Three Women Who Inspired; J. Powell

THEFREEMAN IDEASON UBERTY Rose WilderLane, IsabelPaterson,and Ayn Rand: Three Women Who Inspired the Modem Libertarian Movement by Jim Powell L iberty was in full retreat in the early 1940s. Tyrants oppressed or threat ened people on every continent. Western intellectuals whitewashed mass murderers like Joseph Stalin, and Western govern ments expanded their power with Soviet style central planning. Fifty million people were killed in the war that raged in Europe, Africa, and Asia. The United States, seem ingly the last hope for liberty, was drawn into it. Established American authors who de fended liberty were a dying breed. H.L. Mencken had turned away from bitter pol itics to write his memoirs, while others like Albert Jay Nock and Garet Garrett were mired in pessimism. Amidst the worst of times, three bold women banished fear. They dared to declare that collectivism was evil. They stood up for natural rights, the only philosophy which provided a moral basis for opposing tyranny everywhere. They celebrated old-fashioned rugged individualism. They envisioned a future when people could again be free.

They expressed a buoyant optimism which was to inspire millions. Mr. Powell is editor ofLaissezFaire Books and a Senior Fellow at the Cato Institute. He has written for the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, Barron's, American Heritage, and more than three dozen other publications. Copyright © 1996 by Jim Powell. All were outsiders who transcended dif ficult beginnings. Two were immigrants. One was born in frontier territory not yet part of the United States. They struggled to earn money as writers in commercial mar kets dominated by ideological adversaries. All were broke at one time or another. They endured heartaches with men-one stayed in a marriage which became sterile, and two became divorced and never remarried. These women who had such humble be ginnings-Rose Wilder Lane, Isabel Pater son, and Ayn Rand-published major books during the same year, 1943: The Discovery of Freedom, The God of the Machine, and TheFountainhead, respectively.The women, recalledjournalist John Chamberlain, "with scornful side glances at the male business community, had decided to rekindle a faith in an older American philosophy. There wasn't an economist among them. And none of them was aPh.D." Albert Jay Nock declared that, "They make all of us male writers look like Confederate money. They don't fumble and fiddle around-every shot goes straight to the centre."