Freedom in One Lesson

18.

The Roots of Concord and Discord

In all three synoptic Gospels, Jesus says that “a house divided against itself cannot stand” (Matthew 12:25; Mark 3:25; Luke 11:17). But more Americans have probably heard this quote in the context of Abraham Lincoln’s “House Divided” speech about slavery, delivered on June 16, 1858 after he was chosen over Stephen Douglas as the Illinois Republican nominee for the US Senate.

The principle seems to apply once again to America. Many politicians promise to protect us from division by unifying us (e.g., President Joe Biden’s promise to be a leader who “seeks not to divide, but to unify” [ Joseph Biden, Twitter post, November 23, 2020]), but the only unity they really seem to offer is that of putting together a bare majority to benefit themselves at the expense of others. Such unity is just a form of tyranny.

We can benefit from what Lincoln says about his choice of words for the speech: “I want to use some universally known figure, expressed in simple language as universally known, that it may strike home to the minds of men in order to rouse them to the peril of the times” (Herndon 1889).

Leonard Read echoes the language and seriousness of the problem in his “The Roots of Concord and Discord,” from his 1975 book The Love of Liberty (Read 1975b), because it was clear to him how divided our house was. “The house we call America is divided against itself, as is evident to anyone who has eyes to see and ears to hear. Discord is rampant; concord is rare. . . . If our house is to stand, concord must replace discord and, if this is to be accomplished, we must practice the way of life that leads to harmony.”

The contrasting roads to discord and concord consist of dictocratic determination, on the one hand, and free markets, on the other.

What road are we now treading? It’s the road to serfdom. Day by day and in nearly every way, we move nearer to omnipotent government, the totalitarian state—dictocrats by the millions telling us how to live our lives. . . . When discord is rampant, we’re on the wrong road; when concord prevails, we’re on the right one.

What is the road in the opposite direction? It is the free market, private ownership, limited government way of life. Not a single dictocrat—those in government confined to invoking a common justice and keeping the peace. In a word, no man-concocted restraints standing against the release of creative human energy.

Read then evaluates dictocratic determination and the discord—lack of unity, in more modern terms—that results. Discord reflects an attempt to coerce people to conform with the wishes of some in the absence of consensus.

Why does the road featured by dictocrats lead to discord? And why does the road in the opposite direction, featured by a free and self-responsible people, lead to concord? . . .

The road to serfdom—socialism, the planned economy, the welfare state, call it what you will—is featured by millions of dictocrats . . . each trying to make over society in his image. In view of their dissimilarities, it is instructive to reflect on what dictocrats have in common: . . . Each entertains no doubt that were he to direct the whole economy it would be improved.

. . . Note the mess we’re in—the failures more apparent each day. And the discord! With millions of dictocrats advancing as many or more panaceas—all at odds—how could it be otherwise! . . .

. . . Given socialism as the objective, we will have to learn that there is no right way to achieve the wrong goal. . . . All that the dictocrats can possibly do to modify their mistakes . . . is to attempt something less bad. But not so bad is error still! Never can what’s right be achieved in this manner. . . . The seed is socialism; the fruit has to be discord!

Each individual of the millions afflicted with this egomania—all dictocrats—assesses himself as the focal point of wisdom. I know I know! These millions are in constant tension—every assumed focal point of wisdom being at odds one with the other. Discord!

The ability to freely choose is what converts the discord created by dictocrats into concord. All parties whose rights are involved must agree to the arrangements made, and dictocrats must not violate the rights of any parties to decide for themselves. “ What then is the way of life that leads to harmony? It is every man pursuing his legitimate—intelligent—self-interest, that is, acting any way he pleases so long as his way does not impair the rights of others to be their creative selves.”

Here, Read quotes Frédéric Bastiat, who “so clearly saw the efficacy of this way.” “It is practical, for certainly no maxim is easier to put into practice than this: Let men labor, exchange, learn, band together, act and react upon one another, since in this way, according to the laws of Providence, there can result from their free and intelligent activity only order, harmony, progress, and all things that are good, and increasingly good, and still better, and better yet to infinite degree.”

In a world of scarcity, it is seldom possible to achieve voluntary agreement. There is no real unity in that direction. But despite our disagreements about who should get what, we share far greater unity about what we do not want to happen to us. None of us wants violated what John Locke calls our “lives, liberties and estates” (Locke 1690). We want our rights and property defended against invasion so that we may peacefully pursue our goals.

As Lord Acton puts it, “liberty is the only object which benefits all alike, and provokes no sincere opposition” (Acton 1862). Because the freedom to choose for ourselves is always the primary means to our ultimate ends, the traditional functions of government are to protect us from abuse. Acton recognizes that liberty requires “the limitation of the public authority” because when a government gives rights and privileges to some at the expense of the rights of others—the mainstay of dictocratic society—it becomes the most dangerous predator.

Well-established property rights and the voluntary market arrangements they enable let individuals decide for themselves, limiting each of us to persuasion rather than coercion. And since we would all rather be persuaded than coerced, the unity that is impossible in allocating resources for everyone is possible in our personal preferences.

Reflect on . . . how we may switch from the kind of actions that produce discord to the way of life that leads to concord . . . [where] liberty is a blessing to everyone. . . .

. . . [Now] aggregate coercion is unimaginable, coercion in every instance being the root of discord. . . . Is it any wonder that discord rather than concord is dominant!

. . . These people who exercise coercion see only the “advantages” of their special privilege, of their coercion. They fail utterly to see that were it not for an enormous leakage of creative human energy—liberty—they wouldn’t even exist to practice their legal plunder. . . .

The remedy is nothing less than an eye-opening performance, seeing that which is not seen. It is the seeing at once of a delusion and of a truth.

The delusion? It is a belief that the dictocrats’ coercive tactics are responsible for life being as good as it still is. That which is seen!

The truth? That the free flowing of creative energy— liberty—is the source of human welfare. That which is not seen!

Leonard Read thus sees that the journey from discord to concord is one of expanding people’s ability to choose for themselves under private-property rights, rather than dictocrats making those choices without our consent and often against our will. This requires better protection of our rights than we “enjoy” today. We would continue to disagree about many things, but our disagreements would no longer threaten our society. “Concord can replace discord. It is only a matter of seeing. When seen, our house will no longer be divided against itself.”