Please Step Aside; G.C. Roche III

The story is told that once, while Alexander and his entourage were journeying from one p.art of the empire to another, one of his advisers rushed up to the most powerful man on earth and an nounced breathlessly, "Sire, just Dr. Roche is Assistant Professor of History and Philosophy at the Colorado School of Mines. beyond the next hill is one of the greatest philosophers of your empire." "Quick, take me to this man," commanded Alexander, for "cul tural" attainment of all sorts was an interest upon which the ruler especially prided himself. Alex ander and his chief ministers hur· ried over the hill to discover the philosopher lying upon his back in the green, soft grass, gazing at the clouds, and basking in the sun while he apparently pondered some deep question. "I am Alexander , ruler of the world," the sovereign began. "Name your wish and it shall be granted, for I am a patron of cul ture and will gladly underwrite any project which you select."

As befitted a man of his calling, the philosopher thought a moment 13 14 THE FREEMAN June before replying to such a grand offer, then politely responded, "You may do one thing for me, your highness; p1ease step aside - you are standing between me and the sun." Alexander's reply is not recorded, but it can be as sumed that the ruler returned to affairs of state and the philosopher returned to sunning himself amid the consideration of his own thoughts. In an age when government promises "security" and the satis faction of every human want, with such assurance of its capacity for beneficence that its agents .freely use a growing amount of force to coerce the lucky citizenry into ac ceptance of this state of affairs, we might wonder what would have happened to the Alexandrian phi losopher had he refused the tender, loving care of the Great Society or the communist state in 1966 A.D. instead of refusing Alexander's offer in 326 B.C. In the more frank ly coercive, collective regime of the communist state, our philos opher friend probably would have been shot as an "enemy of the peo ple." In the Great Society, sharing many of the goals of other collec tivisms but ...... so far at least - be ing a little more reticent in the ap plication of force to achieve those goals, the philosopher merely would have been termed "reac tionary" and "antisocial." Had he persisted in his "selfish attitudes,"

he would have been branded with the ultimate crime, that of being "against progress," Le-., not agree ing with the dominant herd in stinct of the age. Whatever might have happened to our friend had he lived in our times, and however the bureau crat of collective welfare and co erced beneficence might view such heresy, we can rest assured that the philosopher would have agreed with Samuel Johnson. It is indeed "easier to be beneficent than to be just." In fact, the collectivist in the final analysis finds it impos sible to be either beneficent or just. The collective interference with the individual, institutional, private sector of society that char acterizes our age is a perfect ex ample of the misplaced, artificial, and coerced type of beneficence that renders justice unattainable within such a system. The Nature of Justice Justice in the practical, working sense, after all, is really society's guarantee to the individual that a definite set of rules and a definite right-and wrong are recognized as governing the conduct of that so ciety's membership. If justice is to prevail, the rules must be uni versally applicable, giving equal treatment and consistent treat ment to any citizen at any time.

1966 "PLEASE STEP ASIDE. • ••" 15 Justice for the individual exists only where 'a fixed value system of right and wrong exists and where the judgments made con cerning whether an act is right or wrong are consistent and there fore predic'table. The collective ethic cannot provide such condi tions. Collective morality is not fixed, but relative. Right and wrong are what the state says they are at the moment. The in dividual citizen has neither a fixed value system nor a predictable re action from his society by which to guide his actions. Lenin's "all tactics are' Bolshe vik tactics" expresses the com munist version of the collectivist standard of justice, quite clearly. Neither fixed standards nor pre, dictability stand in the way of whatever the state might wish to do. In the Western world's less co ercive version of collectivism, many of the same relative stand ards prevail. The Supreme Court of the United States is making very clear, indeed, its lack of con cern for precedent. What has been increasingly substituted is what might be called, "sociological juris prudence." Law, and therefore justice, are no longer to be deter mined according to fixed principle, but according to what the current membership of the court views as the proper "social" goals. For an other example drawn from contemporary American government, what defense does the individual citizen have against the dictates of various bureaus exercising ex ecutive power over his life? These bureaucrats are not elected by the people, not mentioned in the Con stitution, yet wield great influence in interpretation and enforcement of law. These men virtually make the law in the process of execu ting blank legislative checks from Congress. Surely such a system provides neither fixed values nor predictability. Justice for the in dividual in the collective ethic is indeed "far to seek."

Material Welfare The student of the free market might well also add that any genuine material bene,fit to society or to its individual members also goes out the window when justice departs. This is true because the man denied justice is in effect be ing denied a measure of his free dom. And much of the reason for the material failure of the collec tive ethic can be exposed in a short question: who produces more, the slave or the free man? It would be hard to imagine a more basic form of material wel fare than the food a society pro duces for itself. From the very beginning of its regime, the Soviet planned economy in Russia has placed great emphasis upon col16 THE FREEMAN June lective agriculture. Yet, although great amounts of power - virtu ally unlimited by morality or any humane considerations-have been brought to bear throughout a long and bloody chapter of the collec tive experiment, success has re mained beyond the reach of the planned economy. As one wag ex pressed it, 1966 can be predicted to produce the Soviet Union's forty-ninth annual crop failure since 1917, due, according to the Soviet news agency, to "natural causes."

Meanwhile, our planners in the United States have been devoting their efforts to the curtailment of the agricultural production stem ming from our relatively free market system. The planners have met with as little success on this side of the world. In fact, we find the American planners who would curtail production faced with such a surplus that they are able to help in feeding the Russian soci ety whose planning to increase production has resulted in starva tion conditions. Surely such a total disaster for "planning" would be at least an embarrassment if not a lesson to most men; but un willingness or inability to learn fronl experience would seem to be a basic character trait of the mod ern collectivist. In societies lacking freedom, neither material well-being nor justice has historically proven pos sible of attainment. The collective experiments of our age have made abundantly clear how hopelessly lost both prosperity and justice become when freedom is curtailed.

Lack of freedom, then, in the end makes both genuine beneficence and justice casualties of the planned society, no matter how "well-intended" the planners may be. The modern victim of such a double loss might well begin the process of reclaiming his freedom and well-being by following the example of the Alexandrian phi 10sopher.He knew very well what the state could do for him and what the state could do to him; and he told the all-powerful state that its self-proclaimed benefi cence was not required; that what was required was not more inter ference, but less; that it should stand aside and stop blocking the sun. Should· modern man follow this example, the warming rays of self-reliance and human dignity thus generated could easily again provide the greatest of boons to man, leaving the individual free to pursue his own well-being and his own moral growth. ~ WILLIAM HENRY CHAMBERLIN SAILING under its own colors, so cialism never got far in the United States. Native Americans, prag matic by disposition, were not at tracted by the dull and ponderous writings of Marx and Engels, with their underpinning of muddy He gelian metaphysics. They were not inclined to call each other comrade or to take much stock in letters signed "Yours for the rev olution." The availability until 1900 of free land, the absence of European class distinctions, the ease with which individuals could move up or down the economic ladder - all these characteristics of American life were against the so cialist conception of irreconcilable Mr. Chamberlain is a skilled observer and reporter of economic and political conditions at home and abroad. In addition to writing a number of books, he has lectured widely and is a contributor to The Wall Street Journal and numerous magazines.