ȃȂȁ Partʺʺ: Politics and Philosophysatisfaction and frustration. He would probably assert or argue for each
person’s right to personal freedom. Property rights would come into the
argument, but not as its very foundation.
A more pervasive peculiarity is the attempt, openly avowed—recall the
quotation above—to spin out positions on all sorts of specific issues from
the two axioms about ownership of selves and other property. (Although
utilitarian points occasionally creep into Rothbard’s arguments, they do
not characterize his approach.) Rothbard’s positions on crime, extortion,
blackmail, contracts, and bankruptcy provide striking examples, calling
his whole approach into question, as I shall try to show. For brevity, I
forgo commenting on how self-confidently he spins out firm positions
on abortion, boycotts, children’s rights, animal rights, and other issues.
Again, my purpose is not to attack Rothbard but to defend Mises.
Meanwhile, let us note, a utilitarian would not try to derive all sorts
of specific judgments by deducing them in one direction only from a very
few initial axioms. Instead, he would check his tentative specific judg-
ments and his tentative generalizations (rules) against one another. In a
way, judgments about specific cases would serve as data—tentative, cor-
rigible data—for reaching generalizations. Ļe utilitarian would stand
ready to modify any or all of his specific and general judgments until
he had achieved consistency among them, as well as consistency with
his fundamental value judgment about happiness and misery. He would
seek consistency between his judgment about some specific provision of
the bankruptcy laws, for example, and his generalizations about honesty,
promises, and property rights. At each stage, facts of reality, including the
principles of psychology and economics and other disciplines, would be
eligible to enter into his reasoning.Ȅ
Crime provides my first example of the peculiar positions that Roth-
bard deduces. He regards crime as, in effect, a private transaction between
culprit and victim.ȅSuppose someone mugs me. By his aggression, the
mugger has violated my property right in my own person and, if he has
taken any valuables, my property right in them also. I am entitled to
restitution or compensation. If, however, I waive this right and forgive
the mugger, then I have made him a gift of the use (or abuse) he has
ȄĻis method of seeking consistency between specific judgments and general rules is
what John Rawls, not himself an avowed utilitarian, has called the method of reflective
equilibrium; RawlsȀȈȆȀ, esp. pp.ȁǿ–ȁȀ,ȃȇ–ȄȀ.
ȅRothbardȀȈȇȁ, chap.ȀȂ. I hope it is legitimate to draw, also, on personal correspon-
dence with Rothbard.