November

The Solution by Murray N. Rothbard Returning money to the market economy. How to Return to the Gold Standard by Bettina Bien Greaves If ideological obstacles are overcome, return to gold money is a realistic possibility. Central Banks, Gold, and the Decline of the Dollar by Robert Batemarco An analysis of the source and the extent of our monetary disarray. A Solution to the Incentives War? by Andrew Cline Efforts to stop government-subsidized competition. The "Wall of Separation" Between Church and State by Judd W Patton How a misreading of Jefferson's phrase unleashed a cultural war. The Right to Pray by William Cage Only in private institutions does the individual have a right to pray. Steal These Free Papers? by Eric Longley Dealing with theft of free newspapers as a crime is consistent with limitedgovernment philosophy. Is the Unabomber an Ecobomber? by Alan Caruba Finding the roots of terrorism in environmentalist ideology.

Maverick Mark Twain's Exhilarating American Individualism by Jim Powell Samuel Langhorne Clemens' steadfast defense of liberty. COLUMNS NOTES from FEE-Counting Our Blessings by Hans F: Sennholz IDEAS and CONSEQUENCES-Teachers as Entrepreneurs in the Classroom by Lawrence W Reed A MATTER of PRINCIPLE-Conspiracy or Consensus? by Robert James Bidinotto POTOMAC PRINCIPLES-Setting an Example by Doug Bandow ECONOMICS on TRIAL-overworked and Underpaid? by Mark Skousen DEPARTMENTS Perspective-Zach Montgomery, Roger Clites, Bettina Bien Greaves Book Reviews •Forgotten Lessons: Selected Essays ofJohn T. Flynn edited by Gregory ~ Pavlik, reviewed by Paul Gottfried; Disaster in Red: The Failure and Collapse ofSocialism by Richard M. Ebeling, reviewed by Walter Block; Henry Hazlitt: A Giant ofLiberty by Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr., Jeffrey A. Tucker, and Murray N. Rothbard, reviewed by William H. Peterson; The Bell Curve: Intelligence and Class Structure in American Life by Richard 1. Herrnstein and Charles Murray, reviewed by Raymond 1.

Keating; Race, Evolution, and Behavior by 1. Philippe Rushton, reviewed by Patrick Groff; Gold and Liberty by Richard M. Salsman, reviewed by Robert Batemarco; The Case Against the Fed by Murray N. Rothbard, reviewed by Douglas E. French.

THEFREEMAN IDEASON LIBERTY Published by The Foundation for Economic Education Irvington-on-Hudson, NY 10533 Phone (914) 591-7230 FAX (914) 591-8910 E-mail: freeman@westnet.com President: Hans F. Sennholz Managing Editor: Beth A. Hoffman Guest Editor: Bettina Bien Greaves Editor Emeritus Paul L. Poirot Lewisburg, Pennsylvania Book Review Editor Robert Batemarco Marymount College, Tarrytown, New York Assistant Editor Gregory P. Pavlik Columnists Doug Bandow Cato Institute, Washington, D.C. Robert James Bidinotto Lawrence W. Reed Mackinac Center for Public Policy Midland, Michigan Mark Skousen Rollins College, Winter Park, Florida Contributing Editors Charles W. Baird California State University, Hayward E. Calvin Beisner Covenant College, Chattanooga, Tennessee Peter J. Boettke New York University Donald J. Boudreaux Clemson University Clarence B. Carson American Textbook Committee Wadley, Alabama Thomas J. DiLorenzo Loyola College, Baltimore, Maryland Joseph S. Fulda New York, New York Roger W. Garrison Auburn University Bettina Bien Greaves Resident Scholar, FEE Robert Higgs The Independent Institute, Oakland, California John Hospers University of Southern California Tibor R. Machan Auburn University Ronald Nash Reformed Theological Seminary Maitland, Florida Edmund A. Opitz Chatham, Massachusetts James L. Payne Sandpoint, Idaho William H. Peterson Adjunct Scholar, Heritage Foundation, Washington, D.C.

Jane S. Shaw PERC, Bozeman, Montana Richard H. Timberlake University of Georgia Lawrence H. White University of Georgia The Freeman is the monthly publication of The Foundation for Economic Education, Inc., Irvington-on-Hudson, NY 10533. FEE, established in 1946by Leonard E. Read, is a non-political, educational champion of private property, the free market, and limitedgovernment. FEE is classified as a 26 USC 501(c)(3)tax-exempt organization. Copyright © 1995 by The Foundation for Economic Education. Permission is granted to reprint any article in this issue, except "Maverick Mark Twain" and "Is the Unabomber an Ecobomber?," provided appropriate credit is given and two copies of the reprinted material are sent to The Foundation. The costs of Foundation projects and services are met through donations, which are invited in any amount. Donors of $30.00or more receive a SUbscriptionto TheFreeman. Student subscriptions are $10.00 for the nine-month academic year; $5.00 per semester. Additional copies of single issues of The Freeman are $3.00. For foreign delivery, a donation of $45.00 a year is suggested to cover mailing costs.

Bound volumes of The Freeman are available from The Foundation for calendar years 1972to date. The Freeman is available in microform from University Microfilms, 300 N. Zeeb Rd., Ann Arbor, MI 48106. PERSPECTIVE School Choice, 1886 Style Zach Montgomery, nominated in 1886 for Assistant Attorney General, was falsely ac cused of having advocated the teaching of Ro man Catholicism in the public schools. To be confirmed, he had to defend his position in the U.S. Senate. He was critical, he said, not of the public schools' teachings but of their antiparental control by the political State. [T]he chief vice of the [public school] system lies in its usurpation of parental authority, and in its attempting to do for each child, through political agencies, that which can be properly done by nobody else in the world, except by its own father and mother. . . . The question which we are discussing . . . is not whether the Bible ought or ought not to be read in school; nor whether" Johnson's Cyclopedia" is a proper book for school libraries; nor whether a partic ular class of teachers are or are not the best adapted to school work; . . . nor whether the teaching of religion and the physical sciences ought or ought not to go hand in hand, nor whether good children, who have been carefully and morally trained at horne, ought or ought not to be sent to the same school with the vicious and depraved, with the view of reforming the latter.

That there is a wide and an honest difference of opinion amongst the American people as to these questions no candid and intelligent citizen will deny. And accepting this honest difference of opinion as an existing fact, the question which we now propose to discuss is this: Does it rightfully belong to the political state to determine these questions for parents and children, and to compel them to submit to its decision? . . . If the political State has the legitimate power and the rightful jurisdiction to make a binding decisioIr the question-whether it be in favor of or against the use of the Bible in the school-its decision must be equally binding . . . [I]f the State may rightfully, and without trenching upon the doctrine of religious liberty, forbid the teach ing of the Bible in the schools, to the children of parents whose judgments and consciences de mand such teaching,.or may enforce the teaching of the Bible to the children of those whose judgments and consciences are opposed thereto, it then follows as a matter of course, that the State must have jurisdiction to decide as to which one of all the various versions and translations of the Bible is the correct one.... Not only that, but if the State can . . . enforce the teaching of such 682 Bible in the schools, against the judgments and consciences of the parents of the children who are so taught, it must also have jurisdiction to decide, as between conflicting interpretations, which is the meaning of the various texts of the Bible....

[W]e are not discussing the question as to what kind or whether any religion ought or ought not to be taught to children; but we are only consid ering the question as· to whether or not it right fully belongs to the' 'political State" to determine that question, and in doing so, to override the judgments and consciences of the fathers and mothers of children. . . . [I]n our humble opinion, the true and proper course to be pursued by the friends of educational reform is to keep prominently before the people as the fundamental, the vital issue, this question, namely: Shall the parent or the political State determine for a child who shall be its teacher, its companions, and what books it shall or shall not study? -ZACH MONTGOMERY The School Question When Is Price Too High? On the first day of my college Principles of Economics class I often ask students to bring a list of at least five things which they think cost too much. Since I allow them to do this anonymously a few wise guys will start off with such things as cigarettes and beer. But most students approach the assignment seriously.

I quickly dispense with the more frivolous items by suggesting they learn to roll their own cigarettes-something many of them have never heard of-and brew their own beer. After think ing it over they usually decide it is worth the price to have their cigarettes rolled and their beer brewed commercially. This lays the groundwork for a more serious discussion of how much they estimate it would actually cost for them to produce the "over priced" items themselves. In most cases they would have to obtain raw materials, arrange for their transport, hire workers, build factories, and so on. The students soon come to realize that they couldn't produce the things they want at any price. They begin to understand the specializa tion of labor, the complementary function of capital investment, and the role of entrepreneurs in bringing together the factors of production, PERSPECTIVE capital, as well as skilled and specialized work ers. Then they begin to look at prices in a different light.

-ROGER CLITES Professor Clites teaches at Tusculum College in Tennessee. How to Get from Here· to There It is not difficult to criticize current govern ment programs. With some understanding of basic free market principles, it is also possible to describe the ideal free market society of private enterprise and open competition. But it is not so easy to outline steps to take us from here to there, from our present hampered market economy, to, or at least toward, a free market. Granted, it wouldn't be easy for everyone to adjust if their subsidies and protective regula tions were removed. Producers and consumers of many goods and services, who have become accustomed to government subsidies and/or gov ernment-guaranteed "protection," would have to learn to be self-reliant. They would have to rely for support, not on the taxpayers, but on those who actually used their goods or services. But such adjustments are possible.

At times when government interventions be come intolerable, people begin to ignore them even while the subsidies and regulations are still in place. Innovative and ingenious individuals conceive of new solutions to old problems that fall outside the purview of government controls and regulations. For instance, government postal systems throughout the world are already being superseded by private express delivery services, telephones, fax machines, and e-mail. The public schools are being increasingly bypassed by par ents who home school or send their children to private schools. And when government money systems have been inflated until commercial transactions become impossible, people turn to barter and alternate moneys. Under present conditions, only the gold standard can rescue us from the ever-present threat of inflation. Yet few economists have given much thought to "privat izing" money and reviving gold as money. In this issue, several articles discuss this problem and review the proposals that have been made for restoring the gold standard.

-BETTINA BIEN GREAVES November Guest Editor 683 THEFREEMAN IDEASON LIBERTY ShouldWe Cancel the NationalDebt? by Daniel J. Pilla T his question is popping up more and more. The idea of canceling the debt seems to gain support in direct proportion to the increase in the debt itself. Should we or shouldn't we? At present levels, the national debt is about $5 trillion. It grows by hun dreds of billions each year. Current levels of federal spending will add about $1 trillion more in debt over the next four to five years. As the debt grows, government's interest burden grows with it. The more of our tax dollars consumed by interest, the fewer dollars available for discretionary spending. What's worse, more pressure is then ex erted to use tax increases to fund mandatory spending programs, such as Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid. To illustrate how the interest burden is growing, consider this: in 1963, the federal government spent just 6.9 percent of its total budget on net interest.