Frenzied Liberty; The Myth of "A Rich Man's War"

by Otto H. Kahn

Much is being said about the plausible sounding contention that because a portion of the young manhood of the Nation has been conscripted, therefore money also must be conscripted. Why, that is the very thing the Government has been doing. It has conscripted a portion, a relatively small portion, of the men of the Nation. It has conscripted a portion, a large portion, of the incomes of the Nation. If it went too far in conscripting men, the country would be crippled. If it went too far in conscripting incomes and earnings, the country would likewise be crippled.

Those who would go further and conscript not only incomes but capital, I would ask to answer the riddle not only in what equitable and practicable manner they would do it,[^[1]] but what the Nation would gain by it?

Only a trifling fraction of a man’s property is held in cash. If they conscript a certain percentage of his possessions in stocks and bonds, what would the Government do with them?

Keep them? That would not answer its purpose, because the Government wants cash, not securities.

Sell them? Who is to buy them when everyone’s funds would be depleted?

If they conscript a certain percentage of a man’s real estate or mine or farm or factory, how is that to be expressed and converted into cash?

Are conscripted assets to be used as a basis for the issue of Federal Reserve Bank Notes? That would mean gross inflation with all its attendant evils, dangers and deceptions.

Would they repudiate a percentage of the National debt? Repudiation is no less dishonorable in a people than in an individual, and the penalty for failure to respect the sanctity of obligations is no different for a nation than for an individual.

The fact is that the Government would gain nothing in the process of capital conscription and the country would be thrown into chaos for the time being. The man who has saved would be penalized, he who has wasted would be favored. Thrift and constructive effort, resulting in the needful and fructifying accumulation of capital would be arrested and lastingly discouraged.

I can understand the crude notion of the man who would divide all possessions equally. There would be mighty little coming to anyone by such distribution and it is, of course, an utterly impossible thing to do, but it is an understandable notion. But by the confiscation of capital for Government use neither the Government nor any individual would be benefited.