To The Editor
The Argentine Crisis
The article, “The International Debt Problem: The Case of Argentina” (December), is excellent. Michael Adamson envisages the Argentine state of affairs with more accuracy than many people living in this country.
Deliberately provoked misinformation and a great lack of understanding of political, social, and economic matters have allowed many governments to mislead the Argentine population.
At the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th, Argentina had reached a prosperous situation in the world. It lasted till the early twenties. Prospects and conditions began to decline when rulers got wrong ideas about their duties. Instead of realizing that circumstances had given them a responsibility, they felt anointed by the Almighty to execute His will on earth. The perverse creation called the welfare state was the excuse for those messianic governments to assume missions and to perform charity with plunder taken from some to benefit others. The result of this redistribution of wealth was crisis and poverty for all. There will be no solution to the Argentine problem unless the oversized budget of this bureaucracy is reduced. Further international loans will only make this situation worse.
Congratulations to Mr. Adamson for writing and to The Freeman for publishing the facts about such irresponsible behavior.
Pablo Klimann
Buenos Aires, Argentina
The Bishops and Individual Rights
The second draft of the Bishops’ letter on the economy is now public. The most that can be said for it is that it’s not as bad as the first.
Economic fallacies still abound, as pointed out by the articles by Charles Baird and William Kern in your December issue. But there is an additional political problem.
The only hope we have of limiting the power of government is the rule of law, the nonarbitrary application of general principles based on individual rights. The bishops’ proposal that incomes be determined by moral merit would require some individual or group to be aware of all the motives that prompt anyone to do anything and to reward or punish accordingly. Acquiring such information, even were that possible, would be incompatible with the cherished right to be secure in one’s home and person.
The bishops do not seem to understand the totalitarian overtones of their own proposal. Eloquent rhetoric about the sanctity of human rights stands next to calls for the government to determine which industries should be “socialized,” which regulated, and which left alone. But what is this if not a grant of unlimited arbitrary power to government? The bishops apparently assume that since they are referring to property, human rights are unaffected. Nothing could be further from the truth. The freedom to use one’s honestly acquired property is a fundamental human right.
David Osterfeld
St. Joseph’s College
Rensselaer, indiana
The New Format
As a long time reader of The Freeman, I’m very impressed by the new size and design. Efforts like these to revitalize such a well-established publication will undoubtedly expand its audience. I believe that you will attract many new, young readers to join the ranks of those already aware of The Freeman’s excellent coverage of subjects vital to the cause of liberty.
Andrea Millen Rich
New York City, New York
I’m sorry to say that I don’t like your new size for The Freeman.
One big advantage to me and, I believe, to others of your prior size was that it would fit into my coat pocket. As a result, it was more handy to take with me to read while I was waiting in offices for appointments.
Why has the Reader’s Digest its large circulation? I believe its size is one reason.
Harry H. Hodes
Tustin, California
I was surprised to see the new format and cover of the first 1986 issue of The Freeman. It looks most attractive. Did one of your generous sponsors offer to pay that added cost?
I wish FEE every success in its great work. May it move forward in spreading the word on freedom.
George F. Platts
Ormond Beach, Florida
Editors’ Note: We would like to thank our readers for their many comments on the new Freeman format. Our goal, as always, is to provide the very best in the literature of freedom in an attractive and accessible format. We welcome your comments and support as we move forward in this task.
Coming of Age
Twenty-four years ago I was given a list of several hundred recommended books, most of which I had never heard. It was from these that I discovered The Road to Serfdom by F. A. Hayek and became acquainted with The Freeman and thus The Law by Frederic Bastiat. These put foundations under beliefs and principles I already held but to which I had not given deep thought.
In recent years it has been encouraging to witness a growing awareness that there might be some relation between morality and the free market. The dawning was evident when Leonard E. Read expressed his observations in Reflections on Coming of Age, written after twenty-one years of FEE. He had come to the realization that teaching free market economics was not enough, that it was also necessary to stress the virtues that make a moral society.
Would it be proper to suggest that the free market is the natural evolvement from a practicing morality?
Phil Clark
Carthage, Illinois
A Team Effort
I have just read “Production Is a Team Effort,” by Bettina Bien Greaves in the December Freeman. She has put it so clearly that it seems to me it ought to be sent to all labor leaders in the country.
It is such a shame that many of our basic industries are being priced out of the world market due in large part to excessive wage demands on the part of union leaders.
B.C. Carlson
Weston, Connecticut
