Economic liberty

“ With the founders of the American Republic we hold that the purpose of government is to secure every citizen in the enjoyment of this right; but in the right of our conditions we hold, furthermore, that no such right can be exercised under a system of economic inequality, essentially destructive of life, of liberty, and of happiness. ”

“ And although it may be necessary to secure personal and political liberty before economic liberty can be attained, it is certain that until economic liberty be attained, neither political nor personal liberty is effectually enjoyed. ”

“ There are certain people in the labour movement who enlist some absurd ideas about the economic liberty of the peasants and workers without political freedom. They are demagogues or muddle-headed people. Such ideas are unimaginable and preposterous. We mean the economic liberty of the masses, and for that very purpose we are striving to win the political power. ”

“ It is, indeed, implied that the State is vested with a certain overlordship over property in general and a supervisory power over industry in general, and this principle of economic sovereignty may be set side by side with that of economic justice as a no less fundamental conception of economic Liberalism. For here, as elsewhere, liberty implies control. ”

“ In the opening section of this text attention was called to the fact that economic freedom or liberty was one of the corner stones of our modern industrial society. But freedom can best be secured by securing equality and responsibility. Factory legislation and labor laws are designed to correct the inequalities imposed by nature or involved in the very nature of capitalistic production. ”

“ Every practical economic problem that confronts us calls in some degree for the exercise of state activity. It is necessary for us then, if we are to render sound judgment on these questions, to have a clear opinion as to the proper sphere of government action, as to how far the State should interfere in the economic activities of private individuals. We cannot do better than to state first the main functions of a modern state. The modern industrial system, as we saw in the first section, is based upon certain fundamental institutions—personal liberty, competition, and private property. ”

“ The economic situation would answer passably to the classical theory of a free competitive system,—"the obvious and simple system of natural liberty," which rests on the presumption of equal opportunity. ”

“ There is a decided tendency at present to a strengthening of the regulative power of the state for the protection of the weaker classes of society. And yet on the whole the institution of private property, free competition, and a maximum of individual liberty remain the fundamental conditions of our economic life.
But while under the system of individualism, industrial activities have been multiplied, wealth has been enormously increased, and human progress has been greatly advanced, many abuses and evils still remain. Many practical economic problems still await solution. ”

“ This principle is of the very greatest consequence, and in considering the programs of industrial reform we shall come back to it again.
98. FREEDOM.—A large measure of personal liberty is a characteristic of the capitalistic system, To an increasing extent, government is restricting economic activity to productive channels, but with this qualification, the individual is comparatively free to do as he likes. The laborer is free to move about in search of work, free to seek a better job, free to accept or to reject work offered him. ”

“ As I need not remind you who were familiar with it, the industrial system of the world before the great Revolution was wholly based upon the compulsory servitude of the mass of mankind to the possessing class, enforced by the coercion of economic need. ”

“ The American economic, political, and social organization has given to its citizens the benefits of material prosperity, political liberty, and a wholesome natural equality; and this achievement is a gain, not only to Americans, but to the world and to civilization. ”

“ During a ceremony at the Jefferson Memorial here in Washington, we discussed the four basic economic freedoms: the freedom to work, the freedom to enjoy the fruits of one's labor, the freedom to own and control one's property, and the freedom to participate in a free market. ”

“ I wish commerce to be fully protected and encouraged, that the people may have an opportunity of disposing of their crops at market, and of procuring such supplies as they may be in want of. I presume that there can be no political happiness, unless industry be cherished and protected, and property secured. Suppose a poor man becomes rich by honest labor, and increases the public stock of wealth: shall his reward be the loss of that liberty he set out with? Will you take away every stimulus to industry, by declaring that he shall not retain the fruits of it? ”

“ We hear political economy frequently censured by these advocates for violent and legislative remedies, for paying more attention to the accumulation than the distribution of wealth. But in what chapter of political economy is it laid down, that the distribution and enjoyment of wealth is a matter of less moment than its production and accumulation? The simple truth is, that the same law of liberty, which is so favourable to the accumulation of wealth, provides also the best distribution which human ingenuity has yet been able to devise. ”

“ The social economic system must conform to the principles of equity with the special object of guaranteeing an honourable livelihood to all. Within these limits economic freedom shall be secured to each individual. ”

“ And he added: “Only freedom judges aright; only competition never sells too dear, and always pays a reasonable and legitimate price.” Far from being the absence of rule, liberty is the rule itself. To laisser faire the good is to prevent evil.42
There is need of institutions to complete the exercise of the independence acquired by labor, and of laws to regulate that exercise. The laisser faire and laisser passer of economists is, in no way, like the absolute formula, which some have denounced and others sought to utilize, as relieving authority of all care and all intervention. ”

“ Low prices come from competition—a fruitful source of wealth, and a daughter of Liberty. Therefore, a government wishing to establish on a firm basis the prosperity of trade must give commerce full liberty ”

“ A new kind of prosperity demanded new laws and better organised courts of justice; and thus, it may be said, that the civil liberty, the political privileges, the national wealth, the ameliorated laws of modern Europe have all, in a great measure, proceeded out of commercial enterprise. Another confirmation of the truth, that industry is the mainspring of civilization, and has been in modern times, and during the period of the middle ages—for it was then that this new spirit announced itself—the grand regenerator of society. ”

“ We here refer to the liberty of commercial transactions, to the establishment of absolute free trade between the citizens of all the States of our political Union. An immense step was here taken in the progress of liberty. All the liberties—liberty of conscience, liberty of thought and speech, and liberty of exchange—have been slow growths; but no one has grown so slowly or against such resistance, or is still so immature, as that full liberty of action that is involved in the free exchange of property. ”

“ The object of each exchanger was, that labour should be exchanged with capital. That object could not have been accomplished, or it would have been accomplished slowly, imperfectly, and therefore unprofitably, unless there had been interchangeable freedom and security for both exchangers,—for the exchanger of capital, and the exchanger of labour. The first right of the labourer was, that his labour should be free;—the first right of the capitalist was, that his capital should be free. The rights of each were built upon the security of property. ”

“ We have already stated that, by the law of supply and demand, the rewards of each worker are regulated in theory even more perfectly in accordance with our ideas of liberty than they could be on the basis of actual benefit conferred. ”

“ Laws which give every man better command and use of his own energies are in manifest harmony with liberty, and for the State to do such industrial work as it has special natural advantages for doing is conformable with the principle of free-trade itself, which has always prescribed to men and nations as the best rule for their prosperity, that they should concentrate their strength on the branches of industry they possess natural advantages for cultivating, and give up wasting their labour on less productive employment. ”

“ With the destruction of the feudal system, and the birth of commercialism & manufacturers in the 16th century, a contest long & bitter & bloody lasting over a hundred years was waged for mental & religious liberty. The 17th and 18th centuries with their Sanguinary conflicts gave to man political equality & civil liberty based on the monopolization of the resources of life - capital - with its "free laborers" freely competing with one another for a chance to serve king capital; & "free competition" among capitalists in their endeavors to exploit the laborers & monopolize their labor products. ”

“ But as he refused to allow a Catholic or a Tractarian religious freedom, or the common people political freedom, so he refused to allow a cotton-spinner economic freedom. To his narrow mind, no less than to his large heart, the legal protection of working people against economic tyranny is due. ”

“ There must be these two liberties—liberty to create wealth, as the makers of it think best according to the light and experience which business has given them; and then liberty to distribute what they have created without unnecessary vexatious burdens. The comprehensive law of the ideal industrial condition of the world is free manufacture and free trade. ”

“ Trades, business, and commerce cry aloud for liberty, and for union with liberty. The free co-operation of the industrial arts and workmen's societies, of societies of merchants and banking-houses, are ideas and facts so common in these days that the dominion of the two tendencies referred to above is clearly made manifest in the lower order of civilization. ”

“ The development of the economic programme which consists in the destruction of these monopolies and the substitution for them of the freest competition led its authors to a perception of the fact that all their thought rested upon a very fundamental principle, the freedom of the individual, his right of sovereignty over himself, his products, and his affairs, and of rebellion against the dictation of external authority. ”

“ But it is to be kept constantly in mind, that there can be no such thing as free labor, unless there be freedom in money; that is, unless everybody, who can furnish money, shall be at liberty to do so. Plainly labor cannot be free, unless the laborers are free to hire all the money capital that is necessary for their industries. And they cannot be free to hire all this money capital, unless all who can lend it to them, shall be at liberty to do so. ”

“ He has a great deal to say about "liberty of production" and "industrial freedom." He must therefore think that men, if "let alone," and left free to exercise the largest option in the choice and pursuit of vocations, will create more property than if hampered and meddled with by government.
But why the same principle would not apply to the exchange of property, and why wealth would not be further augmented by the liberty of citizens to sell and buy the products of labor when and where they will, without let or hindrance, he does not explain. ”

“ If there be no protection for life, liberty, property, and the fruits of accumulated industry, government becomes comparatively useless, and society is driven back upon its first principles.
Capital is the most sensitive of all things. It flies turbulence and strife, and thrives only in security and freedom. ”

“ The state must hold the balance even and see that fair play is given to all groups and all classes; but the greatest amount of freedom compatible with economic justice must be sought for. It is a difficult question how far the state must interfere in the conduct or management of industrial enterprises in order to secure social justice. ”

“ Economic "states rights" or individualism—the theory upon which the present day industry as well as the modern state was founded. Under this theory each economic group must be free to go its way, cutting a path for itself through the ranks of its competitors, and making its triumphant advance over their prostrate remains. ”

“ It results, therefore, that in any state of society in which the laws did not equally protect the capitalist and the labourer as free exchangers, each having the most absolute command over his property, compatible with a due regard to the rights of the other,—in such a state, where there was no real freedom and no real security, there would be very imperfect production; and production being imperfect, all men, the capitalists and the labourers, would be equally destitute, weak, ignorant, and miserable. ”

“ In internal policy: democratic administration, ditto education and army, economic reconstruction, rationing, public control of monopolies, especially mines and power, right of association and wage boards, public health, rights for civil servants, agricultural development and settlement preferably on reclaimed land, taxation of war profits, income-tax, death duties graduated but not confiscatory, freedom of conscience, freedom of the Press, freedom of meeting—all sorts of freedom. ”