Freedom in One Lesson

90.

The Love of Liberty

In “The Love of Liberty,” from his 1975 book of the same name, Leonard Read (1975b) addresses something very close to his heart. Because it was so central to Read’s whole enterprise, and because we live in an age that is very far from loving liberty, it is worth renewed attention.

Everyone loves liberty, so let’s clear the decks—make it possible! . . .

. . . No other political document in history can approach our Declaration as the fountainhead of liberty. Yet, at the time, the detractors were as common as the initiators were rare—the multitude and the exceptional few!

. . . [People] bow to the shadow while trampling the very substance of liberty . . . evidence of the meager knowledge of what liberty is. For instance, it will be shouted (but not in these terms) that liberty is a liberality with the lives and livelihood of others for self-benefit. . . .

. . . Were we to know what it is, aware of the social structure in which it thrives, and willing to pay the price, it is liberty we would have.

Liberty is freedom of choice. Everyone loves freedom of choice for himself, if not for others; therefore, everyone loves liberty.

Others, of course, may have values or priorities that differ from mine. Their choices are not mine—or vice versa. But does this mean that any of us rejects freedom of choice? . . . I love the freedom to choose . . . my employment . . . how the fruits of my own labor shall be expended . . . the price at which I am willing to offer my goods and/or services . . . with whom I shall exchange this or that . . . the books I read . . . the teachers who may enlighten me . . . my religion . . . the cars I drive, the clothes I wear, the food I eat, that is, what I shall consume . . . when and where I shall travel . . . what I shall think, speak, write, and with whom I may share my thoughts.

If there be anyone who does not favor freedom of choice as much as I do, that person is unknown to me. Thus, my conclusion has to be that everyone loves liberty. . . .

While everyone loves liberty for self, there are ever so many who are unwilling to accord freedom of choice to others. Merely take note of those who favor and endorse wage and price controls, privileges, supports, subsidies, tariffs, quotas, embargoes, the coercive taking from some and giving to others, restrictions on competition; indeed, all deviations from the free market, private ownership, limited government way of life. Note these, and one will have a fair estimate of the number of those who love liberty for self but not for others. They love liberty but they live license.

Thus, the love of liberty for self and not for others is but a selfish, greedy, and unattainable dream. Why not be realistic? The formula? The Golden Rule: Do not to others that which you would not have them do unto you. Or, in this context, expect not from others that which you will not happily, graciously, intelligently accord to them! This is how the lovers of liberty may experience what they love. There is no other way.

Leonard Read could honestly be said to have fallen in love with liberty. And he left behind a key to advancing it, which would benefit us to better emulate: “I love liberty for self—and others!”