Vol. 3.6–7, July–August 1971

A Monthly Newsletter

THE

Libertarian Forum

Joseph R. Peden, Publisher		Murray N. Rothbard, Editor
VOLUME III, NOS. 6-7	July-August, 1971	75¢

DUMPING NIXON

We are now entering a daffy, exciting, exuberant season of Presidential politics. Perhaps come the fall of ’72, with all the hoopla over, we shall be faced with the grim, cold, sobering choice of Nixon vs. Muskie, and the fix is probably in already. But at this stage of the game, we can exult in the seemingly limitless possibilities, as dozens of Democratic candidates jostle each other, black, female, Third Sex, and Lord knows how many other caucuses abound, and third and fourth parties make noises in the wings. At this point, the great quadrennial American extravaganza looms as the most exciting in decades.

Let us begin with a few clear guidelines. For the libertarian, other things being equal, the first desideratum is to punish the incumbent. If we cannot yet abolish the office of President, we can at least make a start toward redressing our grievances by ousting the existing tenant for his numerous high and low crimes and misdemeanors. If we cannot punish the President to the full extent of the natural law, we can at least retire him to the private life he so richly deserves. We can establish a new and glorious tradition of the one-term President.

That’s if other things are equal, and that at least provides us with our first guideline. But other things, of course, are never equal. When we come further to consider the record in office of Richard Milhous Nixon, it is hard to find one redeeming feature, one splotch of white in the black record of the Nixon regime.

Let us summarize:

The shameful genocidal war in Vietnam and Southeast Asia continues, and Nixon has fiercely resisted every attempt by the Congress, no matter how feeble, to put an end to the war. The latest Hanoi-NLF offer totally exposes the Nixon mendacity on the phony prisoner-of-war issue, but still the Administration refuses to accept the offer, and the genocide continues.

The draft continues in full force, despite anarcho-Nixonite assurance that at least Nixon would remove conscription-slavery. Instead, Nixon simply adopted the old Kennedy lottery scheme, which conservatives and libertarians had scorned for years.

“Conservative”, neo-Friedmanite economic manipulation by the Nixon Administration has brought us the new and glorious phenomenon of the inflationary recession. The recession is still with us, while inflation proceeds merrily on its way.

“Conservative” Nixon economics has brought us the largest peacetime federal deficit in our history, which now looms as something like $27 billion, with another $30 billion promised for next year.

“Conservative” Nixon economics is eagerly attempting to foist on us probably the single most disastrous plan ever proposed in America: the neo-Friedmanite Family Assistance Program, which will lock an increasing number of Americans into a parasitic automatic dole.

Nixon has accelerated the system of what has aptly been called “Big Business socialism” or “corporate communism”, in which the government comes ever more nakedly to the support and rescue of inefficient large corporations: e.g. the SST, Lockheed, passenger railroad service boondoggles.

The Nixon administration has moved ever closer to wage and price controls, which have been advocated by high Administration economists. In the meanwhile, it has exercised such controls in the construction industry, and for the rest of industry has adopted the old Democratic “jawboning” policy of verbal threats and intimidation which it had previously spurned.

The Nixon administration has savagely moved to suppress freedom of the press in the famous Pentagon Papers affair, including the criminal indictment of Daniel Ellsberg and an unprecedented attempt to impose prior censorship before publication. The despotic and reprehensible dissents of Nixonite judges Blackmun and Burger, coupled with the narrow and flimsy arguments of most of the other members of the bench, show that we are scarcely out of the woods even on prior censorship. (O.K., Read and Rand: is this enough to make you revolutionaries?) One of the major reasons for dumping Nixon is the looming menace to the structure of civil liberties built up by the Warren Court. With Justice Douglas and the magnificent Hugo Black nearing retirement, our personal and civil liberties are truly in peril unless Richard Nixon is removed from office.

When we add the unrelieved horror of the Nixon record to the original guideline against incumbents, we conclude with one great injunction that every libertarian should be able to support with enthusiasm for 1972: DUMP NIXON!

Here is a goal which all shades of the varied libertarian spectrum should find exhilarating, and indeed the signs are that a broad coalition of left, right, and center libertarians are banding together to work with other anti-Nixon forces in this crusade of cleansing and retribution. It is particularly significant that many of the current anti-Nixon libertarians were high in the Nixon-youth forces in the 1968 campaign.

Clearly, the first place to try to dump Nixon is the Republican primaries. Unfortunately, Senator Mark Hatfield (R., Ore.) has resisted all efforts urging him to run for President, and Nixon’s only Republican opponent is Rep. Paul McCloskey (Calif.), whose only libertarian asset, aside from a dogged and sincere manner, is his staunch opposition to the war in Vietnam. But still this is the major single issue, and the more votes racked up for McCloskey the more the embarrassment and discomfiture for King Richard. At best, there is always the possibility that McCloskey might be able to emulate Gene McCarthy in being so successful as to force the President to withdraw; and at worst, the embarrassing support for the relatively unknown Congressman will clearly be a vote of non-confidence in the President, and will soften him up for the election in November.

Some YAFers and other honest conservatives, in despair at the Family Assistance Plan and especially at Nixon’s grandstand visit to China, which is a deep affront to their most cherished rhetoric if not really significant in itself, are turning in despair to a Draft Reagan movement. But honesty ha never been a strong conservative suit, and indications are that the Buckleyite realpolitik will triumph, and that Republican conservatives, including of course Mr. Reagan, will dutifully if painfully keep their counsel and support the President. Is there no indignity which conservatives are not prepared to swallow?

Let Us assume then that, after as much trouble as can be made for him, Mr. Nixon will sweep into the renomination. What then? The Democratic field is a crowded and ebullient one. In order to make some sense of the large lineup, let us first divide the hopefuls into a rough left-center-right grouping, depending on the intensity of their opposition to the abomination in Southeast Asia.

On the Right, we have those Democrats who are roughly Johnson-Nixon hawks on Vietnam. There is, first, that egregious gasbag and onetime darling of New Deal liberalism, Hubert Horatio Humphrey. Humphrey’s record of toadying to LBJ marked a new low even for American politics, and the thought of a Nixon-Humphrey replay is almost too much for the human soul to contemplate. No, no, not that! Then there is the man who represents the antithesis of libertarianism in American politics, the man who is wrong on every conceivable question, the “Senator from Boeing”, Henry “Scoop” Jackson (Wash.) Bad on the war, bad on the military-industrial complex, bad on the draft, bad on economics, bad, bad, bad. Mr. Statism. Another right-wing hopeful is Rep. Wilbur Mills (D., Ark.), bad on the war and draft, “conservative” fiscal expert and advocate of wage-price controls. Never. And finally, Mayor Sam Yorty of Los Angeles, rightist, clown, crusher of civil liberties, and happily with no chance whatsoever of the nomination.

In the center, demarkations between center and left become rather fuzzy. The epitome of the Center is Ed Muskie (Me.), cool, grey, colorless, fairly good on the war at this point, fairly bad on the draft. Probably the eventual candidate when the party hacks have had their day, Ed Muskie is the furtherest right candidate who could be acceptable as an alternative to Nixon, and then of course only barely and without enthusiasm. Teddy Kennedy, possessed of lots of family charisma, is under the twin clouds of Chappaquiddick and Camelot, but has been moving leftward in an interesting fashion – especially his recent vote in support of the Gravel filibuster against extending the draft. Ramsay Clark is a shadowy dark horse with mysterious backing, whose only claim to our attention seems to be his revulsion against even his own tyrannies as Attorney-General. Senator Birch Bayh (Ind.) is a colorless middle-of-the-roader with some labor union support, which makes him suspect, and whose only leadership came in electoral reform and the Haynesworth-Carrswell cases, estimable perhaps but hardly making him Presidential timber.

On the Left, the man with by far the best libertarian credentials in the Democratic Party has been so badly treated by the press that scarcely anyone knows that he is in the race. This is Senator William Proxmire (D., Wise), a man with an impeccable record on the war and the draft, and heroic leader in the Senate on behalf of economy in government and in opposition to the SST and Lockheed boondoggles. Highly knowledgeable and of proven leadership ability, William Proxmire has the highest rating in the entire Senate from the National Taxpayers Union on spending-and-tax votes in the last Congress, far higher than any other Senator. Proxmire is close to libertarian financial expert A. Ernest Fitzgerald, who broke the Lookheed scandal, and is sympathetic to the broad libertarian cause. PROXMIRE FOR PRESIDENT!

Of the remainder of the Left, Senator George McGovern (S. D.) is the respected leader of the anti-war constituency, especially now that Senator Hughes’s (Io.) propensity for the occult has apparently led him to withdraw from the race. McGovern is also solid on the draft. However, he (1) lacks charisma, and (2) suffers from domestic statism, especially the guaranteed annual income scheme.

It now appears that we are not to be spared a resurgence of Eugene McCarthy. Symbolically important on the war three years ago, McCarthy is poor on the draft, and is an odd sort of anti-hero in style and performance: erratic, offhanded, lazy, he has a generally poor sense of timing in manner as well as substance.

It is hard to take the loudly proclaimed entry of Senator Fred Harris (Okla.) very seriously. A Johnny-come-lately on the war and the draft, Harris just seems to be a statist with an affected “populist” style. Having done a poor job in the national committee, and facing certain defeat in primary and re-election races next year, Fred Harris apparently concluded that he had no place to go, after failing on a smaller scale, than failing as presidential candidate. Neither can we take seriously the candidacy of Rep. Anderson (Tenn.) whose one political issue seems to be support for the Berrigan brothers.

Of course, the big dramatic race is now expected to be made by one candidate possessing authentic charisma: Mayor John Lindsay of New York, expected to make a melodramatic switch of parties and then run for the Presidency. Lindsay has charisma, that is, everywhere except in New York City, and it would be hard to find any New Yorker, regardless of political persuasion, who will not predictably spit fire and curses at the very mention of Lindsay’s name. And with good reason. If it is unfair to blame the entire visible deterioration of New York City in recent years on Lindsay’s stewardship, it is also evidently true that he has hardly succeeded in stemming the tide. In fact, Lindsay is a spectacularly bad administrator; he manages to alienate all concerned groups in every area without helping the situation, and he approaches every problem with a scoutmasterish air of moral superiority that is far more annoying for being totally unjustified. I concede Lindsay’s good record on Vietnam and the draft, but no New Yorker can contemplate Lindsay’s accession to the administration of the entire country without a grimace of horror. Only one good thing has John Lindsay done as Mayor: he has evinced a genuine concern for civil liberties. He has kept the cops more or less under leash; and his concern for civil liberties has led him to place New York City in the forefront of freedom for pornography and prostitution. Until recently, that is; for in recent weeks, the onset of Presidential fever has apparently led Lindsay to a drastic shift rightward on the matter, and he has instituted a continuing crackdown on “vice” – thus cancelling the only good deed of the Lindsay regime.

The Democrats’ chances in 1972 are excellent; predictably, therefore, in view of their long-standing genius for self-destruction, we can count on them trying desperately to kick those chances away. The latest manifestation is the new Women’s Caucus, almost completely left-Democratic, which might well bolt the ticket if a woman is not nominated. Already, Rep. Shirley Chisholm (N.Y.) has decided to run for President, her major qualification being that she is both black and female, and thereby can run as representative of two “oppressed” caucuses. If only Mrs. Chisholm had been also a Chicana, a student, a Youth, an Old Person and a Welfare Mother, she could be the living embodiment of every “oppressed” and un-liberated group in the country. But even as it is, we are unfortunately living in a world where the candidacy of Mrs. Chisholm is not automatically laughed into the oblivion it so richly deserves.

A third and even a fourth party also loom as possibilities in 1972. About George Corley Wallace one can only have mixed feelings. In contrast to Fred Harris an authentic populist, Wallace makes many sound and trenchant criticisms of the existing system: of its corporate statism, its unholy alliance between Establishment rich and welfare recipients to exploit the bulk of the working and middle classes, of its compulsory integration and school bussing. But, alas!, the Wallace policies hardly sustain the promise of his sound critiques; a superhawk on Vietnam and the Cold War, Wallace is also scarcely known for devotion to civil liberties; on the contrary, we can expect the ultimate unleashing of the police and of repression under a Wallace as President.

There remains the possibility of a New Left fourth party, as yet unnamed. In theory, a fourth party could do an effective job in pushing the Democrats to the Left and in a pro-peace direction, by using the time-honored device of the carrot-and-the-stick, promising (a) that if the Democrats nominate a Proxmire or a McGovern, the New Party would run him on its line as well; but (b) that if the Democrats nominate a Hubert Humphrey, the New Party would run its own man in opposition. This seems to be a simple and effective strategy, but for some reason few third parties – among whom New York’s Liberal and Conservative Parties are notable exceptions – have the wisdom and maturity to pursue such a course. Going on past record, we can predict that either the New Party will collapse and not be heard from again, or that it will stubbornly insist on running its own candidate no matter what the Democrats do, and thereby threaten a dangerous split in the anti-war forces. If the black and female caucuses do not succeed in wrecking the Democrats’ chances, then perhaps the New Party will finish the job.

LIBERTY: FROM RAND TO CHRIST

By Joseph R. Peden

In the midst of what appears to be a renaissance of libertarian thought, and a period of rapid increase in the numbers of its adherents – especially among the young college activists – it might be well for us to devote some attention to a remarkable personal testament entitled “Road to Freedom – Or to Nowhere?” published in Rough Beast #4 (1522 Connecticut Ave. NW, Washington, D.C. 20036). The author, Warren Carroll, formerly publisher of Freedom’s Way, a pioneer libertarian publication, has produced a rare document – an analytic repudiation of libertarianism by a onetime true believer.

Although Carroll is familiar with several schools of libertarian thought – that of the individualist anarchists such as Albert Jay Nock, Frank Chodorov and the Rampart College group, and the limited-government classical liberals of The Foundation for Economic Education, he tends to identify libertarianism with Objectivism. As a former Randian Carroll knows the strengths and weaknesses of Objectivism intimately and his detailed and of ten perceptive critical analysis and disillusionment is colored by this personal experience.

Carroll begins his analysis by pinpointing a basic dilemma which besets Objectivists: how can they most effectively create an objectivist social order? If they plunge into the political cauldron they are bound to compromise or sacrifice intellectual consistency – the hallmark of Objectivist morality. If they refrain from political action, they remain intellectually chaste, but doom their movement to “perpetual ineffectiveness”. To Carroll this dilemma is a “fatal short-coming” of libertarianism. Moreover, faced with this inner conflict, the libertarian is likely to be assaulted by a sense of despair that mankind in general will ever have the same passion for intellectual consistency that he has.

“By definition, the existing pattern of government everywhere prevents the realization of the libertarian dream, and the trend of current history sets steadily toward more and more concentration of power in government. Participation on any significant scale in either the political or economic system now existing entails compromises of principle that most libertarians find unacceptable. Increasingly they find themselves hemmed in and blocked on every side by their own philosophy. What was to have been a road to freedom becomes, in the real world, a cage.”

“As the realization grows . . . that he is caught in a trap, . . . increasingly his thought turns either to violence or to flight.” Those who succumb to violence “are quickly absorbed by the New Left and cease to be libertarians”; those who turn to flight – to desert isles or nomadism or hermitage – thereby affirm the Utopian character of libertarian philosophy. “In these two swamps of failure the libertarian movement in all its forms is being swallowed up.”

Clearly Carroll knows whereof he speaks. He seems to have undergone the great intellectual crisis he so accurately describes. The sordid public dispute between Ayn Rand and Nathaniel Branden seems to have precipitated a decision by Carroll to flee to the uninhabited waste of Tasmania. There he was further traumatized by finding the few isolated inhabitants gathered around a TV set watching the Ed Sullivan Show and the Australian government firmly in control of all uninhabited lands. His faith in libertarianism as a workable moral philosophy was finally shattered.

From this disillusionment, Carroll now sees three fundamental errors and a “still more fundamental failure of vision which taken together are fatal to the libertarian dream”.

First of all, says Carroll, there is a “drastic misapprehension of the nature of man”. Libertarians view man as naturally good and rational but corrupted by institutions i.e. the State, the schools, the family, etc. But equally, libertarians know that institutions are merely individuals acting in concert in accordance with their interests, instincts or traditional ways. Therefore, the responsibility for the evils in society cannot be placed upon institutions but upon the individuals acting within the collective behavioral framework we call an institution. “But if men got themselves into their present state through their own corruption, how then do libertarians expect to bring them out of it? The failure of all their specific programs gives the answer to that question: they cannot”.

Here one should note that Carroll raises the very crucial question of the nature of evil in man – a subject of the greatest philosophical and practical importance which deserves serious analysis by libertarians. But he also asserts that because of their inadequate theory as to the true nature of man, the specific programs of libertarians have, historically, failed and in fact cannot succeed. Since he does not give further detail or example to illustrate what he has in mind, one hesitates to comment further than to say that as no fully libertarian society has existed in European civilization since libertarian philosophy first emerged in the age of the Enlightenment, one can hardly prove or disprove Carroll’s sweeping judgement as to its pragmatic effectiveness. One can only point empirically and historically to the fact that since the 18th century there has been a continual expansion of individual liberty as an ideal and social reality in a host of areas of human thought and action. I would give Carroll’s indictment a Scottish verdict of “Not Proven”.

A second error, according to Carroll, is the libertarian’s “optimistic misreading of history”, his assumption that “his system has never failed because it never has been tried, while in fact it has never been tried because it would certainly fail! The failure of the approaches to a libertarian society which were made in the past, particularly in the 19th century, is the proof we have that a fully libertarian society would be even shorter-lived and less successful.” I have already stated my belief that Carroll’s historical verdict on libertarian efforts in previous centuries is not proven. But his accusation of misplaced optimism is central to the condition of despair which permeates his entire attitude towards libertarianism. As a professional historian Carroll shows a surprisingly crude appreciation of the complexity of human society and of the process by which societies undergo change. Libertarian philosophy is largely the product of the 19th century drawing inspiration from the intellectual legacy of the enlightenment. Does he really think that scarcely two centuries would see the triumph of so radical a moral, social and economic philosophy? Christianity as a wholly integrated moral and practical philosophy has been with us for two thousand years and its failures are at least as glaring as those of libertarianism. Does the failure of Christians and their society to conform to the ideals of the philosophy of Christ mean that their “system” would totally fail if ever tried? Are both Christians and libertarians hopeless Utopians? I think not. They may well be the only true realists. Only a person of the narrowest historical perception could dismiss libertarians as guilty of “optimistic misjudgement of history”. They are simply not historical determinists and they recognize that a century is but a minute in the history of the human race. They do have faith in the ultimate value of and vindication of their philosophical insights – as do believing Christians.

I think that Carroll is so frustrated by the collapse of his own Utopian libertarianism that he has lost historical perspective. As Paul Goodman has pointed out, the libertarian revolution is not the work of a day – or a decade – or a lifetime. It is a continuous process through the ages. The focus of the struggle changes from time to time and place to place. Once it involved the abolition of slavery; now it may be women’s liberation; here it may be a struggle for national independence; there it may center on civil liberties; at one moment it may require electioneering and party politics; at another armed self-defense and revolution. Carroll expected too much too soon. There is a tendency among many libertarians to look for an apocalyptic moment when the State will be smashed forever and anarchy prevail. When they realize that the great moment isn’t about to come in their time, if ever, they lose faith in the integrity and plausibility of the libertarian philosophy. Like a Christian awaiting the Second Coming of Christ when the reign of Justice shall be established and evil men receive their just punishment, the libertarian awaits the coming of the rational and anarchic age. But to lose one’s faith in the validity of Christianity because evil continues to thrive in the world makes as much sense as losing one’s faith in libertarianism because the New Order has not yet triumphed over the Old. Such attitudes are naive and not be be expected from mature, sophisticated men of learning. Carroll’s experience should warn us that libertarianism can quite easily become merely an adolescent fantasy in minds that are immature and unseasoned by a broad humanistic understanding. It should not be an idee fixe or magic formula, but a moral imperative with which one approaches the complexities of social reality.

In his discussion of what he considers to be a third fatal error, Carroll gives further clue to what ultimately repelled him in libertarianism – the “fundamental inadequacy of the materialistic value system which, in essence, they all accept”. Crediting Ayn Rand with at least attempting to transcend the obvious limitation of materialism by setting up life itself as the source of value, Carroll accurately perceives that “objectivism in practice measures the value of life in material terms, by the financial profit or the personal satisfaction that can be realized from it”. It is one of the great ironies that Leftists who philosophically are materialists are psychologically quite ready to sacrifice life, liberty and personal comfort for the Cause; yet Objectivists who are rhetorically preoccupied with morals, concepts, dialectic and reason are notoriously adverse to anything that smacks of idealistic altruism. Wealth and the bitch goddess success are the household dieties of the Randian cult. Who else but a Randian would sport a dollar sign as a personal fetish or totem? If they were not so narrowly chauvinistic the Randians might have chosen the more universal symbol of their cult – the golden calf. Worshippers of wealth and success, and hedonists, are seldom very attractive people. They are incapable of either love or true friendship for both are founded upon disinterested loyalty and self-sacrifice to the needs of another. It is not surprising that an audience at a West coast convention should wildly applaud a young man who openly bragged that he had betrayed his fellow students to the police and his only regret was that he had not done it for money! Or as an ex-Randian once put it, the only poetry that will ever come from the Randians will be an Ode to Greed.

Under the circumstances, it is not surprising that Mr. Carroll has abandoned libertarianism (which he tends to identify with Objectivism) and sought elsewhere for a new certitude and a new basis for his moral values. Indeed, it is to his credit that he did so. He has found a new faith; he has become a Christian. The great tragedy here is that he fails to perceive that libertarianism is not incompatible with a Christian world view. Libertarianism is not the atheism, materialism and unrestrained egoism of Objectivism or of Stirnerism or other variant schools. It is essentially the belief that voluntarism is the only just basis for human social relationships; that man is a creature whose inherent worth and dignity is beyond price; that man should live in conformity to his nature as perceived through the light of reason; that you should do unto others as you would have them do unto you. Is this at all incompatible with Christianity? The Christian is, I would argue, a natural anarchist by faith. He has a profound respect for life and human dignity; he governs himself by the inner law of conscience illumined by the teachings of Christ; he denies the State as a source of good or truth – at best it is a punishment placed upon men for their evil deeds; and he accepts moral responsibility for the consequences of his acts. The Christian finds true liberty by living his life in conformity to the will of God as manifest in the law of nature and the revealed wisdom of the great poets, prophets and sages of all ages. If Tolstoy, Dorothy Day, the Anabaptists, and Jehovah’s Witnesses are not libertarians and Christians, the words are meaningless.

Carroll has done us a great service in underscoring the ultimate inadequacy of Objectivism as a social and personal philosophy, and the danger of equating libertarianism as a social philosophy with objectivism’s often perverse and anti-human values. The Randian value system is a potential-millstone around the neck of the libertarian movement. Many observers have noted that Objectivist rhetoric is repellent to many people otherwise attracted to libertarian voluntarism, decentralization, and even the market economy. Carroll’s experience should alert us to the spiritual bankruptcy of that particular school of libertarian thought, and direct us to introduce young libertarians to alternative ethical value systems – such as Christianity – which are rationally and historically compatible with essential libertarian principles.

Comment

by M. N. R.

Dr. Warren Carroll’s Leap Over the Wall from Randianism to Triumphantist Christianity highlights two important problems that deserve far more attention than they have received from libertarians: the growing problem of defection, and the status of Christianity and the Christian ethic within the movement.

As Professor Peden points out, a major reason for Carroll’s defection was his thirst for Instant Victory – a flaw that he shared with all too many libertarians. When that Instant Victory was not forthcoming, Carroll took flight for a retreatist Utopia in Tasmania, and when that proved abortive, abandoned the cause altogether. Why can’t libertarians settle down cheerfully to a lifelong struggle for liberty? Carroll says repeatedly that libertarianism offers “no reward along the way”, no “reward in the road itself” except for the eventual attainment of liberty. But why not? Why is there not joy in dedication to the advancement of truth, justice, and liberty? The businessman, after all, finds joy in the ceaseless pursuit of profit and growth, the scientist in the endless quest for ever-expanding truth; why may not the libertarian obtain the same from the “long march” toward liberty? Every other “career” offers joys and satisfactions in the functioning of the career itself, and apart from specific achievements emanating from it. Why should the “career” of liberty hold any less excitement and reward for the libertarian?

Carroll does have a small point here, however. In that all too many libertarians have, in their commendable “purism”, systematically ruled out any conceivable strategy for even ultimate or eventual victory. By ruling out virtually all tactics except pure education, libertarians have almost doomed themselves to perpetual defeat, which might be enough to discourage even the stoutest of heart. On the contrary, it is precisely in the area of strategy and tactics where the libertarian should be flexible and pragmatic – in contrast to the realm of principle where he should be “doctrinaire” and consistent.

On the whole issue that Carroll raises about the nature of man and his institutions, Carroll is about the one millionth person to totally misinterpret the libertarian view in this area. He states that “all libertarian schools view man as naturally good and naturally rational”; in contrast, I don’t know of one that holds such an absurdly naive doctrine. And yet this has been the major charge hurled at us by archists for generations. To set the record straight hopefully for good and all, the libertarian believes, along with everyone else, that man is a mixture of good and evil. What we are trying to do is to eliminate institutions which are inherently evil and thereby provide a legalized, legitimated channel for evil to proceed unchecked in society. There should be nothing very mysterious about that.

This brings me to the whole question of Christianity and the Christian ethic. Not a Christian myself, I have seen for years how Christian libertarians have been abused, badgered, and hectored by militant atheists and presumptuous Randians, and their libertarian bona fides sharply questioned. Being on the whole – perhaps as a result of their Christian training – far nicer people than their tormentors, these Christian libertarians have put up with this shabby treatment with calm and good humor. But it should be crystal clear that a libertarian movement which imperiously insists upon atheism as a necessary condition for membership is going to needlessly alienate countless numbers of potential supporters. Atheists, to be sure, believe that Christianity, like other theism, is an error; but there are millions of errors in the world, and it passeth understanding why this particular one should bar Christians from the libertarian community. There is certainly no substantial reason why Christians and atheists cannot peacefully coexist within the libertarian movement. It is high time, therefore, for all libertarians, Christian and atheist alike, to blow the whistle on the anti-Christian abuse that has infected the movement for so long a time.

But there is more to the tale than that. For while every rationalist libertarian must hold reason higher than tradition, there is one sense in which the traditionalist conservatives have gotten hold of a very important point, and one that has been unfortunately overlooked by the rationalists. And that is wrapped up in the great truth of the division of labor: the fact that the vast majority of people have neither the ability nor the skill to carve out a rational ethic on their own. Ethics is a science, a discipline like other disciplines; and as in any other branch of knowledge it is vain folly to begin exploration of the science afresh and on one’s own while disregarding all the other explorers and thinkers who have gone before. I once knew a Randian who tried to deduce astronomy a priori and out of his own head without bothering to consult any of the other literature in the field. While this was a caricature and a half-jest on his part, it exemplified all too well the rationalist – and particularly the Randian – disposition to attempt to carve out a body of thought without bothering to read one’s predecessors. In the field of ethics and philosophy in general, it is simply an empirical fact that the greatest thinkers, for two thousand years, have been Christian; and to ignore these Christian philosophers and to attempt to carve out an ethical system purely on one’s own is to court folly and disaster.

Apart from their respective merits, then, it is no accident that, in practical application – from sex to music – Christian ethicists should have a far more rational batting average than the Randian. After all, Randian thought has only been in existence for a decade or two, while Christianity has had two thousand years to develop. We stand on the shoulders of the thinkers of the past, even though of course we must use our reason to correct them.

But there are further, and grimmer, implications here for rationalists. For if few people have the ability or inclination to carve out an ethical system on their own, this means that they must – if their actions are to be guided by any coherent set of values – take them passively, almost on trust. But who then are the masses of men to trust for their system of values? Surely that system with the longest and most successful tradition, with the largest quota of great minds – in short, the Christian ethic. This is a bitter pill for many of us non-Christians to swallow, but I am afraid it is inescapable nevertheless.

This conclusion is reinforced when we look around at what has happened to much of today’s libertarian movement. The peculiar aspects of the Randian ethic are as nothing to the bizarreries, to the outright lunacies, into which so many ex-Randians (who constitute the bulk of the libertarian movement) have sunk, in their vain attempts to carve out a system of objective ethics on their own. (The latest craze, so we have heard, is “rational bestiality.”) The Christian ethic is, in the words of the old hymn, a Rock of Ages, and it is at least incumbent upon the individual to think long and hard before he abandons that Rock lest he sink into the quagmire of the capricious and the bizarre.

Bits And Pieces

By Jerome Tuccille

PRESIDENTIAL POLITICS

At this writing libertarians are about to enter a working coalition with Allard Lowenstein’s Dump Nixon movement for the Presidential campaign of 1972. The New York Times is scheduled to publish a letter, authored by myself and signed by representatives of the leading libertarian groups in the country, announcing our support for the Lowenstein organization and our reasons for supporting it. Toward the end of July a press conference will be held to further publicize these efforts.

A libertarian-left liberal alliance? The prospect shouldn’t be any more surprising than the libertarian-conservative alliance that existed in this country until the middle of 1969. Less so. In today’s political atmosphere the bonds of agreement between ourselves and the liberal left are more numerous than they ever were between libertarians and William Buckley conservatives, with whom we shared only a rhetorical commitment to a free market economy. Liberals of the George McGovern-Allard Lowenstein-Eugene McCarthy school are closer to our views on (1) the war in southeast Asia where they favor an immediate end to all American hostilities, (2) the military draft which they consistently oppose, (3) civil liberties at home, a vital area in which conservatives have traditionally made their weakest showing (the Nixonite assault on freedom of the press, along with Nixon’s infatuation with no-knock legislation, are two of the most dangerous threats to basic freedoms we have faced in recent years), and (4) international economic, cultural and social cooperation where left liberals are more consistently in line with libertarian principles while conservatives, despite Nixon’s recent overtures to Red China, maintain a primarily protectionist attitude.

Only in the area of domestic economic policy do left liberals differ sharply with free market libertarians, but even here we see that a conservative administration has not come any closer to our own ideal (if anything, it has been more disastrous since it promotes the same centralist schemes with laissez faire sloganeering).

So why should we bother entering coalitions with anyone? Why not remain aloof from the manswarm of American politicking and continue to push our own brand of philosophical purism?

First of all, we must remember that any alliance is undertaken strictly for tactical reasons. Basic principles are never compromised. The idea is to convert those with whom we come in contact.

Second, libertarianism per se is not large enough to operate effectively as an independent movement. We have to broaden our base of operation and become directly involved in the give-and-take of realpolitik if we are to be taken seriously by the general public. We have to offer solutions that make sense, and to do this we have to get out into the arena where the battles are being waged. Articles and books are not enough.

Third, in order that we may make life a bit more bearable for ourselves, it is in our own best interests to see that the “best” candidates get into office. Liberalized draft laws, abortion laws, tax laws, trade laws, sex laws, ad infinitum, are better than oppressive laws in all these areas. While reforms tend to co-opt and defuse the radical thrust toward an ideal condition, co-optation is never more than temporary at best.

Fourth. As we fight for the right kind of reforms we must simultaneously maintain our revolutionary posture. That is, while we are fighting to libertarianize society through the vote, we must also refuse to be drafted, to pay taxes, to obey the myriad restrictions on peaceful activities.

If we are going to work with non-libertarians, it follows that we must seek out a viable group somewhere along the political spectrum with whom we find ourselves most compatible. By “a viable group” I mean one that is politically alive and active and operating with a good measure of support. Reform liberals fit that bill for us at the present moment. If we are far apart on economic principle, it is the one area where we are miles apart from every other major faction in the country. At the very least, left liberals are sympathetic to the politics of radical decentralization, and it is through this avenue that we must channel our efforts to achieve the libertarian ideal of individual liberty (Every time I bring up the subject of “decentralization,” I am hounded by morons who want to know why we should fool around with a system which might lead to neighborhood tyranny. If the reasons aren’t apparent by now, then to hell with it. Suffice it to say that neighborhood dictators are easier to deal with than the immensely more powerful ones in federal, state and city governments).

As far as actual candidates are concerned, again we are talking about the “lesser of evils,” about the “best of a bad lot.” Politicians, by definition, are a “bad lot” according to libertarian theory. But as long as we are saddled with a system based on patronage, graft, corruption and the apportioning of power – with no real hope of eliminating that system in the near future – we are forced to think in terms of “degrees of evil” whenever we step beyond the confines of ivory-tower purism. It is only by working with other groups, such as reform liberals, that we can hope to influence them in their own choice of political candidates – perhaps guide them toward one or two more acceptable to us out of a stable of half a dozen or so.

The way the political sweepstakes are shaping up for 1972, this is how the various entries look from this observer’s vantage point:

MARK HATFIELD is perhaps the most acceptable of all. He is serious about getting out of southeast Asia, about eliminating the military draft, about liberalizing trade and diplomatic relations with all other nations, and he has taken a uniquely libertarian position on the middle east – that is, he is the only major politician to speak out publicly for the displaced Palestinians, the real victims of the Arab-Israeli conflict. On the negative side, he continues to vote for centralist welfare schemes, although he has lately spoken favorably of Rothbardian economic principles. Most damaging of all, he voted for Nixon’s no-knock legislation, an inexcusable violation of libertarian principle which requires a very cautious attitude toward his general position on civil liberties.

GEORGE McGOVERN. Good On the war. Good on the draft. Speaks favorably about political decentralization. His stand on the middle east is typically liberal establishment: unabashedly and unqualifiedly pro-Israel. Economically, he is liberal-welfarist, though he seems open to decentralist alternatives.

EUGENE McCARTHY. The remarks on McGovern apply generally here with one major exception: he appears to be a bit more flexible on the middle east. However, his credibility as a serious contender has been considerably weakened by his own inertia following the 1968 campaign.

PAUL McCLOSKY continues to be a one-issue candidate; he is against further U.S. participation in the war. His position on other issues has remained vague until this writing. Most damaging: he is on record as being in favor of the military draft. Still, he might be worth supporting as an anti-Nixon candidate in the primaries if there is no-one else, since he will be an embarrassment to the administration if nothing else. Another important consideration here is the fact that McClosky is backed by Norton Simon, reported to be a strong economic libertarian who will influence McClosky considerably. This possibility is worth watching closely.

JOHN LINDSAY. Bad in so many different ways. He is an unprincipled wheeler-dealer who bends with the political winds. One thing he does have going for him is the fact that he is highly susceptible to pressure. He is good on civil liberties and not likely to come down hard against radical activism (draft and tax resistance, general civil disobedience) if it has any degree of public support at all. This could be a valuable asset to the radical movement.

EDMUND MUSKIE still looks like the front-runner among Democratic hopefuls. Muskie has a history of vagueness and vacillation on virtually every issue one can think of: the war in Asia; the draft; civil liberties; international trade; domestic social and economic policies; even on the question of environmental pollution in which he is supposed to have a strong interest. Not much here to offer the libertarian cause.

HUBERT HUMPHREY. Equally bad. He operates with the New Deal mentality of thirty years ago and his role as Vice President during the early and middle war years borders on the criminal, despite his recent babblings about “withdrawal from Vietnam.” The worst of the traditional political hacks either party has to offer.

HENRY JACKSON. Totally unacceptable from a libertarian point-of-view. He is a New Deal-Great Society welfarist on domestic issues, and his past and present position on Vietnam makes Barry Goldwater sound dovish by comparison. He would also deal severely with domestic dissenters. A disaster for the libertarian cause.

TED KENNEDY. The dimmest of the Kennedy brothers, and completely unacceptable to libertarians. He is adamantly pro-draft, militantly pro-Israel, and as deeply committed to a centralized, quasi-socialistic economy as any other candidate. He is unintelligent and dominated by advisers – the wrong advisers for libertarian purposes.

Right now these are the only men who can be considered serious presidential hopefuls by any stretch of the imagination. Another dark horse possibility rests with the New Party, a left-liberal reformist group, founded by Gore Vidal among others. Vidal is a thorough-going cultural and civil libertarian with a Menckenesque view of the American scene in all its aspects. He is highly individualistic on social, cultural, spiritual and moral questions and, while exhibiting some New Dealist tendencies in his economic philosophy, he is highly sympathetic to the concept of local control of institutions. The New Party is touting Ralph Nader, muckraking critic of the Corporate State, as a presidential hopeful. Nader’s great contribution to date has been as an effective gadfly on the governmental hide. He is most assuredly not an economic libertarian, but he is a disruptive force in opposition to the American status quo, and the reforms that will be generated by his movement will likely serve to benefit the individual – especially in the area of economic consumption.

Beginning in the fall of 1971, libertarian groups in the northeast will be making concrete plans for the new Hampshire primary to be held the following spring. Bill Baumgarth and others in the area have founded Citizens for a Restructured Republic, a libertarian front group, to work actively with other anti-Nixon forces. We should all dig in and lend these efforts our support, in any way possible. The candidate (or candidates) who will receive our support in the primaries depends largely on what happens over the next six months or so.

All in all, it is shaping up to be one hell of a time.

Traditional China And Anarchism

By Murray Rubinstein

(Professor Rubinstein’s fine summary of traditional Chinese political concepts suggests an important lesson for libertarians. In Chinese thought the anarchist ideas were applied within a statist structure; there had been no attempt to overthrow the state but merely to introduce anarchist practices to modify and improve the situation. The result was oppressive; anarchist ideas cannot be applied while the state system continues in existence. In fact, it may be that the application of anarchist ideas within a statist structure can only lead to worse oppression. The state is the central issue; its abolition is the central objective. The introduction of anarchist practices or operations while the state continues to exist may not only be irrelevant but if widespread in application may result in worse oppression. This is an important warning for libertarians. What was the reason for the failure in China to move to an anarchist society? Elitism. There was a disdain for the common people and their institutions. The clan and self-help organizations provided a suitable basis for a libertarian legal system. But their powers were curtailed and limited because they were viewed as a threat to the state structure from which the ruling class drew its wealth. Although they might be committed to the anarchistic philosophy of the Chinese sages, the local rulers recognized that they drew their wealth from the statist structure. Thus, they viewed all activities against the standard of the preservation of the statist structure and acted in their official capacities not as anarchist philosophers but as statist oppressors. — Leonard P. Liggio).

The Chinese Civil Service System with it complicated examination path and its structured pattern of rule and control from above seems far distant from an anarchistic model of society based on free association or voluntarism, and a laissez-faire economy. Yet at the heart of this system are basic concepts very close to those libertarians adopt as their own.

The ideological basis of the System was a combination of Taoism and Confucianism which represented a functional application of these seemingly contradictory thought systems. It is my purpose to examine some of these basic tenets and see how they were modified in the process of application.

Taoism, in its philosophical form, is represented by two major works, the Tao Te Ching (Book of the Way) and the Chuang Tzu. Each of these books is a product of the Warring States period, an age in which much of Chinese phiolsophy was developed. Taoism on this level is a pantheistic thought system which holds that the universe is a continuum in which all matter is in the process of becoming differentiated and then non-differentiated. The Taoist believes that there is a single source to the “ten thousand things” and that he must reestablish his unity with the universe. The inner harmony of nature should be related to the outer harmony of man’s actions. To achieve this external harmony is to leave things alone. The best government is the least government; the best ruler is he who is content to leave his subjects alone.

Confucianism on the surface seems the opposite of this WuWei (non-action) form of rule (or non-rule). It is a philosophy that seems to stress precedent and strict adherence to rites and ceremonies. Li (ritual) is only one aspect of the Confucian ideology, for there is also deep faith in Jen (benevolence-good) and chih (wisdom). The operation of government and thus of society should be in the hands of the Chun-tzu – the gentleman who advises the ruler and leads by moral virtue. The Confucians viewed formal punitive law as negative and only to be used as last resort. There was no formal concept of civil law, for in a society based on virtue such would be unnecessary. In the Analects, this belief in government by virtue is expounded at length:

95. Confucius said, “If a ruler himself is upright, all will go well without orders. But if he himself is not upright, even though he gives orders, they will not be obeyed.”

97. Confucius said, “Lead the people by laws and regulate them by penalties and the people will try to keep out of jail, but will have no sense of shame. Lead the people by virtue and restrain them by rules of decorum and the people will have a sense of shame and moreover will become good.” Theoretically, therefore government means good men, living properly, rather than good laws, strictly enforced.

How did these ideas, Taoist and Confucian, work out in application? Taoist political thought was never put into practice, but the ethics became formalized and a concrete set of rituals and church structure were developed. This religious Taoism can still be seen in operation today on Taiwan.

Confucianism, on the other hand, did become the state orthodoxy. In the reign of the Han emperor Wu Ti the philosophy of Confucius, as it had been passed down and thus modified since 500 B. C., became the theoretical basis for government. During the T’ang Dynasty a method of examination was developed and a complicated government structure developed to make use of the talents of the trained scholars. The means of choosing and utilizing the potential Chun-tzu was thus devised. Once the student had passed through the three stages of exams, the district level, the province level and the central administration level and had achieved the degree of Chin Shih, he was ready to put into practice the lessons he had learned (lessons learned by memorizing and analyzing the works of Confucius and the other “Classics”). He became on the district level the embodiment of the concept of ‘rule by good men’. But instead of letting society run itself, he found himself forced to rule as a despot, acting as tax collector, judge, jury and prosecuting attorney, defense chief, police chief, flood control expert, and moral instructor to the local gentry. He was constantly under the scrutiny of his superiors and had to move to a new post every three years in accordance with custom. The magistrate was thus an overburdened local bureaucrat, very far from the ideal of a man leading by the force of moral virtue alone.

The lesson of Traditional China for those who believe in freedom and the creation of a totally free society is this: that ideas are not enough, that even concepts conceived of by men such as Confucius and Lao Tzu can become stale, rigid, even despotic in application. China in the formative centuries developed proto-anarchistic ideas. The total, unsystematic application of those ideas created a system as rigid, as formalistic, as tyrannical as any we have today.

From The Old Curmudgeon

(Once again, the need for him arises. Tall and lean, he dons his mask, leaps on his trusty white horse, and rides off into the West. Champion of Truth, Defender of Justice, scourge of deviationists, heretics, sinners, and evildoers, the bane of Young Whippersnappers, he rides again. In a storm of thundering hooves, with a hearty “Hi-yo Silver”, here he is, back by popular demand . . . the Old Curmudgeon.)

Excess Curmudgeonry.

I never though I’d have to say this, but as a long-time champion of both Old Curmudgeonry and the Golden Mean, I have to admit that there can be such a thing as being too much of a curmudgeon. For example: under the guidance of Jerome Tuccille and Murray Rothbard as Advisory Editors, Arno Press, a respected reprint publisher and subsidiary of the New York Times, is putting out a series, hopefully by this Christmas, of reprints on “The Right-Wing Individualist Tradition in America.” One would think that libertarians and individualists would jump at the chance of wide distribution in hard cover. But no! Several Old Right-wing Curmudgeons, sequestered away on their literal or figurative mountaintops for decades, have sniffed some sort of Establishment Plot in all this and have refused to sell their copyrights to Arno – preferring to clasp their privately printed and almost unknown editions to their hermitic bosoms.

Come on, fellas; we respect and admire you for your lonely battles over the decades. But new times have arrived; it is at last “in” to be an individualist. Come on, relax and enjoy the New Dispensation; after all, we wouldn’t want to vindicate the old left-wing smear that we became individualists in order to justify our anti-social psyches, would me?