Chapter ǴǸ: Ļe Moral Element in Mises’sHuman Action ȃȄȀpeople. It supposedly invites government hyperactivity aimed at maxi-
mizing some misconceived aggregate welfare. Ethics and policy must be
grounded instead in noble and intuitively obvious principles such as un-
swerving respect for human dignity and human rights.
Mises the utilitarian has drawn his share of criticism, even from some
of his own disciples. I do not maintain that Mises expounded the subtlest
version of the doctrine, distinguishing between act utilitarianism and rules
or indirect utilitarianism. He wrote mostly before detailed philosophical
treatments of these subtleties were published, and, anyway, they were not
central to his main concerns. Still, his basic philosophical stance is worth
defending. Confronting it with the arguments of critics and would-be rein-
terpreters helps clarify it and, I think, strengthen its appeal.
Murray Rothbard called Mises “an opponent of objective ethics” (ȀȈȆȅ,
p.ȀǿȄ). Ļis charge is scarcely fair. Certainly Mises was not an ethical rel-
ativist or nihilist, scorning all judgments of right and wrong and compla-
cent even when some individuals violate others’ rights in pursuit of nar-
row and short-run self-interest. On the contrary, he was concerned with
whether behavior and precepts and character traits tend to serve or subvert
social cooperation and people’s happiness.
According to Rothbard, Mises made one fundamental value judgment:
He hoped that the bulk of the population would get whatever it wanted
or thought it wanted. But what if the great majority wants to murder red-
heads or wants to see innocent persons suffer for its own amusement? A
utilitarian such as Mises would include such preferences “fully as much as
the most innocuous or altruistic preferences, ... in the quantitative reck-
oning” (ȀȈȆȅ, pp.ȀǿȄ,Ȁǿȇ,Ȁȇȁ,ȁȀǿ,ȁȀȂ). Instead of citing specific state-
ments by Mises, Rothbard criticizes what he supposes Mises, as a utilitar-
ian, must believe.
Murray Rothbard has called Mises “an opponent of objective ethics”
and has even trotted out his own standard remark about possibly murder-
ing all the redheads to gratify a majority. Instead of citing specific state-
ments by Mises, however, Rothbard criticizes what he thinks a utilitarian
must believe. Also, like Karen Vaughn, he criticizes Mises on the grounds
that he could not be trusted to hew to the libertarian line in absolutely all
cases. Actually, it seems backward to criticize ethical systems according
to whether they unswervingly support preconceived policy positions. It
is more sensible to appraise policies according to how they accord with a
well-grounded ethics. (On these criticisms, recall the preceding chapter,
numberȁȄ).