Is Philosophical Anarchism Reviving?

Oscar B. Johannsen

[Reprinted from The Gargoyle, April 1978]

As government grows in power, Newton's Third Law: "To each and every action there is an equal and opposite reaction" appears to apply not only in the realm of physics but in the arena of social science for an increasing horde of organizations and individuals are joining in a chorus denouncing this proliferation of statist authoritarianism.

In particular, among the young has arisen an articulate intellectual group which goes under the heading of Libertarians. In large measure they have adopted the economic principles of the Austrian School, but so distrustful are they of the State that the difference between their views and those of the philosophical anarchists is probably paper-thin.

Possibly some of them would classify themselves as individual anarchists but as the term "anarchism" has acquired such a perjorative sense, few do so.

Regardless of what they call themselves if the libertarians continue to gain in strength, inevitably, whether they like it or not, they will be compared with the 19th century anarchists.

Georgists should have some understanding and knowledge of the 19th century anarchists for Henry George lived in that century, and when PROGRESS AND POVERTY appeared, it drew upon itself not only attacks by the establishment but by anarchists.

Possibly the most famous of the European anarchists who stressed individualism was Max Stirner. His "Der Einzige and sein Eigentum" (The Ego and His Own) constitutes one of the most trenchant attacks on authoritarianism while at the same time stressing the uniqueness of the individual. Recognizing the futility of violence, he urged personal legation of the State. Violence he knew would merely result in establishing a new state.

In America, according to James J. Martin in his work "Men Against the State", during the period of 1825-1925 about fifty individual anarchists had published anarchistic writings. Those best known were probably Josiah Warren, Lysander Spooner, William B. Greene and Benjamin R. Tucker, and no doubt their names will crop up again in the literature as men cast wary eyes on the alarming growth of statism. Many of these men had weird ' ideas on money and what should be done about it. Economics does not seem to have Been their strong point, but rather moral and ethical fervor.

Of particular interest to Georgists was Joshua K. Ingalls, Martin states that Ingalls attacked Henry George's ideas in many articles, and especially in his book "Social Wealth".

In his view, the single tax would make the people merely tenants of the State. It would not protect them from state power. Thru leaseholds, a group of super-taxpayers might be created who could shift the burden on to others until the eventual payments of the tax would be made by the lowest economic unit. He was especially opposed to the utilization of taxation to right wrongs, for it tended to obscure the injustices which the taxation was supposed to rectify.

His understanding of economics must have been quite limited for he said that rent was something political and not economic. Russia has learned the hard way that rent exists even tho they don't like it. They found that rent is a measure of opportunity and unless collected, inures to the benefit of those using the land. In addition, if rent is ignored, inefficient utilization of land ensues.

Ingalls also argued that interest and profits were more exploitive than rent. This is a clear indication of his lack of understanding of the role of interest and profits.

One thing he did recognize was that social reformers suffered from an infatuation for passing laws prohibiting some evil. He insisted that social and economic problems would be solved quite readily by the repeal of laws rather than enacting more of them. His solution to the land problem was to let the present title holders keep the land until their deaths. Then their titles to land would be given on the basis of occupancy and use. It was due to Ingalls that the concept of occupation-and-use tenure of land became one of the tenets of anarchist thought.

According to the dictionary, anarchism is "the theory that formal government of any kind is unnecessary and wrong in principle".

The principal problem which anarchists are up against is how would they divide up the land without some formal organization and do it justly. As land differs in productivity some kind of organization must be set up so that those who are allocated the better land pay to the others for the greater opportunities they have, since all men are equally entitled to access to the land.

Interestingly, Ingalls looked with skepticism upon the anti-slavery movement not that he favored slavery.

Far from it. It was merely that he recognized that setting a man free without permitting him to have access to land made a mockery of freedom.

After the Civil War, he looked askance at the Homestead Act as political trickery. He noted that enough land had been given to railroads by the politicians to have furnished a £arm of 25 acres to every family. To him it was plain that the private monopolization of land had displaced slavery as the means to garner the wealth produced by others.

Although Ingalls views on economic principles were not the soundest, he did display the true aspect of a scientist. He never engaged in personal attacks. To him, the institutions mar erected had to be attacked, not individuals. Too many, annoyed by injustice attack individuals who they believe are responsible, when the fact is that if an institution is at fault, the removal of the despised individual would merely result in others taking their places. By and large, most people are decent individuals. Under the institutional conditions in which they find themselves, they act as they believe they should.

While individual anarchism lost much of its vitality in the early part of the 20th Century, it appears that it may be having a revival. The statists have made such a mess of things, it would appear that some attention should be given to the philosophical anarchists to see which of their ideas have merit. Anarchism is nothing new. In Ancient Greece, Zeno the founder of the Stoic philosophy, repudiated the state of Plato and argued for the reign of individualistic moral law. Certainly, over two thousand years, some of the ideas and principles discovered by anarchists must have some value to society. The sooner we understand them, possibly the better for all of us.