Book Reviews

Mr. Rogers' troubles began when he made a supposedly ofT-the-rec ord speech to a group of business executives at a Washington, D.C., "round table." Part of his speech was devoted to criticizing those executives for failure to throw at least some of their advertising to publishing media, that still con tinued to fight socialistic and Big Government trends. As he tried to tell the executives, business has a responsibility to m.aintain a healthy competitive social climate as well as a responsibility to its sales departments and its divi dend-hungry stockholders. He wasn't asking the business men to boycott "liberal" news papers and magazines of large circulation which are admittedly the best advertising media when it comes to marketing widgets, 59 60 THE FREEMAN September gadgets, and buy-now-pay-Iater trips around the world. But he did think it shortsighted of the executives to let struggling pro business journals go down the drain for lack of "institutional"

advertising nourishment. Without a thriving pro-business press, the institution of the free market is in danger of being enfeebled, and with its enfeeblement the sales of widgets, gadgets, and trips around the world would automatically shrink. The Secret Is Out Mr. Rogers' "secret" speech didn't remain secret for very long. A memorandum designed for ex ecutives who couldn't attend the meeting fell into the hands of Barry Goldwater, who was so im pressed with it that he had it printed in the Congressional Rec ord. Next, Human Event,s printed it and offered reprints. Then it appeared in Vital Speec'hes.Alto gether, two million copies of it have been made and distributed. The "left," of course, yelled that Mr. Rogers was trying to inter fere with the editorial integrity of great newspapers by advocating that "advertising pressures" be brought to bear on them. Mr. Rogers retorted that people have the right to use their money as they see fit, and that a business man owes it to his stockholders to try to buy a healthy business cli mate just as much as he owes it to them to sell goods. But the re tort was drowned out by the chorus from the "left." His own paper disclaimed responsibility for his views, and the business com munity remained silent when he was forced to quit his job.

Mr. Rogers is not a bitter man, but all of this has left him a bit piqued, to say the least. In The End of Free Enterprise he accuses the business community of tim idity and of failing to understand its own predicament. He wonders why businessmen subsidize com mittees which underwrite the dis tribution of textbooks that advo cate Marxian tax policies and su per-Keynesian spending programs. He criticizes businessmen for giv ing big donations and bequests to universities whose economic and political "science" departments are against the free enterprise system. He wonders why the money spent on "public relations" by business buys so little in terms of fostering a salubrious competitive climate. Discussing the efforts of the Gen eral Electric Company to defend its right under the First Amend ment to explain its wage policies to union members, Mr. Rogers wonders where the· other big cor porations were when the National Labor Relations Board attempted to silence GE. The GE fight was 1966 TOO MUCH SECRECY 61 their fight, too, he says, but only the Chrysler Corporation seemed to realize it.

Above all, Mr. Rogers criticizes business for failure to anticipate the government in attempting to solve problems of unemployment, "technological illiteracy," and so on. He says the "public relations" of business "does not relate." NANI Program Provides Help for DropOuts Much of what Mr. Rogers says about business timidity is all too true. But some things have been changing recently. The National Association of Manufacturers, which Mr. Rogers criticizes for following bland policies calculated to offend nobody, has recently de cided to run its own pilot programs designed to make high school drop outs employable. The NAM has been picking delinquent kids off the streets of Harlem, giving them intensive schooling, and getting them jobs when they prove them selves capable of handling them. The NAM cannot wipe out the problem of the "unemployables" all by itself, but it hopes to "sell" its dropout education program to business organizations in Chicago, Indianapolis, and Peoria. At last reports the NAM idea had been taken up by some Chicago indus trialists. There is no reason why business should not train its own personnel, and many of our drop outs are good material.

Mr. Rogers thinks the members of the American Medical Associa tion had Federal Medicare thrust upon them because they were on the freight train when it came to proposing practical voluntary al ternatives to Medicare. He notes that the doctors did come up with an "eleventh-hour" alternative, but by this time Congress had decided to act for itself. "The lesson," says Mr. Rogers, "is this: If you don't meet all of the needs as they develop, the government will." Thus he serves notice on the AMA to forestall a Federal adventure in providing "kiddie care" by coming up with a volun tary kiddiecare plan that will make Congressional action unnecessary. The Independent Sedor Finally, Mr. Rogers criticizes business for not being more nim, ble in telling its own great story. Businessmen, as he points out, have created and conducted United Funds all over the country, which "have kept the Federal govern ment and even the local govern ments out of much of the welfare business." Business has donated millions to the private colleges and universities. Its support of the arts has actually been prodi gious. It has provided "medical insurance for employees to such 62 THE FREEMAN September !

an extent that the government has never even considered medical aid for the workingman." All of this has been part and parcel of preserving an atmos phere of voluntarism that enables free enterprise to flourish. But the professional public relations experts whom business employs to tell its story haven't dramatized the actual accomplishments of what Richard Cornuelle calls the "independent sector" in meeting social needs. Mr. Rogers' criticisms of the business community are offered in a constructive mood. The man is a friend of business. He is tired of seeing businessmen blush and stammer when they are called "buccaneers." Frankly, Mr. Rogers likes buccaneers; he only wishes we had a few more of them around. ~ ~ THE MOST OF MALCOLM MUGGERIDGE (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1966, 367 pp., $5.95) Reviewed by Robert M. Thornton THE SUBJECTS of this sparkling collection of short pieces by the British critic run the gamut from Kennedyism, pornography, and the Christian churches to credulity, Shakespeare, and the BBe; and from the pen of this free-swing ing journalist they make for de lightful reading.

Just where MM stands in the political spectrum is not clear from the book under review; consider ing the swipes at Mr. Goldwater and the late Sena tor Joe Mc Carthy, he is certainly not a mem ber of what is called in our coun try the "radical right." But then he turns his guns on Lord Snow, the Fabians, and the admirers of Joe Stalin and the Russian Revo lution. The value of a fellow like Muggeridge is his willingness to speak out disinterestedly against any and all men whenever, in his opinion, they err grievously. He has not sold himself to a party or to an ideology; like H. L. Menck en, he spares no one. What will endear Muggeridge to all enemies of modern "liberal" orthodoxy is his unceasing assault on its underlying premise: the idea that man is really a good sort, you know, nothing wrong with him that a better environment and all that won't take care of nicely. Muggeridge - on the side of the angels here, if not elsewhere comes out strongly for the good Christian doctrine that man is a flawed creature who falls far short of perfection. "To proclaim a king dom of heaven on earth," writes Muggeridge, "is both deceptive and intrinsically absurd. The main tenance of such a notion requires mental gymnastics so extreme and so strenuous that they usually pro duce dementia."

1966 OTHER BOOKS 63 Since all men and all human in stitutions are imperfect, none is beyond criticism: "In a healthy, civilized society everyone and everything should be open to ridi cule. Indeed, I would go further and contend that the degree of health and civilization in any given society bears a direct relation to the degree to which this principle operates. Taboos, where humor is concerned, are an admission of doubt, and derive from a sense of weakness and insecurity. The truly religious take no offense when at tention is drawn to the absurdity necessarily inherent in the dogmas to which they subscribe and the ceremonies in which they partici pate. Protests invariably come from the conventionally religious, from the formalists for whom, the dogmas and the ceremonies con stitute the whole content of their faith. It is the same with politi cians. Those who most object to being ridiculed have least confi dence in the policies they advo cate. It is the same with moralists.

If they complain that some cher ished principle is blasphemed by the humorous treatment of its application, then it is certain that in their hearts they doubt the principle's ultimate validity." "Worldliness," Muggeridge writes elsewhere, "is by its nature, a highly romantic attitude; only mystics know how to be skeptical." And a "skeptical turn of mind . . . is induced only by holding fast to truth." At a time when so many intel lectuals are trying to outdo each other in describing the sartorial splendor of the emperor, it is a great pleasure to read one who with fine humor tells the awful truth. "There is," declares Mug geridge, "nothing serious under the sun except love of fellow mortals and of God." ~ ~ FAULKNER IN THE UNIVER SITY edited by F. L. Gwynn and J. L. Blotner, New York: Vintage Books, 1965, 294 pp., $1.65. Reviewed by Robert M. Thornton WILLIAM FAULKNER served as writer-in-residence at the Univer sityof Virginia from February to June in 1957 and 1958; and this book contains his lectures together with a transcript of the ensuing discussions. "The first attraction of such materials," Edmund Fuller has written, "is immediacy. We feel a direct communication, the presence of the Iiving person through the spoken word in spon taneous talk. Also we get an in sight into the creative process not the blueprint of a process that would fit anybody else, of course, but the disclosure of how one skilled man worked at his craft."

Early in his career Faulkner be64 THE FREEMAN September came an idol of ava,nt-garde writers and political "liberals," but these turned away as they per ceived "the essential conservatism latent in his work and specific in his statements." His stand on the Negro situation, for instance, put him in the doghouse not only with Southern segregationists, but also with Northern radicals who would bring about integration at the point of a gun. Faulkner sympa thized with the plight of the Negro, but he was not so senti mental as to think that mere legis lation would provide the solution. Rather than force, Faulkner saw persuasion and education as the means to the desired end. He re minded Negroes and their friends that responsibility goes hand in hand with rights, and he reminded his fellow Southerners of their duty to bring an end to the in justices suffered by Negroes in their communities.

Faulkner was strongly opposed to "the mythology that one single individual man is nothing, and can have weight and substance only when organized into the an onymity of· a group where he will have surrendered his individual soul for a number." One best com bats collectivism, he said, by re sisting the pressures to relinquish individuality. He believed that the "individual is more important than any mass or group' he belongs to. That the individual is always more important than any state he belongs to. That the state must never be the master of the indi vidual, it is the servant of the in dividual. That ... to retain that superiority over the state, the in dividual must be independent of the state, he mustn't accept gra tuity from the state. He mustn't let the state buy him by pensions or relief or dole or grant of any sort." Faulkner, unlike many of his fellow writers, perceived the tragic element in the human situa tion. Men are often treated pretty roughly by fate, but this is no reason to regard man as a mere pawn in the hands of forces be yond his control. For man does have freedom of choice; he is thus a responsible creature and as such can find meaning in his existence.

Man, Faulkner affirmed, will not merely endure; he will prevail. ~ BOUND VOLUMES OF Thefreeman-J9GS Attractively sewn in a single volume with hard cover, the 12 issues from January through December, fully in dexed-768 pages, for handy reference to the latest literature on freedom. Dolt /5.00 These bound volumes of THE FREEMAN match in appearance and otherwise continue the 12-volume series of Essays on Liberty containing selections from THE FREEMAN and other Foundation releases back to 1946. (A separate cumulative subject matter, author, and title index is available for the 12 volumes of Essays on Liberty. $1.00.) Bound volumes of THE FREEMAN for 1966 will be available shortly after the end of the year. ORDER YOUR BOUND VOLUMES NOW! THE FOUNDATION FOR ECONOMIC EDUCATION IRVINGTON-ON-HUDSON, N. Y. 10533 Please send me: THE FREEMAN for 1965 $ 5.00 0 THE FREEMAN for 1965 and 1966 (The 1966 volume to be shipped when ready) $ 9.00 0 ESSAYS ON LIBERTY (Set of 12, with cumulative index) Cloth $30.00 0 Paper $20.00 0 o CHECK ENCLOSED 0 SEND INVOICE NAME _ STREET _ CITY _ STATE ZIP CODE. _ THE GOOD LIFE • For no one would say that a man was happy who had no fortitude, no temperance, no justice, no prudence, but was afraid of the flies that flew around him; nor would abstain from the meanesttheft if he was either hungryor dry, or would murder his dearest friend for a farthing; and also was in every particularas wanting in his understandingas an infant or an idiot.These truthsare so evidentthat all must agreeto them....

let us thereforebe well assured that everyoneenjoys as much happinessas he possessesvirtue and wisdom, and acts accord ing to their dictates.... It is evidentthat governmentmust be the best which is so established that everyone therein may have it in his power to act virtuouslyand live happily. A R1ST 0 T L E, Polities OCTOBER 1966 Set My People Free The Cost of Living The Case of the Free Rider The Supremacy of the Market. Men of Prey Punch Decries IINo Compromise" The Flight from Reality: 25. Political Experimentation, The Four-Year Plans Canute and the Counting of Noses Visit with a Headmaster The First Liberty Library • Books: For Want of Something Better Edward Y. Breese Paul L. Poirof Peter Farrell Ludwig von Mises Leonard E. Read Punch Clarence B. Carson Willard M. Fox Timothy J. Wheeler Murray N. Rothbard John Chamberlain 3 8 12 17 21 28 30 44 49 56 60 COAST FEDERAL SAVINGS AND LOAN ASSOCIATION DepartmentFl, 9th &Hill Sts., Los Angeles, California90014 o Please send me a FREE copy of "What's Inflation?"