Of Snags and Lights

We have all heard the facile patter of the gentleman who is “in favor of liberty, but”—a phrase that usually opens the door to some such remark as, “but there are some things, some economic goods, that are obviously for the benefit of the people as a whole and cannot be supplied by private enterprise and must therefore be supplied by the government: lighthouses, for example.” And then the cheap shots: “Imagine the Queen Elizabeth II, at three in the morning, in a force-ten gale, coming about and sending a launch across the murderous channel to pay five bucks to the lighthouse keeper, who’s probably dead asleep!” Of course.

Of course not. The late President Franklin Pierce and I rise to oppose the motion. In the first half of the nineteenth century, you will remember (you will have to remember: I can’t find the reference), a similar argument was made in behalf of the Federal Government’s role in clearing snags from the Mississippi River. The river was not the territory of any one state; commerce benefited everyone whether he navigated the river or not; the safety of the crews was paramount (salus populi suprema lex, noted refuge of scoundrels); private venturers were not to be trusted; private ownership would be impractical. And then the cheap shot, vintage 1854: “Imagine the captain of a great steamer, carrying hundreds of important passengers downriver in the full flood of the spring crest, vainly attempting to make fast in the middle of the night at some dark and lonely outpost in order to pay his passage money to the drunken plantation owner!” Of course.

WR

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William F. Rickenbacker

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We have all heard the facile patter of the gentleman who is “in favor of liberty, but”—a phrase that usually opens the door to some such remark as, “but there are some things, some economic goods, that are obviously for the benefit of the people as a whole and cannot be supplied by private enterprise and must therefore be supplied by the government: lighthouses, for example.” And then the cheap shots: “Imagine the Queen Elizabeth II, at three in the morning, in a force-ten gale, coming about and sending a launch across the murderous channel to pay five bucks to the lighthouse keeper, who’s probably dead asleep!” Of course.

Of course not. The late President Franklin Pierce and I rise to oppose the motion. In the first half of the nineteenth century, you will remember (you will have to remember: I can’t find the reference), a similar argument was made in behalf of the Federal Government’s role in clearing snags from the Mississippi River. The river was not the territory of any one state; commerce benefited everyone whether he navigated the river or not; the safety of the crews was paramount (salus populi suprema lex, noted refuge of scoundrels); private venturers were not to be trusted; private ownership would be impractical. And then the cheap shot, vintage 1854: “Imagine the captain of a great steamer, carrying hundreds of important passengers downriver in the full flood of the spring crest, vainly attempting to make fast in the middle of the night at some dark and lonely outpost in order to pay his passage money to the drunken plantation owner!” Of course.