The Case for Economic Freedom – Part 2

Originally published in the Freeman By Benjamin A. Rogge • September 1963 • Volume: 13 • Issue: 9

Basic Values Considered

Inasmuch as my own value systems and my own assumptions about human beings are so important to the case, I want to sketch them for you.

To begin with, the central value in my choice system is individual freedom. By freedom I mean exactly and only freedom from coercion by others. I do not mean the four freedoms of President Roosevelt, which are not freedoms at all, but only rhetorical devices to persuade people to give up some of their true freedom. In the Rogge system, each man must be free to do what is his duty as he defines it, so long as he does not use force against another.

Next, I believe each man to be ultimately responsible for what happens to him. True, he is influenced by his heredity, his environment, his subconscious, and by pure chance. But I insist that precisely what makes man man is his ability to rise above these influences, to change and determine his own destiny. If this be true, then, it follows that each of us is terribly and inevitably and forever responsible for everything he does. The answer to the question, “Who’s to blame?” is always, “Mea culpa, I am.”

I believe as well that man is imperfect, now and forever. He is imperfect in his knowledge of the ultimate purpose of his life, imperfect in his choice of means to serve those purposes he does select, imperfect in the integrity with which he deals with himself and those around him, imperfect in his capacity to love his fellow man.

If man is imperfect, then all of his constructs must be imperfect, and the choice is always among degrees and kinds of imperfection. The New Jerusalem is never going to be realized here on earth, and the man who insists that it is, is always lost unto freedom.

Moreover, man’s imperfections are intensified as he acquires the power to coerce others; “power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely.”

This completes the listing of my assumptions, and it should be clear that the list does not constitute a total philosophy of life. Most importantly, it does not define what I believe the free man’s duty to be, or more specifically, what I believe my own duty to be and the source of the charge to me. However important these questions, I do not consider them relevant to the choice of an economic system.

Here, then, are two sections of the case for economic freedom as I would construct it. The first section presents economic freedom as an ultimate end in itself and the second presents it as a means to the preservation of the non-economic elements in total freedom.

Individual Freedom of Choice

The first section of the case is made in the stating of it, if one accepts the fundamental premise:

Major premise: Each man should be free to take whatever action he wishes, so long as he does not use force or fraud against another;

Minor premise: All economic behavior is “action” as identified above;

Conclusion: Each man should be free to take whatever action he wishes in his economic behavior, so long as he does not use force or fraud against another.

In other words, economic freedom is a part of total freedom; if freedom is an end in itself, as our society has traditionally asserted it to be, then economic freedom is an end in itself, to be valued for itself alone and not just for its instrumental value in serving other goals.

If this thesis be accepted, then there must always exist a tremendous presumption against each and every proposal for governmental limitation of economic freedom. What is wrong with a state system of compulsory social security? It denies to the individual his freedom, his right to choose what he will do with his own money resources. What is wrong with a governmentally enforced minimum wage? It denies to the employer and the employee their individual freedom, their individual rights to enter into any voluntary relationship not involving force or fraud. What is wrong with government-to-government foreign economic aid? It denies to the individual freedom to choose, as his conscience dictates, whether to send aid or not. What is wrong with a tariff or an import quota? It denies to the individual consumer his right to buy what he wishes, wherever he wishes.

It is breathtaking to think what this simple approach would do to the apparatus of state control at all levels of government. Strike from the books all legislation that denies economic freedom to any individual and three-fourths of all the activities now undertaken by government would be eliminated.

I am no dreamer of empty dreams and I do not expect that the day will ever come when this principle of economic freedom as a part of total freedom will be fully accepted and applied. Yet I am convinced that unless this principle is given some standing, unless at least those who examine proposals for each new regulation of the individual by government look on this loss of freedom as a “cost” of the proposed legislation, the chances of free enterprise surviving are small indeed. The would-be controller can always find reasons why it might seem “expedient” to control the individual; and unless slowed down by some general feeling that it is immoral to do so, he will usually have his way.

Dr. Benjamin A. Rogge (1920-1980) was dean and professor of economics at Wabash College, Crawfordsville, Indiana and a longtime trustee of FEE. This lecture, printed in Freeman magazine in 1963, was delivered at several FEE seminars and on other occasions. It set forth the Rogge ideal of the unmixed, free economy.