Page:David Atkins - The Economics of Freedom (1924).pdf/35

 by the state of obvious aggregations of power which it would have been much more advantageous to leave to the citizen; and finally, in desperation, to state-sanction of these aggregations, as in California, under the seductive battle-cry that the corporations should pay the taxes.

There is so much rigid belief in regard to this matter of state-control—ranging from a fervid conviction that only the state should distribute milk, to an ecstatic belief in the wisdom and efficiency of the Shipping Board—that to question its justification is to scoff at a new gospel.

To clear away these zealous misconceptions, it is necessary to take as nearly as possible a bird’s-eye view of democracy, to see from what it sprang, and to realize again what we originally hoped of it.

The simplest possible picture of our situation is that we had become, through tribal evolution, political serfs on the estate of one family to which we had conceded all power and all responsibility. This power was exercised individually, or delegated to favorites by franchises and royal grants, and the responsibility ignored or repudiated, until individual freedom of action became impossible. We withdrew with great difficulty both the power and the responsibility and decided to redistribute sovereignty as fairly as we could among all the residents of the estate. This dramatic change was a natural reaction from an intolerable interference with personal freedom. What we hoped of our altered position was a prevention of similar interference.

In this way, through the taxing power which we seized, we became the joint-landlords of the estate and were no longer serfs. Surely our collective wisdom should not make us less wise than the individual landlord.

What are the advantageous duties of the landlord, on the simple basis of far-sighted self-interest? Without much controversy they may be catalogued as follows:

(1)&ensp;To maintain order with the least possible interference with the tenant.

(2)&ensp;To facilitate production and exchange within the estate for the benefit of all the tenants.