Robert Menzies Quotes
Individual enterprise must drive us forward. That does not mean we are to return to the old and selfish notions of laissez-faire. The functions of the State will be much more than merely keeping the ring within which the competitors will fight. Our social and industrial laws will be increased. There will be more law, not less; more control, not less.
This was his most famous speech.
Robert Menzies, 1894–1978, Prime Minister of Australia (Liberal), Speech, “The Forgotten People,” May 22, 1942
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Mises observes the classic philosophical quandary of business and commerce. If we cannot leave everything to the market place and the capitalists and entrepreneurs because they are morally and ethically fallible, will not the government people who regulate and control them be equally moral and fallible? Mises critics point out that Mises misses the difference in a democracy, that if fallible businessmen err, all can suffer and their personal vested interests do not necessarily coincide with the interests of the majority in general. If the government representative of the majority are fallible and err, the majority can correct them and if the majority does not, the people have undone themselves and have not been the victims of the foibles of a few privileged people in the society. Mises argues that it is the minority who, if left alone, would produce the best standard of living for the majority who should exercise they right to regulation only by their acts as consumers.
To the modern reader utterances such as this from a Conservative Prime Minister seem astounding. However, the Great Depression existed in Canada as well as the United States, and Franklin Delano Roosevelt was not the only world leader who would reach the conclusion that business and capitalism must be profoundly regulated and the system changed if it was to be saved.
Some economic conservatives see little or no role for government. For many of them, in a free market there is no role for government. This quotation, from one of the economic heroes of the conservatives, shows that he not only saw a role for government, but believed that government was essential to the operation of a free market.
TR came from a wealthy, upper class family, and because of his position favoring regulation of corporations he was called a traitor to his class by many.
The prime minister had a political and philosophical position that government should not interfere with or set or control pricing in the economy. However, a scandal broke out involving payday lending—short term lending the working class does to tide them over till pay day if they run out of money. Lenders were charging huge interest rates beyond anything that is conscionable. Cameron’s government placed controls on interest rates and other facets of that industry as they might have lost a vote of confidence in Parliament had they not acted. He was then questioned about the hypocrisy involved in his regulation, and he gave this amazing quotation, which was the classic reason for government price controls on the private sector that had been given by the Labor Party opponents for years. This also distressed extreme conservatives, who argue that market controls are always preferable to government controls.
The President had decided to aggressively push for railroad regulation to end the rate rebate abuses that were used to support the monopolies like Standard Oil. In vintage Roosevelt tactics, he gave his first major speech on the subject in the setting and forum that would be most opposed to it. The Union League Club of Philadelphia in included the wealthiest men in the area where were most opposed to any Federal Regulation of anything. All the major railroad executives and stock owners and traders were also members. The President wanted to persuade the opponents to change their positions, and sometimes he did. He also was driven by his concept of sports and athletics so that the “opposition” should have “fair notice” for the contest ahead.
Sir Robert Gordon Menzies, KT, AK, CH, QC, FAA, FRS, was an Australian politician who twice served as Prime Minister of Australia, in office from 1939 to 1941 and again from 1949 to 1966. He played a central role in the creation of the Liberal Party of Australia, defining its policies and its broad outreach. He is Australia's longest-serving prime minister, serving over 18 years in total.
