes. 141 The Guaranteed Life by Maxwell Anderson A playwright's timeless plea for limited government and individual liberty. 146 America's Other Democracy by William H. Peterson The virtues ofthe market economy. 148 Inequality ofWealth and Incomes by Ludwig von Mises He who best serves consumers profits most. 152 Competition and Cooperation by Donald J. Boudreaux and Hugh Macaulay In a peaceful, prosperous society, competition and cooperation are channeled into their appropriate realms. 155 "From Each According to His Abilities ..." by Thomas J. Shelly A lesson in socialism. 158 Legalized Immorality by Clarence Manion Unlimited government propagates the very evils that it is designed to reduce. 160 Nullifying the Rule of Law by Mark S. Pulliam Reconsidering jury nullification. 162 Why It Matters by Roger M. Clites An evaluation ofthe Quebec secession question. 163 Warning: OSHA Can Be Hazardous to Your Health by Raymond J. Keating The dangers ofunbridled workplace regulation. 166 Private Enterprise Regained by Henry Hazlitt How the Pilgrims abandoned communism in favor of freedom. 168 Prosperity Without Pollution by John Semmens We can have both a growing economy and an improving environment. 173 James Madison-Checks and Balances to Limit Government Power by Jim Powell A tribute to the Father ofthe Constitution. COLUMNS Center NOTES from FEE-The Meaning of Freedom by Hans F: Sennholz 144 IDEAS and CONSEQUENCES-My Kind of President by Lawrence W Reed 156 POTOMAC PRINCIPLES-The Morality of Freedom by Doug Bandow 180 ECONOMICS on TRIAL-What Do You Make ofThis Graph? by Mark Skousen DEPARTMENTS 130 Perspective-William H. Peterson, Leonard E. Read 183 Book Reviews -Albert Speer: His Battle With Truth by Gitta Sereny, reviewed by Bettina Bien Greaves; Noah's Choice: The Future ofEndangered Species by Charles C. Mann and Mark L. Plummer, reviewed by Doug Bandow; The Sword ofImagination: Memoirs ofa Half-Century ofLiterary Conflict by Russell Kirk, reviewed by William 1. Watkins, Jr.; The Solzhenitsyn Files, edited by Michael Scammell, reviewed by Robert Batemarco; Ayn Rand: The Russian Radical by Chris Matthew Sciabarra, reviewed by David M. Brown; Payback: The Conspiracy to Destroy Michael Milken and His Financial Revolution by Daniel R. Fischel, reviewed by George C. Leef; To RenewAmerica by Newt Gingrich, reviewed by Wesley Allen Riddle. THEFREEMAN IDEAS ON LIBERTY PERSPECTIVE

Published by Thoughts on FEE's The Foundation for Economic Education Irvington-on-Hudson, NY 10533 50th Anniversary Phone (914) 591-7230 FAX (914) 591-8910 E-mail: [email protected] It is force, not opinion, that queens its President: Hans F. Sennholz way over the world, but it is opinion that Managing Editor: Beth A. Hoffman looses the force. Guest Editor: William H. Peterson -Blaise Pascal, 1670 Editor Emeritus Paul L. Poirot Lewisburg, Pennsylvania How to get from here to there-from (to Book Review Editor Robert Batemarco supply a current benchmark on massive Marymount College, Tarrytown, New York Associate Editor government) the U.S. $1.7 trillion budget, Gregory P. Pavlik over to a widespread reaffirmation of the Assistant Editor William J. Watkins, Jr. rule of law, offreedom and free enterprise, Editorial Assistant in America and throughout the West? That Mary Ann Murphy Columnists reaffirmation is the challenge that the Foun­ Doug Bandow Cato Institute, Washington, D.C. dation for Economic Education has tackled Lawrence W. Reed Mackinac Center for Public Policy since it was chartered in March 1946. Midland, Michigan How has it done so? By seeking to re­ Mark Skousen Rollins College, Winter Park, Florida shape public opinion through such things as Contributing Editors Charles W. Baird seminars and discussion clubs, but in the California State University, Hayward Doug Bandow main through the printed word, through its Cato Institute, Washington, D.C. Essays on Liberty early in its career, a Peter J. Boettke New York University variety ofbooks and, for the last 40 years or Clarence B. Carson American Textbook Committee so, its monthly, The Freeman. Wadley, Alabama Thomas J. DiLorenzo In this issue, some early FEE essays­ Loyola College, Baltimore, Maryland some early roots-are reprinted. The spirit Joseph S. Fulda New York, New York ofFEE's founder and first president, Leon­ Bettina Bien Greaves Resident Scholar, FEE ard E. Read, who hammered out what he Robert Higgs The Independent Institute, Oakland, California called the Freedom Philosophy, underlies John Hospers University ofSouthern California these works. Tibor R. Machan Why are words and thoughts so pivotal? Auburn University Edmund A. Opitz With words we rule men, said Disraeli. Chatham, Massachusetts James L. Pay~e Thought precedes human action, said Sandpointi Idaho William H. Peterson Mises. Ideas have consequences, said AdjunctSqholar, Heritage Foundation, Washington, D.C. Weaver. The power ofideas through words, Jane S. Shaw' PERC, Bozeman, Montana spoken or written, on the human mind and Richard H. Timberlake University ofGeorgia hence on the course of human events is Lawrence H. White University ofGeorgia incontestable. The Freeman is the monthly publication of The Foundation for That power was seen by St. Paul in his Economic Education, Inc., Irvington-on-Hudson, NY 10533. FEE, Epistles such as those to the Romans, Corin­ established in 1946 by Leonard E. Read, is a non-political, educa­ tional champion of private property, the free market, and limited thians, and Galatians. Through these letters government. FEE is classified as a 26 USC 501(c)(3) tax-exempt organization. to clusters of early Christians, St. Paul Copyright © 1996 by The Foundation for Economic Education. Permission is granted to reprint any article in this issue, except "James mightily helped convert people to Christi­ Madison," provided appropriate credit is given and two copies of anity, extended the New Testament, and the reprinted material are sent to The Foundation. The costs of Foundation projects and services are met through became a fountainhead of Christian faith donations, which are invited in any amount. Donors of$30.00 or more receive a subscription to The Freeman. Student subscriptions are $10.00 and doctrine. for the nine-month academic year; $5.00 per semester. Additional copies ofsingle issues ofThe Freeman are $3.00. For foreign delivery, The power of words is seen further from a donation of $45.00 a year is suggested to cover mailing costs. Bound volumes of The Freeman are available from The Foundation 1776 through 1783 in Thomas Paine's The for calendar years 1972 to date. The Freeman is available in microform Crisis. Paine's words still hold true for 1996: from University Microfilms, 300 N. Zeeb Rd., Ann Arbor, MI 48106. COVER ART: Grover Cleveland These are the times that try men's souls. 130 PERSPECTIVE George Washington hailed Paine the pam­ In An Ideal America phleteer for helping to forge the American Revolution. Every person should be free Later on, Alexander Hamilton, John Jay, and James Madison, under the nom de ·.. to pursue his ambition to the full extent plume of Publius, wrote 85 papers seriatim ofhis abilities, regardless ofrace or creed or of The Federalist, 1787-1788, mostly aimed family background. at the people ofNew York State so as to win ·.. to associate with whom he pleases for ratification of the U.s. Constitution as laid any reason he pleases, even ifsomeone else down in Philadelphia in 1787. thinks it's a stupid reason. More periodicals, The Liberator, 1831­ 1866, flowed from the pen of abolitionist · .. to worship God in his own way, even if William Lloyd Garrison. He favored moral it isn't "orthodox." suasion over violence or political involve­ ment. He helped organize the Anti-Slavery ·.. to choose his own trade and to apply for Society and was long its president. He any job he wants-and to quit his job if he opposed the Civil War until the Emancipa­ doesn't like it or if he gets a better offer. tion Proclamation. He ceased publication of ·.. to go into business for himself, be his The Liberator with the passage of the 13th own boss, and set his own hours of work­ Amendment barring involuntary servitude. even if it's only three hours a week. But a sort of involuntary servitude still persists in America and accounts for the rise · .. to use his honestly acquired property or of FEE. For example, Washington-based savings in his own way- spend it foolishly, Americans for Tax Reform, led by Grover invest it wisely, or even give it away. Norquist, says that the typical American enjoys personal freedom beginning on July ·.. to offer his services or products for sale 9th when he or she will have paid for the cost on his own terms, even ifhe loses money on of taxes and regulation imposed by govern­ the deal. ment. The Norquist calculation may suggest · .. to buy or not to buy any service or that today's American is more than half­ product offered for sale, even if the refusal slave. displeases the seller. In the second half of its century, with public opinion continuing to rule the roost as ·.. to disagree with any other person, even it has for millennia, FEE carries on its fight when the majority is on the side ofthe other to shape that opinion for better ends and person. means by continuing to promote Leonard Read's boundless optimism and Freedom ·.. to study and learn whatever strikes his Philosophy. fancy, as long as it seems to him worth the -WILLIAM H. PETERSON cost and effort of studying and learning it. Guest Editor ·.. to do as he pleases in general, as long as he doesn't infringe the equal right and op­ portunity of every other person to do as he The May 1996 issue of The Freeman pleases. will be a celebration of 50 years of FEE-and 40 years of The Freeman. -LEONARD E. READ, 1898-1983 Founding President ofFEE

131 FEE Classic Reprint

The America We Lost by Mario A. Pei

hen I first came to America in 1908, I at the internal-revenue barriers and pay duty W learned a new meaning of the word to the government, and so did the farmers "liberty"-freedom from government. who brought in the city's food supply every I did not learn a new meaning for morning. No business could be started or ,'democracy." The European country from run without the official sanction ofa hundred which I came, Italy, was at that time as bureaucrats. "democratic" as America. It was a consti­ Young people did not dream ofgoing into tutional monarchy, with a parliament, free business for themselves; they dreamed of a and frequent elections, lots of political par­ modest but safe governmentjob where they ties, and plenty of freedom of religion, would have tenure, security, and a pitiful speech, press, and assembly. pension at the end oftheir plodding careers. But my native country was government­ There was grinding taxation to support the ridden. A vast bureaucracy held it in its many government functions and the innu­ countless tentacles. Regardless ofthe party merable public servants. Everybody hated orcoalition ofparties that might be in power the government-not just the party in at the moment, the government was every­ power, but the government itself. They had where. Wherever one looked, one saw signs even coined a phrase, "It's pouring-thief ofthe ever-present government-in the uni­ ofa government!" as though even the evils forms of numberless royal, rural, and mu­ ofnature were the government's fault. Yet, nicipal policemen, soldiers, officers, gold­ I repeat, the country was democratically braided functionaries ofall sorts. You could run, with all the trappings of a many-party not take a step without government inter­ system and all the freedoms of which we in vention. America boast today. Many industries and businesses were gov­ ernment-owned and government-run-rail­ Freedom from Government roads, telegraphs, salt, and tobacco among them. No agreement, however trivial, was America in those days made you open legal unless written on government-stamped your lungs wide and inhale great gulps of paper. Ifyou stepped out ofthe city into the freedom-laden air, for here was one addi­ country and came back with a ham, a loafof tional freedom-freedom from government. bread, or a bottle of wine, you had to stop The government was conspicuous by its very absence. There were no men in uni­ Mario Pei, now deceased, was Professor of form, save occasional cops and firemen, no Romance Philology at Columbia University. This essay appeared in the Saturday Evening visible bureaucrats, no stifling restrictions, Post ofMay 31, 1952, andwas republished by the no government monopolies. It was wonder­ Foundation later that year. ful to get used to the American system: To 132 133 learn that a contract was valid ifwritten on the boundless opportunity that all Ameri­ the side ofa house; that you could move not cans seemed to consider their birthright. only from the city to the country but from Those same Americans loved their govern­ state to state and never be asked what your ment then. It was there to help, protect, and business was or whether you had anything defend them, not to restrict, befuddle, and to declare; that you could open and conduct harass them. At the same time, they did not your own business, provided it was a legit­ look to the government for a livelihood or imate one, without government interfer­ for special privileges and handouts. They ence; that you could go from one end ofthe were independent men in the full sense of year to the other and never have contact the word. with the national government, save for the Foreign-born citizens have been watching cheery postman who delivered your mail with alarm the gradual Europeanization of with a speed and efficiency unknown today; America over the past twenty years. They that there were no national taxes, save have seen the growth of the familiar Euro­ hidden excises and import duties that you pean-style government octopus, along with did not even know you paid. the vanishing of the American spirit of In that horse-and-buggy America, if you freedom and opportunity and its replace­ made an honest dollar, you could pocket it ment by a breathless search for "security" or spend it without having to figure what that is doomed to defeat in advance in a portion of it you owed the government or world where nothing, not even life itself, is what possible deductions you could allege secure. against that government's claims. You did Far more than the native-born, they are in not have to keep books and records ofevery a position to make comparisons. They see bit ofincome and expenditure orrun the risk that America is fast becoming a nineteenth­ ofbeing called a liar and a cheat by someone century-model European country. They are in authority. asked to believe that this is progress. But Above all, the national ideal was not the they know from bitter experience that itjust obscure security of a government job, but isn't so. D

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Fallacies of Uncritical Multiculturalism by Tibor R. Machan

ome ofthe trends in our country are new dence; ofcourse, persons from almost every Sonly if you have very little knowledge of nation in the world, come here as to an human history. Such is the case with the assylum from oppression; Each brings with current multiculturalism craze on our col­ him prejudices in favor of the habits of his lege and university campuses. own countrymen. .. ." (Quoted in "End­ The idea is that no culture is better than paper," New York Times, November 5, any other, so it is only fair for us to pay heed 1995, p. 46.) to them all. As a consequence, there is now While diversity is pervasive in a free much agitation around the country for drop­ society, when it comes to such differences ping the emphasis on the Great Books, since as religious practices, political regimes, these were written mostly by Europeans. forms ofjurisprudence, types of marriages, Instead, various campuses are requiring that and so forth, one cannot be so uncritical of their students encounter writings from all multiculturalism. In some countries crimi­ cultures. Well, not really all, since cultures nals are punished so severely that it is are almost as numerous as people, at least simply intolerable for any society that rec­ over time. Also, who knows all the cultures ognizes individual rights and prizes human that exist now-or even what exactly de­ decency. Women in certain places are so fines a unified culture. (Should we include subservient to men that even to suggest the Cosa Nostra? How about the Nazis?) some changes meets with violent rebuffs. Now multiculturalism may seem innocent Such treatment cannot be dismissed as enough, mainly because we tend to think of merely a cultural difference-it does vio­ cultural differences largely in terms offood, lence to anyone's essential humanity, dress, music, dance, and customs. And this whether so recognized or not. In many kind of multiculturalism has always been cultures throughout the world children are part of American society. In 1798 a young beaten and tortured in the name of disci­ man, J. M. Holley, wrote to his brother that pline, a practice that would be child abuse in "thediversity ofdress, manners, & customs our society. Again, this cultural difference is is greater in America, than in any other far from benign. country in the world, the reason ofwhich, is Interestingly, just at a time when so many very obvious. It is considered as a country people are concerned about other people's where people enjoy liberty and indepen- sensibilities-so that how we talk about various people is virtually mandated-we Dr. Machan teaches Philosophy at Auburn Uni­ also insist that all sorts of different cultures versity, Alabama. be honored for their various ways of think- 134 135 ing and talking. Yet, ifwe really honored the stressing, namely, practicing fairness and way some cultures talk about others, we paying careful attention, are not embraced would have to tolerate contradictory prac­ everywhere. In certain parts ofIndia people tices. We would at once allow insults to fly, do not give a hoot about fairness and toler­ but demand that everyone speak with equal ance but proceed to kill anyone who defies respect about everyone else. The simple fact local custom. Tolerance of diversity is rare is that in some cultures it is perfectly ac­ even in Western Europe, outside of the ceptable to insult members of other cul­ major cosmopolitan cities. tures. I know for a fact that in many Euro­ One reason why in most of our universi­ pean and Asian cultures people openly and ties we have stressed the tradition of the unhesitatingly debase and deride members Great Books, focusing, for example, on the of other cultures simply for being different. works of Greek, European, and British Consider, also, how many people in the philosophers, is that these thinkers have academic world urge us to honor Native grappled hard with just the issues that even Americans or Indians. Yet, do they realize multiculturalists find irresistible. What is that there were many different groups of truth? What is justice? What is art? What is aboriginal people on this continent, not all of knowledge? What is nature? What is God? them deserving of admiration? Not all Na­ What is liberty, equality, or order? What is tive Americans were equally peaceful and law? What are rights? gentle, quite the contrary. Many other cultures, however, have Even Mrican-Americans could not sensi­ tended to focus their concerns much more bly defend all the practices of their ances­ narrowly. And the result has been that they tors, some ofwhom actually spurred on the remained a tad parochial. In such cultures black slave trade. any suggestion of multiculturalism would The demand for fairness to all cultures is meet with ridicule-not even a gesture of predicated on a misunderstanding, namely, consideration would be forthcoming. that cultures consist mainly of benign char­ So, while it is informative and even cour­ acteristics, nothing mean and nasty. Once teous to open one's mind to what other we admit that different cultures may exhibit people across the world are thinking and various degrees of evil, not simply benign doing, it is by no means a forgone conclusion dissimilarities, it immediately becomes per­ that all these are of equal merit. The very fectly justified to ask which, on the whole, fact that multiculturalism has made its in­ exhibit the best characteristics. This is not roads in our culture suggests that ours is an easy thing to deal with, since what is indeed something of a special culture, even "best" is itself often unthinkingly deter­ if its problems are evident as well. mined from within a culture. Few people Multiculturalists tend to intimidate us take the time and trouble to consider more with their suggestion that we are being stable and universal standards than those unfair. Yet, in what other culture would they they have picked up in their own cultures. be able to make such a suggestion, to be care­ Yet, the very points multiculturalists are fully listened to, and peacefully debated? D THEFREEMAN IDEAS ON L1BERlY

The Rise of Government and the Decline of Morality by James A. Dorn

Government and Morality incentives for moral conduct and blurs the distinction between right and wrong. he growth ofgovernment has politicized More government spending is not the T life and weakened the nation's moral answer to our social, economic, or cultural fabric. Government intervention-in the problems. The task is not to reinvent gov­ economy, in the community, and in soci­ ernment orto give politics meaning; the task ety-has increased the payofffrom political is to limit government and revitalize civil action and reduced the scope of private society. Government meddling will only action. People have become more depen­ make matters worse. dent on the State and have sacrificed free­ Ifwe want to help the disadvantaged, we dom for a false sense of security. do not do so by making poverty pay, by The most obvious signs ofmoral decay in restricting markets, by prohibiting school America are the prevalence of out-of­ choice, by discouraging thrift, orby sending wedlock births, the breakup offamilies, the the message that the principal· function of failure ofpublic education, and the eruption government is to take care ofus. Rather, we ofcriminal activity. But there are other signs do so by eliminating social engineering and as well: the decline in civility, the lack of welfare, by cultivating free markets, and by integrity in both public and private life, and returning to our moral heritage. the growth of litigation as the chief way to settle disputes. One cannot blame government for all of Early Twentieth-Century society's ills, but there is no doubt that Virtue: Lessons from the economic and social legislation overthe past Immigrants 50 years has had a negative impact on virtue. Individuals lose their moral bearing when At the turn of the century, there was no they are not held accountable for their welfare state. Family and social bonds were actions. The internal moral compass that strong, and civil society flourished in nu­ normally guides individual behavior will no merous fraternal and religious organiza­ longer function when the State undermines tions. Total government spending was less than 10 percent of GNP and the federal government's powers were narrowly lim­ Mr. Dorn is vice presidentforacademic affairs at the Cato Institute and director ofCato's Project ited. on Civil Society. This essay is based on his Immigrants were faced with material pov­ Chautauqua Institution lecture in 1995. erty, true, but they were not wretched. 136 137

There was a certain moral order in everyday daily and the vast majority of inner-city life, which began in the home·and spread to births are to unwed mothers receiving Aid to the outside community. Baltimore's Polish Families with Dependent Children. In addi­ immigrants provide a good example. Like tion to the moral decay, high tax rates and other immigrants, they arrived with virtu­ regulatory overkill have driven businesses ally nothing except the desire to work hard and taxpayers out of the city and slowed and to live in a free country. Their ethos of economic development. It's not a pretty liberty and responsibility is evident in a 1907 picture. housing report describing the Polish com­ In sum, the growth ofgovernment and the munity in Fells Point: rise of the "transfer society" have under­ mined the work ethic and substituted an A remembered Saturday evening inspec­ ethos of dependence for an ethos of liberty tion of five apartments in a house [on] and responsibility. Virtue and civil society Thames Street, with their whitened floors have suffered in the process, as has eco­ and shining cook stoves, with the dishes nomic welfare. gleaming on the neatly ordered shelves, the piles of clean clothing laid out for Sunday, and the general atmosphere of preparation for the Sabbath, suggested The Role of Government: standards that would not have disgraced a Con8icting Visions Puritan housekeeper. Market-Liberal Vision. From a classical­ Yet, according to the report, a typical liberal perspective, the primary functions of Polish home consisted "of a crowded one­ government are to secure "the blessings of or two-room apartment, occupied by six or liberty" and "establish justice"-not by eight people, and located two floors above mandating outcomes, but by setting mini­ the common water supply." mum standards ofjust conduct and leaving Even though wages were low, Polish individuals free to pursue their own values Americans sacrificed to save and pooled within the law. The "sum of good govern­ their resources to help each other by found­ ment," wrote Jefferson, is to "restrain men ing building and loan associations, as Linda from injuring one another," to "leave them Shopes noted in The Baltimore Book. By ... free to regulate their own pursuits of 1929, 60 percent of Polish families were industry and improvement," and to "not homeowners-without any government as­ take from the mouth oflabor the bread it has sistance. earned." Today, after more than 50 years of the The Jeffersonian philosophy ofgood gov­ welfare state, and after spending $5 trillion ernment was widely shared in nineteenth­ on anti-poverty programs since the mid­ century America. Indeed, Jeffersonian de­ 1960s, Baltimore and other American cities mocracy became embodied in what John are struggling for survival. Self-reliance has O'Sullivan, editor ofthe United States Mag­ given way to dependence and a loss of azine and Democratic Review, called the respect for persons and property. "voluntary principle" or the "principle of The inner-city landscape is cluttered with freedom." In 1837, O'Sullivan wrote, crime-infested public housing and public schools that are mostly dreadful, dangerous, The best government is that which gov­ and amoral-where one learns more about erns least. ... [Government] should be survival than virtue. And the way to survive confined to the administration ofjustice, is not to take responsibility for one's own for the protection of the natural equal life and family, but to vote for politicians rights ofthe citizen, and the preservation who have the power to keep the welfare of the social order. In all other respects, checks rolling. Dysfunctional behavior now the voluntary principle, the principle of seems almost normal as people are shot freedom ... affords the true golden rule. 138 THE FREEMAN • MARCH 1996

During the nineteenth century, most welfare rights. Today, more than half the Americans took it for granted that the fed­ federal budget is spent on entitlements, and eral government had no constitutional au­ social welfare spending is 14 percent ofGNP. thority to engage in public charity (i. e., to During the transition from limited govern­ legislate forced transfers to help some indi­ ment to the welfare state, freedom has come viduals at the expense of others). It was to mean freedom from responsibility. Such generally understood that the powers ofthe freedom, however, is not true freedom but federal government were delegated, enu­ a form of tyranny, which creates moral and merated, and therefore limited, and that social chaos. there was no explicit authority for the wel­ The modern liberal's vision of govern­ fare state. In 1794, Madison expressed the ment is based on a twisted understanding of commonly held view ofthe welfare state: "I rights and justice-an understanding that cannot undertake to lay my ,finger on that clashes with the principle offreedom inher­ article of the Constitution which grant[s] a ent in the higher law of the Constitution. right to Congress ofexpending, on objects of Welfare rights or entitlements are "imper­ benevolence, the money of their constitu­ fect rights" orpseudo-rights; they cannot be ents." From a classical-liberal or market­ exercised without violating what legal schol­ liberal perspective, then, the role ofgovern­ ars call the "perfect right" to private prop­ ment is not to "do good at taxpayers' erty. Rights to welfare-whether to food expense," but "to prevent harm" by estab­ stamps, public housing, or medical care­ lishing rules ofjust conduct and a rule oflaw. create a legal obligation to help others. In The general welfare clause (art. 1, sec. 8) contrast, the right'to property, understood of the U.S. Constitution cannot be used to in the Lockean sense, merely obligates in­ justify the welfare state. That clause simply dividuals to refrain from taking what is not states that the federal government, in exer­ theirs-namely, the life, liberty, or estate of cising its enumerated powers, should exer­ another. cise them to "promote the general welfare," For the modem liberal, justice refers to not to promote particular interests. The distributive justice or social justice. But clause was never meant to be an open "social justice" is a vague term, subject to invitation to expand government far beyond all sorts of abuse if made the goal of public its primary role of night watchman. policy. Indeed, when the role ofgovernment "With respect to the words 'general wel­ is to do good with other people's money, fare,'" wrote Madison, "I have always there is no end to the mischief government regarded them as qualified by the detail of can cause. powers connected with them. To take them Many Americans seem to have lost sight in a literal and unlimited sense would be a ofthe idea that the role ofgovernment is not metamorphosis of the Constitution into a to instill values, but to protect rights that are characterwhich there is a host ofproofs was consistent with a society offree and respon­ not contemplated by its creators." sible individuals. We have a right to pursue Yet, what Madison feared happened-as happiness, but there can be no legal guar­ his vision of government was overtaken by antee that we will obtain it without depriving the views of people who sought to use others of their liberty and their property. government, not to prevent harm, but to When democracy becomes unlimited, the "do good" at taxpayers' expense. power of government becomes unlimited, and there is no end to the demands on the Modern Liberal Vision. The transforma­ public purse. Democracy then becomes tion of the Framers' constitutional vision crude majoritarianism in which the "win­ began with the Progressive Era, accelerated ners" are allowed to impose their will and with the New Deal, and mushroomed with vision of the "good society" on everyone the Great Society's War on Poverty, which else. In such a system politics becomes a created new entitlements and enshrined fight of all against all, like the Hobbesian THE RISE OF GOVERNMENT AND THE DECLINE OF MORALITY 139 jungle, and nearly everyone is a net loser as society, people are entitled to what they taxes rise, deficits soar, and economic own, not to what others own. Yet, under the growth slows. pretense of morality, politicians and advo­ cacy groups have made the "right to wel­ Bankruptcy of the fare" the accepted dogma of a new state Welfare State religion, in which politicians are the high priests and self-proclaimed "benefactors" Most voters recognize that the welfare of humanity. state is inefficient and that there is a built-in But "the emperor has no clothes": poli­ incentive to perpetuate poverty. It should be ticians pretend to "do good," but they do so common sense that when government prom­ with other people's money. Politicians put ises something for nothing, demand will on their moral garb, but there is really grow and so will the welfare state. Indeed, nothing there. Government benevolence, in total government spending on social welfare reality, is a naked taking. Public charity is is now over $1 trillion per year. Yet only $1 forced charity, or what the great French of every $6 of social welfare spending goes liberal Frederic Bastiat called "legal plun­ to families with less than poverty-level in­ der"; it is not a virtue but a vice. comes. For all the money spent on fighting poverty since 1965, about $5 trillion, the Constitutionally Bankrupt. The welfare official poverty rate has remained roughly state is also constitutionally bankrupt; it has the same, about 14 percent. Government no basis in the Framers' Constitution of waste, however, is only part ofthe problem; liberty. By changing the role ofgovernment the welfare state is also intellectually, mor­ from a limited one ofprotecting persons and ally, and constitutionally bankrupt. property to an unlimited one of achieving "social justice," Congress, the courts, and Intellectually Bankrupt. Itis intellectually the president have broken their oaths to bankrupt because increasing the scope of uphold the Constitution. market exchange, not aid, is the only viable In contrast, Congressman Davy Crockett, way to alleviate poverty. The best way to who was elected in 1827, told his colleagues, help the poor is not by redistributing income "We have the right, as individuals, to give but by generating economic growth. Pov­ away as much of our own money as we erty rates fell more before the War on please in charity; but as members of Con­ Poverty when economic growth was higher. gress we have no right to appropriate a The failure ofCommunism shows that any dollar of the public money." attenuation ofprivate property rights weak­ ens markets and reduces choice. Individual What Should Be Done? welfare is lowered as a result. The welfare state has attenuated private property rights Polls show that three of four Americans and weakened the informal rules ofmanners distrust government and that more young and morals that make life worthwhile. Real people believe in UFOs than in the future of growth has slowed as a result. From 1889 Social Security. Those sentiments express a through 1919, real growth averaged 4 per­ growing skepticism about the modern liberal cent per year while government consumed state. What should be done? 10 percent ofGNP. From 1973 through 1992, First, and foremost, we need to expose however, real growth averaged only 2.3 the intellectual, constitutional, and moral percent while government consumed 36 per­ bankruptcy ofthe welfare state. We need to cent of GNP. change the way we think about government and restore an ethos of liberty and respon­ Morally Bankrupt. In addition to being sibility. The political process can then begin inefficient and intellectually bankrupt, the changing the direction of government and welfare state is morally bankrupt. In a free rolling back the welfare state. 140 THE FREEMAN • MARCH 1996

America has a great future, but that future Welfare reform is in the air, but the is endangered by a federal government that elimination of the welfare state is still con­ has become bloated and unable to perform sidered heresy by most politicians. They even its rudimentary functions. The col­ consider themselves "benefactors," albeit lapse of Communism and the failure of with other people's money. Yet the role of socialism should have been warning enough government is not to legislate morality-an that it is time to change direction. impossible and dangerous goal-or even to It is time to get government out of the ,'empower people"; the role ofgovernment business ofcharity and to let private virtue, is to allow people the freedom to grow into responsibility, and benevolence grow along responsible citizens and to exercise their with civil society-just as they did more inalienable rights. than 150 years ago when Alexis de Tocque­ During the past 50 years, the welfare state ville, in his great study of Democracy in has divorced freedom from responsibility America, wrote: and created a false sense of morality. Good intentions have led to bad policy. The moral When an American asks for the cooper­ state of the union can be improved by ation of his fellow citizens it is seldom following two simple rules: "Do no harm" refused, and I have often seen it afforded and "do good at your own expense." Those spontaneously and with great good will. rules are perfectly consistent in the private ... If some great and sudden calamity moral universe. It is only when the second befalls a family, the purses of a thousand rule is replaced by "Do good at the expense strangers are at once willingly opened, of others" that social harmony turns into and small but numerous donations pour in chaos as interest groups compete at the pub­ to relieve their distress. lic trough for society's scarce resources. D

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The Guaranteed Life by Maxwell Anderson

, 'Agovernment is a group of men or- ment must never be trusted, must be con­ ganized to sell protection to the stantly watched, and must be drastically inhabitants ofa limited area at monopolistic limited in its scope, because it, too, is a prices." So said Peter Stuyvesant in Knick­ selfish interest and will automatically be­ erbocker Holiday, and so I believe now. In come a monopoly in crime and devour the other words there's no such thing as a civilization over which it presides unless "good" government; one and all they par­ there are definite and positive checks on its take of the nature of rackets. But govern­ activities. ment is better than anarchy, and was in­ The Constitution is a monument to our vented as insurance against anarchy. And forefathers' distrust of the State, and the some kinds of government are far better division of powers among the legislative, than others. Specifically, our American ex­ judicial, and executive branches succeeded periment has worked so well that we can so well for more than a century in keeping point to it as one of the most successful in the sovereign authority in its place that our the history of the world, if not the most government has become widely regarded as successful. a naturally wise and benevolent institution, In Knickerbocker Holiday I tried to re­ capable of assuming the whole burden of mind the audience of the attitude toward social and economic justice. But there was government which was prevalent in this nothing natural or accidental about it. Our country at the time ofthe revolution of 1776 government has done so well because ofthe and throughout the early years ofthe repub­ wary thinking that went into its making. lic. At that time it was generally believed, as I believe now, that the gravest and most A Selfish Interest constant danger to a man's life, liberty, and happiness is the government under which he The thinking behind our Constitution was lives. dominated by such men as Franklin and It was believed then that a civilization is Jefferson, men with a high regard for the a balance of selfish interests, and that a rights of the individual, combined with a government is necessary as an arbiter cold and realistic attitude toward the bless­ among these interests, but that the govern- ings ofcentral authority. Knowing that gov­ ernment is a selfish interest, they treated it Maxwell Anderson (1888-1959) was a noted as such, and asked of it no more than a American playwright. selfish interest can give. This essay was first written as a preface to his Knickerbocker Holiday in 1938. It was rewritten But the coddled young reformer of our in 1950 and published as a FEE "In Brief' day, looking out on his world, finding merit pamphlet. often unrewarded and chicanery trium- 141 142 THE FREEMAN • MARCH 1996 phant, throws prudence to the winds and ian, running their business and making their grasps blindly at any weapon which seems decisions for them. This is statism, or Stalin­ to him likely to destroy the purse-proud ism, no matter who advocates it, and it's haves and scatter their belongings among plain treason to freedom. the deserving have-nots. Now he is right in believing that the accumulation oftoo much Ward of the State wealth and power in a few hands is a danger to his civilization and his liberty. But when And life is infinitely less important than the weapon he finds is economic planning, freedom. A free man has a value to himself and when the law he enacts sets up bureaus and perhaps to his time; a ward of the state to run the nation's business, he is fighting a is useless to himself-useful only as so lesser evil by accepting a greater and more many foot-pounds of energy serving those deadly one, and he should be aware of that who manage to set themselves above him. A fact. people which has lost its freedom might better be dead, for it has no importance in Monopolistic Prices the scheme ofthings except as an evil power behind a dictator. In our hearts we all A government is always "organized to despise the man who wishes the state to take sell protection to the inhabitants ofa limited care of him, who would not rather live area at monopolistic prices." The members meagerly as he pleases than suffer a fat and ofa government are not only in business, but regimented existence. Those who are not in a business which is in continual danger of willing to sacrifice their lives for their liberty lapsing into pure gangsterism, pure terror­ have never been worth saving. Throughout ism and plundering, buttered over at the top remembered time every self-respecting man by a hypocritical pretense at patriotic un­ has been willing to defend his liberty with his selfishness. The continent of Europe has life. seen too many such governments lately, and If our country goes totalitarian out of a our own government is rapidly assuming soft-headed humanitarian impulse to make economic and social responsibilities which life easy for the many, we shall get what we take us in the same direction. vote for and what we deserve, for the choice Whatever the motives behind a govern­ is still before us, but we shall have betrayed ment-dominated economy, it can have but the race of men, and among them the very one result, a loss of individual liberty in have-nots whom we subsidize. Our Western thought, speech, and action. A guaranteed continent still has the opportunity to resist life is not free. Social security is a step the government-led rush ofbarbarism which toward the abrogation of the individual and is taking Europe back toward Attila, but we his absorption into that robot which he has can only do it by running our government, invented to serve him-the paternal state. and by refusing to let it run us. When I have said this to some of the If the millions of workingmen in this youthful proponents of guaranteed exis­ country who are patiently paying their So­ tence, I have been met with the argument cial Security dues could glimpse the bureau­ that men must live, and that when the cratic absolutism which that act presages for economic machinery breaks down, men themselves and their children they would must be cared for lest they starve or revolt. repudiate the whole monstrous and dishon­ This is quite true, and nobody is opposed to est business overnight. When a government helping his fellow man. But the greatest takes over a people's economic life it be­ enemies of democracy, the most violent comes absolute, and when it has become reactionaries, are those who have lost faith absolute it destroys the arts, the minds, the in the capacity of a free people to manage liberties, and the meaning of the people it their own affairs and wish to set up the governs. It is not an accident that Germany, government as a political and social guard- the first paternalistic state of modem Eu- THE GUARANTEED LIFE 143 rope, was seized by an uncontrollable dic­ That was exactly what the wary old tator who brought on the second world war; founding fathers wanted, and if we are wise not an accident that Russia, adopting a we shall keep it, for no scheme in the history centrally administered economy for human­ of the world has succeeded so well in itarian reasons, has arrived at a tyranny maintaining the delicate balance between bloodier and more absolute than that of the personal liberty and the minimum of au­ Czars.... Men who are fed by their gov­ thority which is necessary for the free ernment will soon be driven down to the growth ofideas in a tolerant society. But we status of slaves or cattle. shall not keep our Constitution, our free­ All these dangers were foreseen by the dom, nor our free elections, if we let our political leaders who put our Constitution government slide gradually into the hands of together after the revolution against Eng­ economic planners who bribe one class of land. The Constitution is so built that while men after another with a state-administered we adhere to it we cannot be governed by dole. one man or one faction, and when we have Since Knickerbocker Holiday was writ­ made mistakes we reserve the right to ten, the power ofgovernment in the United change our minds. The division of powers States has grown like a fungus in wet and the rotation of offices were designed to weather, price supports and unemployment protect us against dictatorship and arbitrary benefits and farm subsidies are the rule, not authority. The fact that there are three the exception, and our government has branches of government makes for a salu­ turned into a giant give-away program, of­ tary delay and a blessed inefficiency, the fering far more for votes than was ever paid elective rotation makes for a government by the most dishonest ward-heeler in the not by cynical professionals, but by nor­ days of Mark Hanna. . .. mally honest and fairly incompetent ama­ The guaranteed life turns out to be not teurs. only not free-it's not safe. D

FREE TO TRY

his concise, thought-provoking COlleCtl.·on of two dozen classic essays from The Freeman demonstrates that the risk-taking entrepreneur is Tactually a creative visionary - indeed, the mainspring of human progress. Filled with entertaining stories of successful capitalists, Free to Try reveals the strength of character required to rise "from rags to riches" - how the profit-seeking of individuals also benefits society at large - why"specula­ tors" should be praised, not despised - and why capitalism is the only social system compatible with the productive needs of the entrepreneur, and the many benefits he provides to us all. For students, teachers, public officials, and ordinary citizens alike, Free to Try provides a potent antidote to centuries of poisonous myths about business­ men and what they do. It offers a ringing and inspiring defense of creative market activit~ and of those who labor heroically to provide us with goods and services that make our economy the envy of the world. FREE TO TRY 144 pages + index, paperback, $14.95. Ideas and Consequences by Lawrence W. Reed

My Kind of President

hen historians are asked to grade the icans made him their 22nd president. They W men who have served as America's did it again in 1892. In his Pulitzer· Prize­ presidents, they usually give high marks to winning biography Grover Cleveland: A the so-called "activist" ones-those who Study in Courage, Allan Nevins described expanded the frontiers of the central gov­ the traits that explain such a meteoric po­ ernment, pushed taxes and spending higher, litical career: and left a mark on the country by foisting In Grover Cleveland the greatness lies vast new bureaucracies on future genera­ in typical rather than unusual quali­ tions. ties. ... He possessed honesty, cour­ I prefer activist presidents, too, though of age, firmness, independence, and com­ a different variety. I give high marks to those mon sense. But he possessed them in a presidents who actively sought to uphold degree that others did not. His honesty the Constitution, and who worked to expand was of the undeviating type which never the frontiers offreedom. I'll take a president compromised an inch; his courage was who leaves us alone over one who can't immense, rugged, unconquerable; his in­ keep his hands out ofother people's pockets dependence was elemental and self­ any day of the week. Honesty, frugality, assertive.... Under storms that would candor, and a love for liberty are premium have bent any man of lesser strength he qualities in my kind of president. ploughed straight forward, never flinch­ The one man among post-war presidents ing, always following the path that his (post-Civil War, that is) who exemplified conscience approved to the end. those qualities best was Grover Cleveland, who remains the only man ever to serve two Cleveland said what he meant and meant nonconsecutive terms in the White House. what he said. He did not lust for political This month marks the 159th anniversary of office and never felt he had to cut corners or his birth in Caldwell, New Jersey. equivocate or connive in order to get When Grover Cleveland was elected elected. A man who knew where he stood, mayor ofBuffalo in 1881, few people outside he was so forthright and plain-spoken that ofwestern New York had ever heard ofhim. he makes Harry Truman seem like an inde­ A year later, he was elected Governor ofthe cisive warner by comparison. state. Two years after that, in 1884, Amer- Cleveland took a firm stand against a nascent welfare state. Frequent warnings Lawrence W. Reed, economist and author, is against the redistributive nature of govern­ President of The Mackinac Center for Public Policy, a free market research and educational ment were characteristic of his tenure. He organization headquartered in Midland, Michi­ regarded as a "serious danger" the notion gan. that government should dispense favors and 144 145 advantages to individuals or their busi­ prices, and violate the people's freedom to nesses. patronize the sellers of their choice. In vetoing a bill in 1887 that would have On the matter ofa sound currency, Cleve­ appropriated a mere $10,000 in aid for land stood firm as a mountain. Itwas, in fact, drought-stricken Texas farmers, Cleveland the paramount issue of his second term. noted that "though the people support the Debtor farmers, silver mining interests, and Government, the Government should not inflationist quacks-during the terms of support the people." For reliefofcitizens in other presidents-had secured passage of misfortune, the president felt it was impor­ laws that belched out depreciated silver cur­ tant to rely upon "the friendliness and rency and ballooned the nation's papermoney charity of our countrymen." supply. With the country's financial system That veto was one of many. In fact, reeling from Congress's monetary misman­ Cleveland in his first term refused to sign agement, Cleveland defended the gold stan­ twice as many bills as did all previous 21 dard as a matter of honesty and integrity. presidents combined. Most of those bills Even in foreign policy, Cleveland's in­ were nothing more than cynical attempts stincts were principled and sound. He was a by somebody to get something from some­ noninterventionist who thought that other body else by the force of the government's nations should keep to their own legitimate gun. business too. He invoked the Monroe Doc­ He struck down one river or harbor im­ trine and suppressed Great Britain's terri­ provement bill after another. Disdainful of torial ambitions in this hemisphere, partic­ pork barrel politics, he felt that those who ularly its phony claims against Venezuela. would use and gain from such projects He canceled President Harrison's proposal should pay for them. to the Senate for annexing Hawaii, arguing Cleveland broke with the common prac­ that America had no right to acquire the tic,e of presidents' bloating the federal bu­ islands by engineering the overthrow of reaucracy with their cronies. As the first Queen Liliuokalani. Democrat to win the White House since Grover Cleveland wasn't perfect. Under James Buchanan in 1856, he was expected the illusion that reasonable regulation would by many in his party to pass out the plush undo the harm that railroads had done with government jobs they longed for. But those the subsidies and privileges that previous who longed for patronage underestimated administrations had given them, he signed Cleveland's commitment to good, clean, into law the bill that created the Interstate and limited government. He maintained the Commerce Commission. He did not antici­ highest standards, making appointments pate the anti-competitive force the ICC when necessary and then, only of those eventually became. whose character and qualifications were Cleveland was also persuaded to take an beyond reproach. obscure bureau from within the government Close political advisers strongly urged and make it the new Department of Agri­ Cleveland in 1887 to avoid pushing for lower culture in his first term. In his second term, tariffs until after the following year's elec­ however, he whacked away at its budget and tion. Too risky, they told him. But the canceled programs that bestowed free seeds president's mind was made up and in char­ and other handouts on farmers. acteristic fashion he said so. "I did not wish This year marks the one hundredth anni­ to be re-elected without having the people versary of Grover Cleveland's last full year understand just where I stood ... and then in office. As Americans prepare to choose spring the question on them after my re­ another president, they would do well to election," he later declared. He rightly ar­ ponder the reasons why their ancestors gued that tariffs stifle competition, raise picked this one twice. 0 THEFREEMAN IDEAS ON LIBERTY

America's Other Democracy by William H. Peterson

eonard Read used to tell the story of a Think about it: There's a dominion within L shopper in a crowded department store our dominion that works without pork, during the Christmas rush. After buying taxes, political parties, bureaucratic chica­ some gifts, she forges her way to the gift­ nery, and government waste. What is more, wrap counter, telling the clerk how jammed this second democracy, while hardly per­ the store is. "Yes," says the clerk, "it's our fection, is strictly voluntary, self-regulating, best day so far." Then the shopper walks and a lot more moral than the first democ­ over to the post office to mail her gift racy. On the critical matters ofconsent and packages, again remarking to a clerk on the participation, this second democracy also crowd in the post office. "Yes," muttered wins hands down. the clerk, "it's our worst day so far." Well, where is this unsung Shangri-La The Read story ties into the partisan where the people themselves command and fracas over the federal budget, a fracas control, direct and manage a slew of hier­ between those who would "reinvent" gov­ archies of authority? ernment and those who would "disinvent" It's all around, under your nose, as near it. Initially, the disinventors would elimi­ as your telephone from which you can call nate the U.S. Commerce, Energy, and a doctor or plumber, or order a pizza or Education Departments and some 300 pro­ airline tickets. This democracy is the com­ grams, including funding for the National mon-if unrealized and unappreciated­ Endowment for the Arts and the Corpora­ marketplace. Indeed, it's the whole private tion for Public Broadcasting. Down would sector. go a big chunk of government. Consider. In America's first democracy Reinventors shake their heads and ask: 104 million votes were cast in the last But what, ifanything, takes the place ofthat Presidential election. In the second democ­ chunk? racy, billions ofvotes are cast daily to make The answer, it seems to me, swings on phone calls or watch TV or pay rent or use perceiving and re-evaluating what amounts some other market facility such as a bank, to America's second democracy. This is a restaurant, gas station, motel, newspaper, largely undiscerned sector under the rule of coin laundry, supermarket, brokerage of­ law which in important respects is larger fice, country club, corner bar, and now than the first. interactive TV or the modernized PC. Throughout, dollars are ballots. Dr. Peterson, Heritage Foundation adjunct scholar, is Distinguished Lundy Professor Emer­ itus ofBusiness Philosophy at Campbell Univer­ The Miracle of the Market sity in North Carolina, and author of a forth­ coming book, Peterson's Law: Why Things Go Note that every day is Election Day in the Wrong, from which this article is drawn. marketplace, that it is based on free choice, 146 147 that it regulates itself with high prices en­ Too, with the marketplace invariably couraging supply and discouraging demand, based on individual consent, it reflects so­ with low prices discouraging supply and cial cooperation and peaceful dealing even encouraging demand. Free prices thus ever with local tensions. Hindus and Muslims, adjust to new conditions, erasing shortages for example, trade with each other-that is, and surpluses as they develop-unheard of vote for each other-in Calcutta, as do in the first democracy. Catholics and Protestants in Belfast, Arabs This is the ordinary extraordinary market and Jews in Jerusalem, blacks and whites in which Nobel Laureate F. A. Hayek called a Johannesburg. "marvel." Marvelous to behold for its in­ In a similar vein, says a wise old IBM herent dynamics and growth. Said Thomas slogan: "World Peace Through World Paine in his Rights ofMan in 1791: "Society Trade." Indeed., So sip your tea from Sri performs for itself almost everything which Lanka, drive your car with gasoline refined is ascribed to government." from oil from Kuwait, eat a banana from Note too that in marketplace democracy Ecuador, enjoy your wine from France, your every producer-candidate is held strictly camera from Japan, your furniture from Fin­ accountable, that he runs scared all the time, land, your cocoa from the Ivory Coast. Mil­ that he daily tries to score with a better lions of people who are strangers help each product at less cost for the sovereign con­ other, cooperate with each other, depend on sumer-sovereign because of his life-or­ each other. What world leader has achieved death power ofthe purse. (Importantly, the such remarkably harmonious domestic and sovereign consumer includes the business international collaboration across the globe? consumer.) To be sure, government is essential to Indeed, the consumer is king or queen, an safeguard life, liberty, and property-oth­ absolute monarch ruling this second domin­ erwise we'd plunge into anarchy. But the ion with an iron hand. Ordering this. Order­ core problem of the last 66 years of hyper­ ing that. Literally. Even lethally. Your active, interventionist government reaches mother (or grandmother or great-grand­ beyond deficit spending and heavy inflation; mother, depending on your age) did in the it is this: iceman in the 1920s and 1930s. How? She Expansion ofthe first democracy means and millions of her cohorts switched their diminution ofthe second-the shrinkage of votes-and bought refrigerators, and today freedom and free enterprise. the iceman cometh no longer. Yet the Father-Knows-Best state Reinventors complain about America's stretches from the Davis-Bacon Act to So­ inequality ofwealth. But they don't mention cial Security, from Medicare to the Envi­ how this wealth is put to work for all ronmental Protection Agency, from the Americans-and at risk. As Ludwig Mises Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation to says in Human Action: "Ownership of the the Fair Labor Standards Act to the pro­ means ofproduction is not a privilege, but a gressive income tax, to thousands of other social liability." state interventions, all highly politicized, all Mises explains that savers, investors, impeding social cooperation. landowners, and all other owners of wealth These interventions are at odds with the are prompted by self-interest to place their Mises concept of market-driven economic property at the highest possible advantage calculation whose lack befuddles state to the consumers. Ifthe capitalists are slow planners and regulators. This lack is the or inept in advantaging the consumers, they Achilles' heel ofsocialism and intervention­ incur losses. And if they don't mend their ism. Nonetheless, state interventions per­ ways, they lose their wealth. Among cor­ sist, boomerang, make things worse, set porate giants who lost market share and had back the second democracy and a key prin­ to play catch-Up: IBM, General Motors, ciple of a free society-consent by the Sears, Xerox. individual. D FEE Classic Reprint

Inequality of Wealth and Incomes by Ludwig von Mises

he market economy-capitalism-is supreme in giving them the power to force Tbased on private ownership of the ma­ all those engaged in production to comply terial means of production and private en­ with their orders. It forces all those engaged trepreneurship. The consumers, by their in production to the utmost exertion in the buying or abstention from buying, ulti­ service of the consumers. It makes compe­ mately determine what should be produced tition work. He who best serves the con­ and in what quantity and quality. They sumers profits most and accumulates riches. render profitable the affairs of those busi­ In a society of the type that Adam Fer­ nessmen who best comply with their wishes guson, Saint-Simon, and Herbert Spencer and unprofitable the affairs ofthose who do called militaristic and present-day Ameri­ not produce what they are asking for most cans call feudal, private property of land urgently. Profits convey control of the fac­ was the fruit of violent usurpation or of tors of production into the hands of those donations on the part of the conquering who are employing them for the best possi­ warlord. Some people owned more, some ble satisfaction of the most urgent needs of less and some nothing because the chieftain the consumers, and losses withdraw them had determined it that way. In such a society from the control of the inefficient business­ it was correct to assert that the abundance men. In a market economy not sabotaged by of the great landowners was the corollary the government the owners of property are of the indigence of the landless. mandataries ofthe consumers as it were. On But it is different in a market economy. the market a daily repeated plebiscite de­ Bigness in business does not impair, but termines who should own what and how improves the conditions of the rest of the much. It is the consumers who make some people. The millionaires are acquiring their people rich and other people penniless. fortunes in supplying the many with articles Inequality of wealth and incomes is an that were previously beyond their reach. If essential feature of the market economy. It laws had prevented them from getting rich, is the implement that makes the consumers the average American household would have to forgo many of the gadgets and Professor Mises (1881-1973), one o/the century's facilities that are today its normal equip­ pre-eminent economic thinkers, was academic ment. This country enjoys the highest stan­ adviser to The Foundation/or Economic Educa­ tion from 1946 until his death. dard ofliving everknown in history because This article first appeared in the May 1955 for several generations no attempts were issue o/Ideas on Liberty, published by FEE. made toward "equalization" and "redistri- 148 149 bution." Inequality ofwealth and incomes is these measures are "economically untena­ the cause ofthe masses' well-being, not the ble" and that they advocated them only cause ofanybody's distress. Where there is because "they necessitate further inroads" a "lower degree of inequality," there is upon the capitalist social order and are necessarily a lower standard ofliving ofthe "unavoidable as a means of entirely revo­ masses. lutionizing the mode ofproduction," i.e., as a means of bringing about socialism. But it is quite a different thing when these Demand for "Distribution" measures which Marx and Engels charac­ terized as "economically untenable" are In the opinion ofthe demagogues inequal­ recommended by people who pretend that ity in what they call the "distribution" of they want to preserve the market economy wealth and incomes is in itself the worst of and economic freedom. These self-styled all evils. Justice would require an equal middle-of-the-road politicians are either distribution. It is therefore both fair and hypocrites who want to bring about social­ expedient to confiscate the surplus of the ism by deceiving the people about their real rich or at least a considerable part of it and intentions, or they are ignoramuses who do to give it to those who own less. This not know what they are talking about. For philosophy tacitly presupposes that such a progressive taxes upon incomes and upon policy will not impair the total quantity estates are incompatible with the preserva­ produced. But even if this were true, the tion of the market economy. amount added to the average man's buying The middle-of-the-road man argues this power would be much smaller than extrav­ way: "There is no reason why a business­ agant popular illusions assume. In fact the man should slacken in the best conduct of luxury of the rich absorbs only a slight his affairs only because he knows that his fraction of the nation's total consumption. profits will not enrich him but will benefit all The much greater part of the rich men's people. Even ifhe is not an altruist who does incomes is not spent for consumption, but not care for lucre and who unselfishly toils saved and invested. It is precisely this that for the common weal, he will have no motive accounts for the accumulation oftheir great to prefer a less efficient performance of his fortunes. If the funds which the successful activities to a more efficient. It is not true businessmen would have ploughed back that the only incentive that impels the great into productive employments are used by captains ofindustry is acquisitiveness. They the state for current expenditure or given to are no less driven by the ambition to bring people who consume them, the further ac­ their products to perfection." cumulation of capital is slowed down or entirely stopped. Then there is no longer any question of economic improvement, tech­ Supremacy of the Consumers nological progress, and a trend toward higher average standards of living. This argumentation entirely misses the When Marx and Engels in the Communist point. What matters is not the behavior of Manifesto recommended "a heavy progres­ the entrepreneurs but the supremacy of the sive or graduated income tax" and "aboli­ consumers. We may take it for granted that tion ofall right ofinheritance" as measures the businessmen will be eager to serve the "to wrest, by degrees, all capital from the consumers to the best oftheir abilities even bourgeoisie," they were consistent from the ifthey themselves do not derive any advan­ point of view of the ultimate end they were tage from their zeal and application. They aiming at, viz., the substitution ofsocialism will accomplish what according to their for the market economy. They were fully opinion best serves the consumers. But then aware of the inevitable consequences of it will no longer be the consumers that these policies. They openly declared that determine what they get. They will have to 150 THE FREEMAN • MARCH 1996 take what the businessmen believe is best Demand for Equalization for them. The entrepreneurs, not the con­ sumers, will then be supreme. The consum­ The supremacy ofthe consumers consists ers will no longer have the power to entrust in their power to hand over control of the control of production to those business­ material factors of production and thereby men whose products they like most and to the conduct ofproduction activities to those relegate those whose products they appre­ who serve them in the most efficient way. ciate less to a more modest position in the This implies inequality of wealth and in­ system. comes. If one wants to do away with in­ If the present American laws concerning equality of wealth and incomes, one must the taxation of the profits of corporations, abandon capitalism and adopt socialism. the incomes ofindividuals and inheritances (The question whether any socialist system had been introduced about sixty years ago, would really give income equality must be all those new products whose consumption left to an analysis of socialism.) has raised the standard of living of the But, say the middle-of-the-road enthusi­ "common man" would either not be pro­ asts, we do not want to abolish inequality duced at all oronly in small quantities for the altogether. We want merely to substitute a benefit of a minority. The Ford enterprises lower degree of inequality for a higher would not exist if Henry Ford's profits had degree. been taxed away as soon as they came into These people look upon inequality as being. The business structure of 1895 would upon an evil. They do not assert that a have been preserved. The accumulation of definite degree of inequality which can be new capital would have ceased or at least exactly determined by a judgment free of slowed down considerably. The expansion any arbitrariness and personal evaluation is of production would lag behind the in­ good and has to be preserved uncondition­ crease of population. There is no need to ally. They, on the contrary, declare inequal­ expatiate about the effects ofsuch a state of ity in itself as bad and merely contend that affairs. a lower degree of it is a lesser evil than a Profit and loss tell the entrepreneur what higher degree in the same sense in which a the consumers are asking for most urgently. smaller quantity of poison in a man's body And only the profits the entrepreneur pock­ is a lesser evil than a larger dose. But if this ets enable him to adjust his activities to the is so, then there is logically in their doctrine demand of the consumers. If the profits are no point at which the endeavors toward expropriated, he is prevented from comply­ equalization would have to stop. ing with the directives given by the consum­ Whether one has already reached a degree ers. Then the market economy is deprived of of inequality which is to be considered low its steering wheel. It becomes a senseless enough and beyond which it is not necessary jumble. to embark upon further measures toward People can consume only what has been equalization, is just a matter of personal produced. The great problem of our age is judgments ofvalue,quite arbitrary, different precisely this: Who should determine what with different people and changing in the is tobe produced and consumed, the people passing of time. As these champions of or the State, the consumers themselves or a equalization appraise confiscation and "re­ paternal government? If one decides in fa­ distribution" as a policy harming only a vor of the consumers, one chooses the minority, viz., those whom they consider to market economy. Ifone decides in favor of be "too" rich, and benefiting the rest-the the government, one chooses socialism. majority-of the people, they cannot op­ There is no third solution. The determina­ pose any tenable argument to those who are tion ofthe purpose for which each unit ofthe asking for more of this allegedly beneficial various factors of production is to be em­ policy. As long as any degree of inequality ployed cannot be divided. is left, there will always be people whom INEQUALITY OF WEALTH AND INCOMES 151 envy impels to press for a continuation of enhance his chances for re-election. For, the equalization policy. Nothing can be under the sway of the doctrines taught by advanced against their inference: Ifinequal­ contemporary pseudo-economists, all but a ity ofwealth and incomes is an evil, there is few reasonable men believe that they are no reason to acquiesce in any degree of it, injured by the mere fact that their own however low; equalization must not stop income is smaller than that of other people before it has completely leveled all individ­ and that it is not a bad policy to confiscate uals' wealth and incomes. this difference. The history of the taxation of profits, There is no use in fooling ourselves. Our incomes and estates in all countries clearly present taxation policy is headed toward a shows that once the principle ofequalization complete equalization of wealth and in­ is adopted, there is no point at which the comes and thereby toward socialism. This further progress ofthe policy ofequalization trend can be reversed only by the cognition can be checked. If, at the time the Sixteenth of the role that profit and loss and the Amendment was adopted, somebody had resulting inequality of wealth and incomes predicted that some years later the income play in the operation of the market econ­ tax progression would reach the height it has omy. People must learn that the accumula­ really attained in our day, the advocates of tion of wealth by the successful conduct of the Amendment would have called him a business is the corollary ofthe improvement lunatic. It is certain that only a small mi­ of their own standard of living and vice nority in Congress will seriously oppose versa. They must realize that bigness in further sharpening of the progressive ele­ business is not an evil, but both the cause ment in the tax rate scales if such a sharp­ and effect of the fact that they themselves ening should be suggested by the Adminis­ enjoy all those amenities, whose enjoyment tration or by a congressman anxious to is called the"American way of life." D

Back in print! LIBERALISM: The Classical Tradition By Ludwig von Mises "I heartily recommend Liberalism, not only as the best introduction to Mises' writings, but also as the finest exposition of classical liberalism-the philosophy of free men, free markets, and limited government." -Robert Hessen Senior Research Fellow, Hoover Institution LIBERALISM: The Classical Tradition by Ludwig von Mises neatly sums up the ideas and principles of nineteenth-century classical liberalism as they apply to the twentieth century. First published in Germany in 1927, Liberalism was published in the United States under the title The Free and Prosperous Commonwealth in 1962 and reissued in the mid-seventies by The Institute for Humane Studies. Republished by FEE in 1985; 2nd printing 1995. 230 pages $14.95 paperback THEFREEMAN IDEAS ON UBERTY

Competition and Cooperation by Donald J. Boudreaux and Hugh Macaulay

ree-market competition is often de­ for the advantage of satisfying consumer F scribed as "cutthroat" and "wasteful." demands. But these firms are no less coop­ "Dog-eat-dog" rivalries are fueled by erative. A mistake made by those who "greedy self-interests" operating according condemn competitive capitalism is to as­ to "thelaw ofthejungle" in which "survival sume that competition and cooperation are of the fittest" is the only rule. In contrast, two alternative means of achieving some government regulation is said to have the end. Alternatives they are not. Competition potential to promote genuine cooperation in and cooperation are not only complemen­ which citizens "pull together" to advance tary human relationships-each is an un­ the common good. On the rhetorical battle­ avoidable reality of human society. A mark field, "competition" is too often out-gunned ofa peaceful and prosperous society is that by "cooperation." both competition and cooperation are chan­ But those who deplore free-market com­ neled into their appropriate realms. petition simply do not understand it. Com­ petitive markets excel at promoting coop­ The Principal Realm of eration. Indeed, to succeed in the market Each Activity requires great cooperative skills. Adam Smith described how a person A symphony orchestra is an unequaled buying a wool coat gains his comfort as a example of cooperation, yet competition result of the willing cooperative efforts of has a role to play even in orchestras. Dif­ many workers in widely varied activities­ ferent musicians compete for each seat in from raising sheep to spinning yarn to re­ the orchestra, just as different conductors tailing. Every wool coat requires that very compete to be maestro. Moreover, different large numbers of people coordinate their orchestras compete for the privilege ofmak­ efforts-cooperate-in production and dis­ ing recordings with prestigious recording tribution. Perhaps more famously, Leonard studios. Football and baseball teams parallel Read told of the pencil-an apparently sim­ orchestras in these respects: different play­ ple device whose existence would be im­ ers compete for slots on the team, and possible without the cooperation of count­ different teams compete against each other less people and firms from around the globe. for the championship. And although less Still, private firms selling coats and pen­ obvious, the production of steel, the oper­ cils are described as competitive, not as ation of a department store, and the publi­ cooperative. And so they are in a genuine cation of a magazine all involve both coop­ sense. Each firm, each producer, competes eration and competition. Competition and cooperation are unavoidable in human so­ Drs. Boudreaux and Macaulay are faculty mem­ ciety. bers at Clemson University. Competition is inseparable from scarcity. 152 153

Scarcity exists when there is not enough of when the coordinated efforts and knowledge some good to provide consumers with all of many people are necessary to produce a they would take ifit were free. Itfollows that good-such as Adam Smith's wool coat or we must find some way to decide who gets Leonard Read's pencil. People who com­ how much ofany scarce good. The accepted peted for jobs now find themselves cooper­ way in a free society is to allow those who ating with others to produce a product. This want a particular good-say, a bushel of cooperation takes place not only among apples-to bid for it. The bushel of apples fellow employees but among firms with will then go to the person who voluntarily their customers, stockholders, creditors, sacrifices the greatest quantity of other and with all manner of suppliers. Sellers goods in exchange for the apples. We call cooperate with buyers so that buyers will such bidding competition, but note that such become repeat customers. Employers co­ competition differs fundamentally from an­ operate with workers to improve worker other kind of "competition" that could be productivity. Customers cooperate with used to allocate the apples-physical terror: suppliers to ensure reliable service and qual­ he gets the apples who beats up all others ity supplies. Cooperation is indeed a hall­ who want the apples. mark of all economic activity in a compet­ Capitalism's critics insist that there is a itive market. cooperative way to allocate resources. Peo­ Socialists and so-called "communitari­ ple can meet together and agree who gets ans" may believe that their systems are free what. Early American colonists in James­ ofcompetition and marked only by cooper­ town and Plymouth initially tried to avoid all ation. Yet resources are scarce in planned competition and allocated resources exclu­ economies no less than in capitalist econo­ sively by cooperative, collective decision. mies. At some level, competition will The result was starvation. When each settler emerge to allocate these scarce resources. realized that his food entitlement was inde­ In planned economics, people will compete pendent ofthe amount ofwork he put in, too to occupy positions of power. many settlers chose not to cooperate in the These power struggles, though perhaps community's productive efforts. In both hidden from sight, are undeniably compet­ colonies, the specterofstarvationforced the itive. With more power concentrated among abandonment ofthese collectivist plans, and the decision makers, losers may give up output then expanded.! more than mere goods. When Stalin decided Similarly, the Marxist plan for distribu­ how to allocate Crimean grain in the early tion is a wonderfully cooperative, and det­ 1930s, approximately two million kulaks rimental, scheme. If needs are the basis lost their wheat and their lives. upon which goods are allocated, it will pay each person to produce not goods but The Good and the Bad "needs." It will pay people to move toward poverty, for only then will one's needs be Not all varieties of competition are ben­ maximized. Moreover, if others do not eficial, just as not all varieties of coopera­ readily recognize these "needs," it will pay tion are desirable. Labor unions are made those in "need" to exertefforts emphasizing up of cooperating workers. To the extent the genuineness of their "needs." Such that unions secure special-interest legisla­ cooperation on this score would produce not tion, the wages of workers cooperating in a only universal poverty-society would be union are raised at the expense of consum­ awash in nothing but "needs"-but also ers and of non-unionized workers. Simi­ hostility among those who do not receive larly, businesses often cooperate through what they believe to be their due. Such an trade associations that lobby effectively for outcome is hardly a happy consequence for import restrictions. Such cooperation yields a cooperative society. benefits for the few at the greater expense of Cooperation is appropriate, of course, the many. 154 THE FREEMAN • MARCH 1996

Popular phrases describing competition its. To protect firms from the competition of were cited at the beginning ofthis essay. All rival firms would be to encourage protected such phrases are pejorative. And indeed, firms to be less cooperative with consumers. competition can be bad. If the owners of Of course, in any competitive industry General Motors spread nails on the roads only the fittest firms do survive. In the leading to Ford factories and dealerships, 1930s, groceries were distributed mainly this is a form ofnoneconomic competition­ by mom-and-pop stores. Today, supermar­ and a most undesirable form. General Mo­ kets-each of which carries on average tors benefits not only at the expense ofFord, about 50,000 different kinds of products­ but also at the expense of consumers be­ have replaced the mom-and-pops. Super­ cause the nails on the road effectively elim­ markets did not prey on mom-and-pop inate consumers' option of buying Fords. stores as cheetahs prey on gazelles. Super­ But notice that identically undesirable con­ markets offered consumers a new shopping sequences occur when General Motors and choice. Consumers voluntarily switched Ford cooperate with each other to lobby their patronage from mom-and-pops to su­ successfully for import restrictions on for­ permarkets because, as judged by consum­ eign automobiles. Tariffs hurt consumers no ers, supermarkets cooperated better with less than do nails on the road. Genuine consumers than did the mom-and-pops. No cutthroat competition occurs whenever supermarket literally killed mom or pop. firms successfully lobby government for Some of these small-store owners retired artificial "advantages" such as tariffs or while others moved into other lines ofwork. regulations that unnecessarily burden ri­ Today, the descendants of the owners of vals: consumers and foreign-producers are mom-and-pops are surely better off than harmed by government pandering to interest they would have been had supermarkets groups. Few people, however, refer to tar­ never come along. iffs, dumping laws, and costly regulations as examples of cutthroat competition or busi­ Conclusion ness cooperation. Instead, such legislation is typically revered as desirable social pol­ Competition in the marketplace is com­ icy. petition among cooperators. While the best The phrases "dog-eat-dog" and "survival cooperators in each line of work "win" in of the fittest" are harsh-sounding phrases, the sense ofearning greater profits than their and they vastly misrepresent competitive rivals, these victors do not literally destroy activity within private-property markets. In rivals. Rivals unsuccessful in one line of competitive markets, firms do not attack work move into other lines, where they are each other claw and fang. Rather, firms do more likely to enjoy a comparative advan­ battle by seeing who can best serve the tage. Market discipline, in combination with customer. That is, in competitive markets, the information conveyed in the form of firms compete by seeing who can best co­ market prices, ensures that each of us is operate with consumers. K-Mart and Wal­ cooperating with as many other people as Mart strive to offer consumers better deals possible, in the most effective manner pos­ because each firm knows that if it fails to sible. Far from undermining cooperation, offer good deals, customers will patronize the market enhances cooperation. D other, more responsive firms. Both firms survive as long as each cooperates with 1. See Robert C. Ellickson, "Property in Land," Yale Law consumers effectively enough to earn prof- Journal, Vol. 102, April 1993, pp. 1315-1400. FEE Classic Reprint

"From Each According to His Abilities .. ."

by Thomas J. Shelly

s a teacher, I found that the socialist­ and they are always a minority in school as Acommunist idea of taking "from each well as in life-would soon lose all incentive according to his abilities," and giving "to for producing. Why strive to make a high each according to his needs" was generally grade if part of it is taken from you by accepted without question by most stu­ "authority" and given to someone else? dents. In an effort to explain the fallacy in Second, the less productive students-a this theory, I sometimes tried this approach: majority in school as elsewhere-would, for When one of the brighter or harder­ a time, be relieved ofthe necessity to study working students made a grade of 95 on a orto produce. This socialist-communist sys­ test, I suggested that I take away 20 points tem would continue until the high producers and give them to a student who had made had sunk-orhad been driven down-to the only 55 points on his test. Thus each would level of the low producers. At that point, in contribute according to his abilities and­ orderfor anyone to survive, the "authority" since both would have a passing mark­ would have no alternative but to begin a each would receive according to his needs. system of compulsory labor and punish­ Mter I juggled the grades of all the other ments against even the low producers. students in this fashion, the result was They, of course, would then complain bit­ usually a "common ownership" grade of terly, but without understanding. between 75 and 80-the minimum needed Finally I returned the discussion to the for passing, or for survival. Then I specu­ ideas of freedom and enterprise-the mar­ lated with the students as to the probable ket economy-where each person has free­ results if I actually used the socialistic dom ofchoice and is responsible for his own theory for grading papers. decisions and welfare. First, the highly productive students- Gratifyingly enough, most ofmy students then understood what I meant when I ex­ The late Mr. Shelly was a high school teacher in plained that socialism-even in a democra­ Yonkers, New York. This essay, first published in 1951 as HA cy-wouldeventually result in a living death Lesson in Socialism," was apopularFEEreprint for all except the" authorities" and a few of for many years. their favorite lackeys. D 155 Potomac Principles by Doug Handow

The Morality of Freedom

reedom. Presumably every reader of propose corporate average fuel economy F The Freeman is committed to this prin­ (CAFE) standards for automakers to save ciple. But why? What good is it? energy and the environment, not to make After I endorsed a federal budget "train cars more cost-efficient. They propose wreck," arguing that closing down the gov­ safety regulations to save lives, not to en­ ernment would help people appreciate the sure a proper balancing ofcosts and benefits value offreedom, one correspondent chided in manufacturing. They propose the welfare me: "What has freedom ever done for state to assist the poor and elderly, not to African-Americans?" The question is im­ standardize the provision ofsocial services. portant. Consider the problems of poverty In short, they emphasize the moral case for and crime. Consider the scourge of slavery intervention. and discrimination. Ofwhat relevance is our Against which practical arguments usu­ abstract commitment to liberty? ally fail. I want to ensure that poor families Supporters of a free society sometimes can feed themselves and you want to protect seem to drift off into cant, denouncing the corporate profits. I want to preserve the "state" and upholding "individuals." They environment for future generations and you use the word "liberty" like a talisman, want to let automakers make more money which they expect to mesmerize everyone. selling gas-guzzlers. I want to protect chil­ Critics ofcollectivism have long focused on dren's lives and you want to ensure lower­ economic analysis-inefficiency, lack of cost production. I want to save the helpless cost-effectiveness, and waste have all be­ and disadvantaged and you want to cut the come bywords. And when the votes have deficit. There should be no surprise that been counted, they have lost. advocates of a free society have so often This is not to say that practical arguments lost. are irrelevant. Whether a policy works, and But we have moral arguments too, stron­ at what cost, are critical questions. The ger moral arguments since political freedom efficiency case for freedom is overwhelming. is, ultimately, based on moral principle. But it is not the most important, or most Rather than dividing society between ruled convincing, argument. Advocates ofstatism and rulers, we believe that all people are have long understood this. They propose an truly equal. That human beings· really are increase in the minimum wage to help strug­ endowed by their creator with certain in­ gling families, not to eliminate imperfections alienable rights. That they have the right to in labor-management negotiations. They live their lives without outside interference, Mr. Bandow is a Senior Fellow at the Cato so long as they respect the rights ofothers. Institute and the author ofThe Politics ofEnvy: Liberty goes to the core of the human Statism as Theology (Transaction). person, the right to live life with dignity, 156 157 strive for success, build a family and com­ • The minimum wage. Once advocates of munity, worship God, and earn a living. freedom began to emphasize that the mini­ Without freedom none of these is possible. mum wage destroys jobs rather than, say, Of course, all of this sounds terribly contributes to inflation, they gained more abstract. But the practical implications, too, listeners. Even reporters now cite the neg­ are profound, and can still be explained in ative impact of the minimum on minority moral terms. Consider the question posed unemployment. by my correspondent: what has freedom • CAFE. Congress routinely ignored at­ done for African-Americans? Let's turn it tacks on federal fuel standards when critics around: what has the lack of freedom done focused on the cost to manufacturers. But for African-Americans? opponents of CAFE have had greater suc­ One need only visit an inner-city to see the cess after pointing out that CAFE, by forc­ horrendous consequences of statism. ing people into smaller cars, kills. The point Where to start? Everyone has a right to form is, when cars crash, the smaller one, along a family and household. But look at the with its occupants, loses. impact of welfare, which has discouraged • Food and Drug Administration. After family formation and encouraged family the tragedy with thalidomide, Congress break-up. Everyone should be able to tightened FDA control over pharmaceuti­ choose a safe and effective school for one's cals and no plea about the costs to U.S. children. The government's educational manufacturers could move it. But as dereg­ monopoly, however, has created schools ulators have shown how the FDA is actually which cannot even protect children from killing people by delaying production ofnew violence, let alone teach them to read. drugs and devices and interfering with trans­ Everyone is entitled to walk the streets mission of medical information, the FDA is without being robbed, assaulted, or mur­ promising to reform. dered. Yet drug prohibition, by creating an • Education. Public education has long artificial criminal market, has fueled an been one of the strongest bulwarks of the epidemic of crime in urban America. Ev­ interventionist state, impervious to over­ eryone should be able to find a job and get whelming evidence offailure. But the rhet­ on the economic ladder of opportunity. oric of choice, especially for the inner city, Alas, government employment restrictions, has begun to divide liberals concerned about like the minimum wage, occupationallicens­ the interests ofteachers' unions from those ing, and the Davis-Bacon Act, make it hard concerned about the future of disadvan­ for African-Americans to get work. And on taged kids. and on. • Welfare. Criticism of AFDC, Food The vision of a free society, then, is a Stamps, and the like on budget grounds long profoundly moral one. It is a place where had only a limited effect. But the argument poor children are educated. It is a place in that the real crisis is human-a catastrophe which poor women are not trapped in pov­ in which young boys are growing up without erty. Itis a place in which people do not drop fathers, becoming criminals, and being to the floor when gunfights erupt outside jailed or gunned down, and young girls are their houses. It is a place in which those with permanently wedding welfare and losing political power do not constitute a privileged their sense of dignity, worth, and opportu­ class. Itis a place in which the phrase "equal nity-is now accepted even by many on the opportunity" has real meaning. Left. We need to communicate that vision in Part of the lesson from these cases is to both Washington policy debates and the appeal to the emotion as well as the intellect. larger political discourse ofour nation. Ad­ But it's more than that. As much as policy­ vocates ofa free society have been learning, makers like to criticize "ideologues," they and we are winning some battles because of base many of their actions on principle, on it. Among these: what they think is right and wrong. 158 THE FREEMAN • MARCH 1996

So we need to convince our fellow citi­ wrong, morally wrong. In these cases free­ zens that not all policy outcomes are equal dom means opportunity, career, and life in principle. Rather, there are moral impli­ itself. Freedom matters. cations of taxing and spending, regulating It is unfortunately easy for liberty's de­ and intervening. To deny parents a choice fenders to eschew moral arguments. The on the education of their children, to lock temptation is particularly strong for those disadvantaged kids in schools where they within the Beltway, since Washington dis­ won't learn and aren't safe, is wrong, mor­ courages appeals to principle on behalf of ally wrong. To buttress union wages through freedom. But the strongest case for the free the minimum wage while throwing black society is philosophical. In the end, we teens out ofwork is wrong, morally wrong. aren't likely to win until we are able to To let government bureaucrats deny dying convince our fellow citizens that liberty is patients access to lifesaving products is morally right. D

FEE Classic Reprint

Legalized Immorality by Clarence Manion

t must be remembered that 96 percent of ofhuman welfare with thejustice, economy, I the peace, order, and welfare existing in and effectiveness that are possible when human society is always produced by the these same fields are the direct responsibil­ conscientious practice of person-to-person ity of morally sensitive human beings. This justice and charity. When any part of this loss ofjustice, economy, and effectiveness important domain ofpersonal virtue is trans­ is increased in the proportion that such ferred to government, that part is automat­ governmental management is central­ ically released from the restraints of moral­ ized.... ity and put into the area of conscienceless Government cannot make men good; nei­ coercion. The field of personal responsibil­ ther can it make them prosperous and ity is thus reduced at the same time and to happy. The evils in society are directly the same extent that the boundaries of traceable to the vices of individual human irresponsibility are enlarged. beings. At its best government may simply Government cannot manage these fields attack the secondary manifestations ofthese vices. Their primary manifestations are The late Clarence Manion was Dean of the found in the pride, covetousness, lust, envy, College ofLaw, Notre Dame University. "Legalized Immorality," an excerpt from his sloth, and plain incompetency of individual 1950 book, The Key to Peace, appeared in people. When government goes far beyond Essays on Liberty, Volume I (FEE, 1952). its limited role and deploys its forces along LEGALIZED IMMORALITY 159 a broad, complicated front, under a unified provide funds with which the government command, it invariably propagates the very pays Paul a "subsidy." Paul now has what evils that it is designed to reduce. he wanted. His conscience is clear and he In the sweet name of "human welfare" has proceeded "according to law." Who such a government begins to do things that could ask for more?-why, Paul, ofcourse, would be gravely offensive if done by indi­ and at the very next opportunity. There is vidual citizens. The government is urged to nothing to stop him now except the eventual follow this course by people who con­ exhaustion ofPeter's resources. sciously or subconsciously seek an imper­ The fact that there are millions of Pauls sonal outlet for the "primaries" of human and Peters involved in such transactions weakness. An outlet in other words which does not change their essential and common will enable them to escape the moral respon­ characteristic. The Pauls have simply en­ sibility that would be involved in their per­ gaged the government "to do for them (the sonal commission of these sins. As a con­ people) that which they are unable to do for venience to this popular attitude we are themselves." Had the Pauls done this indi­ assured that "government should do for the vidually and directly without the help ofthe people what the people are unable to do for government, each ofthem would have been themselves." This is an extremely danger­ subject to fine and imprisonment. ous definition ofthe purpose ofgovernment. Furthermore, 95 percent of the Pauls It is radically different from the purpose would have refused to do this job because stated in the Declaration of Independence; the moral conscience of each Paul would nevertheless it is now widely accepted as have hurt him if he did. However, where correct. government does it for them, there is no Here is one example of centralized gov­ prosecution and no pain in anybody's con­ ernmental operation: Paul wants some of science. This encourages the unfortunate Peter's property. For moral as well as legal impression that by using the ballot instead of reasons, Paul is unable personally to accom­ a blackjack we may take whatever we please plish this desire. Paul therefore persuades to take from our neighbor's store of rights the government to tax Peter in order to and immunities. D

Light a fire for freedom! Launch a Freeman Society Discussion Club!

ain the growing ranks of Freeman readers who have become part of FEE's net­ work of Freeman Society Discussion Clubs. More than 100 clubs have been Jorganized in the 30 states and 10 foreign countries. Club members receive a number of special benefits, including discounts on FEE publications and invitations to special FEE events. For more information about starting a discussion club, or joining a Freeman Club that may already be meeting in your area, write Felix R. Livingston, Vice President and Director of Freeman Services, 2814 Hilsdale Harbor Way, Jacksonville, FL 32216, or callifax (904) 448-0105. THEFREEMAN IDEAS ON UBER1Y

Nullifying the Rule of Law by Mark S. Pulliam

hat do nineteenth-century anarchist "oppression" ofthe dissenting minority has W Lysander Spooner,1 the O. J. legal long perturbed anarchist philosophers such defense team, some elements of the militia as the aforementioned Spooner, who ob­ movement,2 the Los Angeles juries that jected to the "social compact" rationale failed to convict the Menendez brothers of for the state as well as the institution of the murdering their parents and that acquitted jury.4 Jury-power activists sometimes cite the brutal assailants ofReginald Denny, and Spooner as a proponent of "jury nullifi­ the activists who promote the idea of "fully cation," but he is best known for his more informed juries"3 have in common? fundamental objection to constitutional gov­ They all symbolize the notion that juries ernment. can and should refuse to heed the instruc­ On what basis do advocates ofjury nul­ tions given them by the trialjudge, and that lification attempt to justify the lawlessness jurors should instead follow their own con­ that ignoring the court's instructions en­ sciences and "nullify" those instructions by tails? Advocates advance two principal ex­ doing what they personally feel is just. planations, neither of which is persuasive: Jury instructions are the applicable legal (1) civil disobedience, or the moral right or rules communicated to the jury by the trial obligation to resist enforcement ofan unjust judge. In virtually every jurisdiction, jurors law, 5 and (2) populist opposition to tyran­ take an oath at the beginning ofthe case that nical actions by an unresponsive govern­ they will consider only the evidence pre­ ment. 6 Let's consider these explanations. sented and the instructions ofthe court. The "instructions" are, therefore, laws that so­ Civil Disobedience ciety has duly enacted through either the legislative process or the common law judi­ Civil disobedience is a misnomer in the cial process. In either event, the laws derive context of a seated juror refusing to follow legitimacy from our democratic political the law. Civil disobedience, properly under­ traditions. stood, is resistance to unjust government As citizens, we may not agree with all action as a last resort-when disobedience the laws on the books, but in a system of is the only alternative to becoming a partic­ representative government we are ~ound ipant in an objectionable act. This will never to follow them. It is inherent in the concept be the case with a seated juror. A potential ofthe State that there will not be unanimity jurorwho obje.cted to service could refuse to in all matters, but that the views of the report to court or serve on a jury. A person majority will prevail. This "coercion" or with a moral objection to enforcing a par­ ticular law (say, punishing a defendant Mr. Pulliam is an attorney in private practice in charged with private drug use or blockading San Diego. abortion clinics) could disclose that objec- 160 The Foundation for Economic Education Irvington-on-Hudson, New York 10533 Tel. (914) 591-7230 Fax (914) 591-8910 E-mail: [email protected]

March 1996 Looking Back hen Leonard Read, a Chamber of lectual fort of resistance and, hopefully, a Commerce executive from Los rallying point for this country to re-estab­ W Angeles, set out to launch The lish the enduring principles on which it Foundation for Economic Education in was founded. The FEE plan was a great March of 1946, the world was facing design, the restoration of an order of free­ tremendous problems of readjustment and dom and harmony. Leonard Read sur­ recovery from the upheavals of World War rounded himself with half a dozen schol­ II. The country was suffering from persis­ ars and journalists, men and women of tent, ugly confrontation between labor and excellence, seekers of knowledge, and stu­ management, from vacillating governmen­ dents of liberty. Most of them spent a few tal policies on price controls, and incredi­ years with FEE and then moved on to ble food shortages resulting from the price other important pursuits in industry and controls over meat, sugar, and cereaL For education. Some were to become famous most of the year the Office of Price educators, captains of industry, and Administration (OPA) was controlling founders of enterprise. One of the most more than four-fifths of industrial produc­ eminent scholars was Professor F. A. tion through its 68,000 inspectors and Harper, who subsequently was to found a agents. And thousands of businessmen think tank of his own, The Institute for were facing criminal charges in the courts Humane Studies in Menlo Park, California, and press for having violated OPA orders. now in Fairfax, Virginia. Another was Socialism was reigning supreme in all George C. Roche III, who was to lead parts of the world. Surely, its nationalistic Hillsdale College to new heights of leader­ version, fascism, had been crushed by ship and educational service. A few schol­ allied forces, but its two blood relatives, ars stayed on and dedicated their produc­ Soviet communism and democratic social­ tive lives to the noble tasks of the ism, were alive and welL In the United Foundation. Paul Poirot was to edit The States, capitalism was commonly blamed Freeman for thirty-one years; W. M. Curtiss for depression and unemployment and was to direct the business affairs of ,FEE for condemned for intolerable economic and 27 years, Robert G. Anderson for 19 years. social inequality. The 68,000 federal Bettina Bien Greaves was to reach out to inspectors were the vanguard of a new school children of all ages, and the social and economic order. Reverend Edmund A. Opitz was to The Foundation for Economic explore the moral and spiritual founda­ Education (FEE) was meant to be an intel- tions of liberty. There was unassuming greatness in their dedication and will, their Throughout the decades the Foundation faith and moral strength. has reached and touched millions of indi­ The Foundation was guided and assist­ viduals with its freedom message. When ed by two great men who will be remem­ there were no other voices defending the bered and cited for centuries to come: the free society, The Freeman spoke clearly and dean of Austrian economics, Ludwig von convincingly. Its ideas and arguments Mises, and the illustrious journalist, Henry influenced and guided countless millions Hazlitt. Mises served as advisor until his around the world. For five decades, FEE death in 1973, at the age of 92, and Hazlitt has been the Rock of Gibraltar of sound served as one of the seven founders who economics and moral principle, of devo­ met on March 7, 1946, for the inaugural tion to individual freedom and the private meeting. He remained on the Board of property order, in a turbulent and danger­ Trustees until his passing in 1993, at the ous world. No one can know the intellec­ age of 98. tual effect and end result of its labors, but Throughout the decades, FEE was ably we do believe that conditions have supported and greatly encouraged by men improved immeasurably during the life of of finance, commerce, industry, and the FEE and that FEE has contributed its part professions. Some of them joined the to the improvement. World communism Board of Trustees, meeting regularly and has disintegrated under the weight of its supervising not only the business affairs of miscreation and inhumanity, and socialism the organization but also its educational in all its colors and designs is in full work. But most supporters, some 10,000 to retreat. 20,000 strong, consist of two kinds of peo­ No matter how we may want to com­ ple: those who subscribe to The Freeman pare the political, social, and economic sit­ and purchase its books and services and uation in 1946 with that of today, half a those who make voluntary donations. century later, we believe that economic The buyers who subscribe to FEE's cele­ knowledge has advanced visibly and that brated monthly journal, The Freeman, are conditions are on the mend. Surely, the probably the staunchest friends of FEE. voice of political power and bureaucratic They identify with the journal because it control continues to be heard in the halls of makes the spiritual, moral, and rational Congress, in the press, and in the U.N., but case for liberty. Standing far above the fray it no longer dominates the American of politics, it emphasizes ideas rather than scene. The American people of the 1990s party programs and political agendas, pre­ seem to be more knowledgeable in social scriptions for public policy, and govern­ matters and wiser in the affairs of the ment edicts. It never argues ad hominem or political world than their forebears in the denigrates other peoples' motives with 1940s. They may have learned what had to wit, sarcasm, and ridicule. be unlearned. The buyers may also avail themselves of more than one hundred books and book­ lets published by FEE and another three hundred titles stocked and shipped by FEE to all corners of the world. Or they may attend a seminar, a round-table discussion, or a summer school. They all support FEE by being FEE customers. Hans F. Sennholz Round-Table Events for Spring 1996

on't miss out on our new series of Spring Round-Table Events! We've revamped the format (and our charges) to enhance your Denjoyment as you listen to great speakers on exciting topics like freedom and artistic inspiration (March), drug and alcohol prohibition (May), and economic freedom and your personal prosperity (June). We'll start our evening at 5:00 with a buffet supper while you chat with friends, then move on to the presentation at 6:30; after a fascinating talk, the speaker will open the floor for discussion. Join us for great fun!

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Call or write: Dr. Barbara Dodsworth, Foundation for Economic Education, 30 South Broadway, Irvington-on-Hudson, NY 10533; phone (914) 591-7230 or fax (914) 591-8910.

THEFREEMAN IDEAS ON LIBERTY

1995 Bound Volume

turdily sewn in a single volume with navy blue cloth cover and gold foil stamping, the twelve issues from January through December 1995 - 808 Spages, fully indexed for handy reference to the latest literature of free­ dom. More than 100 feature articles on topics such as education, environment, government regulation and control, health care, individual rights, money, morality and ethics, private property, voluntary action, and international trade. Reviews of more than five dozen books. $24.95 each Save! Special introductory price; $19.95, through April 30, 1996 Note: Freeman bound volumes for the years 1986 through 1994 are available at $24.95 each. March Book Sale

Essays on Liberty Regular Sale Each volume includes more than forty articles representing the best of FEE thought. Gems from great writers such as Leonard Read, Paul Poirot, Edmund Opitz, Murray Rothbard, Henry Hazlitt, F. A. Hayek, and many others. Volume 1 $ 8.95 $ 7.95 Volume 6 12.95 10.95 Volume 8 8.95 5.95 Volume 10 (hardcover) 12.95 7.95 (paperback) 8.95 5.95 Volume 12 (hardcover) 12.95 7.95 (paperback) 8.95 5.95 Faustino Ballve Essentials ofEconomics 9.95 8.95 The best survey of principles and policies. Frederic Bastiat Economic Sophisms 11.95 9.95 The book exposes the fallacies and absurdities of a host of harmful interventionist ideas. Selected Essays on Political Economy 14.95 11.95 Economic principles stated simply and eloquently. Leonard E. Read Pattern for Revolt 4.95 3.95 A collection of political speeches the author would give if he were to run for and be elected to the Presidency of the United States. Henry Grady Weaver The Mainspring ofHuman Progress 5.95 4.95 Perhaps the best available introduction to the history of human freedom. Excellent for study groups.

Sale Ends March 31, 1996 Postage and handling: Please add $3 per order of $25 or less; $4 per order of $26-$50; $5 per order of more than $50. Send your order, with accompanying check or money order, to FEE, 30 South Broadway, Irvington-on-Hudson, New York 10533. Visa and MasterCard telephone and fax orders are welcomed: (800) 452-3518; fax (914) 591-8910. 161

tion during voir dire and be excused from ists point to historical events where juries serving in the case. refused to enforce the Fugitive Slave Act,8 But, after ajuror has reported for service, there is no assurance that a jury operating been screened through voir dire, been outside the law would only acquit in a seated and sworn to follow the law accord­ criminal case; it could just as easily ing to the instructions of the court, there "nullify" the instructions by convicting a is no room for "civil disobedience." Ajuror person who was technically innocent. More­ reneging on his oath is an outlaw, a scofflaw. over, there are no counterparts to the Fu­ A renegade juror cheats the parties to the gitive Slave Law in a civil case. Further­ case out of their right to have the matter more, nullifying the law strips the decided according to the law, on the basis of individuals who comprise society of their which the evidence and arguments have right to have the laws enforced. Nothing been presented. could be more tyrannical or despotic than Despite proponents' fondness of quoting the arbitrary decision of a jury that has Henry David Thoreau on civil disobedi­ rejected the law. ence,7 a lawless juroris no more heroic than It disturbs me to see libertarians and a rogue policeman violating the law or a conservatives-whom I generally regard as politician accepting a bribe. Ifajuror(or any allies-embrace thejury nullification cause. other member of the political community) The rule of law is essential to the preserva­ feels that a particular law is unjust-and in tion of liberty. Friedrich Hayek, perhaps a society as large and diverse as ours, we can this century's pre-eminent theorist of clas­ assume that someone, somewhere, feels sicalliberalism-the political philosophy of that every law on the books is unjust-the freedom-believed that the defining char­ remedy is to petition the legislature for acteristic ofa free society is the rule oflaw, reform, not to infiltrate the jury and then meaning legal rules stated in advance, uni­ ignore the law. formly applied, without excessive discre­ tion. 9 In Hayek's words: "[W]hen we obey Populist Opposition laws, in the sense of general abstract rules laid down irrespective oftheir application to The otherfrequently citedjustificationfor us, we are not subject to another man's will jury nullification-the need to rein in abu­ and are therefore free." 10 Thus, it is the sive government power-is even more spe­ universal, non-selective nature of law that cious. An honest anarchist such as allows us to be free.! 1 In Hayek's view, it is Lysander Spooner would refuse to serve on precisely because judges and juries cannot a jury because he wouldn't believe in the pick and choose what laws to enforce in a concept of mandatory jury service or even particular case "that it can be said that laws governmental proceedings to enforce the and not men rule. "12 Jury-activist pamphle­ law. Let's not forget that a trial, whether teers in front of the courthouse would do civil or criminal, is government action. En­ well to heed Hayek's admonition that "few forcing democratically enacted laws is one beliefs have been more destructive of the ofthe basic purposes ofgovernment. When respect for the rules of law and of morals a juror considers defying his oath and de­ than the idea that a rule is binding only ifthe ciding a case based on his personal feelings beneficial effect of observing it in the par­ rather than the court's instructions, the ticular instance can be recognized." 13 alternative is not between liberty and coer­ Yet that is exactly what advocates ofjury cion, but between coercion informed by the nullification espouse-following the law rule of law and coercion at the whim of 12 only ifthey agree with it in a particular case. jurors. I am not unsympathetic to concerns about And what is a jury acting outside of the unjust laws and government overreaching. law but a 12-person mob, like modern-day The solution is grassroots political activism vigilantes? Although the jury-power activ- and reforms such as fewer federal mandates 162 THE FREEMAN • MARCH 1996

and expanded use ofthe initiative and recall 4. Lysander Spooner, No Treason: The Constitution of No Authority (1870). devices, not shortsighted demagoguery in 5. Michael Pierone, "Requiring Citizens to Do Evil," The the form ofjurynullification. Jurors ignoring Freeman (July 1993), p. 261. 6. "Militias," p. A8; N. Stephan Kinsella, "Legislation the law accomplish nothing but anarchy in a and Law in a Free Society," The Freeman (September '1995), microcosm-nullifying the rule of law. 0 pp. 561, 563. 7. Pierone, note 5, p. 262. 8. Ibid. 9. Friedrich A. Hayek, The Road to Serfdom (Chicago: 1. Lysander Spooner, An Essay on the Trial By Jury University of Chicago Press, 1944), pp. 72-79. (1852). 10. Friedrich A. Hayek, The Constitution ofLiberty (Chi- 2. "Militias Are Joining Jury-Power Activists to Fight cago: University of Chicago Press, 1960), p. 153. Government," Wall Street Journal (May 25, 1995), p. Al 11. Ibid., pp. 153--54. (hereinafter "Militias"). 12. Ibid., p. 153. 3. Ibid. 13. Ibid., p. 159.

Why It Matters

by Roger M. Clites

ast November people in Quebec voted take place more efficiently were government Lon whether to secede from Canada. not constantly meddling in commerce. Com­ Before the vote took place there was spec­ petition would equalize production costs. ulation in bothCanadaand the United States Comparative advantage would determine about how much harm such a pullout would what would be produced in a given location. do to Canada, to the United States, and to Efficiency would be greatly enhanced and Quebec itself. With only one exception levels of living would rise dramatically. every opinion that I saw was that secession But can a nation the size of Quebec "go would harm all of them. In a short article it alone"? Of course it can. When I visited two graduate students did make the case Luxembourg and even tiny Lichtenstein I that Quebec would benefit from breaking observed some ofthe highest levels ofliving away. anywhere in the world, certainly higher than Their analysis leads us toward why it those in large nations in Africa, Asia, and matters. It matters because ofvarious types Latin America. People who have traveled to of governmental meddling in economic ac­ Andorra and little Monaco have told me that tivity. Contrary to what we are told by people in both of those minute nations are political leaders and others, governments do quite prosperous. In fact, small countries not engage in or promote economic activity. are often more hospitable to economic ac­ Governments only place restrictions and tivity because their governments are small. barriers. Also they have to recognize the importance Were it not for government intervention, of international trade and the need to be trade would be free throughout North Amer­ competitive. ica, indeed throughout the world. Move­ The problem is not that economic activity ment of people, capital, and goods would would be curtailed. The problem is that government does not want to give up any of Professor Clites teaches at Tusculum College in its power to control. That is the only reason Tennessee. that it matters. 0 THEFREEMANIDEAS ON UBERTY

Warning: OSHA Can Be Hazardous to Your Health

by Raymond J. Keating

ow could anyone find fault with a sumption, thereby imposing significant and H government agency whose stated mis­ unnecessary costs on business and the econ­ sion is "to assure so far as possible every omy. Such costs translate into less entre­ working man and woman in the nation safe preneurship, slower economic growth, and and healthful working conditions and to fewer jobs. preserve our human resources"?1 There is substantial evidence that OSHA As is typical with government agencies has strayed far from its much-touted edu­ brandishing impossible missions, the Occu­ cational, advisory, and cooperative rela­ pational Safety and Health Administration tionship with business. Indeed, OSHA's (OSHA) has become a burdensome regula­ concern for real safety is lost in a bureau­ tory body, seemingly more concerned with cratic and regulatory haze of citation quo­ pushing paper and imposing fines rather tas, tax collection, and remarkably inane than in establishing safer working environ­ regulations. For example: ments. Indeed, since OSHA's first month • OSHA imposes an incredible paper­ in existence in 1970, when it instituted 4,400 work burden on U.S. business. In 1994, job safety and health rules, the agency has seven of the top ten most frequent OSHA played the role of adversary to American citations were related to paperwork. OSHA business. 2 has perfected the government "make­ In reality, the private sector possesses work" scheme-generate a paper blizzard every incentive to maintain a safe and of regulations and then fine businesses for healthy working environment for employ­ not complying. ees. Indeed, beyond a commonly held con­ • In 1976, 95 percent of OSHA citations cern for one's employees, the financial in­ were classified as "nonserious," while in centives are substantial. That is, after recent years 70 percent of citations have factoring into the equation lost production been classified as "serious."3 It remains and productivity costs, health-care costs, difficult to fathom that "serious" violations insurance costs, possible lawsuits, and so have grown so much, especially considering on, it is clear that safety pays. the general decline in workplace deaths and Unsafe workplaces have always been and injuries. More likely, a considerable, ongo­ remain the exception rather than the rule. Of ing redefinition of OSHA violations has course, OSHA acts under the opposite as- been undertaken. Such a development re­ flects the arbitrary and subjective nature of Mr. Keating is chief economist for the Small OSHA citations. Business Survival Foundation. • With the 1990 budget deal, OSHA 163 164 THE FREEMAN • MARCH 1996 stepped up its role as a revenue collector for Another glaring problem with govern­ the federal government. OSHA's maximum ment regulation and inspections of any in­ allowable penalties were increased seven­ dustry or workplace is that most, if not all, fold, and $900 million in additional revenues regulators lack expertise in particular indus­ were expected over five years. tries. If such individuals were experts, they OSHA's maximum penalties range from would hold productive, private sectorjobs. $7,000 per violation-for "serious" and They are government bureaucrats. Bureau­ "other than serious" classifications-to crats know paperwork. Hence, the most $70,000 for the "willful and repeat" classi­ cited violations by OSHA are paperwork fication. These are dollar levels that can put related. The phenomenon was noted by Mr. many small- and medium-sized businesses Vitas M. Plioplys-safety services manager out of business. OSHA can levy an "egre­ at R.R. Donnelly & Sons Company, the gious penalty," where fines can be arbi­ world's largest commercial printer-before trarily increased by counting each employee the U.S. House ofRepresentatives Subcom­ possibly exposed as a separate violation­ mittee on Workforce Protections of the another example of the arbitrary nature of Committee on Economic and Educational OSHA citations. Opportunities: The current administration's so-called Any time an OSHA inspector comes into plan to "reinvent" OSHA noted a few one ofour facilities, it is probably the first examples of ridiculous OSHA regulations: timethey have ever seen a large commer­ • Plastic gas cans can be used on manu­ cial printing press. In our plants where the facturing work sites, but not on construction presses are 100 feet long and three stories sites, even if they have been approved by high, the OSHA inspector doesn't know local fire marshals. where to start. In every case the inspector • OSHA only allows for radiation signs will invariably find a guard off, or some with purple letters on a yellow background, other minor, readily apparent violation, while the Department of Transportation but will pass by process equipment which, calls for black on yellow. if it failed, could blow up our facility. • OSHA requires that work-site first-aid Because they are not experts in the in­ kits be approved by a physician. dustry they cannot know the critical is­ Unfortunately, in the mitist ofall the talk sues we deal with on a daily basis.... about government "reinvention," OSHA Our informal conferences end up being has been busily preparing additional regu­ training sessions on safety in the printing lations. The federal budget offers program industry to the local OSHA offices. They statistics for each agency. "Standards do not know our industry, yet try to cite promulgated" (Le., regulations imposed) us as if they do. are estimated at 12 annually for 1995 and 1996 by OSHA-a kind ofregulation quota. Even after noting the many OSHA horror OSHA has committed substantial resources stories, regulations, paperwork burdens, to three particular areas in recent years­ and costs, some still claim that OSHA's indoor air quality, ergonomics, and manda­ benefits outweigh its costs. In a May 16, tory workplace safety commissions. Scien­ 1995, speech President Clinton linked tific evidence pertaining to indoor air quality OSHA with reduced workplace deaths: and ergonomics is weak, ifnot non-existent, "The Occupational Safety and Health Ad­ while mandatory worker safety commis­ ministration has been at work in this cause sions amount to nothing more than a sop to since it was created with bipartisan support labor unions. If implemented, such regula­ in 1970. Since that time, workplace deaths tions will cost tens of billions of dollars have been cut in half." annually-translating into fewer resources Of course, workplace deaths were on the for investment, employee compensation, decline for decades before OSHA was cre­ and job creation. ated. Fewer workplace deaths reflect many WARNING: OSHA CAN BE HAZARDOUS TO YOUR HEALTH 165 changes in our economy-greater automa­ vancements, expanded knowledge, and tion, shift in employment from manufactur­ proper incentives-has steadily improved ing to the service sector, leaps in technol­ the working conditions of employees. Reg­ ogy, enhanced knowledge, et ale There ulatory efforts, have been largely incidental exists no clear and substantial evidence that to such developments. Indeed, as noted OSHA has played any significant role in above, regulations often simply create ad­ preventing workplace injuries or death. ditional costs with few benefits. The incentives for the private sector to Workplace safety can be and is ensured maintain safe working conditions are clear. by individuals-employers, employees, and As already mentioned, many factors make insurance companies-and ifnecessary, the safety and good health a priority for em­ courts. If the U.S. economy is to compete ployers. Indeed, as many business owners and succeed in the years ahead, govern­ and operators will tell you, maintaining a ment's heavy hand of regulation must be safe working environment and complying lifted. 0 with OSHA regulations are quite often sep­ arate endeavors. OSHA deregulation efforts are underway 1. The Occupational Safety and Health Act as quoted in Congressional Quarterly's Federal Regulatory Directory, Sev­ in Congress, and should be applauded. How­ enth Edition, Congressional Quarterly Inc., Washington, D.C., ever, OSHA eventually should be scrapped 1994, p. 394. 2. Ibid., p. 394. altogether-"disinvented" ifyou will. 3. Information provided by U.S. Representative Cass Bal­ Private industry-with technological ad- lenger's office. FEE Classic Reprint

Private Enterprise Regained by Henry Hazlitt

overnor Bradford's own history of the way that they should set come every man GPlymouth Bay Colony over which he for his owne perticuler, and in that regard presided is a story that deserves to be far trust to them selves.... And so assigned to better known-particularly in an age that every family a parcell of land. ... has acquired a mania for socialism and communism, regards them as peculiarly A Great Success "progressive" and entirely new, and is sure that they represent "the wave of the "This had very good success; for it made future." all hands very industrious, so as much more Most of us have forgotten that when the corne was planted than other waise would Pilgrim Fathers landed on the shores of have bene by any means the Gov. or any Massachusetts they established a commu­ other could use, and saved him a great deall nist system. Out of their common product of trouble, and gave faIT better contente. and storehouse they set up a system of "Thewomen now wente willingly into the rationing, though it came to "but a quarter feild, and tooke their litle-ons with them to of a pound ofbread a day to each person." set corne, which before would aledg weak­ Even when harvest came, "it arose to but a ness, and inabilitie; whom to have com­ little. "A vicious circle seemed to set in. The pelled would have bene thought great tiranie people complained that they were too weak and oppression. from want offood to tend the crops as they "The experience that was had in this should. Deeply religious though they were, commone course and condition, tried sun­ they took to stealing from each other. "So drie years, and that amongst godly and sober as it well appeared," writes Governor Brad­ men, may well evince the vanitie of that ford, "that famine must still insue the next conceite of Platos and other ancients, ap­ year alIso, if not some way prevented." plauded by some of later times;-that the So the colonists, he continues, "begane to taking away of propertie, and bringing in thinke how they might raise as much come communitie into a comone wealth, would as they could, and obtaine a betercrope than make them happy and florishing; as if they they had done, that they might not still thus were wiser than God. For this comunitie (so languish in miserie. At length [in 1623] after faIT as it was) was found to breed much much debate of things, the Gov. (with the confusion and discontent, and retard much advise ofthe cheefest amongest them) gave imployment that would have been to their beneflte and comforte. Henry Hazlitt (1894-1993), author ofEconomics "For the yong-men that were most able in One Lesson, was a Founding Trustee ofFEE. This essay was written in 1949 and subse­ and fltte for labour and service did repine quently appeared in thefirst volume ofEssays on that they should spend their time and Liberty, published by FEE in 1952. streingth to worke for other mens wives and 166 167 children, with out any recompense. The plentie, and the face ofthings was changed, strong, or man of parts, had no more in to the rejoysing of the harts of many, for devission ofvictails and cloaths, than he that which they blessed God. And the effect of was weake and not able to doe a quarter the their particuler [private] planting was well other could; this was thought injuestice.... seene, for all had, one way and other, pretty "And for men's wives to be commanded well to bring the year aboute, and some of to doe servise for other men, as dressing the abler sorte and more industrious had to their meate, washing their cloaths, etc., they spare, and sell to others, so as any generall deemed it a kind of slaverie, neither could wante or famine hath not been amongest many husbands well brooke it. . . . them since to this day." "By this time harvest was come, and The moral is too obvious to need instead of famine, now God gave them elaboration. D

FREE TRADE The Necessary Foundation for World Peace Edited by Joan Kennedy Taylor "Free Trade: The Necessary Foundation for World Peace is a much-needed contribution to the present debate. Protectionism and statism are the same animal. As the late, great authors includ­ ed in this volume, Frederic Bastiat, Ludwig von Mises, and Frank Chodorov, strongly insisted, free trade creates the spirit of peaceful growth while protectionism is the forerunner of military aggran- dizement. Every reader will reap a wealth of valuable analysis from this book." -Leonard P. Liggio Executive Vice President, Atlas Economic Research Foundation ere are fifteen short essays that discuss such thorny issues as world hunger, industrial superiorit)T, industrial unemployment, the American H Revolution, foreign investment, the fallacies of economic nationalism, and how free trade protects our national interests. In addition to Bastiat, Mises, and Chodorov, contributors include Clarence B. Carson, W. M. Curtiss, Bettina Bien Greaves, Henry Hazlitt, Samuel H. Husbands, Gary North, David Osterfeld, E. C. Pasour, Jr., and Hans Sennholz. 140 pages $9.95 paperback Please add $3 per order of $25 or less, $4 per order of $26-$50. Send your order with the accompanying check or money order to FEE, 30 South Broadway, Irvington-on-Hudson, NY 10533. Visa and MasterCard telephone and fax orders are welcomed: (800) 452-3518; fax (914) 591-8910. THEFREEMAN IDEAS ON LIBERTY

Prosperity Without Pollution by John Semmens

recently had the opportunity to partici­ not natural. In a state ofnature, most deaths I pate in a World Future Society" debate" are violent, painful, or agonizing. The most on whether we could reduce pollution with­ common modes of demise are being killed out also reducing our economic well-being. and eaten or starving to death. The natural Mainstream thinking asserts that we must world is not the "playland" depicted by sacrifice at least some of our prosperity in Disney cartoons. Itis the constant struggle order to protect the environment. One pan­ for survival perceived by Charles Darwin. elist in the World Future Society debate Some 99 percent of extinctions that have insisted that we must drastically reduce occurred on this planet occurred before population, live in houses made ofmud and human beings existed. The environment straw (apparently oblivious to thefate ofone does not preserve species or habitat. Left of the "Three Little Pigs" who tried this), alone, the environment is ruled by an undi­ and ride bicycles to work. luted principle of "might-makes-right." Fortunately, this mainstream thinking is Civilization is artificial. This creation of wrong. We can have both a growing econ­ the human species has modified the "might­ omy and an improving environment. In fact, makes-right" rule of nature. The artificial it seems likely that a growing economy may institution of law helps to channel human well provide the very means needed to predatory instincts to more humane pur­ improve the environment. "Sacrifice" may poses. One does not have to watch too many not only be unnecessary, it may even be nature documentaries before it becomes counterproductive. On balance, there is clear that theft, assault, rape, and murder good reason to be optimistic about the''fate are common behaviors in the animal king­ of the planet." dom. Nature has no law respecting prop­ Ifwe are to overcome the institutionalized erty. The strong dispossess the weak. Aban­ pessimism of the mainstream environmen­ donment, exile, and death are the fate of talist creed, we must first dispel its errone­ those who cannot compete in the Darwinian ous premises. struggle. Technology is artificial. The inquiring Erroneous premise #1: minds ofthe human species have discovered Natural is better than artificial. or created the means to enable the survival Natural is the survival of the fittest. The of the weak, the lame, and the sick. Medi­ natural condition is for the weak, the lame, cine has lowered the mortality rates from the sick to be mercilessly exterminated by disease, accident, and violence. Improved predators and climate. Dying of old age is production methods have made starvation a relatively rare cause ofdeath in the Western Mr. Semmens is an economist with Laissez-Faire world. Devices like eyeglasses and wheel­ Institute in Chandler, Arizona. chairs have helped to offset disabilities that 168 169 would imperil survival in a state of nature. final analysis, it is not the "finiteness" of As a result, we have the opportunity to lead any substance that is critical. The critical lives that are less violent, painful, and pre­ factor is the scope of the human imagina­ carious than would be natural. tion. This scope seems to be getting broader. "Environmentalism" itself is an artifact The accelerating pace of technological ad­ ofcivilization. The abundance generated by vancement should give us confidence that, our technologically advanced civilization barring the implementation of oppressive allows people to contemplate more thanjust government meddling, we are not likely to survival. Creatures living in a natural state run short of intellectual resources in the of subsistence cannot afford the luxury of foreseeable future. refraining from unbridled exploitation ofthe environment. For example, without abun­ Erroneous premise #3: dance, wilderness is a barrier for humans to Population growth is a problem. overcome or avoid. With abundance, wil­ One participant in the World Future So­ derness can be perceived as worthy ofbeing ciety debate showed a graph of world pop­ preserved. ulation growth that he described as "scary." Frankly, I would find a graph Erroneous premise #2: showing a comparable plunge in world pop­ Resources are finite. ulation far more scary. The growth in pop­ The very concept of what constitutes a ulation that has characterized the modern resource is a creation of the human mind. era is due primarily to lower mortality rates. No "thing" is a resource by nature's decree. Fewer people are dying at young ages. More All "resources" are "man-made." That is, are living longer lives. For most, the pros­ it is only the application ofhuman valuation pect of living a longer life would not be to objects that make them resources. If considered a fearful event. Fear is more humans place no value on an object it is not aptly associated with. an untimely early going to be called a resource. Its supply in demise. a state ofnature will exceed the demand for The fear ofpopulation growth seems to be it. An example ofa "thing" that has under­ driven by the notion that eventually there gone a transition from a non-resource to a will be too many people for the planet to highly valued resource is crude oil. At one support. Such a fear is grossly exaggerated. time, in the not too distant past, oil was seen Most of those familiar with the "carrying mainly as a blight on agriculture. The few capacity" concept agree that given the cur­ places where oil bubbled to the surface rent level of technology the sustainable posed hazards to livestock and crops. How­ human population figure is in the 30 to 40 ever, during the nineteenth century, human billion range. Inasmuch as the present pop­ ingenuity discovered a means ofconverting ulation is under 6 billion and no credible this substance to useful purposes. forecast projects a figure even close to the 30 Even such a highly prized substance as billion mark for the next few centuries, the crude oil is not valued for itself. Rather, it is planet seems far from overloaded. Besides, valued for the service it can perform in as the mortality rates have fallen in the meeting human wants. If some other sub­ industrialized portions of the globe, so too stance can be found or made that offers have the birth rates. Once parents are more better or cheaper service, it will supplant assured that their children will survive to crude oil, just as crude oil supplanted whale adulthood, the need to produce enough oil in the nineteenth century. That some offspring to compensate for a high death rate other substance will eventually be found or is alleviated. Obviously, human reproduc­ made seems highly probable. The high tion is influenced by factors more compli­ prices of scarce resources stimulate the cated than pure sexual instinct. search for better or cheaper alternatives for It is not population, per se, that could meeting the same human wants. So, in the pose a problem for humanity, but the polit- 170 THE FREEMAN • MARCH 1996 ical and social institutions that affect human internal combustion engine powered vehi­ behavior. In this regard, the paternalistic cles pose a much smaller threat to human welfare state is a serious problem. Govern­ health. ment programs that entitle people to con­ Neither should the efficiency aspect be sume without their having to produce turns ignored. A gasoline powered vehicle can them into drones and parasites. Energy travel farther in one hour than a horse can in conservation is an important survival trait. a day. Therefore, on an emissions per mile Individuals that can obtain more goods for of travel basis, automobiles are less pollut­ less cost will tend to thrive. The welfare ing than horses. state seduces individuals into behavior pat­ Automotive technology has not stood still terns that exploit this survival trait, but at since supplanting animal-powered travel. the cost of imposing extra burdens on the Autos last longer, travel faster, and use less productive individuals. The more generous fuel per mile now than they did when first the welfare benefits, the larger the number invented. In terms ofpollution emitted dur­ of people that will be drawn into this para­ ing the operation of autos, noxious emis­ sitic mode of existence. At some point, the sions per vehicle mile are down· 70 percent burden of the parasitic portion of the pop­ to 95 percent since 1970. In most cities, the ulation may overwhelm the output capacity ambient air is cleaner now than it was 20 of the productive portion. Thus, it is the years ago. ratio of parasitic to productive individuals that is crucial, not the total size of the Erroneous premise #5: population. More government control is the answer. Absent parasite-inducing paternalism, a The awesome power wielded by govern­ larger population could offer significant ad­ ment has persuaded many that it should be vantages. More people means more minds. the instrument of choice for dealing with Having more minds working on human environmental problems. Plausible as the problems improves the chances of finding resort to government's awesome powers solutions. There is more opportunity for may at first appear, experience would seem specialization and the depth of expertise to indicate that this would be a poor choice. that specialization brings. The dramatic ac­ The first source of difficulty for those celeration in science and technology in our wont to rely upon government solutions is high population era is evidence for the that government is inherently irresponsible. potential advantages of a growing popula­ Because government has the might to com­ tion. pel compliance with its dictates, it cuts itself offfrom essential feedback on the success or Erroneous premise #4: failure of its efforts. Government coercion The environment is getting worse. rides roughshod over differing values. Its On balance, the environment is getting "one-size-fits-all" standard ignores the dif­ better. Consider the case of transportation. fering needs of diverse individuals. The The internal combustion engine is fre­ balancing of values that typically occurs in quently singled out as a prime culprit in the the marketplace is suppressed. In its place, pollution of the environment. Yet, the in­ costly, and frequently ineffective measures ternal combustion engine vehicle is clearly are imposed. less polluting than the animal-powered The fact that government is funded transportation it supplanted. A horse pro­ through taxation increases the odds that duces 45 pounds of manure per day. This government programs will fail to achieve emission, in an urban context, typically their announced objectives. Taxes sever the generated a horrible smell and mess. Fur­ link between costs and benefits. This creates ther, it provided a breeding ground for a "problem of the commons." The "prob­ insects, vermin, and the diseases associated lem of the commons" is that everyone has with filth. In contrast, the emissions of an incentive to demand more than can be PROSPERITY WITHOUT POLLUTION 171

PUBLIC TRANSIT OPERATING RESULTS BefoJ'e arid After Federal Aid Millions of Dollars 1000 a ......

-1000 .... ~ -2000 -3000 -4000 -5000 -6000 .\..... -7000 ...... \ -8000 -9000 .... -10000 -11000 -12000 _ Actual Total Losses -13000 State & Local Cash Flow After Federal Aid -14000 1965 1970 1975 1980 1985 1990 Year Source: Transit Fact Book (American Public Transit Association) provided by the resources available. At the Since they don't have to pay in proportion same time, no one has an incentive to to the cost to obtain access to roads, drivers provide more resources. Those who receive demand more than can be provided. High­ the benefits do not have to pay the costs. way agencies go through recurring financial Those who pay the costs do not receive the crises in a futile effort to sate this demand. benefits. This is the formula for failure that Meanwhile, a massive waste of precious contributed to the demise of socialistic so­ time is underway during every''rush hour." cieties like the Soviet Union, East Ger­ Some would have us address this waste by many, and Poland. building heavily subsidized rail transit sys­ One of the clearest demonstrations of tems. However, even with two-thirds ofthe the''problem ofthe commons" in the Amer­ cost of transit trips being borne by taxpay­ ican economy is in our urban transporta­ ers, this mode has continued to lose riders. tion systems. Almost all of the urban Continuing to pour more money into these transportation systems in America are op­ transit systems is the kind of irresponsible erated under conditions that could most misallocation ofresources that only govern­ accurately be characterized as socialistic. ment is prone to inflict on society. (See the The roads and rails are owned and operated chart of "Public Transit Operating Results" by government. Most of the funding comes for an illustration ofthe inauspicious results from taxes. Decisions regarding invest­ of government subsidies to transit.) ment, services, and prices are all made A second source of difficulty for those through a political rather than a market who look to government for solutions is that process. government planning is inherently inept. 172 THE FREEMAN • MARCH 1996

Reality is too complex to fit into any plan that would result would permit more invest­ that government can devise. Government ment in innovations and technological ad­ lacks adequate information on the subjec­ vancement. The lure of greater "net-of­ tive values of individuals, on the world's taxes" returns on investment would provide continuously changing circumstances, and added incentive for innovations and tech­ on what the future might bring. Further, nological advances. government lacks sufficient incentives to The socialistic enterprises ofgovernment, avoid mistakes. The burdens ofits errors fall like highways and transit systems, should be on others. Its failures serve as a rationale for privatized. Selling such operations to pri­ further meddling. vate-sector owners would enable the pow­ If granting more power to government is erful forces of market incentives to more not the best way to achieve prosperity and efficiently direct resources to meet consum­ reduce pollution, what is? Well, since the ers' most urgent needs. More rational pric­ attainment ofboth prosperity and a cleaner ing of services will reduce the deadweight environment is likely to hinge upon the losses epitomized by traffic jams. The fixed application ofhuman creativity to perceived capacities of urban roads could be more problems, an obvious option would appear effectively used and avert the need to pave to be to attempt to encourage more creativ­ over more of the environment. ity. Creativity is likely to be encouraged if Environmentalists urging a government­ individuals are (1) free to use their minds and mandated return to a more natural mode of (2) have sufficient incentive to do so. living are misperceiving the pastand the true This argues for reducing the scope of implications of"natural."Thereis no "Gar­ government intervention and control over den ofEden" to which humanity can return. society and increasing the scope for volun­ Human creativity is the key to a more livable tary human interactions. Government spend­ future in both economic and environmental ing and taxing should be reduced. The terms. To foster creativity we must have lessening burden on private transactions freedom to think and act. D

New from FEE An Endless Series of Hobgoblins: The Science and Politics of Environmental Health Scares by Eric Hagen and James Worman

he American public is constantly warned about the danger of man­ made chemicals. Hackneyed admonitions regarding the risk of cancer Tring out when a new chemical product is introduced. Unfortunatel)', the public normally only hears one side of the story. The truth behind the scares rarely sees the light of day. In this study, Eric Hagen and James Worman examine the three major chemical scares of our time-Alar, Asbestos, and Dioxin. The authors expose the uncertainties of the risk assessments, the costly federal regulations that follow, and the dismal quality

of the 1/ science" behind the hysteria. The research presented provides a gen­ uinely eye-opening account of the dangers of pseudo-science and environ­ mental alarmism. 89 pages $9.95 paperback THEFREEMAN IDEAS ON UBERTY

James Madison­ Checks and Balances to Limit Government Power by Jim Powell

ames Madison didn'toriginate the ideaof Legislature to levy taxes; and for that reason checks and balances for limiting govern­ solely approve of the greater house being Jment power, but he helped push it farther chosen by the people directly ... preserv­ than anyone else before or since. Previous ing inviolate the fundamental principle that political thinkers, citing British experience, the people are not to be taxed but by had talked about checks and balances with representatives chosen immediately by a monarch in the mix, but Madison helped themselves. I am captivated by the compro­ apply the principle to a republic. Contrary to mise ofthe opposite claims ofthe great and such respected thinkers as Baron de Mon­ little states, of the latter to equal, and the tesquieu, Madison insisted checks and bal­ former to proportional influence. ... I like ances could help protect liberty in a large the negative given to the Executive with a republic. third of either house...." Ifone must endure a central government, Madison didn't have a grand vision of it seems hard to improve on the highly liberty like Jefferson, but he acquired prac­ sophisticated checks and balances provided tical insights about how to protect liberty. in the U.S. Constitution, which reflects a Madison, recalled William Pierce, a Georgia good deal ofMadison's handiwork. Stalwart delegate to the Constitutional Convention, republican Thomas Jefferson embraced it. "blends together the profound politician, He told Madison, his best friend: "I like with the Scholar. In the management of much the general idea offraming a govern­ every great question he evidently took the ment which should go on ofitselfpeaceably, lead in the Convention, and tho' he cannot without needing continual recurrence to the be called an Orator, he is a most agreable state legislatures. I like the organization of [sic] eloquent, and convincing Speaker. the government into Legislative, Judiciary From a spirit of industry and application, and Executive. I like the power given the which he possesses in a most imminent degree, he always comes forward the best Mr. Powell is editor ofLaissez-Faire Books and informed Man of any point in debate . . . a a Senior Fellow at the Cato Institute. He has Gentleman of great modestY,-with a re­ writtenforThe New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Barron's, American Heritage, andmore markably sweet temper." than three dozen otherpublications. Copyright © Like his compatriots from Virginia, Mad­ 1996 by Jim Powell. ison's record was stained by slavery, an 173 174 THE FREEMAN • MARCH 1996 inheritance he could never escape. He tried several business ventures aimed at generat­ ing adequate income without slaves, but none worked. Ultimately, he didn't even liberate his slaves upon his death, as George Washington had done. Madison, a shy man, was perhaps the least imposing Founder. He stood less than five feet, six inches tall. He had a sharp nose and receding hairline. He suffered a variety ofchronic ailments including fevers, gastro­ intestinal problems, and seizures. "I am too dull and infirm now," he wrote at 21, "to look out for any extraordinary things in this world for I think my sensations for many months past have intimated to me not to expect a long or healthy life." The most distracting ailment, Madison recalled much later, was "a constitutional liability to sud­ den attacks, somewhat resembling Epi­ lepsy, and suspending the intellectual func­ tions. They continued thro' life, with prolonged intervals." But he blossomed when, at 43, he met the 26-year-old, black- haired, blue-eyed widow Dolley Payne Todd. One of her friends Dolley Madison reported: "At Night he Dreams of you & Starts in his Sleep a. Calling on you torelieve a reputation as a "drinking school," and in his Flame for he Bums to such an excess 1769, Madison left home for the College of that he will be shortly consumed...." They New Jersey, which later became Princeton were married September 15, 1794, and for University. Its library was well stocked, and the next four decades were the "first cou­ included books by Scottish Enlightenment ple" of republican politics, keepers of the authors like Adam Smith and Adam Fergu­ Jeffersonian flame. son as well as influential works on natural James Madison was born March 16, 1751, rights by John Locke and John· Trenchard at his stepgrandfather's plantation on the and Thomas Gordon, co-authors ofthe rad­ Rappahannock River, King George County, ical Cato's Letters. Madison graduated in Virginia. His ancestors had come to Amer­ September 1771. ica not as persecuted people seeking a Madison was drawn to current affairs. He sanctuary but as entrepreneurs hoping to devoured newspapers. He read more books profit. He was the eldest child of Nelly about liberty, such as Josiah Tucker's Conway, a tobacco merchant's daughter. Tracts, Philip Furneaux's Essay on Tolera­ His father, James Madison Sr., was a to­ tion, Joseph Priestley's First Principles on bacco farmer in Orange County. Government, and Thomas Paine's pamphlet Biographer Ralph Ketcham describes Common Sense. Madison as "a sandy-haired, bright-eyed, rather mischievous youth." He had private An Early Dedication to Liberty tutors who taught Latin, arithmetic, alge­ bra, geometry, history, and literature. Al­ On April 25, 1776, 25-year-old Madison though most Virginians considering college was elected a legislator to help draft a state would have chosen William and Mary, it had constitution for Virginia. Proposals came JAMES MADISON 175

son declared government money corrupts. Christianity, he noted, "flourished, not only without the support of human laws, but in spite of every opposition to them...." During these debates on religious free­ dom, Madison got a key idea for protecting individual rights: " ... freedom arises from that multiplicity of sects which pervades America, and which is the best and only security for religious liberty in any society." Meanwhile, in December 1779, Madison had been appointed to the Continental Con­ gress which, meeting in Philadelphia, per­ formed legislative, executive, and judicial functions during the Revolutionary War. The government was broke and financed the war effort with vast issues of paper money known as "continentals," which triggered ruinous runaway inflation. Madison became the most articulate advocate of an alliance with France, and he supported Benjamin Franklin who was lobbying King Louis XVI for help. Madison participated in negotia­ tions with Spain, which controlled Louisi­ ana, aimed at assuring vital American ac­ James Madison cess to the Mississippi River. Madison served in Congress under the Articles of Confederation, ratified March 1, from Thomas Jefferson and Richard Henry 1781. It was a voluntary association of Lee, who were in Philadelphia preparing states. Congress depended on voluntary to declare American Independence. Mad­ contributions, not taxes. If people in a ison's first contribution to liberty: a measure particular state didn't approve what Con­ which affirmed that "all men are equally gress was doing, they kept their money, and entitled to enjoy the free exercise ofreligion that was that. Although states squabbled according to the dictates of conscience, with each other, they were bit players in unpunished and unrestrained by the magis­ world politics, unlikely to become entangled trate, unless the preservation of equal lib­ with foreign wars. Amending the Articles erty and the existence of the State are required unanimous consent-the general manifestly endangered." rules people lived by couldn't be upset Madison worked with Thomas Jefferson easily. Voluntary cooperation worked well who shared his passion for religious liberty. enough that the states defeated Britain, the The two men began meeting frequently after world's mightiest naval power, and they Jefferson was elected governor of Virginia. negotiated tremendous territorial conces­ They both loved books, ideas, and lib~rty, sions. and they remained best friends for a half­ Madison, however, was frustrated at century. what he considered the irresponsible behav­ In 1784, Madison persuaded the Virginia ior ofstates. He objected to their trade wars legislature to enact Jefferson's "Bill for and continued paper money inflation-a Establishing Religious Freedom." He de­ result ofRevolutionary War costs. Devious feated Patrick Henry's proposal that the New Englanders tried to arrange a monop­ state subsidize the Anglican church. Madi- oly on codfish sales to Spain in exchange for 176 THE FREEMAN • MARCH 1996 giving up American rights on the Mississippi inclined to seek more power than permitted River, which would have devastated people by the Articles of Confederation. in the Kentucky territory. Madison believed A quorum of seven states was present things would be better if Congress could by May 25th. Proceedings began on the function as a centralized government. Just first floor of the Pennsylvania State House. 12 days after ratification of the Articles, he During the next four months, delegates conceived the dubious doctrine of implied met six days a week from late morning till power: if a government agency were as­ early evening. Details ofwhat went on were signed a particular responsibility, it could kept secret at the time. "I chose a seat in assume power it considered necessary to front of the presiding member, with the fulfill that responsibility even if the power other members on my right & left," Madi­ wasn't enumerated in a constitution. son recalled. "In this favorable position for hearing all that passed ...I was not A "Fatal Omission"? absent a single day, nor more than a cassual fraction ofan hour in any day, so that I could Madison, incredibly, insisted that to be not have lost a single speech, unless a very legitimate, a government must coerce peo­ short one." Madison was a major influence, ple. "A sanction is essential to the idea of rising to speak 161 times through the Con­ law, as coercion is to that ofGovernment," vention. he wrote in his paper Vices ofthe Political System of the United States (April 1787). The Virginia Plan The Confederation, he continued, "being destitute ofboth, wants the great vital prin­ Defying explicit instructions to revise the ciples ofa Political Constitution. Under the Articles of Confederation, Madison form of such a constitution, it is in fact launched the debates by helping to draft nothing more than a treaty of amity .of the "Virginia Plan," which called for a commerce and alliance, between indepen­ brand-new constitution. It described a two­ dent and Sovereign States." Madison called branch national legislature. The House the lack of coercion "a fatal omission" in would be elected directly by the people, the the Confederation. Senate by the House. Seats would be pro­ On February 21, 1787, Madison and Al­ portionate to population. There would be a exander Hamilton, Washington's former national executive and a national judiciary, assistant who believed passionately in a both chosen by the legislature. Madison powerful central government, persuaded insisted the proposed national government Congress to name delegates who would must be the supreme power with a "nega­ revise the Articles of Confederation. tive" over state legislatures. Large states Madison got George Washington to at­ supported this plan. tend the National Convention, where he Small states rallied to the "New Jersey served as presiding officer. This meant se­ Plan," which aimed to revise the Articles of rious business would be done, convincing Confederation with a single legislative body distinguished citizens that they, too, should where each state had equal representation. attend. Benjamin Franklin would be present The "New Jersey Plan" accepted the prin­ as well, lending his international prestige to ciple that all acts of Congress "shall be the the gathering. supreme law of the respective States." Madison arrived in Philadelphia May 3, The Convention stalemated on the issue 1787. He was to be among 55 delegates from of state representation, and it was referred 12 states (Rhode Island refused to send to a committee which proposed the "Great delegates). The delegates included attor­ Compromise": each state would have equal neys, merchants, physicians, and plantation representation in the Senate, the House owners. Thirty-nine delegates had served in would be apportioned by population, and the Continental Congress, and they were money bills would originate in the House. JAMES MADISON 177

As for the executive, Madison hadn't Checks and Balances worked out his ideas before the Convention. The Committee on Detail recommended The Constitution attempted to limit the an executive who would be called "Presi­ power of central government through intri­ dent," be elected by the legislature, serve cate checks and balances. A key principle a single seven-year term and function as was separation of powers: those who make commander-in-chief of armed forces. Once laws, enforce laws, and interpret laws delegates decided that each state would should be substantially independent and have an equal number ofSenators, Madison capable oflimiting each other's power. The became convinced that the executive two houses ofCongress provide a check on should be elected independently of the leg­ each other. The President can veto legisla­ islature. He helped draft the final proposal to tion, but he can be overruled by a two-thirds have the president selected by electors majority in both houses. The judiciary can whom the people choose-the "electoral strike down laws considered unconstitu­ college." tional. Proposed amendments become part Madison's collaborator, Alexander Ham­ of the Constitution when approved by two­ ilton, was the most outspoken critic of thirds of Congress and by legislatures in democracy at the Convention. After praising three-quarters of the states. Britain's hereditary monarchy, he declared: Yet the Constitution did establish unprec­ "Let one branch ofthe Legislature hold their edented government power in America. The places for life or at least during good behav­ Constitution authorized federal taxes which ior. Let the Executive also be for life." never existed before. It gave the federal Slavery was an explosive issue. If the government power to overrule elected state Constitution had prohibited it, Southern and local officials who were closer to the states would have surely bolted the Con­ people. Control over larger territory in­ vention. Madison successfully pressed for a creased the temptation for U.S. presidents clause permitting the end of the slave trade to become entangled in foreign wars, which in 20 years (1808), and he kept direct support had the consequence of further expanding for slavery out of the Constitution. The federal power. There's some irony here, Constitution provided that the census count since many people supported the Constitu­ slaves ("other persons") as three-fifths of tion because of dissatisfaction with high a person, thereby reducing Southern repre­ inflation, high taxes, and other economic sentation in the House. consequences of the Revolutionary War. The final draft of the Constitution, about Madison accepted Alexander Hamilton's 5,000 words, was engrossed and signed by invitation to help promote ratification in 38 delegates on September 17, 1787. Sixteen New York State. Between October 1787 and delegates had quit the Convention or re­ March 1788, Madison wrote 29 essays fused to sign it at the end. It was sent to which, together with 56 more essays by Congress which, in turn, referred it to states Hamilton and lawyer John Jay, appeared in for ratification by conventions of elected New York newspapers. The essays became delegates. The Constitution would be known as The Federalist Papers. All were adopted upon ratification in nine states. signed "Publius" after the Roman law­ By eliminating state tariffs, the Constitu­ maker Publius Valerius Publicola who tion created a large free trade area, eventu­ helped defend the Roman republic. In July ally the world's largest, which made possi­ 1788, the essays were published as a two­ ble America's phenomenal peacetime volume book. Madison seems to have rec­ prosperity starting in the early nineteenth ognized that by setting up a central govern­ century. Entrepreneurs could travel freely ment, the Constitution conflicted with ideals without the myriad tolls, tariffs, and other of liberty. Not until August 1788 did he obstacles that plagued business enterprise in finally tell Jefferson about his collaboration: Europe. "Col. Carrington tells me he has sent you 178 THE FREEMAN • MARCH 1996 the first volume of the federalist, and adds Constitution wouldn't gain acceptance with­ the 2nd. by this conveyance. 1 believe 1 out a bill of rights. The Constitution was never have yet mentioned to you that pub­ ratified in Delaware (December 7, 1787), lication." Pennsylvania (December 12th), New Jersey Because the Constitution proposed to (December 18th), Georgia (January 2, 1788), expand government power, there was sub­ Connecticut (January 9th), Massachusetts stantial opposition, spearheaded by the so­ (February 7th), Maryland (April 28th), called "Antifederalists." They included South Carolina (May 23rd), New Hampshire New York governor George Clinton, Rev­ (June 21st), Virginia (June 25th), and New olutionary War organizer Samuel Adams, York (July 26th), but the Antifederalists still and Virginians George Mason and Patrick had some aces. They threatened to cam­ Henry. Respected pro-Constitution histori­ paign for a second constitutional conven­ ans Samuel Eliot Morison, Henry Steele tion, which Madison didn't want. Commager, and William E. Leuchtenburg Madison, elected a Congressman, be­ admitted "There is little doubt that the came the key advocate for a bill ofrights. On Antifederalists would have won a Gallup June 8, 1789, he rose on the House floor and poll. " presented his version. He declared: " ... The Antifederalists presented a wide those who have been friendly to the adop­ range of often conflicting points against the tion of this constitution, may have the op­ Constitution. Most important: the lack of a portunity .of proving to those who were Bill of Rights. Madison considered bills of opposed to it, that they were as sincerely rights to be mere "parchment barriers" devoted to liberty and a republican govern­ which an oppressive majority could easily ment. .. ." Madison led the debates and ignore. He was convinced that liberty would parliamentary maneuvering which involved be best protected in a large republic with conferences between House and Senate. many competing interests, where it would The House voted for the proposed Bill of be difficult for a single one to oppress the Rights on September 24, 1789, and the others. Senate followed the next day. State legisla­ tures ratified the Bill ofRights on December Bill of Rights 15, 1791. Madison conceived a limited role for this Jefferson made clear he opposed the Con­ new government. "The powers delegated stitution without a bill of rights. For exam­ by the proposed Constitution to the federal pie, on December 20, 1787, he told Madison government," he explained, "are few and he objected to "the omission of a bill of defined. Those ... will be exercised prin­ rights providing clearly and without the aid cipally on external aspects, as war, peace, ofsophisms for freedom ofreligion, freedom negotiation and foreign commerce. .. ." of the press, protection against standing Madison was shocked at how fast the armies, restriction against monopolies, the Federalists, led by President Washington's eternal and unremitting force of the habeas Treasury Secretary Alexander Hamilton, corpus laws, and trials by jury. .. ." Jef­ expanded central government power be­ ferson added: a Bill of Rights is "what the yond the limits he helped set up. As early as people are entitled to against every govern­ November 1789, Madison expressed oppo­ ment on earth, general or particular, and sition to Hamilton's recommendation that what no just government should refuse, or the self-interest ofwealthy investors should rest on inference." Madison resisted. "I be linked to the central government by have never thought the omission a material issuing bonds-running up a big national defect," he wrote Jefferson, "nor been debt. anxious to supply it even by subsequent Hamilton convinced President Washing­ amendment. .. ." ton to approve the establishment of a gov­ Madison, however, came to realize the ernment bank as a convenience for the JAMES MADISON 179 government, and Madison opposed it be­ courage the warring British and Frenchfrom cause the Constitution didn't say anything seizing American merchant ships. He pur­ about a bank. Indeed, the Constitutional sued an embargo which backfired, devastat­ Convention had specifically rejected a pro­ ing American port cities. He stumbled into posal that the federal government charter the War of 1812, and the British torched corporations such as a bank. Madison re­ Washington, D.C.-retaliation against the jected the doctrine ofimplied powers which United States, which had torched Toronto. he had previously advocated during his Demands of wartime finance spurred Mad­ campaign for central government. Implied ison to ask for higher taxes and a second powers, he declared, struck "at the very government bank, since the term of Hamil­ essence ofthe Government as composed of ton's bank had expired. Madison was vin­ limited and enumerated powers." dicated on one point, though. He relied on volunteers, not conscripts, and it was Amer­ Countering the Federalists ican privateers who ravaged the British coastline, forcing the British government to Madison became nearly as radical as Jef­ negotiate peace. London merchants ferson. Both men praised Thomas Paine's couldn't even get maritime insurance be­ The Rights ofMan (1791), a clarion call for tween Britain and Ireland. liberty which alarmed the Federalists. Despite his inconsistencies, Madison out­ Hamilton unleashed nasty attacks against lived all the other Founders and continued Jefferson in Philadelphia newspapers, and expressing the ideals of republican liberty. Madison together with James Monroe wrote As Jefferson wrote in his most poignant counterattacks. Madison denounced Hamil­ letter, February 17, 1826: "The friendship ton's view that the President should have which has subsisted between us, now half a considerable discretionary power to con­ century, and the harmony of our political duct foreign policy, even if it undermines principles and pursuits, have been sources Congressional power to declare war. In ofconstant happiness to me.... It has also 1793, Madison spoke out against the military been a great solace to me, to believe that you build-up sought by the Federalists. Three are engaged in vindicating to posterity the years later, Federalists wanted to suppress course we have pursued for preserving to American societies sympathetic to the them, in all their purity, the blessings of French Revolution, but Madison insisted self-government. ... To myself you have they were innocent until proven guilty of been a pillar of support through life. Take some crime. Federalists warned that aliens care of me when dead, and be assured that posed grave dangers, while Madison intro­ I shall leave with you my last affections." duced a bill which made it easier for aliens Madison's time came a decade later to become American citizens. Madison re­ when, in early 1836., he began suffering from sisted Federalist demands for higher taxes. chronic fevers, fatigue, and shortness of He denounced the Alien and Sedition Acts breath. On June 27th, Madison wrote his (1798), which empowered the government final words, about his friendship with Jef­ to silence, even deport critics. His was a ferson. During breakfast the next day, he crucial, courageous voice during the Feder­ suddenly slumped over and died. He was alist assault on liberty. buried in the family plot a half-mile south of Jefferson won the 1800 presidential elec­ his house. tion, turning the Federalists out, and Mad­ For all their flaws, constitutional checks ison became Secretary of State for two and balances endure as the most effective terms. Then Madison won the presidency means ever devised for limiting govern­ twice himself. These years were marked by ment-atribute to the insight, industry, and frustration as he groped for a way to dis- devotion of James Madison. D Economics on Trial by Mark Skousen

What Do You Make of This Graph?

"It was felt that if the policy prescriptions According to these GDP statistics, the of the New Economics were applied, American economy has become more business cycles as they had been known stable since World War II. Expansions would be a thing of the past." are longer and slumps are milder. More­ -Hyman P. Minsky, 1968 1 over, the trend appears to be improving, and some economists are once again pre­ n the 1960s, the heyday of Keynesian dicting that recessions will disappear al­ I economics, economists spoke optimisti­ togther. cally of an end to the dreaded business cycle. Then came the stagflationary jolt of Big Government: the 1970s, the credit crunch and banking Boom or Bane? crisis of the 1980s, and Japan's depression of the 1990s. In short, the business cycle So what do we make ofthis graph? I asked seems alive and kicking. an MIT economist, who immediately re­ Now, however, comes a graph recently sponded, "Keynesianism works!" Then I published by the N ati()~al Bureau of Eco­ asked a Chicago professor, who exclaimed, nomic Research (NBER) showing that the "Monetarism works!" cycle has been tamed since World War II, Can we surmise from this graph that big resurrecting the "business cycle is dead" government, as reflected in activist fiscal thesis. The graph is printed below. and monetary policy, has permanently re-

Source: Victor Zarnowitz, Business Cycles (NBER and University of Chicago Press, 1995), reprinted in The Economist, Oct. 28, 1995.

180 181 versed the prewar ups and downs ofAmer­ ward. According to real growth rates pro­ ica's GDP? vided by Milton Friedman, the U.S. econ­ Granted, there have been significant in­ omy grew between 3 and 4 percent a year in creases in the size and scope of govern­ inflation-adjusted terms between 1869 and ment policy since the 1940s-the introduc­ 1969, except during the 1929-39 depression. tion of so-called automatic stabilizers (un­ However, since 1969, the annual real growth employment compensation, federal deposit rate fell to only 2.4 percent, and lately, in the insurance, Social Security), the increase 1990s, the real growth rate has declined even in total government spending to over 40 further. percent of GDP, and a resolve by federal What is the cause of this malaise? A authorities to inflate in the face ofany sign of ubiquitous and unproductive state has economic downturn or crisis. All these clearly left a huge and growing burden on policy changes have created an environ­ society. Government at all levels is stran­ ment that errs on the side ofinflation, rather gling business and individual initiative than deflation. And an inflation-biased econ­ through excessive taxation and regulation. omy is likely to give you more boom than Not surprisingly, most federal regulatory bust over the long term. agencies (EPA, OHSA, FDA, etc.) bur­ Of course, there could be other explana­ geoned in the late 1960s and early 1970s­ tions for a milder and less frequent postwar the same time the growth rate began falling. business cycle: It was also the time that the government broke the last link to sound money (the gold -no world war since 1945; standard). -expanding free trade and globalization, In sum, we must not fall into the trap which tends to ameliorate economic ups and of supporting big government because of downs; its allure of economic stability and a safety -improved methods of inventory con­ net. For stability may simply be a camou­ trol, thus minimizing fluctuations in indus­ flage for economic lethargy and a declin­ trial output; and ing standard of living. As Ben Franklin remarked, "Those who would give up es­ -shifts in the economy away from sential liberty to purchase a little tempo­ volatile agricultural markets toward more rary safety, deserve neither liberty nor stable manufacturing and service indus­ safety." tries.2 Leviathan Is Not Benign The Cost of Artificial Before we join the "business cycle is Stability: Less Growth dead" school, let us not forget that Levia­ than is not benign. More than likely, it But there is no free lunch. Interestingly, will blunder again in the face of a world greater stability in the business cycle has crisis-whether it be a financial panic, a also coincided with less growth in the post­ natural disaster, or a· war. As Adam Smith war U.S. economy. There has clearly been once remarked, "There is much ruin in a a secular decline in the economic growth nation. " According to the Austrian theory rate, particularly the late 1960s when the of the business cycle, as developed by size of government began to explode up- Ludwig von Mises and Friedrich Hayek, Dr. Skousen is an economist at Rollins College, monetary inflation does not simply raise Winter Park, Florida 32789, and editor ofFore­ prices, but also de-stahlizes the economy. casts & Strategies, one ofthe largest investment newsletters in the country. For more information In a world of fiat money inflation and frac­ about his newsletter and books, contact Phillips tional reserve banking, business cycles are Publishing Inc. at (800) 777-5005. inevitable. 182 THE FREEMAN • MARCH 1996

Just because we have avoided another 1. Quoted in Martin Bronfenbrenner, ed., Is the Business Great Depression over the past fifty years Cycle Obsolete? (New York: Wiley, 1969), p. vi. 2. Some economists, especially Berkeley economist Chris­ does not guarantee that we will avoid it in tina Romer, emphasize this point and question whether there the next fifty years. The U.S. economy may has been much improvement in postwar business cycles. See "The Postwar Business Cycle Reconsidered," Journal of be Depression-resistant, but it is not Political Economy, Feb. 1989. However, even accepting Depression-proof. D Romer's revised GDP figures, a huge difference exists between prewar and postwar business cycles.

THE LUSTRE OF GOLD

hy is the gold standard viewed with disfavor by many? What is it that causes politicians and economists, such W as John Maynard Keynes, to disparage and decry a monetary system which has been man's standard for thousands of years?

The gold standard is a monetary system in which gold is proper money and all paper moneys are merely substitutes payable in gold. It is as old as man's civilization. Throughout the ages it emerged again and again because man needed a dependable medium of exchange and gold was found to be such a medium.

The gold standard that builds on freedom does not fail of its own accord. It springs eternally from freedom but succumbs to force and violence. Its implacable enemy is government in search of more revenue.

The seventeen essays in this collection examine the rejection of gold, the history of the gold standard and private coinage in the United States, and the prospects for monetary reform. Contributors include Hans F. Sennholz, Mark Skousen, Henry Hazlitt, Elgin Groseclose, Robert G. Anderson, and Lawrence W. Reed.

150 pages + index $14.95 paperback 183

American, has lived for years in London and is a British joumalist. 1 Into That Dark­ BOOKS ness, her book about Franz Stangl, Nazi Commandant of the Treblinka death camp, Albert Speer: His Battle With Truth attracted Speer's attention when it was by Gitta Sereny published. He wrote Sereny in 1977, and after some correspondence and months of Alfred A. Knopf. 1995 • 757 pages. $35.00 lengthy phone calls, they collaborated on a Reviewed by Bettina Bien Greaves profile ofhim for the London Sunday Times Magazine. They spent almost three weeks in conversation working on the profile and in ver since the appearance in 1944 ofF. A. the course of this decided to work together EHayek's masterpiece, The Roadto Serf­ on a book. dom, it has been generally accepted that Under Sereny's relentless questioning, it is always "the worst" who get to the top Speer explored the past, trying to discover in an interventionist/socialist society. But the truth which he had unconsciously kept so do some ofthe best and the brightest. We hidden even from himself. Sereny gained know about the thugs and sadists who sur­ respect for his sincerity in his personal rounded Adolf Hitler. But architect Albert "battle with truth." Four years into their Speer was also close to Hitler. Yet he has relationship, in September 1981, Speer died. gained the reputation of being different Sereny decided to complete the book somehow-intelligent, better than the oth­ alone and proved herself a skillful sleuth. ers, and not directly involved in the Nazi She interviewed every friend and associate cabal. of Speer's who agreed to see her. In time Speer was among the top National Social­ Sereny found out a great deal about Speer, ists put on trial at Nuremberg. There he his life, family, friends, emotions, ideas, and incurred the wrath of his co-defendants by the Nazi regime. This prodigiously re­ blaming Hitler and admitting personal guilt searched book is. a remarkable tour de for having contributed to his evil regime. force-it is biography, history, psychoanal­ This sincerity on Speer's part may have ysis, and detective story all combined. saved him from the hangman's noose, for Speer was bright, ambitious, hard-work­ when the penalties were announced, he was ing, and energetic, but by his own account not condemned to death, but "only" to not a particularly brilliant architect. Yet, he twenty years in Spandau prison. was an exceptional person-capable, disci­ In his two books (Inside the Third Reich plined, thoughtful, conscientious, resource­ and Spandau), both based on notes written ful, and talented, as evidenced by his ac­ in prison and smuggled out, he portrays count of how he survived twenty years of himself basically as "unpolitical" and gen­ confinement at Spandau. But he was also erally unaware of the Nazi atrocities. But aloof, self-centered, proud, and incapable of now to set history straight, we have Gitta close friendship. Sereny's account. Speer's early success began when, after Sereny, Austrian-born, educated in completing in record time a couple of as­ France and England, and married to an signments for the National Socialist Party, he came to Hitler's attention. Hitler, a

1 Gitta Sereny's father died when she was just frustrated architect himself, felt drawn to two years old. She and her older brother were this attractive young architect and Speer raised by their mother, Margit Herzfeld Sereny, soon became one of Hitler's inner circle. in chaotic, inflationary Vienna of the 1930s. In Speer was seduced in large part by the 1938 their mother remarried and became Mrs. Ludwig von Mises. As a student and friend of opportunities Hitler gave him to fulfill his Professor and Mrs. Mises, I came to know Gitta architectural ambitions-to design grandi­ personally. ose structures, spectacular parade grounds, 184 THE FREEMAN • MARCH 1996 elaborate government offices, and even the pat answers to all such questions, well­ entire city of Berlin with a massive trium­ honed and practiced over years, he suc­ phal arch and an ostentatious domed hall. ceeded. Only at the very end did she ferret In the summer of 1941, however, Speer out a confession from him which, she be­ turned to war work and erected factories all lieved, if stated at Nuremberg would have over Europe for war production and air raid condemned him to death. D shelters. He also directed the repair of Mrs. Greaves is FEE's resident scholar. bomb-damaged transport facilities in the conquered East. Then in February 1942, Speer was named Hitler's Minister of Ar­ maments and Munitions Production. Noah's Choice: The Future of Speer's efficiency in planning and organiz­ Endangered Species ing production, which had been demon­ by Charles C. Mann and strated in his construction projects, made Mark L. Plummer him invaluable to the war effort. He became No.2 in Germany in terms of power and Alfred A. Knopf. 1995 • 336 pages. $24.00 authority. Thus Speer, one of the best and brightest, joined the "worst" at the top of Reviewed by Doug Bandow the Nazi hi~rarchy. As Minister of Arma­ ments he had to use great ingenuity to or some people, nature is sacred. To acquire workers and keep armament pro­ Fthem, little is more important than pre­ duction going during the war. Millions of serving biodiversity-the great expanse of forced laborers were brought from the east, animal species. For instance, in the view of from concentration camps, and from Ger­ Paul and Anne Ehrlich, extinctions must be man-occupied territories to work long stopped because of their "religious" con­ hours, often under dreadful conditions, in viction "that our fellow passengers on the plants he willingly controlled. His use of Spaceship Earth ... have a right to exist." forced labor was the basis for the principal A cynic might say that ifanimals have this charge against him at Nuremberg. right, let them assert it. But they don't have In spite of his powerful positions and his to, since the federal government currently close association with Hitler, Speer claimed does so for them through the Endangered at Nuremberg that he had always remained Species Act (ESA). The result has been ignorant of most of the Nazi crimes. Mter costly: economic growth foreclosed, draco­ Kristallnacht (November 9, 1938) when nian mitigation procedures imposed, and Jewish synagogues, shops, and homes were private property effectively seized. Ofgreat­ burned, he admitted only to having been est concern may be the devastating impact disturbed by the disorder of broken win­ on people's liberty. For example, develop­ dows and smoldering buildings; he claimed ment of large stretches of property around no knowledge ofwhat such maltreatment of Austin, Texas, ground to a halt after the Fish the Jews foretold. He admitted that he and Wildlife Service listed the golden­ should have known but, teflon-coated to the cheeked warbler as "threatened." When a end, he succeeded in convincing himselfand rancher asked if he could cut a couple of others that he had known little about the posts to fix his fence, one agency official Nazi brutalities. responded: "We can't generalize. We have Sereny was determined to discover the to do it on a case-by-case basis. You'll have true extent of his knowledge about the to contact us." maltreatment of forced laborers and about Into the emotional issue of endangered the persecution and extermination of the species delve Charles Mann and Mark Plum­ Jews and other minorities. She became mer, science journalist and economist, re­ convinced that he was concealing the truth spectively. The result is an entertaining even from himself. For weeks, with his too book that mixes policy analysis with snap- BOOKS 185 shots of the actual impact of government more important than the health and comfort policies on communities across America. of several thousand impoverished people? Estimates of the number of discovered The federal government, that's who. species range as high as 1.8 million, "but There are several important technical issues one cannot be sure," explain Mann and involving the implementation of the ESA, Plummer. The number ofundiscovered spe­ the history of which Mann and Plummer cies is almost certainly higher-between relate in fascinating detail. But more funda­ two and four million are common estimates. mental is the question: why? Why work so But some scientists think the total number of hard to preserve species at all? Mann and insects alone could be six million. As Mann Plummer neatly debunk the practical argu­ and Plummer put it, "ourplanet is stuffed to ments, such as the potential for developing bursting with life." new, life-saving cures for diseases. An inevitable result of so much life is a The real issue is what Mann and Plummer certain amount of death. Species do disap­ call the Noah Principle: "Because it's pear-most spectacularly the dinosaurs. there." Purists want to protect anything Man didn't start the extinction process, that exists. In contrast, the public likes though his impact has been significant. what can be best termed charismatic mega­ At what rate man kills is in dispute. fauna: eagles and elephants, for instance. Apocalyptics abound: Thomas Lovejoy of Most creatures, like burying beetles, gener­ the World Wildlife Fund predicts that fully ate no public support. Then there are vari­ one-quarter of the earth's species could be eties of life that most people would prefer eliminated by the year 2025. Thomas Ehr­ to kill, like the species of monkey in which lich even contends that "Homo sapiens is the AIDS virus is thought to have first no more immune to the effects of habitat developed. destruction" than any other creature. Mann and Plummer call for balance. They However, as with such controversies as warn: "We must choose, a nerve-wracking global warming and ozone depletion, real selection among praiseworthy ends that has scientists are increasingly weighing in tragic overtones, and sometimes tragic con­ against the scaremongers. Many are genu­ sequences." The ESA does·not allow us to inely concerned, but nevertheless reject make such choices, however. Although hysteria. Observe Mann and Plummer: it intends to enact the Noah Principle, it has failed, despite its enormous cost. It Is the extinction crisis, then, a chimera, the has not halted the decline of species, with figment of some biologists' imagination? The successful removals from the endangered answer is more complex than a simple yes or list outnumbered one-hundredfold by addi­ no. Extinction rates are surely on the rise, but tions. the number ofverified disappearances is a tiny fraction of the multitude of species thought to Thus, the authors make a number of exist. ... We need much more evidence to practical proposals, the most important of believe that the world is in the midst of an which is to sharply reduce the legal duties immediate extinction crisis. imposed on owners ofproperty with wildlife habitat. Where the government wants to Species preservation is not cheap. The preserve habitat, it should purchase the problem is much more than denying profits property-something already done by pri­ to wealthy developers. It involves every­ vate groups like the Nature Conservancy. one's quality of life. Mann and Plummer Forcing the government to pay would force begin their book with Oklahoma's Nico­ it to trade off the protection of species phorus americanus burying beetle, which against other, competing goals. held up construction of a road connecting a The environment matters, including the community of poor Choctaw Indians to a diversity ofspecies. But man, too, is part of hospital. Who is to say that the protection of the environment. Federal policies must be this one of perhaps six million insects was changed to better reflect this reality, some- 186 THE FREEMAN • MARCH 1996 thing much more likely to occur if policy­ lished his most influential book, The Con­ makers read Noah's Choice. D servative Mind. He went on to become one Doug Bandow is a Senior Fellow at the Cato of the intellectual leaders of the conserva­ Institute and the author ofThe Politics ofEnvy: tive movement as he clearly delineated its Statism as Theology (Transaction). principles. The America of the 1950s was still very much FDR's America. Voices of opposition to statist policies were not wel­ The Sword of Imagination: Memoirs of comed, much less understood. a Half-Century of Literary Conflict Kirk describes the nomination of Dwight by Russell Kirk Eisenhower by the Republican convention William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company. in 1952 as an enormous setback for conser­ 1995 • 514 pages. $34.99 vatism. Had the delegates not betrayed Senator Robert A. Taft, whom Kirk de­ Reviewed by William J. Watkins, Jr. scribes as the true leader of the party at the time, "the United States might have entered ussell Kirk (1918-1994) was proof of early upon far-reaching conservative mea­ R the power of individuals. Kirk's influ­ sures. .. ." So instead of the repeal of the ence on the blossoming of contemporary New Deal, the United States got the inter­ American conservative thought cannot be state highway system. Defeats of principle measured. His 30 books on everything from like this are one reason why Kirk almost economics to history will inspire their read­ titled The Conservative Mind, The Conser­ ers for years to come. vatives' Rout instead. Kirk's final work, completed shortly be­ The publication of The Conservative fore his death in April 1994, ranks among his Mind was a watershed event. It helped give best. The SwordofImagination: Memoirs of coherence to an inchoate opposition to the a Half-Century ofLiterary Conflict contains fads ofmodernity. The book sparked debate his entertaining and informative rumina­ and revived interest in such seminal thinkers tions spanning the 1920s to the 1990s. It is a as John C. Calhoun and John Adams. Now personal chronicle oftumultuous times that in its seventh edition, the book continues to anyone interested in ideas should not miss. inspire thought in new readers as well as old. How Russell Kirk, enemy of omnipotent It is destined to become part ofThe Perma­ government, became interested in ideas and nent Things that Kirk loved so dearly. began his higher education is indeed ironic. Ofcourse his memoirs don't stop with The As his secondary education drew to a close, Conservative Mind. Kirk goes on to recount Kirk felt he had had enough formal learning. how the political climate ofthe nation slowly Fortunately, he was persuaded by his high changed. "The Remnant he had addressed school principal to apply for a scholarship to had grown in numbers," writes Kirk ap­ Michigan State College. So as not to appear provingly, "now and again it had taken a rude to the principal, Kirk applied for and town or a castle." Though it would be won a scholarship that he really didn't want. presumptuous to credit Kirk for the victo­ "Off he went to college against his will," ries, his influence should not be given short writes Kirk in the third person that he uses shrift. Russell Kirk made an enormous dif­ throughout the work, "having nothing bet­ ference in the intellectual environment. ter to do during the Roosevelt Recession in Kirk's memoirs are an honest and enlight­ 1936...." Hence, we can credit the New ening account of the intellectual battles of Deal and its ruinous economic policies as the past half-century. The Sword ofImagi­ the impetus behind the career ofone ofthis nation is testimony to a life lived in defense century's great men of letters. of principle. It is a proper farewell from a The year after he finished his formal giant of our times. D education with a Doctor of Letters degree from St. Andrews in Scotland, Kirk pub- Mr. Watkins is assistant editor ofThe Freeman. BOOKS 187

The Solzhenitsyn Files lance activities (knowing where he shops, Edited and with an introduction by what he spends, and recording his conver­ Michael Scammell sations with his children), their attempts to discredit him even after his expulsion, ac­ edition q, inc.• 1995 • 470 pages. $29.95 cusing him ofemploying some of their very own modus operandi ("lies, juggling of Reviewed by Robert Batemarco facts, intentional distortion of the truth, etc.") and being out of touch with reality , 'Freedom without a literature is like (KGB head and later party chairman Yuri health without food. It just cannot Andropov claims, "there are indications be. To be sure, the yearning for freedom is that domestic and foreign policies of the deep in the hearts ofmen, even the slaves of Party enjoy the unanimous support ofall the the Soviets. But the yearning can turn into Soviet people," for instance). hard, numb despair if the faith upon which We also hear from Solzhenitsyn himself, freedom thrives is not revivified from time to in his courageous letter to the Fourth Con­ time by reference to its philosophy. It is not gress ofSoviet Writers as well as some ofhis without reason that the communists do seized manuscripts. We can see for our­ away with writers on freedom...." selves the qualities of mind and character So wrote Frank Chodorov, former editor which made him such a threat in the eyes of of The Freeman, over 40 years ago. The the Soviets. Contrast the prescience of the story ofAlexander Solzhenitsyn provides a following statement with the self-delusion of case in point. Michael Scammell skillfully the Andropov quote cited above: "This is a teases out that story from over 150 recently government without prospects. They have declassified documents from Soviet ar­ no conveyor belts connecting them to ide­ chives. The only thing that detracts from ology, or the masses, or the economy, or the drama ofthe events described therein is foreign policy, or to the world communist that many ofus already know how it turned movement-nothing. The levers to all the out. For those readers not familiar with the conveyor belts have broken down and don't whole affair, Scammell's excellent introduc­ function. They can decide all they want tion places everything in context. The book sitting at their desks. Yet it's clear at once covers a 17-year period starting with the that it's not working. You see? Honestly, I beginning of the end of Nikita Khruschev's have that impression. They're paralyzed." thaw in 1963 through Solzhenitsyn's being Although the documents included here of awarded the Nobel Prize in literature and his necessity reflect the Party's perspective, years of exile. most readers will take them not at face In between, we are treated to a fty-on­ value, but rather as a glimpse into the the-wall view of Soviet Politburo agonizing pathology of power. The lesson of the de­ over how to stop Solzhenitsyn's searing mise of that power is that nothing is more criticism of the Soviet system without pro­ effective in curing its pathology than the voking adverse reaction from the West. The truth. D alternatives they consider range from "ed­ In addition to editing the book review section iting down" his works to the point of elim­ ofThe Freeman, Dr. Batemarco is a marketing inating their appeal abroad to trying and research manager in New York City and teaches imprisoning him. They eventually settle on economics at Marymount College in Tarrytown, exile and revocation of his Soviet citizen­ New York. ship. It is enlightening to hear firsthand the Politburo's morbid fear of criticism, their straitened views of free expression (' 'the Soviet writer will go his own way. Together with the Party''), the extent oftheir surveil- 188 THE FREEMAN • MARCH 1996

Ayn Rand: The Russian Radical score) but to interpret them in their histor­ by Chris Matthew Sciabarra ical context. After examining the historical back­ Pennsylvania State University Press. 1995 • ground in Russia, Sciabarra goes on to 477 pages. $55.00 cloth; $18.95 paperback consider how Rand's dialectical rejection of Reviewed by David M. Brown dualism, as a "by-product" of her Russian heritage, saturated every aspect of her thought. From this angle he dissects the uch to my surprise the author ofAyn systemic relations of being and knowing, MRand: The Russian Radical, a com­ ethics, art, politics, sex, and "history and prehensive new study ofRand's thought and resolution," critically illuminating not only its genesis in Russian culture, has persuaded Rand's own thought but also its develop­ me that something called ' 'dialectics', is ment and amendment in the hands of her integral to Ayn Rand's philosophic ap­ followers, orthodox and non-orthodox proach and crucial to its success. alike. At every step, Sciabarra's scrupulous Russian Radical is a different kind oflook scholarship, dispassionate tone and dialec­ at Ayn Rand, a full-fledged "hermeneutic" tically dynamic argument are calculated to on the contours, development, and interpre­ render Rand as palatable as possible to tation of her thought. Not to fear. Chris serious academic consideration. But the Sciabarra is a visiting scholar at New York book is not aimed only at academics. It also University who easily deploys crypto-post­ invites those who already appreciate Rand modernist scholarly lingo, but he does not to consider her thought anew. seem to be entirely depraved. His funda­ Rand has repeatedly been read as a kind mental sympathy with Rand's thought is of''vulgar" Nietzschean egoist herself. But obvious; and clearly, Sciabarra wants to true to her non-dualism, Rand's mature convey its complexity and power to an theory in fact transcends the false alterna­ academic audience that has often dismissed tive of sacrificing one's self to others or Rand's rational egoism and libertarianism as sacrificing others to one's self. She rejects polemical and shallow. not only the masochism of conventional Sciabarra wants to approach Objectivism altruism but the sadism of conventional, "as an evolved response to the dualities other-trampling "egoism." To pursue one's Rand confronted in Soviet Russia. Although long-range interests rationally, one func­ she rejected both the mysticism ofRussia's tions as neither master nor slave. Rand religious traditions and the secular collec­ vividly illustrates these themes in her tivism of the Russian Marxists, she none­ novel The Fountainhead, in which the theless remained a profoundly Russian Nietzschean kinds of egoist are contrasted thinker." The author argues, "Rand's Rus­ with the more independent-minded, self­ sian nature was not reflected merely in her sufficient Howard Roark. Roark succeeds heavy foreign accent or in the length of her by earning the trust and rational agreement novels. She was Russian in more fundamen­ of others, and by trading values with them, tal ways. In the sweeping character of her not by getting anyone's self-sacrificial sub­ generalizations, and in her passionate com­ mission (despite dramatic opportunities to mitment to the practical realization of her do so). ideals, Rand was fully within the Russian Sciabarra's insight into the import of literary and philosophic tradition. " The his­ Rand's integrative, contextualist dialectic is torical inquiry and speculation about Rand's part ofwhat makes his book distinctive and Russian roots is core to Sciabarra's project. challenging. His methodology will be con­ As political scientist and intellectual histo­ troversial, and here I cannot begin to sug­ rian, his goal in the book is not to evaluate gest its playing out in the skein of the the validity ofRand's radical ideas (although "hermeneutic." I take his understanding of his analysis is frequently suggestive on that Randian dialectic to be somewhat problem- BOOKS 189

atic as enunciated, less so as applied in financial world in the 1980s. Fischel is a Sciabarra's actual interpretation of Rand. professor of law at the University of Chi­ There is room for much more controversy, cago and also an expert in finance and the too: for example, in Sciabarra's comparison securities markets. He writes fearlessly, ofRand to other thinkers, including provoc­ taking politicians, journalists, judges, and ative wondering about, say, whether Rand prosecutors to task for their ignorance but may have picked up her emphasis on pro­ mostly venality in the entire affair. And in ductive work from Karl Marx. In terms of the course ofit all, the reader learns a great sheer new information, the material on deal about the world offinance, particularly Rand's education is invaluable, but of a the benefits of corporate restructurings fi­ necessarily speculative character. nanced by high-yield bonds. Any book that Sciabarra also rehabilitates Rand's advo­ accomplishes so much good deserves hearty cacy oflimited government and repudiation praise indeed. of anarchism as an expression of her non­ The root of a vast amount of economic dualistic, dialectical approach (and, yes, it good and his own success (and later down­ turns out that anarchism really is "context­ fall) was Michael Milken's insight that there dropping"). He reconstructs Rand's analy­ was a great untapped reservoir of capital sis of power relations on the interlocking available to entrepreneurs in "junk" (more personal, cultural, and "structural" levels, appropriately called "high-yield") bonds. and notes that her capitalist ideal is set forth These are bonds with a higher risk of non­ as "the only social system that makes pos­ repayment than investment-grade bonds sible a triumph over social fragmentation. " and a correspondingly higher interest rate. The Aristotelian philosopher Henry Wall Street traditionally looked down its Veatch has asked whether Objectivism will nose at such securities; the bond markets ever be academically respectable. That for­ were for the blue chips. Those who wanted merly open question must now be answered to borrow large quantities ofcapital for risky with an unequivocal "Yes," inasmuch as ventures had a very hard time doing so. Chris Matthew Sciabarra's profound and Michael Milken changed that. Working at subtle study has made it inevitable. But an insignificant New York investment bank, more important, Ayn Rand: The Russian Drexel Burnham Lambert, Milken con­ Radical is a fundamental challenge to ev­ vinced management to allow him to give his eryone to reassess the remarkable thought theory a try. Beginning with its first high­ of a remarkable woman. D yield bond deal in 1977, Drexel swiftly rose Mr. Brown is a freelance writer. to prominence in the industry. In creating this success at Drexel, Milken also made many enemies. In selling billions worth of junk bonds, Milken angered the Wall Street patricians. Wall Street etiquette Payback: The Conspiracy to was that on big underwritings, the lead Destroy Michael Milken and underwriter would form a syndicate to His Financial Revolution spread the risk and share the fees. Drexel rarely ever did this. Milken also made ene­ by Daniel R. Fischel mies of the old-line Fortune 500 executives HarperCollins Publishers. 1995 • 326 pages. who felt threatened by the emergence of $25.00 competitors for control over their corpora­ tions. Reviewed by George C. Leef One of the book's virtues is Fischel's ability to set the record straight about finan­ aniel Fischel is eminently qualified to cial dealings, such as leveraged buyouts, D write a book on the attack on Michael which have been so demonized in the press Milken and the changes he wrought in the that most of the public believes them to be 190 THE FREEMAN • MARCH 1996 no different from pillage. But all the blown than as an attack on the integrity of "raiders" were doing was competing for the financial markets. control by purchasing stock. In the '70s and If the case against Milken was so weak, '80s, there were many overextended and why did he plead guilty? The answer is that ineptly run corporations in the country. the government had also indicted Michael's That made it possible for the takeover spe­ brother, Lowell, who had no involvement cialists to profit by taking control, replacing with any ofthe counts in the indictment, but complacent management teams and selling was used by the government to increase its offparts ofthe corporation that didn't fit in. leverage against Michael. He knew that the In the free market, you don't make money government could and would ruin his by destroying things. When the "raiders" brother if he didn't cooperate. One of the made money, they did so by increasing most disturbing facts that Fischel brings out efficiency. is how easy it is for the government to The destruction of Michael Milken, coqjure up allegations of securities law vi­ Drexel, and a host of other firms and indi­ olations and use the threat of prosecution viduals was accomplished by the use of to force people's hands. Guilt isn't neces­ prosecutorial tactics that are the twentieth­ sary. The prospective financial and emo­ century counterparts ofthe rack. The pros­ tional costs of a trial are sufficient to bend ecutors were out to make big names for most people to the government's will. themselves by bringing down the high and After Milken's coerced guilty plea, nu­ mighty. Many of the convictions were later merous demagogic politicians piled on, reversed by the Second Circuit Court of claiming that he was responsible for the Appeals, but that was back-page news. savings and loan crisis that had become a Just what was it that Milken had suppos­ major political and financial debacle by the edly done? Fischel writes, "After the most late '80s. Milken made the perfect scape­ thorough investigation of any individual's goat. Congress enacted a law forcing re­ business practices in history, the govern­ maining S&Ls to divest themselves ofown­ ment came up with nothing. In fact, the ers.hip of all junk bonds. Fischel's government never established that Milken's discussion of the facts of the S&L crisis is 'crimes' were anything other than routine excellent, refuting numerous popular business practices common in the myths, and his analysis of the destructive industry. " effects offorcing still-solvent S&Ls to dump Milken would eventually plead guilty to their junk bond portfolios is razor sharp. six felonies. Four of them were in conjunc­ Fischel sums up the campaign against tion with an alleged "stock parking" deal Michael Milken this way: "Milken's down­ between Milken and Ivan Boesky. Stock fall proves only that the government, with parking is a harmless practice whereby one its unlimited ability to harass and change the individual purchases and holds securities on rules in the middle of the game, is more behalf of another under an agreement that powerful than any individual. ... The un­ the true owner will later buy back the stock, holy alliance ofthe displaced establishment taking all gains orlosses. The SEC regulates and 'decade of greed' rich-haters, aided by stock parking, however, so that it will not be ambitious but unscrupulous government used to evade other regulations. The so­ lawyers ... combined to destroy him. The called crime was over a failure of record­ whole episode is a national disgrace. " Read keeping. Such violations had never before this excellent book and see if you don't been treated as anything but a minor regu­ agree. D latory infraction. Milken had in all proba­ Mr. Leefis an adjunct scholar at the Mackinac bility, Fischel concludes, not even commit­ Center, Midland, Michigan, and legislative aide ted the offenses charged. "Felonies" five to state Senator David Honigman. and six were likewise feeble, more proof that the SEC's regulation is absurdly over- BOOKS 191

To Renew America ion, he asserts it is within our power to mold by Newt Gingrich the future-to succumb or forge ahead to­ HarperCollins Publishers. 1995 • 260 pages. ward a boundless bounty. "To renew or to $24.00 decay"-that is the question. Got problems? Take six steps and all will be well when it's Reviewed by Wesley Allen Riddle morning again in America: (1) reassert American civilization; (2) accelerate entry 'TV Renew America is a good book worth into the Third Wave Information Age; (3) ..1. reading. That said, one hastens to add become more competitive in the world mar­ that it is not a profound book; moreover, ket; (4) replace the welfare state with an it is not as good as it should have been. opportunity society; (5) decentralize power Indeed, while the book is provocative and by shifting it to states, locales, and individ­ far superior to anything on the other side of uals; and (6) balance the federal budget. the ideological aisle, it lacks depth and even Few would disagree per se with the six coherence in some places. To Renew Amer­ steps, which are really goals. Many should ica fails to develop the essential philosoph­ be a bit wary, however, because every step ical groundwork for cultural and spiritual entailing an active verb above also employs renewal or the economic and political ratio­ the agency of the federal government. Gin­ nale for any other type. The argumentation grich reveals a so-called pragmatic conser­ is built on platitudes and an almost boyish, vatism in the book, which smacks ofmeans naive optimism. Hence the book does little justifying ends. Even the step to decentral­ to achieve the purpose implied by its title. It ize power is a bit disingenuous, since he leaves the serious reader annoyedly disap­ does not predicate his argument on consti­ pointed. tutionalism or morality. Gingrich writes instead for popular con­ Gingrich pictures a kind ofpolitical inter­ sumption. His style is straightforward like net, in which the devolution of power plan the conservative talk radio commentary he goes out through the modem of centralized celebrates. There is nothing inherently state policy. The policy exists as long as wrong with the approach, but the approach Republicans happen to be in charge-and is persuasive as opposed to reasoned. To while everyone behaves. Jack Kemp has Renew America does give the reader some identified this central inconsistency, namely heavy doses of common sense, an increas­ the faith that individuals must be empow­ ingly uncommon commodity. The book's ered but also harnessed to inexorable his­ treatment of welfare and health-care issues torical forces such as technology (helped is particularly good in this regard. Gingrich along by government). also writes lucidly about the wrongheaded­ Waves don't make history. People do. In ness of the current tax code, as well as the the final analysis, To Renew America lacks incessant running ofbudget deficits. Butfew imagination, even as it sports a futuristic and conservatives and libertarians will take the sometimes far-fetched vision. Gingrich con­ simplistic and programmatic approach in ceives of everyone marching to the beat of this book as seriously as the liberals. the same Third Wave Information Age Gingrich is at his best when he explains drummer. By doing so, he fails to give history. The former history professor pre­ people proper credit for their ability to sents a clear exposition ofwhat amounts to envision and pursue still greater potentiali­ an emerging neoconservative revisionist in­ ties. He also fails to acknowledge people's terpretation of the modern period. Slowly natural right to choose one or a combination but increasingly, this new school ofthought of such-or to reject them all. D is also affecting established academe. Gin­ Wesley Allen Riddle is Assistant Professor of grich assesses the American predicament History at the United States Military Academy, today as one of cultural disintegration and West Point, New York, where he teaches the elec­ civilizational decline. In Reaganesque fash- tive course in the American political tradition.