Declaration of Freedom - Chapter III

Chapter III: The Six Positive Freedoms

Man's capacity for justice makes democracy possible; but

man's inclination to injustice makes democracy necessary.

 - Reinhold Nieburh

Though the positive proposal concerning a way of life, which is presented as a live option for all men, must first be stated in general terms, it is not enough to end there. In order to make really clear the idea of a free society we must go on to list the specific freedoms. Are there a few which tower above others in importance, so that they are worthy of separate presentation? Are there some particular freedoms which, far from being limited to the East or to the West, are universal or nearly universal in their human appeal?

It is generally agreed that there are a few such basic freedoms, but often they are stated in negative form. Can we not go further, therefore, and concentrate in our analysis on those specific freedoms which can be put in positive form? If it is the affirmative answer that we are trying to formulate, we should concern ourselves more with “freedom to” than “freedom from.” Men are made really free, not by escape from restrictions, and certainly not by the avoidance of burdens or responsibilities, but by giving themselves with loyalty and fidelity. The best life for man is the life of integrity, but the only integrated man is the dedicated man. The good life is produced, for the most part, not primarily by what we are, nor even by what we do, but by what we give ourselves to. The man who can resist both threats and bribes as well as the pressures of a totalitarian state is the man whose deepest loyalty is to a moral order which transcends and judges the temporary political and economic orders by which he is surrounded.

The freedoms which can be stated positively as moral imperatives and which are universal or nearly universal in their appeal are sufficiently few that together they constitute a manageable unit. Six of these stand out as necessary elements in any human society that is a truly good society. If the other factors, such as equality and individual dignity, are present, the excellence of a social order may be judged by the degree to which these six freedoms are realized.

The first freedom is the freedom to learn. It may rightly be stated first, because it comes so near to being absolute in its value. All of the other primary freedoms have obvious limits, but there is no obvious limit to the freedom to acquire knowledge. The applications of learning may easily be evil, but it is doubtful if it is ever possible to know too much. In any case it is reasonable to assert, as a self-evident proposition, that all persons, regardless of sex or financial situation, should be free to learn as much as they can profitably assimilate. A person who has the desire and the intellectual capacity to learn astronomy should not only be allowed to  study this science, in the sense that no legal hindrances are put in his way; he should also be provided by the social organization with the facilities without which his study is impossible. In such ways the freedom to learn becomes truly possible and is not merely the negative matter of the elimination of arbitrary barriers.

This conception leads directly to the provision of educational opportunities for all, up to the level of ability. In a truly liberal social order public education would not end at sixteen or at the conclusion of secondary school, but each would be encouraged to go as far as his own ability or enjoyment would determine. Perhaps some ought to stop regular education at fourteen and not be put through the farce of forced attendance in which there is constant and effective resistance to learning, with the consequent habit of laziness and the harmful psychological by-product of continual frustration. Many, on the other hand, might profitably go on with education until the age of thirty or beyond, often in connection with some productive employment.

Since the whole society gains by better achievement on the part of its citizens, the financial responsibility for the advancement of learning ought not to be placed solely upon the individual or his family. The limitation of advanced learning to those in easy financial circumstances is manifestly absurd, because the child of the poor family may be far more able to absorb learning than is the child of the rich family. In the words of a famous university president, we ought to be able to announce, honestly, that no person who is able to profit by a university education will ever be denied it because of his personal lack of funds. This does not mean that education  should be handed to those who do not desire it enough to help themselves as much as is feasible; neither does it mean that all help should be given through the dispensing of tax money. There are many other ways of approaching this ideal, which may be achieved through independent channels quite as well as by government support. Indeed the ideal is more nearly reached by means of the variety which independent foundations provide than it is by monolithic governmental control. We have reason to prefer a system which includes variety to one in which all advanced students are automatically supported by the state as state employees, as is done in Russia.

The reason for the observation just made is that freedom to learn is concerned not merely with the number who learn, but also with the quality and mood of the learning. The most important question in this regard is the question whether the learning is really open and untrammeled. Does the citizen, in his learning, have the privilege of following the evidence wherever it leads, or must he see to it that his conclusions are in line with some preconceived conception of what the truth is? It is intrinsic to the whole democratic faith that all search for knowledge should be absolutely free, limited by nothing except the objective truth as revealed by disciplined experience. The climate of opinion which makes this possible is a rare and wonderful one, but we may be sure that it is the only climate in which true learning can flourish permanently.

The second of the six major freedoms is the freedom to debate. Debate is necessary to mankind if we are ever to get even near the truth on any important question. This is be cause man, though terribly fallible and liable to error, easily forgets his weaknesses in this regard and is tempted to idolize and absolutize his own opinions. Since this temptation is universal, being shared by rulers as well as ruled, all require the checking of opinion which we know as discussion. This is why any government must have a system of checks and balances if it is to avoid tyranny. Discussion is necessary to men, not because they are wise, but because there is no other way in which they may be made aware of their foolishness. Dr. Grayson Kirk, president of Columbia University, noted, in the recent two hundredth anniversary celebration of the famous institution which he serves, that the facilitation of free discussion is one of the chief reasons for the existence of places of higher learning. “We must maintain," he said, “the greatest possible opportunities for the free clash of opinions on all subjects, trusting the innate good judgment of men and women to reach decisions that are beneficial to society.”

Herein lies much of the enduring significance of the classic Socratic dialogue. Socrates established himself as the father of dependable reflection by approaching the truth by means of a system of cross lights. The truth, be believed, is better revealed by a combination of contrasting and mutually checking approaches than by a single frontal attack. This we have applied to many phases of our experience, including government in general and the court procedure in particular. In

general government, this principle has emerged in the idea of the separation of powers, because no men are good enough or wise enough to operate unchecked. All men are open to self-delusion about the righteousness of their own aims and decisions, but wherever those in positions of power are able to employ their power without criticism their self-delusion is intolerable.

In the courts the conception that the truth is better reached through contrasting efforts than by the single approach has led to the general employment of competing legal talent. There is a better chance for the truth about a man's guilt or innocence to be known if two able men are struggling, with all their powers. one to convict and the other to exonerate. The system is, of course, far less efficient than one in which there is no distinction between judge, counsel and jury, but the slower process represents a realistic estimate of both the powers and dangers of the human mind.

No society is a true democracy unless the freedom to debate is shared by all the citizens. Those who make and administer the laws might find their work far easier if they could proceed with their decisions unchallenged, but in the long run we should pay a heavier price for the denial of debate than we pay for its permission. The exciting idea is that the humblest citizen is permitted to issue a challenge to those in places of leadership. The person who feels that an investigating committee has treated him unfairly can appeal to the public in airing his grievance. Thus the right to debate includes the right to complain. Not only can fellow legislators ask embarrassing questions in Parliament; not only can the ladies and gentlemen of the press make pointed inquiries in the President's press conference; the ordinary citizen may share in the debate by making a speech if he can get anyone to listen or by writing a letter to the newspaper. If the editor will not print his letter, the citizen is free to start his own newspaper or to organize his own society for the promotion of the idea for which he feels a burning personal concern.

This is one of the points at which the practical contrast between life on the two sides of the iron curtain is clearly marked. In the U.S.S.R. freedom of speech and press are allowed, but allowed with one highly significant exception: they are not allowed to those who, in any serious way, oppose the regime. So eminent a spokesman as the late Andrei Vishinsky has said that “freedom of speech, of the press . . . are the property of all the citizens in the U.S.S.R., fully guaranteed by the State upon the sole condition that they be utilized in accord with the interests of the toilers, and to the end of strengthening the socialist social order." In short, the editor can print anything he likes so long as it is favorable.

It is hard to overestimate the beneficent part played by a truly free and responsible press, as free to say “No" as to say "Yes.” A newspaper like The New York Times, which is absolutely unfettered, which is in no sense an arm of the government, which seeks to present the news objectively while using its editorial page to analyze, to criticize and to support, is really priceless. Without such organs the practice of a free society would be greatly hampered. Jefferson believed this so much that he suggested, with jocularity, that if he had to choose between a society with a good government and a society with a good press, he would choose the latter.

Critics of democracy are always shocked by what seems the babel of voices, but this is a price which free men gladly pay. The scene of freedom may seem superficially unlovely and confusing and a free society is certainly slow in making decisions, but wise men do not complain when they realize how much worse the alternative is. It is easy to criticize a democracy on the ground that its foreign policy may be stated in conflicting terms by prominent individuals, but the criticism is nearly always inept. Of course Mr. Clement Attlee and Sir Anthony Eden take different positions on Britain's foreign policy, the leader of the opposition having been given abundant opportunity to express his divergent views, on his return from his visit to China in 1954, but this is an evidence of Britain's strength rather than of her weakness. Such divergence does not mark the regime which . Mr. Attlee visited.

Freedom of debate is very precious, but it always degenerates unless it is balanced by regard for the reputations of others. The very freedom to attack a man's opinions or to expose his corruption involves the responsibility to be extremely careful with the truth. It is right that we have laws of libel and slander. A truly democratic man will never make derogatory statements without the willingness to pay the penalty if he is proved wrong. Whenever official immunity is an escape from responsibility for cowardly attacks on the reputation of others, it is inconsistent with the democratic ideal. Persons in a democracy need to remind themselves of the disciplines of liberty so that sometimes, for the sake of unity in a time of danger, the various individuals curb some of their exuberance and restrain themselves from the kind of criticism that is irresponsible or cruel. It is better for those in a democracy, who value freedom, to curb themselves in the practice of that freedom, before the abuse of the freedom leads to the destruction of the very freedom so highly valued.

The third of the six positive freedom is the freedom to worship. This seems like a simple thing, so simple indeed that it is hard to understand why this freedom has not been universally encouraged. What harm can come in permitting each group to worship God in that manner which seems to them most decent and proper? This, we tend to assume, could not possibly interfere with government or business or education or the social order.

In actual practice, however, this assumption about the harmlessness of religion is far from correct. In all religion that is vital, and especially in that which takes its rise from the prophetic religion of Israel, the religious experience impinges on all other parts of living. Worship is not a compartmentalized undertaking; it is something which affects the ways men earn, the ways they govern, the ways they marry, the ways they play, and not merely the ways they pray. Despotic governments are seldom willing to bear the challenge which a vital religion provides and they are especially unwilling to permit the division of loyalties entailed in the recognition that there are things which belong to God just as there are things which belong to Caesar. It is worth while to remember that Hitler encountered some of his worst opposition from men who had the courage to say, “God is my Fuhrer.”

Most of the countries, both East and West, which have totalitarian governments, announce a policy of religious freedom, but this freedom turns out in some instances to be spurious, because it refers only to ceremonial acts or beliefs and not to the religion which penetrates all of life. The important questions to ask are: Is there freedom of instruction, especially of the Youth? Can public meetings be freely advertised? Is there full freedom to propagate the faith? Above all, are religious bodies free to challenge and to criticize those in power, whether civil or ecclesiastical?

So important has religious freedom in all its aspects seemed in the United States, that the guarantee of it is made the first part of the First Amendment to the Constitution. “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.” In short, it was early recognized by the state that the claims of the state on the citizen are not total claims. It was a way of saying explicitly that the society envisaged was not totalitarian. In the developing pattern of free societies there has been general agreement with john Calvin when he pointed out that “man is under two kinds of government—one spiritual, by which the conscience is formed to piety and the service of God; the other political, by which a man is instructed in the duties of humanity and civility.”

At the beginning of the Russian Revolution the official communist policy, far from being one of religious liberty, was one which engaged in strong antireligious propaganda, many church buildings being turned into centers of atheistical indoctrination. During World War II, however, the governmental antagonism to religion was supplanted by a tolerant attitude, partly, it would appear, in an effort to appease antagonistic public opinion among the citizens of the Westem Alliance. The tolerant attitude of the nineteen forties was made possible by the fact that the attack on religion had, by then, apparently succeeded. It is easy to be tolerant of a movement which is devoid of all vitality. Visitors to Russia in those days reported that a good many people attended public worship, but that nearly all of the attenders were older people; the party line had won the adherence of nearly all of the youth.

Now a change has come in Russia, with a reactivation of the antireligious crusade similar to that which marked the early days of the Revolution. This new drive, especially in the effort to show that all religion is incompatible with science, constitutes a vivid revelation of what is now occurring. Young people are again seeking baptism, young couples are asking that their children be christened, and attendance at public worship, both in the Orthodox Church and in the minority groups, such as the Baptists, has increased. The Baptist meeting house in Moscow often has more than two thousand persons at its Wednesday night prayer meeting. Membership in this group is made difficult and is limited to those who can give convincing evidence of their full commitment. This, of course, is the kind of religious vitality which any totalitarian system fears and is justified in fearing. The accentuation of such a movement suggests one of the best hopes for an ultimate change in the world situation.

In Communist China the constitution makes a great point of religious freedom. A contemporary Chinese Christian writes, “Our freedom of religious belief was guaranteed in the Common Platform, and the Government has made every effort to preserve this freedom.” We have only to check such a statement with the evidence assembled in such a book as “Now I Can Tell”, by  K. Y. Huang, to realize how hollow the claim is. How, then, can it be made? Only by the restriction of religion to the area of the purely ceremonial, where it is considered harmless.

We need to recognize that the full religious freedom, which Jefferson called the "fair experiment," is a bold affair. Those who uphold it are ready to tolerate the prophet as well as the priest. The degree to which this was possible was one of the most remarkable features of the life of the ancient Hebrew people, a feature which places them near the fountainhead of the stream of freedom. When David could accept the direct rebuke of Nathan, or Ahab the direct rebuke of Elijah, something of tremendous importance was coming to pass in human history.

The most difficult problem associated with religious liberty arises in the effort to distinguish between harmful fanaticism, which may be religiously based, and the beneficent dissent of a religious minority which keeps alive a moral sensitivity which the entire nation needs. Though there is no perfect known rule by which this distinction can be made, and though there are obviously antisocial acts against which the state must use restraint, the general line of development is indicated by the growing tendency to respect the consciences of the courageous dissenters. The test case is that of conscientious objection to participation in war. This poses a particularly difficult problem because, on the one hand, a nation ought to value those who are sensitive enough to see the evil of war and brave enough to go against public opinion in rejecting any part in it, but, on the other hand. all defenders are needed when the very endurance of the whole society seems to be endangered by actual or potential attack. It is one of the more notable achievements of the advanced democracies that they have been increasingly generous toward those who refuse to kill and who refuse on purely religious or conscientious grounds. One of the finest aspects of England's finest hour is that conscientious objectors were, on the whole, generously handled in that dangerous period. A society which bothers with such matters in a time of peril is worth preserving.

The fourth of the six primary freedoms is freedom to work. Because work is the chief way in which we make a difference in the course of events, a man's toil is one of the most important things about his total life and character. Ordinarily, when we ask what a person is, we mean, "What work does he do?” Thus a man's work becomes part of his personality. The medical man is a doctor whether he is on duty or off duty, and the same holds for many other occupations. When a person decides how he is to use his life, his decision is full of dramatic significance. Apart from marriage, it is likely to be the most important decision he ever makes. Our toil is all that we have to give, for all else is given us. It is by work that we leave the world different from what it would have been without us.

Since work is thus so important, both to the individual and to society, it is integral to the idea of a free society that citizens should be allowed to choose the work they are to do. But freedom to work necessarily includes freedom not to work, and the freedom not to work is meaningless unless it can be done by a group in concerted action. Therefore, a society which eliminates the freedom to strike is not a truly free society. It is significant that strikes are not permitted to occur in communist countries.

It may be freely admitted that we often pay a great price for this fourth freedom. There are times when the efficiency of production would be much greater if the freedom to strike or to quit were curtailed, but it ought to be said here, as was said in connection with the freedom to debate, that the price is paid most willingly. The personal gains which come from freedom of personal movement are sufficient to offset the occasional disadvantages which are entailed.

In this particular freedom, as in most of the others, there are obvious limitations. We deny such freedom to malefactors who are sentenced to imprisonment with labor. The logic of this is that these persons have, by their own volition, contracted out of the society and its safeguards. Their condition in prison is not tantamount to slavery, because the crime that is being punished was committed as a voluntary and deliberate act. But they are imprisoned in a free society only for moral crimes and never for mere dissent. Though it is generally recognized in a free society that it is ignoble to quit work in the face of great human need, the chief restraints are moral ones. Dependence must be placed upon the inner restraint of the workers themselves, in the conviction that they can usually be trusted. We must not interpret freedom of action in such a way as to be unmindful of the general good. Great moral strength is therefore needed to prevent an undoubted good from becoming a serious evil, and when this moral strength is lacking the free society collapses.

Freedom to work is meaningless unless it includes the fruits of work, such as earning and saving. It is a good thing to encourage better work by the incentive of profit, either in wages or in some other way, because the total welfare of the society depends, in part, upon the production of more goods and services. But the incentive loses all of its power if men are not allowed to keep what they sacrifice to save, and to engage in risk in the hope of honest gain. To say that the motive of profit is a very important motive is not to say that it is the only one that is effective. As a free society advances, the motive of honest service becomes very powerful and is a

significant factor in all good government. Fortunately, the two motives are not necessarily incompatible and the best society is one in which men's work is good because both motives are allowed to operate in conjunction.

The fifth of the primary freedoms is the freedom to live. Because many calamities occur, both in individual and in family life, against which adequate individual provision cannot be made, the members of the truly free society will have help in protecting themselves against such calamities. The citizen is entitled to know that, if his own health should fail, his little children will not thereby be rendered destitute and helpless. He has a right to know that, if some heavy misfortune should befall him, he will not be allowed to starve. In short, a truly free society can never be a Iaissez-faire arrangement in which the weak inevitably suffer, but rather one in which the citizens recognize the degree to which they are members one of another. Freedom must never be so interpreted that it is the freedom of tooth and claw in which only the strongest survive. The strong man must have the freedom to succeed if he can, but, at the same time, the weak and the unfortunate must have the freedom to survive. The strong must frequently bear the burdens of the weak.

There are obvious dangers in what is called a welfare state, the chief of these being that people who are secure often become supine and relatively unproductive, but we must run some slight risk in this direction if we are to keep the tenderness toward persons which the good life requires. There may be some argument about what ought to be done for the lazy man, but there cannot be any serious argument about what ought to be done for his children. They. in any case, are innocent of his sins, and ought not to suffer hardship because of the shiftlessness of their parent. The free society will avoid coddling the lazy, but it will seek at the same time. to take fear of absolute destitution out of every heart. The good life advances when the people in a society are free from the haunting fears and anxieties of catastrophic changes in their lives. The encouragement of group insurance and the widening of social security are, therefore. not at variance with the idea of a free society, but essential to it, if the freedom to live is one of the primary freedoms. The task is to give full scope to this freedom without, at the same time, losing the freedom of enterprise and initiative. But this. as in the other situations already reviewed, comes best by deliberate moral development rather than by legal restraint. Neither this nor any other system is foolproof. It is part of the idea of a free society that it never, at any point, releases the individual from the necessity of moral effort.

The sixth of the primary freedoms is the freedom to serve. In a totalitarian regime more and more of the needs of men and women are taken over by the central authority, so that little scope is left for volunteer effort, but by this means one of the fairest aspects of man’s effort to be civilized is spoiled. Man deserves to be free to organize for economic and social ends and to engage in volunteer service projects without being told that these are the vested interest of some official body. We ought to be free to give our services, to engage in voluntary philanthropy, to start new enterprises. If all service is performed by a tax-supported bureaucracy, something fine is spoiled.

Few features of a free society are more revealing than that according to which great industries, organized for profit, give away immense sums in order to maintain colleges and universities and learned societies. The cynical may try to explain this by reference to tax deductions, but this is not sufficient to explain all of the giving. Moreover, the cynic is adequately answered by pointing out the really surprising fact that a powerful government is willing to encourage private giving by allowing tax deductions for such purposes. But why do so many give when they are not forced to do so? Some of it, of course, is due to social pressure, but far more of it comes because freedom, when combined with its moral disciplines, actually tends to create a keen sense of social responsibility.

Though we do not normally consider it, because it is so common, volunteer service is one of the most remarkable aspects of an unregimented social order. When we think of the millions given freely for research, for higher education, for hospitals, for Christian Associations, for churches, for Scouts and a thousand other objects of generosity, the total is really staggering. There is a tendency, even in the Western democracies, for these matters to become professionalized, so that the ordinary lay individual loses his initiative, but this totalitarian tendency must be resisted at all costs. In the freedom to serve we have something truly precious and it must be guarded jealously.

There may be other positive freedoms in addition to these six, but if so, we do not know what they are. Perhaps they will emerge in the course of the fair experiment. The chance that they will emerge, so that we come to value freedoms which are not now understood, is very great, because a free society is inevitably a growing one. There is undoubtedly new light to break forth, but it is only in a free society that this light is likely to be recognized. Much of the strength of a free society lies in its flexibility, its growth, its constant adaptation to new situations, its ability to recognize evils and to take steps to overcome them. The positive proposal in which the six basic freedoms are such important elements is not that of a fixed society. We do not know the long future, but the immediate lines of advance are fortunately clear.