Book Reviews

What is astonishing is that his beautifully written and rigorous es says have been quite forgotten. I confess that I had never heard of Herbert until Isaac Don Levine dug him out to present him in a series printed in Plain Talk Magazine of prophets who tt saw it coming." In all these years of Herbert's eclipse, the fame of Bernard Shaw, H. G. Wells, Sidney and Beatrice Webb and the Fabian Society grew. The English Liberal party, badly infected with the Statism that Herbert decried, dw.indled while the Labor Party waxed fat. There was the Beveridge plan for cradle-to-grave security, and the English Tories, Statists 381 382 THE FREEMAN June themselves, went along with it. How it all could have happened-and, of all places, in the England of John Locke, Edmund Burke, Adam Smith, John Stuart Mill, Richard Cobden and John Bright-is one of the world's great mysteries. The de bacle can't be blamed on John Maynard Keynes, who was a mere Bloomsbury dandy when the Fa bians were riding high.

Not so many years ago George Dangerfield wrote a nostalgic book call The Strange Death of Liberal England. The very memory of Aube ron Herbert was one of the casual ties of the 1906-1912 period. He was drowned, fathoms deep. Ideas Live On Yet every one of his voluntary ideas retains its vitality. The reason is that common sense continues to flow in· subterranean channels even in periods of extreme collectivist de bacle. Herbert tangled with the British socialist J. A. Hobson, and it is Hobson's name that has been re membered. Hobson's theory that the fact of our social interdependence justifies compulsion in the organiza tion of human life has been accepted by all our modern ((liberals." But the Leonard Read who insists that we all have a vested interest in the uncompelled differences of human beings would recognize Herbert as a doughty champion of a truth that should be obvious. Herbert accused Hobson of tricking himself with words. Hobson's phrase, ttthe social entity," is, as Herbert said, a liter ary creation.

If an individual is molded and formed by ttsociety," Herbert argued, it can only mean that he is molded and formed by other individuals who are the components of that society. Even supposing that a social entity can exist apart from individuals, the thoughts that the individual thinks act upon the social entity. So what is claimed for one must also be claimed for the other. You arrive at the truism that people influence people. The contrast between society and the individual is an unreal one, for society is individuals. You might as easily, so Herbert says, contrast ttpence and pounds." Hobson's strange syllogism con sists of a non sequitur: ttWe all in fluence each other by words and our writings; therefore we are all to be yoked together under a system of in tellectual compulsion, chosen for us by others." ttLiterature apart," says Herbert, ttl think Mr. Hobson will admit that it is a bold transmutation of unlike things into each other voluntary service and the free ex change of influence, passing into universal compulsion of each other, worked by the votes of a majority."

The Limits of Majority Rule Herbert's criticism of the fetish of majority rule is devastating. Why, 1979 VOLUNTARYISM 383 he asks, should there be any more magic in numbers than in a king, a tyrant or an oligarchy? The accident that three people may prefer one thing while two people may prefer another hardly justifies the rule of the three over· the· two. If there is common ownership-say of a piece of property-a majority vote is a convenient way of settling differ ences. But when ownership is not involved, rule by majority vote can be just as tyrannical as rule by a dictator. Auberon Herbert quit the British parliament because he had been convinced by Herbert Spencer that it was wrong for a majority to try to coerce minorities in the employment oftheir energies. He was never quite an anarchist, as the word had come to be understood. He believed in the limited state, with the government empowered to use force against in dividuals who invaded the rights of others. But beyond that, Herbert wanted all things determined by in dividual action or voluntary associa tion.

He solved the knotty problem of taxes in his own individual way. Mildred McLearn, the modem pro ponent of voluntary taxation, would be interested in Herbert's statement thatttthe power to levy taxes com pulsorily seems to me the inner keep, .the citadel of the whole ques tion of liberty . . . until that strong hold is leveled to the ground, I do not think that men will ever clearly realize that to compel any human being to act against his own convic tions is essentially a violation of the moral order, a cause of human un rest, and a grievous misdirection of human effort." Herbert advocated letting people finance the govern ment's few legitimate payrolls (for police, the courts, the sanitary ser vices and the army) by voluntarily trading small sums for the right to exercise the franchise at the polls. CompUlsory Schooling Opposed to Workingman's Interest Leonard Read has recently called for a movement to separate state and school as our founding fathers once separated state and church.

Examining his ttfirst principles" way back in 1880, Auberon Herbert told the British workingman that he would be ttselling his birthright for the mess of pottage" if he accepted the ttrate and tax" paid by others to maintain a system of compulsory public education. The compulsory tax-supported school, he said, would allow the rich to intrude themselves into the poor man's home affairs. The state would be telling the school child's parents that henceforward ((you need have no. strong convic tions, and need make no efforts of your own,as you did when you or ganized· your chapels, your benefit societies, your trade societies, or your cooperative· institutions. We 384 THE FREEMAN are the brain that thinks; you are but the bone and muscles that are moved." Eric Mack, in his introduction, tells us just enough about Auberon Herbert's life to make us want more. Evidently Herbert could have had a: long career in parliament if he had not decided to chuck it to become an advocate of a consistent libertarianism. Such integrity is a rarity in any age. The irony of Herbert's eclipse is compounded when we con trast his eloquent prose to the jargon-ridden stuff put out by Bea trice and Sidney Webb who, strangely, carried the day with their ~~inevitability of gradualism" going, as we must see it now, the wrong way. , HANDSOME BLUE LEATHERLEX FREEMAN BINDERS $3.00 Order from: THE FOUNDATION FOR ECONOMIC EDUCATION, INC.

IRVINGTON-ON-HUDSON, NEW YORK 10533 the Freeman VOL. 29, NO. 7 • JULY 1979 The Mythology of Energy Yale Brozen 387 A scholarly exposure of prevailing myths about the energy crisis. Repressing Economic News Walter B. Wriston 393 If prices are censored, or frozen, they cannot tell producers what goods or services people want. Blaming the Victims: The Government's Theory of Inflation Robert Higgs 397 Inflation is a monetary phenomenon, resulting from government manipulation and control. The Economics of the Barricades Antony G. A. Fisher 404 The British confrontation between labor, government, and the exhausted taxpayer affords a lesson for all. The Redistribution of WealthLabor Union Style Robert G. Anderson 407 Competition and freedom, not legal privilege and violence, lead to general prosperity. "Windfall" for Consumers in Deregulation of Oil John Chamberlain 419 The outlook, if government will let the market function, is for more efficient motors or cheaper fuel, or a combination of the two.