ȃȂȃ Partʺʺ: Politics and Philosophyrights in the contents of their own minds, even including their opinions
of me.
It seems strange that a member of the Austrian school of economists,
who put such emphasis on the radically subjective nature of benefits and
costs, goods and bads (YeagerȀȈȇȆ), should make such a momentous
distinction between threats according to whether they do or do not involve
physicalharm to persons or objects. But that is what Rothbard deduces
from his two axioms.
Rothbard takes a similar position on blackmail, defined as obtaining or
trying to obtain money or goods in exchange for silence on some matter.ȇ
Again, the supposedly decisive question is who has a property right to the
contents of the minds of the blackmailer and other people with whom
he might share his information (or misinformation). Not the victim—so
runs Rothbard’s answer. It is irrelevant to Rothbard’s judgment that the
victim might be better off if the blackmailer had never been born. Roth-
bard brushes aside the contention that the blackmailer’s activity might be
judged unproductive in some sense. Rights, not assessments of produc-
tivity, must prevail. A utilitarian side point enters in: the victim may be
better off with than without the opportunity to give the possessor of infor-
mation an incentive not to blab. Ļe presumption still holds that voluntary
transactions—in this case, an exchange of money for silence—benefits all
concerned. I would reply (not taking space here to develop the argument)
that such a proposition about gains from trade is no more universally
valid than the proposition about more options always being preferable to
fewer.
Rothbard’s conception of property rights also determines his position
on what contracts are properly enforceable at law (ȀȈȇȁ, chap.ȀȈ). Suppose
a performer agrees with an impresario to take part in a concert tour for a
specified compensation, and the impresario proceeds with costly arrange-
ments. Or suppose a retailing chain agrees to buyȀǿǿ,ǿǿǿtables over the
following two years at a specified price, thereby inducing the manufacturer
to construct a new factory to be able to deliver. Now, for no extenuating
reason (whatever one might be), the performer or the retailer defaults on
his part of the bargain, leaving the impresario or the manufacturer with
heavy expenses that he can hardly recoup. In neither case, we stipulate, has
any money or other property yet changed hands between the contracting
ȇRothbardȀȈȇȁ, chap.Ȁȅand pp.ȁȃȀ–ȁȃȂ; similar arguments appear in Block and
GordonȀȈȇȄand BlockȀȈȇȅ.