I Chose Liberty - Ludwig von Mises Institute

6 I Chose Liberty: Autobiographies of Contemporary Libertarians
real life example made a lasting impression on me. A second event occurred in early 1958
when I was watching The Armstrong Circle Theater on television. This was a live television
broadcast and the subject being debated was the reality of the UFO phenomena. I’d prepared
a report on UFOs in a high school science class so I knew something about the subject.
The government/Air Force position (then and now) was that there was nothing in the nature
of the reports that represented anything extra-ordinary or a threat to national security. The
Air Force mantra was that UFOs were balloons or mirages or hoaxes and that no information
to the contrary was being withheld. Yeah, right.
The “other side” in the debate was represented by Donald E. Keyhoe, who was then
the executive director of the National Investigations Committee on Aerial Phenomenon in
Washington, D.C. Keyhoe, a feisty retired ex-Marine Major, spoke in support of the reality
of the phenomenon and of an Air Force cover-up of inconvenient facts such as 90 degree
turns and evasive action when pursued by our jets. At one point in the program Keyhoe
suddenly broke away from his prepared remarks, looked at the camera and said: “And now
I am going to reveal something that has never been disclosed before . . .” but his microphone
abruptly went dead. The live TV audience saw his lips moving (me included) but his audio
had been terminated by CBS and the U.S. Air Force under prior agreement. I think I
became a radical libertarian at that very moment.
While still in high school I attended one of the Foundation for Economic Education
seminars in Irvington, New York, and still remember Leonard Read lighting his candle in
a dark room. (Later I would become a Trustee of that fine organization.) When I got into
college, a good friend and I formed an Objectivist Study Group and I wrote articles for the
college newspaper on Rand and her ideas. I began to argue with my professors about
monopoly and unemployment and the proper role of government. I was reading Friedman
and Hayek and especially Hazlitt by that time and frequently asking “outrageous” questions
in class. There were never any serious answers, of course, only smirks and ridicule. I would
often make appointments to meet professors after class to pursue issues, but few ever showed.
Indeed, what I remember most about those undergraduate years is the almost complete
“liberty blackout” in economics classes.
None of my economics professors seemed interested in free market theory or were even
aware that there was another viewpoint aside from religious Keynesianism. No reading list
from my undergraduate days EVER had a Friedman or Hayek citation, let alone Mises or
Murray Rothbard. My only brush with classical liberal ideas and libertarianism came in
courses on political philosophy, where we explored the ideas of Aristotle, Hobbes, Locke
and Mill and took seriously the conflict between liberty and power. Graduate school
(1962–1966) was a slightly better intellectual experience. Graduate classes were smaller and
the cadre of students and professors were more committed to serious pursuits. We all hung
out together and constantly debated free market theory, the Great Depression, tax policy,
the history of child labor and, of course, the Viet Nam War.
Joel Dirlam, an iconoclast industrial organization professor at the University of
Connecticut, sparked my early interest in antitrust law, though our policy views could not
have been more different. Dirlam was the first professor to send me off to read “original”
documents and trial record material in order to really understand what went on at court