Freedom in One Lesson

53.

Fear of Freedom or Trusting Yourself

Virtually everyone claims to prefer freedom but in practice makes many exceptions.

International trade is a good example. We want free trade for selling our output, deciding how to produce that output, and for those who would like to sell to us. Such exchanges earn us higher sale prices and provide us lower costs. But we also support restrictions on competitors because they also benefit us. Our support for coercive action, given when it will line our pockets, contradicts our support for free trade.

It is harmful to freedom to believe that while freedom is good as a general principle, I cannot survive or prosper without coercion of others on my behalf—that is, that I cannot trust the voluntary actions of myself and others but I can trust the actions of those in charge of the coercion.

Leonard Read addresses this central issue in “The Fear of Freedom,” from his 1974 book Having My Way (Read 1974), and in “ Trust Thyself— Some Others Do,” from his 1975 book Castles in the Air (Read 1975a). Beginning with the recognition that individual creativity and effort is the source of all production, not some coercive “Robin Hood,” he makes a powerful case that without government seizure, society would be far more productive and that productivity would focus on what others value. This is because voluntary arrangements align the self-interest of producers with the self-interest of consumers. Freedom leads to a far better world than coercion, which degrades individuals as both givers and takers of orders.

From “The Fear of Freedom”:

Nearly everyone says he favors freedom, but in reality— with few exceptions in today’s world—most people are “scared to death” of it. . . .

. . . The word freedom . . . is shrouded in fuzziness. So, let me define the freedom to which I refer.

I wish to be free from dictators—all of them—be they of the one-man variety or an agglomeration hiding behind an act of Congress or an administrative ruling that restrains creative actions. Leave me free to do anything I please—stupid or brilliant—so long as it is peaceful and not injurious to others. Let me work at whatever I please for whatever I can obtain by willing exchange, whether the wage be a mere trifle or a king’s ransom. Let my hours of labor range as I please . . . subject, of course, to contracts. And leave me free to exchange whatever I please with whomever I choose. . . . Free me from those people who would attend to my welfare, not with the fruits of their own labor in the voluntary practice of charity, but with the coercively exacted income of others. My welfare is no one else’s business; it is a matter between me and my God, not between those who levy and those who pay taxes. Finally, free me from fraud, violence, misrepresentation, thievery— the destructive actions of men—the curbing of which is the sole role I would assign to government.

These aspirations, strung together, are what I mean by the kind of freedom of which people are “scared to death”!

Why scared? . . . It requires responsibility for self. And in consequence . . . belief and faith in freedom is all but abandoned in America today! . . .

In order rationally to embrace freedom rather than fear it, we must see and understand the two faces of freedom: benefits and burden. If we wish to enjoy the benefits we must accept the burden.

Everyone wishes to partake of the benefits of freedom, its spiritual advantages and its material windfalls. These goods flow exclusively from people acting creatively as they choose. The range in benefits is staggering: . . . an abundance of goods and services is at the beck and call of ordinary people in exchange for such minor performances as writing, lecturing, or hammering nails into a building. . . .

Here, however, is the rub: only a minority have the slightest idea that these benefits spring from the unfettered release of creative energy, and even fewer know how to achieve that release. Such failure may be traced to the fallacy of the False Cause: because the muscle of freedom is so strong that the benefits continue to flow from the economy despite increasing political interventions, it is all too easy to assume that the interventions cause the benefits! Many people . . . fail to see that government is not the source of productivity but first must seize from producers any goods that it may eventually give to others.

That benefits spring from interventions is a falsity broadcast from every conceivable station: public media, pulpits, classrooms, the halls of Congress. . . .

Goods and services flow exclusively from individuals acting creatively and cooperatively as they personally choose. . . . Freedom affords the only way to release the creativity of the individual. Contrast this with the opposing formula, coercive regimentation, the dictocrat’s method currently on the upswing. Instead of release, it applies restraint! . . .

. . . Applied 100 per cent, the restraints would fully paralyze; but to the extent of their application, to that extent are we kept from becoming our creative selves. What part of our property and our earnings belongs to us is their decision, not ours. The hours we shall labor, with whom we shall exchange and at what rates, even our educational efforts are less and less self-determined. . . . Let there be widespread surrender to this politico-economic heresy and the individual is no longer a man but a mere statistic.

. . . Why is it that so many people believe that our unprecedented and enormous benefits flow from the dictocratic arrangement presently in vogue?

There is indeed a myriad of political controls on the economy, but there is widespread evasion of the controls. . . . Creative energy goes coursing through loopholes, no dictocrat nor any combination of them being smart enough to foresee and to block all the ways of possible circumvention. . . . The zest to be a man rather than a statistic, the pull or push of freedom, the will to stay alive, is not easy to down. . . .

But reflect on the price for this short-term victory over the political obstacle course: destruction of character! Men, under these circumstances, become schemers. When the dictocratic trend advances far enough . . . many citizens turn into outlaws, smugglers, black marketeers, breakers of the law. . . . What, then, is the price of interventionism? Banditry, a depraved way of life, is substituted for the way of the Golden Rule that characterizes a truly free people.

. . . Meanwhile, the best and most responsible individuals—creative men—gradually lose their moral character; society slowly disintegrates at the core. This is the dreadful price we pay!

. . . The burden of self-responsibility . . . “scares people to death.”

Our forefathers escaped from dictocratic arrangements and set up house in a truly underdeveloped country. They were at once free and self-responsible, neither condition being possible without the other. . . . With them it was “root hog or die,” and they rooted. Also, it was trade or perish, and they traded. Trade is possible only among those who are honest—who fulfill their promises—which means that they are self-responsible and free. . . .

Our forefathers feared political tyranny. It never entered their heads to fear self-responsibility and its correlate, freedom. People do not fear the righteousness from which they benefit.

Our early American ancestors feared political tyranny because they were physically close to it; it breathed down their necks. Under the circumstances, there was worse to fear than freedom. But, as each succeeding generation receded further from the experience of tyranny—possessing little if any understanding of the effects upon men of restraint and release—people came to be less and less fearful of authoritarianism. . . . There are comparatively few among us who fear political management.

As the fear of political tyranny disappears, the fear of freedom and self-responsibility mounts, until many may be found praying thus: “Oh, Great White Father, protect me from whoever would labor for less than I; from whoever would undersell me; from the lack of possessions which I think are my due. Give unto me my cravings.” Responsibility for self has become nearly unthinkable.

. . . Our hope lies in an intellectual and moral awakening. . . . We need to realize that. . . . being one’s own man is better than existing as a mere fraction of a collective. Self-responsibility is the joyous key to being human!

In the light of such understanding, Americans will no longer fear to be free. To love righteousness or intelligence or outstanding talent or virtue of any sort is to love freedom!

Read argues that the fear of freedom arises from misunderstanding both freedom and its alternative, some form of coercion. But he also sees that fear of freedom entails a lack of trust of people in themselves and others as well as greater trust in those who would like to decide for them in their place.

From “ Trust Thyself—Some Others Do”:

It is a safe guess that 99 percent of the adult population in America today believe in more governmental control over citizens than I do. These millions would say that I go too far in suggesting the limits that should be placed on political power.

In other words, I believe more in those millions than they believe in themselves! . . .

. . . All creative activity stems from individuals, for only individuals have ideas, thoughts, insights. Creative men and women are not and cannot be induced to respond creatively to the gun or sword or the threat of violence. The notion that I can command you to have a constructive, creative idea is absurd. . . .

. . . If government—physical force—is ruled out as the stimulator, director, manager of constructive and creative activities, to whom are such activities left? . . . To individuals acting voluntarily, cooperatively, competitively, privately—as they freely choose. Government’s role can be likened to that of an umpire: to see that there is a fair field and no favors, that no special privilege is extended to anyone—not one!

. . . However, most everyone insists on an exception; . . . they have a “ but” that pleads a special privilege for themselves that only an omnipotent government can bestow. Let government stay within bounds—except to serve them—is what it amounts to! . . .

These “leaks,” however, give the case away. . . . One “ but” endorses the principle of omnipotent government no less than two “ buts” or a thousand. What could be more irrational than the notion that one should feather his own nest at the expense of others but let not others feather their nests with what is mine?

Trust thyself—some others do! . . . Who are these others? . . . [Those] who have more faith in free men than in fettered men. We trust the 99 percent more than they trust themselves! . . . They do not go all the way in trusting themselves as free and self-responsible citizens. We trust them, as such, all the way. They harbor a fear that they could not thrive without some governmental largesse—plunder. We would replace that fear with the confidence that these millions, acting freely, cooperatively, competitively, voluntarily, privately would maximize their chances of success. We are far more on the side of their true self-interest than they are!

Read’s conclusion in this essay contrasts admirably our trust in ourselves and others—and therefore in freedom—with our trust in coercion—which degrades individuals and destroys freedom. The moral of the story is well worth remembering.

Anyone who consistently stands for the freedom philosophy trusts the exception-makers more than they trust themselves. Their road leads to all-out statism, which would destroy them as free and self-responsible individuals. The road of the freedom devotees, on the other hand, opens the way to all persons to become their potentially creative selves. Trust thyself, not dictocrats! No one else who ever lived can manage your life as well as you can. No one can achieve life’s purpose by remote control.