Let Freedom Reign

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THE MIRACLE OF A MEAL

I like to emphasize again and again the common and careless inclination to take our blessings for granted, and why we should not do so. Miracles of the free market abound in our daily experiences but, short of an appreciation of what accounts for our affluent existence, we’ll do nothing to preserve the miraculous process; we’ll let it go by default!

Day-in and day-out experiences? To illustrate, here’s a homey case in point, commonplace as our daily bread; indeed, it’s about an ordinary dinner and, for good measure, with the recipe thrown in.

’Twas a Sunday morning. The two of us had given no thought to any eating for the day except the conventional orange juice and coffee and the unconventional sautéed chicken livers and bean soup for breakfast. Let the rest of the day take care of itself! Then the not-too-unconventional thing happened: three unexpected guests for dinner!

What to do? Westchester County has numerous restaurants of moderate quality. Why shouldn’t the five of us dine out? That’s the expedient even if the expensive solution—the escapist way. But to the gent who likes to cook, this is also to run from a challenge; it is to accept conventional check-writing while rejecting exciting culinary creation.

An inventory of the refrigerator revealed some staples but nothing in the way of main-course fare except a cup of canned tuna and a cup and a half of left-over roast chicken—not much of a start for a table of five. Yet, it was this paucity of supplies that presented the challenge. The Chinese approach came to mind—a little meat and fish for flavor and many vegetables for good diet and bulk.

Two utensils were brought forth from the gadgetry closet and placed on the stove. One was an enameled cast iron casserole, an art of the Belgians, Dutch, and French—lost for years—in production again as the finest cooking ware there is. The other was a large, shallow, steel bowl used in Chinese kitchens for numerous kinds of cookery and called a “woc.”

A tablespoon each of butter and flour went into the casserole for a roux. After whisking and cooking over a low heat, two cups of an excellent chicken stock, made by a lady in Connecticut, were added and blended. Added and blended into this was the following, already combined: 1/4 cup of water, a heaping tablespoon brown sugar, juice of one lemon, 2 tablespoons soy sauce, a smidgen of Accent, 1/2 teaspoon Pernod, and a tablespoon of corn starch which gives the sauce that glistening effect achieved by the Chinese. At this point, the heat was turned off under the casserole. Then was added a large clove of garlic, put through a garlic press, 1 can bean sprouts, drained and rinsed, and the tuna.

Now to the woc. Five slices of bacon were chopped and sautéed to a near crispness, the pieces, drained of the grease, added to the casserole. The grease was removed from the woc and then returned sparingly for the following high heat and quick sautéeing, each put in the casserole when no more than half cooked: cup of chopped celery, can of water chestnuts, drained and sliced, a cup of chopped scallions, and a cup of sliced mushrooms. Last, the chicken was browned and added to the casserole.1

Well, there’s the concoction; call it a chop suey, a salmagundi, or what you will. I merely mixed the sauce and ingredients with a fork, put the cover on the casserole, brought it to a simmer, and served the stuff over rice in soup plates. I announced to my hoped-for admirers, “We’re in business!”

The Miracle Workers

Anyway, this dish came off first-rate and it was pronounced “Delectable!” Wanting at least to affect modesty, and seeing an opportunity unobtrusively to strike another blow for the free market, I demurred by saying: “I had very little to do with this Chinese hash. Many tens of thousands of persons had a hand in its making.” This remark evoked more in the way of astonishment than did the savoriness in the way of “ums” and “ahs.”

I explained: “Consider the persons who made my utensils, the ones who discovered how to enamel cast iron, and all of those who had to do with the facilities of manufacture. Who grew and milled and packaged the rice? From whence came the vegetables, and who brought them to market, and who had a part in the transportation and communication apparatus? The gal in Connecticut who processed the chicken stock had a part in this dish, as did the fishermen who caught the albacore and the folks who made their boats and tackle—and the canners and the makers of cans. Reflect, also, on the countless persons who saved, thus providing the capital for all of the enterprises. Think of the army of people who brought the gas to my stove. Above all, bear in mind that not one ingredient used in this preparation was grown, mined, fabricated, or transported by me. Numberless thousands, perhaps millions, through space and time, lent their services for this which you now declare delectable.”

“But,” retorted one of our guests, “it has always been thus. What you speak of as if it were a miracle is really commonplace. Aren’t you making much ado about nothing?”

“Indeed, I am not. To get a full appreciation of my point, I shall give you a copy of Weaver’s Mainspring.2 Read this and you will get the history of freedom and its meaning to you as a person. You will see that most of the people who have inhabited this earth have been faced with famine and starvation; that in most countries only a certain few have been able to command the services of others. The historical rarity is where persons, in moderate circumstances like ourselves, can obtain the services of millions in exchange for some minor specializations of our own. The abundance we are experiencing at this table is no longer necessarily confined to kings and commissars and monopolists, the special privileged, to successful pirates and thieves. A way is known, at least to a few, that can make a meal like this the fare of anyone who is willing to work. It is this little known way that constitutes by far the most important ingredient of any good meal.”

“What is this way in a few well-edited words?”

“This way is to get out of the way of all creative activities, an absence of authoritarianism. As a consequence of getting out of the way, there is a releasing, a flowering of creative energy. We refer to this as the free market, private ownership, limited government way of life.”

“You have carried brevity too far. Can’t you expand on this a bit?”

“Not adequately during a dinner hour. In essence, however, it is simply to leave everybody totally free to act creatively as he pleases, to let anyone and everyone exchange their goods and services with whomever they choose on whatever terms can be mutually agreed upon, to let the fruits of one’s labor be one’s own, and to limit government—society’s agency of force—to the protection of everyone equally in these freedoms.”

“Do you mean that government should never assume the role of Robin Hood?”

“That is precisely what I mean. Political Robin Hoodism is like taking 20 points from the student who graded 95 and giving the 20 points to the student who graded 55: this would give each a grade of 75, adequate for passing. The first will work less because his incentive has been removed, and the second will see no point in working at all because he has become the object of something for nothing. Fancy names for this way of life are Egalitarianism, Dirigisme, Etatism. Labels more familiar to us are Communalism, Communism, Socialism, or just plain Welfare State.”

“You go too far in limiting government. Imagine the chaos there would be in a complex society like ours if government were not managing the economy at all.”

“When you say I go too far, you are really saying you favor some predation, providing it is legal, and that I am wrong for being opposed to all of it. And as to government management of the economy, could you manage it or organize its management? Let me make this easier for you. Could you have directed the creative activity that went into the making of the woc that sautéed our food?3 Or that went into the other ingredients employed by us today? Could you direct just one person in invention, discovery, ingenuity? Why, directing your own self in this respect is a bigger chore than you can fulfill. And what makes you think that voting you into or appointing you to some political office betters your capacities? By doing this, we would make you less capable. If we give you power to direct us, that will corrupt you. Examine yourself and your limitations, add a dose of corruption, and you will see the true nature of an authoritarian, the one who presumes to direct the creative lives of people within a society. And, remember, everyone else, no matter how skilled in other ways or how well educated, is just as incompetent as you are when it comes to controlling the productive lives of others.”

“But, under your system how are the poor fed?”

“You are now witnessing the answer. The principles I have but casually touched upon have been practiced in the U.S.A. more than elsewhere, and the poor are better fed here than in those countries where these principles are less practiced. All five of us started with no inheritance beyond what God gave us. We are the beneficiaries of freedom. We not only have good food by reason of it; we have life and the opportunity to enrich our lives intellectually and spiritually by reason of it.”

“Why, though, do you dwell so passionately on the subject? Your talk would imply that freedom is precariously held; that it’s something we are in imminent danger of losing.”

“We are in danger of losing our freedom. You and millions of others are taking freedom for granted, so much so that you embrace authoritarian ideas as long as they are legally clothed and democratically implemented. Only now and then can a skilled expositor of the free market, private ownership, limited government way of life be found. Socialism (authoritarianism)—freedom’s opposite—is on the increase, and dangerously so.”

“I did not know this.”

“Without an understanding of freedom and how it works, you couldn’t possibly know this.”

“Anyway, I enjoyed your dish.”

“Well, thanks. And, please don’t think I have been talking irrelevantly. I only want you to know the whole recipe and to realize that numberless thousands of others, past and present, were ‘cheffing’ for you this day. Here’s a toast to their health and happiness, all of them, and, with a wine from California—to the vintners, and to all the folks through the ages who brought it to perfection and to our table.”

The right words didn’t occur to me until after my guests had departed. I should have concluded that meal with, “Here’s a toast to free men, the miracle workers!”

• 1The Royal Bank of Canada Monthly Letter, February, 1969.
• 2Even prohibiting pollution in highly polluted areas may be no solution. Pollution is becoming a problem of the whole troposphere, that is, the troposphere assuredly has containment limitations. If this view be accepted, then pollution released atop Mt. Everest could eventually wreak its havoc on Americans.
• 3But to what avail are gas masks for human beings if plant and animal life succumb to pollution?