Property Rights are the Foundation for Free Speech

by Borut Prah (May, 2002), borut@prah.net

"In the general course of human nature, a power over a

man's subsistence amounts to power over his will."

Alexander Hamilton, Federalist Papers, Number 79.

It was very dangerous to be alive in the twentieth century. Nazis and assorted fascists killed millions of people simply because of their race. But Reds had outdone them all by the factor of ten. They killed about one hundred million people simply for saying something. For speaking out. Indeed, life in any of the Peoples Republics was quite unsafe for anybody that practiced free speech.

Criticizing the Party was simply not allowed and if you did not know who is listening, politics became a very dangerous activity indeed. One soon learned that survival depended on knowing the secret code that identified who in the group is the Party member and how dangerous he is. The code classified the Party members into tomatoes, radishes and watermelons. Tomatoes, red inside and outside, were a danger, but known. Radishes, who were only red on the outside were harmless. Watermelons, however, were deadly.

These simple terms safely and precisely defined the degree of danger to those who could not keep their mouth shut. Many, if they were still alive, would be familiar with the following episode which occurred several million times form the Iron Curtain on the west to Siberia on the east,

Ivan Ivanovich was a worker in a steel mill, clearly the type that any socialist country needed to meet its ever elusive goals of the Five Year Plan. Comrade Ivanovich always attended the Five Year Plan meetings, after all, absence itself was a form of free speech. At the end of each meeting, the commissar, who conducted the meetings, always asked: "Are there any questions?" There never were. It was a normal procedure that nobody ever had a question and this formality always concluded the meeting. To everyone's delight.

Then one day, when the commissar asked "Are there questions?" Ivan Ivanovich raised his hand, and said: "Yes, I have one. Why have we no bread?" The surprised commissar did not expect a question and especially not this one. He had no ready answer, but replied: "Well, let me ask about this at our next Party cell meeting. I’ll give you the answer next time. Comrade, what is your name?" And the meeting was over.

The following week the commissar again talked and talked about the five year plan and its coal and steel production, but not a word on the bread shortage. Finally the time came again for the questions and again there was the usual silence. Finally a shy voice was heard from the back of the room: "Yes, comrade commissar, I have one question. Where is Ivan Ivanovich?"

For seventy-five years people were disappearing – and then came “Glasnost”. With it, free speech returned to Russia. By 1991 the Red Empire collapsed and the secret code was no longer needed. The radishes simply shed their red coats. The tomatoes, totally discredited by the evidence of failures of Marxism, could not hide; they became visible as professors of Marxism or as journalists. The watermelons were not noticed, because being green they dissolved among the Greens and continued operating from their new base.

The world breathed a sigh of relief. Communism collapsed of its own

weight and no nuclear war was necessary. And so it seemed. “Glasnost” led to free speech and free speech led to free elections, from Albania to Russia. Free speech and free elections -- we were assured -- will purge the world of communist dictators just like the wars eliminated Nazis and Fascists.

We were misinformed. Although Communism lost -- the communists won. Today, in the year of 2002, the former communists are ruling in almost every country that ten years ago denounced communism: Albania, Bulgaria, Croatia, Hungary, Poland, Russia, Slovakia, Slovenia. How could this happen in the environment where free speech and free elections were assured, and indeed happen? If these nations wanted the change, why did they re-elect Marxists and communists?

Some insight into why was provided by an interview of a woman voter on the Slovenian TV, shortly before the 1992 presidential elections in Slovenia.

TV: “Tell us, why do you again want to vote for communists? Didn't they foul everything up?".

Voter: "I know, but now they're willing to change."

The loyalty such as this was only known to come from people who have had a gun poked to their head. But no such thing existed in December of 1992 in Slovenia. How can communists command loyalty such as this, which gives them victory in free elections despite their terrible reputation?

The answer: they were the only political group who had money and resources to spend on pre-election propaganda.

Free speech and free elections are wonderful concepts if all the people have equal opportunity to have their speech heard and to present their election platform to large audiences. Such equal opportunity simply was not present in the former communist countries, because the state owned all. That is, one hundred percent of all the property. All the assets: banks, insurances, factories, schools, media, forests, farms, or any other significant property, that was plundered by the communists when they took power, remained in the hands of the plunderers. It was state property and -- they ran the State.

Just at that time, in the West, precisely in the countries that built their prosperity by respecting private property, the concept of redistribution of wealth also became popular. When professors from capitalist universities, such as Harvard, crisscrossed Eastern Europe, advising against restitution of property to the legitimate owners, the pressure from the West was off. Most countries returned nothing to the legitimate owners. The confiscated properties remained under total control of the Party-appointed bureaucrats. Although their Communist Party no longer existed, it now operated under a different name, and true to its renown perfidy, it was divided into several political parties to reinforce the illusion of a multi party system. The Party members, all former communists, but now repainted Reds, were now running as candidates under any name but Communist or Marxists, in a multi-party free elections.

Even the most skeptical western governments were impressed with such a progress of democracy. Hidden to most western leaders, however, was the fact that one group of candidates had all the resources and that the opposition that was formed from people who actually created the fall of local communists from power -- had no assets whatsoever.

The absurdity of such free elections can only be illuminated with an absurd example. This situation is equivalent to passing a law in the United States by which the Republican Party is not allowed to raise any election funds. All the donations shall go to the Democrat Party. In a situation such as this, how many Republican candidates will be elected? Yet, we certainly cannot state nor prove that such elections in America would not be totally free elections.

The question we must therefore address is this: is money, or in broader terms, the right to own property, necessary to ensure free speech in the 21^st century?

Indeed it is, if we are talking about freedom of advocacy, such as it is needed before the elections. Certainly no money is needed to complain, to say things one disagrees with. But try to stand on a street corner and promote a change.

Since the 17^th century we have invented radio, TV, internet, in addition to vast distribution of press. While it was sufficient for Martin Luther to nail a proclamation on the church door to get the ball rolling, we must ask ourselves how much success would Martin Luther King have if he simply nailed his speech “I have a dream” on the church door.

It is therefore even more remarkable that James Madison foresaw the importance of financial resources, that is, the property, in the days when you could still start a movement by standing on an orange crate. In 1792, James Madison stated that the natural right to property was the most comprehensive of all the natural rights that provided reservations against governmental sovereignty. Madison wrote:

“In its larger and juster meaning, the right to property embraces everything to which a man may attach a value and have a right; and which leaves to every one else the like advantage. In the former sense, a man's land, or merchandize, or money is called his property.  In the latter sense, a man has a property in his opinions and the free communication of them. He has a property of a peculiar value in his religious opinions, and in the profession and practice dictated by them. He has a property very dear to him in the safety and liberty of his person. He has an equal property in the free use of his faculties and free choice of the objects on which to employ them. In a word, as a man is said to have a right to his property, he may be equally said to have a property in his rights.”

Madison understood that Life and Liberty are mainly jeopardized through the violation of property rights by government's demands on citizens’ property through direct taxation, confiscation, or regulation. Since the right to property is not even mentioned in the Declaration of Independence and Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness are, this may be, to many American Liberals, some justification for the redistribution of wealth in America. They are quite happy that the redistribution has already been accomplished in Central and Eastern Europe.

But Madison reasoned the opposite. Madison reasoned to make property the test and measure of Liberty because assault on Property rights is the assault on the Pursuit of happiness, and indirectly on Liberty. While Life and Liberty may still be maintained if property is confiscated, Pursuit of happiness cannot. If a government can simply threaten a person with a loss of Property, it will control such a person’s livelihood and thus effectively curtail its Liberty.

Therefore, we should be alarmed at the slightest inroads by the State upon the rights of property, for this is also the proven and most effective way to control free speech and all the remaining human rights.