--><div>
<font color="#002864" size="1" face="Verdana">http://www.mises.org/fullstory.asp?control=1162</font>
</div>
<div>
</div>
<div>
<font face="Verdana" size="2"><font color="#002864" size="5"><strong>Five Books That Explain It All</strong></font>
</div>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><font size="4">By Jeffrey
Tucker</font>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><o:p>
<font size="2"> </font></o:p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><font size="2">[Posted
February 10, 2003]</font>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt">
<p class="MsoNormal" style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><font size="2">The drive to
war, the threat of terrorism, the stock-price meltdown, the continuing
recession, and the decline of liberty—all add up to a moment of grave
insecurity in which government power thrives and grows. Underneath it all
is widespread confusion about what happened to turn the prosperous and
relatively peaceful 90s into the current madness, who or what is to blame, and
what to do about it.</font>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><o:p>
<font size="2"> </font></o:p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><font size="2">What most
people do in such times is cling to the words of politicians and the
statements of TV's talking heads—the two sources least likely to offer a
broad perspective that yields answers. The best means to fight back
against their superficial prattle is serious study of history and
economics. Looking over the Mises Institute's shelf of books, five stand out
for providing a clear a historical perspective, a theoretical explanation, a
forecast for the future, and an agenda for change. These are the books that
are essential to understanding our times of conflict and stagnation.</font>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><o:p>
<font size="2"> </font></o:p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal">[img]" alt="[image]" style="margin: 5px 0px 5px 0px" /> <font size="2">America's
Great Depression</font>[/i]<font size="2"> by </font><st1:City>
<st1:place>
<font size="2">Murray</font></st1:place>
</st1:City>
<st1:place>
<font size="2">N. Rothbard</font></st1:place>
<font size="2">. A Republican president, facing relentlessly falling stock
prices, tries every manner of intervention to shore up an economy headed
toward liquidation. The result is new protectionism, welfare for labor, vast
increases in government spending, and an economic decline that just seems to
get worse all the time. This narrative could apply to George W. Bush in our
own times, but it also applies to Herbert Hoover and his response to the 1929
crash on Wall Street.</font>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><o:p>
<font size="2"> </font></o:p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><font size="2">Even today,
students are taught that Hoover pursued a policy of laissez-faire and that FDR
rescued the country with the New Deal. Rothbard shows that the story is
completely false. The Hoover presidency was one of rampant intervention,
policies for which he was criticized by (of all people) Franklin Roosevelt
before he was elected. Rothbard further documents how Hoover's policies drove
the country into depression from what might have otherwise been a brief
recession. His protectionism laid the foundation for conflicts that led to
World War II, his attempt to prop up banks led to the later bank closings, and
his labor interventions prevented wages from falling as they should have.</font>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><o:p>
<font size="2"> </font></o:p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><font size="2">Here again, it
is hard to overestimate the importance of this book. For generations, it has
been taught that the free market is at fault for the Great Depression (in the
same way it is said that Bush is pursuing free-market policies now). Rothbard,
especially in his chapter on the Austrian theory of the business cycle, shows
that it was the Federal Reserve's loose money policy that set the stage for
the stock market crash, and the government that prolonged the suffering with
policies that accomplished the opposite of their stated aims. In other words,
this book refutes a central myth of the 20th century, and shows that the
current path of countercyclical policy will not only fail to save it; it will
dig us in deeper.</font>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><o:p>
<font size="2"> </font></o:p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal">[img]" alt="[image]" style="margin: 5px 0px 5px 0px" /> <font size="2">Reassessing
the Presidency: The Rise of the Executive State and the Decline of Freedom</font>[/i]<font size="2">
edited by John V. Denson. If George Washington had delivered a speech along
the lines of George W. Bush's State of the Union in January 2003, the
outcry would have been palpable. It would have widely been assumed that King
George had returned, madder than ever. One was given the impression that
nothing in the Constitution restrains his war-making power, nothing prevents
him from spending billions upon billions on what he wants to do, and that
anyone who objects is an enemy of all that is right and true.</font>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><o:p>
<font size="2"> </font></o:p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><font size="2">The framers
envisioned that the president would have few powers at all, and those that he
did have were to be exercised with stern oversight from the legislative branch.
If you are seeking an answer to how we came to imperial presidency of the
current day, don't look at the conventional presidential histories, in which
it is widely assumed that the more power the chief executive grabs, the"greater"
he is. Especially wartime presidents come in for good marks, while the
downside is either not discussed or downplayed.</font>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><o:p>
<font size="2"> </font></o:p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><font size="2">This massive
volume takes a completely different approach. It examines every important
presidency, and effectively reverses the judgment that you are likely to get
from the mainstream treatments. Each chapter is a classic on its own terms,
but if we have to single out a few, special mention should be made of Randall
Holcombe's reconstruction of the presidential election process, Scott Trask's
rehabilitation of Andrew Johnson, Thomas Woods's demolition of Theodore
Roosevelt, Ralph Raico's shredding of the Truman presidency, John Denson's
first-shot revisionism, and Joseph Salerno's examination of the role of money
manipulation in funding executive dictatorship.</font>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><o:p>
<font size="2"> </font></o:p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><font size="2">Read this book
and you will never think of the presidency in the same way. You certainly
won't cheer a State of the Union address (which is a 20<sup>th</sup>
century invention in any case) in which the president promises that he alone
can defend your freedom and security.</font>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><o:p>
<font size="2"> </font></o:p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal">[img][/img] <font size="2">A
History of Money and Banking in the United States: The Colonial Era to World
War II</font><font size="2"> </font>[/i]<font size="2">by Murray N.
Rothbard. Anyone who has studied the relationship between money and state
eventually comes to a remarkable realization: there is no modern leviathan
without the central bank. It is the analytical key to understanding how
government can run up deficits and debts without limit, bail out foreign
governments, fund wars without end, and otherwise attempt to manage the globe.
Take away the power to print and you rob the government of its primary means
of expansion. (More than any reform, the gold standard would devastate
big government.)</font>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><o:p>
<font size="2"> </font></o:p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><font size="2">The story of
American political history is radically incomplete without a history of money
and banking, and yet there is not one history that gave the complete picture
until this treatise by Rothbard appeared just last year. The history itself is
masterfully done, enhanced by the theoretical lens of Austrian School
economics through which the author understands events. But what really makes
this a great read (aside from the sparkling prose) is the way Rothbard weaves
together the theory and history through the lives of shady financiers and the
politicians and political machines with which they are connected.</font>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><o:p>
<font size="2"> </font></o:p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><font size="2">In many ways,
this treatise brings all the themes of our day together. It shows how central
banking creates the boom-bust cycle and funds wars, how the financial sector
serves as the essential link between politics and banking, and how paper money
makes big government possible and manages to make worse all the problems it
originally caused. Most importantly for our purposes, this book shows that no
matter how extraordinary our times appear, there are many precedents for the
current mess, and one clear path away from destruction: freedom, sound money,
and ever smaller government.</font>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><o:p>
</o:p>
<div>
<hr align="left" width="33%" SIZE="1">
</div>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt">
<font size="2">Jeffrey Tucker is vice president of the Mises Institute.
Send him MAIL. See his
Mises.org Daily
Article Archive.
<div align="center">
<div align="right">
<font face="Arial"><span class="567591613-06062002"><strong>[</strong></span></font>
</div>
</div>
</font></font>
|