Mencken on Government

Mencken on Government

Thomas Allen

    In 1926, H. L. Mencken (1880-1956) wrote Notes on Democracy in which he expressed his views on democracy and related issues. He was a journalist, satirist, and critic and a libertarian and one of the leaders of the Old Right. In his book, he describes government, pages 126-128 and 130-131. Below is an overview of his discussion on government; my comments are in brackets.
    Mencken notes, “All government, whatever its form, is carried on chiefly by men whose first concern is for their offices, not for their obligations.” Government is essentially “a conspiracy of a small group against the masses of men, and especially against the masses of diligent and useful men. Its primary aim is to keep this group in jobs that are measurably more comfortable and exhilarating than the jobs its members could get in free competition.” To accomplish this goal, political leaders are “always willing to make certain sacrifices of integrity and self-respect in order to hold these jobs, and the fact is just as plain under a despot as it is under the mob.” [Mencken gives a good argument for term limitation and for limiting the number of years anyone can be employed by the government in the civil service, armed forces, and appointed positions.]
    As the “mob has its flatterers and bosh-mongers; the king has his courtiers.” However, the two have an important difference. “The courtier, at his worst, at least performs his genuflections before one who is theoretically his superior, and is surely not less than his equal. He does not have to abase himself before swine, with whom, ordinarily, he would disdain to have any traffic. He is not compelled to pretend that he is a worse man than he really is. He needn’t hold his nose in order to approach his benefactor. Thus he may go into office without having dealt his honour a fatal wound, and once he is in, he is under no pressure to sacrifice it further, and may nurse it back to health and vigour.” Moreover, "[h]is sovereign, at worst, has a certain respect for it, and hesitates to strain it unduly.” Furthermore, “[t]he courtier’s sovereign . . . is apt to be a man of honour himself.”
    On the other hand, “the mob has no sensitiveness [for honor] . . . and, indeed, no knowledge that it exists. . . . To the democrats of the world this attitude was puzzling, and on reflection it began to seem contemptible and offensive.” (“Once Frederick the Great was asked why he gave commissions in his army only to Junker. Because, he answered, they will not lie and they cannot be bought. That answer explains sufficiently the general democratic theory that the Junker are not only scoundrels but also half-wits.”)
    Mencken summaries the difference between feudalism and democracy. “[T]he  the essential objection to democracy is that, with few exceptions, it imposes degrading acts and attitudes upon the men responsible for the welfare and dignity of the state. The former was compelled to do homage to his suzerain, who was very apt to be a brute and an ignoramus. The latter are compelled to do homage to their constituents, who in overwhelming majority are certain to be both.”
    [Throughout his book, Mencken blames most of America’s problems on demagogues and the mob that they manipulate. Although he occasionally looks behind the demagogues, he seldom goes further than a glance. If he were to remove a few layers, he would find what he seems to consider the betters and superiors manipulating from behind the scene their puppets like Roosevelt, Wilson, Harding, and Coolidge — all of whom Mencken considers to be men of the mob. These betters or superiors are the plutocrats and intellectuals, people of high intelligence, most of whom would have been aristocrats, Catholic clergymen, and international merchants of the olden days. {Later in his book, he does go to the heart and identifies the real power behind the government.}]

Copyright © 2017 by Thomas Coley Allen.

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Explanations of the Trinity

Explanations of the Trinity

Thomas Allen

    Explanations of Trinitarians of the Trinity as expressed by the Athanasian Creed (“So the Father is God, the Son is God, and the Holy Spirit is God; And yet they are not three Gods, but one God.”) fall into one of four categories: subordinationist, modal, distinctionist, and real. These four are described below.
    Before describing them, two other groups of Trinitarians should be mentioned: acceptors and clueless. Acceptors accept, or profess to accept, the Trinity Doctrine with all its paradoxes and absurdities without any attempt to modify, explain, or understand it. The clueless have no real clue about what the Trinity Doctrine is. For the most part, they believe that by believing in the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, they are believing in the Trinity Doctrine — not realizing that the Trinity Doctrine is much more. (Most Unitarians and Monotheistic Christians believe in a trinity of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, but they reject the Trinity Doctrine.) Acceptors and the clueless account for most Trinitarians.
    1. Subordinationist Trinitarians. Some Trinitarians consider that the Father alone is underived and that the Son and the Holy Spirit derive their existence from him. Thus, they are subordinate to the Father. Still, they possess all the same divine attributes that the Father possesses. In nature and every essential perfection, the Father and the Son are equal. However, because the Son came from the Father, the Father is greater than the Son. This explanation attempts to preserve the divine unity while simultaneously presenting the Son as a real person who is distinct from the Father and is equally God with all divine perfections. The only difference is that the perfections of the Son are derived from the Father, whose perfections are underived. Likewise, the same is true of the Holy Spirit. Subordinationist Trinitarians who maintain the supremacy of the Father and subordination of the Son and the Holy Spirits fall into at least two difficulties. If they really affirm the distinction, they maintain an untenable form of Unitarianism. On the other hand, by claiming the subordination of the Son and the Holy Spirit, while declaring them properly God, they encounter new difficulties if they seek to retain the common doctrine of the Trinity. The subordinationists’ concept of the Trinity is similar to that of the pre-Nicene Fathers and essentially that held by the Nicene Fathers. Although this concept was once orthodox, it is now heterodox.
    2. Modal Trinitarians. One group of Trinitarians understands the word “person” in the sense of its Latin translation persona, which translates into English as, “character” or “roll.” (The Greek translation of “person” in the Trinity Doctrine is hypostasis, which means “independent existence.”) According to the modal explanation, the three persons of the Godhead are three different characters. In relation to man, these three persons denote three relationships: Creator (the Father), the Redeemer (the Son), and the Sacrificer (the Holy Spirit). These three persons may also be conceived as three attributes of God: his goodness, wisdom, and power. Basically, the modal Trinitarian explanation of the Trinity is Unitarian. This explanation is similar to that of the Sabellians, who were denounced as heretics. Needless to say, this explanation of the Trinity is unorthodox and heretical. However, it is similar to the Augustinian Trinitarianism, which is Modal Trinitarianism in disguise and upon which the Athanasian Creed is based.
    3. Distinctionist Trinitarians. Another group of Trinitarians asserts that the word “person” should not be understood in the normal sense. It should be understood to mean three real distinctions in the Godhead. However, when explaining the Trinity, these Trinitarians resort back to using “person” in its proper sense. The three of the Trinity are ascribed personal attributes. Each has personal relations distinctly to himself and performs personal actions distinct from the others. For example, the Father sends the Son into the world. The Son makes the atonement for the sins of man while the Father receives the atonement. Moreover, the Son was the Logos who was with God; the Father was not. Likewise, the Son, not the Father, is the firstborn of every creation and the image of God. Furthermore, the Holy Spirt is the “Comforter” sent to the Apostles, and not the Father or the Son. Thus, in spite of their claims to the contrary, distinctionist Trinitarians, in essence, maintain that there are three divine persons, in the proper sense of the word, who are distinguished from each other. By denying that the Godhead consists of three persons, they, in effect, maintain there is one person. This one person consists of three distinctions in the divine nature, i.e., the nature of one person. Thus, distinctionist Trinitarians have one person who is God with three attributes or properties called distinctions. Therefore, distinctionist Trinitarians are modal Trinitarians in their statement of doctrine, but are real Trinitarians in their belief. In summary, they maintain three distinctions and deny three persons. Then, they reason and write as though the three persons are not three distinctions, but are really three distinct persons in the proper sense of the word. This explanation of the Trinity attempts to rescue the Trinity Doctrine from absurdities if the language used to express it is understood in their commonly accepted use. In their attempt to avoid the untenable doctrine of the Trinity, distinctionist Trinitarians create new difficulties.
    4. Real Trinitarians. Real Trinitarians readily admit the existence of three equal divine minds and consequently three Gods. All the unity of God is that the three Deities are in-separately conjoined with a mutual consciousness. The Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are really distinct persons as are Matthew, Mark, and Luke. Thus, the three divine persons of the Godhead are really distinct beings. Real Trinitarians are the most orthodox Trinitarians and, therefore, the most orthodox Christians. However, they must avoid becoming too orthodox, for then they become tritheists.
    When real Trinitarians attempt to explain the new math of three equals one of the Trinity Doctrine, they are at high risk of crashing into the Scylla of Sabellianism or of being swept away in the Charybdis of tritheism. To keep from crashing into the rock of Sabellianism or being swept away in the whirlpool of tritheism, most obfuscate by using vague, paradoxical, incomprehensible, irrational language — just as in the Trinity Doctrine. (If the Trinity Doctrine were clear, rational, and understandable, it would need little explanation.) To avoid heresy, many Trinitarians take the coward’s way out by refusing to explain the Trinity Doctrine and claim that it is a mystery beyond comprehension, which is a strange response to a manmade doctrine. They just assert that three equals one just as the Athanasian Creed does. In essence, real Trinitarians maintain the unity of God only by declaring that the three Gods of the Godhead are inseparable and most intimately united.
    As Bishop Beverage, a Trinitarian, explains the Trinity Doctrine; it is extremely sensitive to words and phrases and their order. What a normal person considers a different way of saying the same thing converts orthodoxy to heresy. He writes:

We are to consider the order of those persons in the Trinity described in the words before us, Matt, xxviii. 19. First, the Father, and then the Son, and then the Holy Ghost; every one of which is really and truly Gcd. A mystery which we are all bound to believe, but yet must have a great care how we speak of it, it being both easy and dangerous to mistake, in expressing so great a truth as this is. If we think of it, how hard it is to imagine one numerically divine nature in more than one and the same divine person? Or, three divine persons in no more than one and the same divine nature? If we speak of it, how hard it is to find out words to express it? If I say, the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost be three, and every one distinctly God, it is true; but if I say, they be three, every one a distinct God, it is false. I may say, God the Father is one God, and the Son is one God, and the Holy Ghost is one God, but I cannot say, that the Father is one God, and the Son is another God, and the Holy Ghost a third God. I may say, the Father begat another who is God; yet I cannot say that he begat another God. And from the Father and the Son proceedeth another who is God; yet I cannot say, from the Father and the Son proceedeth another God. For all this while, though their nature be the same their persons are distinct; and though their persons be distinct, yet still their nature is the same. So that, though the Father, be the first person in the Godhead, the Son the second, the Holy Ghost the third, yet the Father is not the first, the Son a second, and the Holy Ghost a third God. So hard a thing is it to word so great a mystery aright; or to fit so high a truth with expression! suitable and proper to it, without going one way or another from it (Bishop Beverage’s Private Thought, Part II, p. 48-49).

Explaining a manmade doctrine can be amazingly difficult. Knowing the stupidity of mankind, God would not have authored such a convoluted doctrine; He keeps His doctrines simple so that common people without doctoral degrees in theology can understand them and that are common sense.
    The following illustrates the problem with the Trinity Doctrine. Ask the typical Christian if there is only one God, he will answer “yes.” If he is asked if Jesus Christ is God, he will answer “yes.” If he is asked if the Heavenly Father is God, he will answer “yes.” Then if he is asked if Jesus Christ is the Heavenly Father, he will answer “no.” Thus, he has identified two Gods: Jesus Christ and the Heavenly Father. Yet, he claims that there is only one God. Consequently, while believing in one God, the typical Christian also believes in two Gods. Such are the confusion, conflict, illogic, absurdity, and incomprehensibleness of the Trinity Doctrine.
    Another illustration of the absurdity and illogic of the Trinity Doctrine is the favor Trinity proof verse: John 1:1. John 1:1 reads, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” Most Christians identify “the Word” with God the Son and “God” with God the Father. If “Son” is substituted for “Word” and “Father” for “God,” John 1:1 reads, “In the beginning was the Son, and the Son was with the Father, and the Son was the Father.” Thus, the Son is the Father. Only the Trinity Doctrine can make a son be his own father.  (Even Unitarians who believe in a preexisting Son and identify the Son with the Word come to the same conclusion.)
    (Here are a few comments on the Holy Spirit, who is usually treated like the proverbial redheaded stepchild. How often should one pray to the Holy Spirit? [I have never heard anyone pray to him.] After all, he is one of the coequal Gods of the Godhead, the third Person of the Trinity, and, therefore, should be worthy of as much attention as God the Father and God the Son. Why does not the Holy Spirit have a throne in heaven? Moreover, why is he not even mentioned in the book that has the most words describing heaven: namely, Revelations? Poor old Holy Spirit, even the Bible neglects him and treats him like an afterthought.)

Copyright © 2018 by Thomas Coley Allen.

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The Genocidal War Against the White Race

The Genocidal War Against the White Race

Thomas Allen

    A genocidal war is being waged in America today, and it is not against the Black race. It is against the White race. This genocidal war is being waged in Europe and other countries founded and built by the White race. (It has been nearly won in South Africa.)
    The intellectuals of academia, who ironically are mostly White, are the architects of the genocide of the White race. Their preaching of the goddess Equality demands the death of the White race: All that is White must be destroyed. They are guided by envy, an insatiable lust for equality (well not exactly — they are to be the masters and all others are to be slaves, a millennium ruled by intellectuals instead of Jesus to correct the errors of mankind), and apparently self-hatred (victims of their own propaganda?).
    These intellectuals have built a system in America based on the premise of equality: All humans are equal; there are no racial differences beyond skin color (even differences in skin color would be denied if they were not so obvious). Being mostly White, these intellectuals have concluded that Whites are intellectually superior to other races. Their conclusion is not ill-founded, for studies, many of which they have suppressed, support their conclusion. To serve their goddess Equality, they must remove the source of inequality by eradicating the White race. They must destroy the White race even if they must destroy themselves. (This suicidal urge is hard to understand because most of these intellectuals are White males. However, then habitual sin leads to self-destruction.)
    The intellectual supremacy of the White race has led it to acquire a larger share of the wealth, which is an affront to the goddess Equality. The coercive power of government can only go so far in redistributing wealth. There is no guarantee that its redistribution will not later be undone. To ensure the permanence of the redistribution, the superior race must be eliminated. The White race must go. (These intellects delude themselves with their own intelligence. Every race has great variation of intellect, talents, and abilities. Wealth has to continuously be redistributed to prevent some from having noticeably more wealth than others.)
    To achieve equality among humans, the White race must be destroyed. Many tactics have been employed to achieve this objective. Two fratricidal wars have been fought in Europe during the twentieth century. These wars killed tens of millions of White men in the prime of life. In the second war, tens of millions of White women and children were also killed. Billions of dollars in wealth were wasted and destroyed, thus, hastening the day when White civilization would be reduced to third-world poverty.
    During recent decades, the war has taken on a more subtle tone. The “divide and conquer” tactic has been used with a great degree of success. White women have been pitted against White men. Woman is no longer man’s complement. She is now his competitor.
    Numerous laws have been enacted to destroy the family and to inject women into the workplace. Various welfare programs make fathers superfluous and destroy their need and responsibility. Public education relieves parents of the responsibility of training and teaching their children. Equal employment opportunity and affirmative action laws force discrimination against White males. Ever increasing taxes force White women into the workplace if the family is to maintain a reasonably decent standard of living. These and other laws are attempting to eradicate the White race by belittling and reducing to insignificance the White male.
    Other weapons include integration and immigration. Integration is used to break down inhibitions against the sin of miscegenation. The White race can be destroyed by breeding it out of existence through interracial marriages. To provide breeding stock for this objective, immigration laws have been revised to favor the immigration of non-Whites. Because nearly all illegal immigrants are non-White (Blacks from the West Indies, mestizos from Mexico, and East Asians) little effort has been expended to thwart the flow. To the contrary, the United States government acts to encourage illegal immigration by requiring American taxpayers to support them.
    University professors, who are mostly White males, habitually condemn White males. They accuse them of being the scourge of the Earth, the source of racism (the greatest sin known to these intellectuals), and the root of all evil. White males, i.e., the White race, for without White males the White race is impossible, is a virus that must be eradicated if the world is to be saved.
    White males have been delegitimized and dehumanized to the point where many feel the necessity to apologize for being one. They are the only class against whom people can legally discriminate. They are the only class against whom people are required to discriminate. If White males can be completely delegitimized and dehumanized, the enemies of the White race may succeed in their attempt to destroy the White race.
    White males need to stop apologizing for being White and men. They need to reassert their authority. They need to purge their ranks of traitors, which unfortunately includes most of their political, business, labor, academic, and religious leaders. Then they can save the White race and return it to its rightful place.

Copyright © 2016 by Thomas Coley Allen.

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Mencken on the Occasional Exception

Mencken on the Occasional Exception

Thomas Allen

    In 1926, H. L. Mencken (1880-1956) wrote Notes on Democracy in which he expressed his views on democracy and related issues. He was a journalist, satirist, and critic and a libertarian and one of the leaders of the Old Right. In his book, he describes the occasional exception, pages 124-126 and 128-130. Below is an overview of his discussion on the occasional exception; my comments are in brackets.
    Mencken acknowledges that “a man of unquestionable integrity and ability occasionally gets to the bench, even of the State courts. In the same way a man of unquestionable integrity and ability sometimes finds himself in high executive or legislative office; there are even a few cases of such men getting into the White House.” When such a man does get elected, it happens because of “a failure of the rule.” However, “[t]he self-respecting candidate obviously cannot count on that failure: the odds are heavily against him from the start, and every effort he makes to diminish them involves some compromise with complete candour. He may take refuge in cynicism, and pursue the cozening of the populace as a sort of intellectual exercise, cruel but not unamusing, or he may accept the conditions of the game resignedly, and charge up the necessary dodges and false pretences to spiritual profit and loss, as a chorus girl charges up her favours to the manager and his backer; but in either case he has parted with something that must be tremendously valuable to a self-respecting man, and is even more valuable to the country he serves than it is to himself.”
    Most members of the U.S. House of Representatives have compromised their honor [if they began with any honor]. “They have been broken . . . [and] have learned how to leap through the hoops of professional job-mongers.” Furthermore, they keep quiet about good causes and speak on causes known to be evil. “The higher they rise, the farther they fall.” [Senator Jesse Helms is an example of such a man. He entered the Senate as an honorable man of integrity. The longer he served, the lower he fell. By his last term, he was little more than a puppet of the Israeli-Zionist lobby.]
    “The occasional mavericks . . . last a session, and then disappear. The old Congressman, the veteran of genuine influence and power, is either one who is so stupid that the ideas of the mob are his own ideas, or one so far gone in charlatanry that he is unconscious of his shame.” [Most speakers of the House and Senate presidents pro tempore are examples of the former. Senator John McCain is an extreme example of the latter.]
    Unfortunately, the laws are made mostly “by men who have sold their honour for their jobs, and they are executed by men who put their jobs above justice and common sense.” Mencken concludes, “We are dependent for whatever good flows out of democracy upon men who do not believe in democracy.”
    “The democratic politician . . . tries to save his amour propre [self-esteem] in a characteristically human way; that is to say, he denies them. . . . The democratic politician, confronted by the dishonesty and stupidity of his master, the mob, tries to convince himself and all the rest of us that it is really full of rectitude and wisdom.” Mencken adds, “This notion that the mob is wise . . . is not to be taken seriously: it was invented by mob-masters to save their faces.”
    Then Mencken remarks, “The best democratic statesmanship, like the best non-democratic statesmanship, tends to safeguard the honour of the higher officers of state by relieving them of that degrading necessity [of going to the mob for support].” Consequently, the president of the United States is not elected by popular vote.
    He adds that when an “office becomes steeped in intolerable corruption, . . . [it should be taken] out of the gift of the mob and make . . . appointive.” Nevertheless, “[t]he aspirant, of course, still has to seek it, for under democracy it is very rare that office seeks the man, but seeking it of the President, or even of the Governor of a State, is felt to be appreciably less humiliating and debasing than seeking it of the mob.”

Copyright © 2017 by Thomas Coley Allen.

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Is the Old Testament a Jewish Book?

Is the Old Testament a Jewish Book?

Thomas Allen

    Many people, both Judeophiles and Judeophobes, believe that the Old Testament is a “Jewish holy book.” Jews as such did not come into existence until the time of the prophet Jeremiah. The ancestry of today’s Jew and Judaism began during the Babylonian captivity. (The Babylonian captivity occurred in two waves, 597 B.C. and 586 B.C., and ended in 538 B.C., when the Jews in Babylon were allowed to return to Jerusalem.)
    As most of the books of the Old Testament were written before the Babylonian captivity and even before Jeremiah’s time, they cannot be Jewish — except in the sense that Jews consider them sacred as Christians consider them sacred. Thus, they are just as much Christian as they are Jewish. Indeed, they are even more Christian than Jewish, as Christians recognize and accept Jesus as the Messiah prophesied in them and Jews do not. Moreover, Moses, a Levite, wrote the first five books, the Pentateuch; he was not a Jew.
    Originally, a Jew was a citizen or a subject of Judea from about the time of Jeremiah — sometime between 627 and 580 B.C. Later, the term was used specifically to identify those who returned to Jerusalem from Babylon at the end of the captivity (538 B.C.). Eventually, it came to apply to the followers of the tradition of men, the Talmud.
    In the time of Jesus, “Jew” primarily meant an inhabitant of Judea. In the religious sense, most Jews were followers of the “tradition of men.” Accepting the tradition was the Pharisees, and rejecting them was the Sadducees. Later, “Jew” came to signify a person who followed the tradition of men as preserved in the Talmud. Today, a Jew is a person whose ancestors were Jews who did not convert to Christianity.
    Also, in the days of Jesus, many inhabitants of Judea, Jews, were Edomites, who were not descendants of Judah, but were distant cousins. Today, according to Jewish historians, most Jews are descendants of the people of the now extinct Khazar Empire. Only a few seem to be descendants of Judah.
    The tradition of men was the oral precepts attached to the Law. Presumably, they were the oral teachings of Moses, who, by the way, was not a Jew. He was a Levite and never lived in Judea. By the time of Jesus, the tradition was replacing the Old Testament as the supreme authority, which explains why Jesus adamantly and ardently condemned it. Eventually, the tradition became the written Talmud.
    Unfortunately, Christians have followed the example of the Jews and have created their own tradition of men. Often, the Christian tradition appears in the creeds adopted by the Catholic Church, most of which the Protestants have also adopted. Furthermore, they appear in the teachings of such renowned church fathers as Augustine. As the Jewish tradition superseded the Scriptures, so the Christian tradition has superseded the Scriptures.
    Converts from Judaism to Christianity are often called “Jewish Christians,” especially converts during the first century or two. To call someone a “Jewish Christians” is an error. The term is an oxymoron. A Jew rejects Jesus as the Messiah, the Son of God. A Christian accepts him as the Messiah, the Son of God. (I do not recall converts from paganism being called “Pagan Christians,” although they brought of a good deal of corrupting baggage into Christianity as taught by Jesus and the Apostles.)
    Also, to refer to Jesus as a Jew is erroneous and, perhaps, even egregious. For Jesus to be a Jew religiously, he would have had to denounce himself. Instead of claiming to be the Messiah, he would have to reject himself as such. (As an inhabitant of Judea, he could be considered a Jew politically, but even the use of Jew in the political sense is incorrect because Jesus was a Galilean and not Judean. However, the political sense of Jew is not what those who call Jesus a Jew mean. They mean Jew in the religion sense.) Furthermore, in the Bible, Jesus is referred to the “Son of David,” “Son of Man,” the “Son of God,” and the Messiah (Christ), among other things; but except the sign that Pilate ordered to be placed above Jesus on the cross, he is never called a Jew (or, for that matter, as “God the Son”).
    In summary, most of the books of the Old Testament are not Jewish since most were written before Jews as such came into being. Moreover, they are more Christian than Jewish because Christians recognize and accept the Messiah prophesied by the Old Testament. Furthermore, the real holy book of the Jews is the Talmud, which contains the tradition of men.

Copyright © 2018 by Thomas Coley Allen.
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Does Money Measure Value and Store Value?

Does Money Measure Value and Store Value?

Thomas Allen

    In Money (1878), Francis Walker discusses his concept of money. He identifies what he considers the basic functions of money: a medium of exchange (it facilitates exchanges), a common denominator (this function should not be confused with money as a measure of value), and a standard for deferred payments (it is a standard of value for paying debt). Walker rejects two functions of money that most economists hold: money as a measure of value and money as a store of value. At least before the demise of money’s connection to gold in 1971, most economists disagree with Walker on these two functions.

Measure of Value
    Under the gold standard, when an economist claims that gold is a measure of value, he means that the value of goods and services are compared with the value of a specific weight and fineness of gold. This comparison results in the price of the good or service. For example, between 1837 and 1934, the US dollar was defined as 23.22 grains of fine (pure) gold or 25.80 grains of standard gold, which was 90 percent pure. Thus, a theater ticket that cost $10 had the same value as 232.2 grains of gold.
    According to Walker, when most economists are describing money as a measure of value, they are really describing it as a common denominator. Although some use the two terms interchangeably, they are really two different things. Moreover, “they have no necessary relation to each other.”
    Walker defines the value of money the way that adherents of inconvertible paper money define the value of money. That is, the value of a gold coin is the value of what it can purchase. According to Walker, the value of a gold coin is determined by its use as a medium of exchange and is independent of its gold content. (Presumably, if the gold content of a gold coin were doubled or halved, its purchasing power would not change. Even Walker and the opponents of gold know that this is absurd.) To most adherents of the gold standard, the value of a gold coin is the value of the material of which it is made, although some of them argued against this notion by claiming that the quantity of gold coins was the primary determinant their value. Others, such as George Weston, argue that the value of the gold coin determines the value of its metal content, and the value of the gold coin is determined by the supply of metallic and paper money. To illustrate the difference between the two, today, the value of the dollar is the value of a dollar’s worth of goods. Between 1837 and 1934, the value of a dollar was the value of 23.22 grains of gold. The latter definition is superior to the former because it defines the value of the dollar independently of itself. The former defines the value of the dollar in terms of itself.
    Walker argues that when values are measured, they may be expressed relatively to each other as a scale of numbers. Perceiving money as providing a scale of value instead of a measure of value, was not original with Walker. Dugald Stewart had earlier argued this notion. Like Stewart, Walker seems to believe that gold is the best form or type of money. Yet, if his argument that money does not measure value, but merely provides a scale for relative values is correct, then the material of which the money is made is irrelevant. Like Stewart, Walker does not consider money as capital but as an aid in enumeration and arithmetic. Many economists, especially today, and even in the nineteenth century, concur with Walker and Stewart. Thus, for example, if item A has a value of 1 and item B, of 5, then item B is worth 5 times more than A.
    He notes that advocates of Ideal Money, which is inconvertible paper money, maintain that money merely provides a common denominator by which the relative values of various goods can be compared. Advocates of Real Money, which is full-weight metallic coin either gold or silver, maintain that money provides a common measure of value to which various goods are compared and measured. (Ironically, while supporting the adherents of Ideal Money on money being merely a numeric that compares but measures nothing, he abhors inconvertible paper money.)
    Instead of money measuring value, Walker argues that money merely provides a common denominator. If money is merely a numeric, as today’s money essentially is, although it does measure value, albeit poorly, what purpose do such apparent units of measure as the dollar, pound, franc, mark, or peso, serve? Walker does not say. If money merely provides a common denominator, then the coin or paper note would only need a number stamped on it. Adding “dollar,” “pound,” “franc,” “mark,” or “peso” is superfluous and can be confusing (misleading one to believe that value is being measured). Why make a $10 gold coin twice the size of a $5 gold coin and a $20 gold coin twice the size of a $10 gold coin, if the coin does not measure value? Why not just use paper money with numbers and no units printed on them? Yet Walker abhors inconvertible paper money.
    Following the lead of Prof. Rogers, Walker compares measuring value to measuring distances. If the distance between A and B is 1 and the distance between B and C is 10, then the distance between B and C is ten times greater than the distance between A and B. However, one does not know if the distance is in zeptometers (an extremely short distance) or in zettameters (an extremely long distance). Without a unit of measure, one does not know whether the distances are short or long. Moreover, a unit of measure is needed to ensure that the relative values are understood correctly. Thus, the distance between A and B compared with B and C is much greater than it appears if the distance between A and B is in zeptometers and B and C is in zettameters. Instead of the relative distance between B and C being ten times greater than A and B, it is 10 to the 43rd power greater (an enormous number). (Another example of the inadequacy of relative comparisons occurs with corporate profits. Corporation X has a 100 percent increase in profit compared with the previous year, while corporation Y has only a 1 percent increase in profit. In relative terms, corporation X appears to have a greater profit. However, when absolute profits are considered, a different story is revealed. Corporation X had a profit of $1 the previous year and $2 this year; thus, it had an increase in profit of 100 percent. Corporation Y had a profit of $1 billion last year and $1.01 billion this year, which is an increase in profit of 1 percent. Of the two which did the best?)
    When comparing values, a measure of value, that is a unit of value, is also needed. For example, the US dollar had a value of 23.22 grains of gold and the British pound had a value of 113 grains of gold. Thus, the value of the British pound was about 4.86 times greater than the value of the US dollar. One needs to know whether prices are being compared in dollars or pounds or both. The relative values may be the same, but the absolute values may not be. For example, if item X costs £2 and item Y costs £1, then item X costs twice as much as item Y. If item A costs $2 and item B costs $1, then item A costs twice as much as item B. Although both X and A have twice the value of Y and B respectively, X is worth 4.86 times A and 9.72 times B. Thus, more than a common denominator is needed to estimate value or even to measure relative differences. A unit of measure, i.e., a unit of value, is also needed. Furthermore, that unit of value must have value in and of itself.
    As shown above, when distance or value is being compared, more than a numeric value is needed. Moreover, that unit of measure must possess what is being measured.
    Walker does admit that to measure value, a value must be used. Nevertheless, that value can be relative and expressed as a pure number without reference to any common value. He states, “Value is a relation. Relations may be expressed, but not measured.” He illustrates this with distance by claiming that the relationship between a furlong and a mile cannot be measured but can only be expressed as 8 to 1. (By definition, a mile equals eight furlongs. However, as discussed above, if no units of measure are attached to the relative numbers, one has no clue about the distances being expressed.)
    Furthermore, Walker uses seigniorage as an argument that money does not measure value. Because of seigniorage, the monetary value stamped on the coin exceeds the value of its metal content. This is true. Seigniorage may cause the coin to be overvalued domestically, but not necessarily so. If the seigniorage is too high, coins will exchange based on the value of their metal content and not based on the monetary value stamped on them — even if such exchanges are illegal. Nevertheless, the seigniorage premium disappears once the coin leaves the country of issue. Outside the country of issue, its purchasing power is that of its metal content and not that which is stamped on it.
    Unlike Walker, most economists argue that to measure and compare values of various items, these items have to be compared with a common item, which under the gold standard is a specific weight and fineness of gold. Moreover, this standard to which items are compared has to have value in and of itself, which is often called “intrinsic value.” Walker argues that money cannot measure value because unlike the yardstick or meterstick, its value is not fixed, even for a gold coin. (Even the definition of the meter has changed several times since it was first invented. Therefore, the measure of distance has changed over time, although minutely.) It varies with time, place, and circumstances. This is true. Being subjective, value is not constant — not even for money regardless of the material of which it is made. Moreover, relative values vary with time, place, and circumstances. Yet nothing cannot measure something as Walker seems to argue. If it could, unitless numbers on paper could serve as money as well as full-weight gold coin. Moreover, paper money would be much cheaper to manufacture. However, Walker presents a convincing argument that inconvertible paper money is vastly inferior to gold coin. (Nevertheless, he uses inconvertible paper money to argue against the notion that money can measure value and has to have value in and of itself to do so.)

Store of Value
    Most economists who support the gold standard assert that one of the important functions of money is to serve as a store of value. Some even claim that this is the most important function of money.
    Contrary to the assertion of these economists, Walker argues that money does not serve as a store of value. About this function of money, or more correctly, lack of it, he agrees with the proponents of inconvertible paper money.
    The store of value is closely related to the measure of value. If money does not and cannot measure value, it need not store value. However, if money is the measure of value, then it needs to be able to store value so that it can measure value. That is, money has to have value in and of itself to measure value. Value can only be measured against value and with value.
    Walker identifies money serving as the standard for deferred payments as an important function of money; that is, money serves as the payment for debt. Why would anyone give up something of value, whatever is lent, in exchange for payments of no value? To function as payment for debt, money has to be able to transfer value through time and often through space. Even inconvertible paper money transfers value through time to a highly limited degree.
    Furthermore, money functioning as a medium of exchange implies that money is a store of value. It must store value so that it can carry value from its receipt to its expenditure so that little or no value is lost. Also, why would anyone sell his goods or labor in exchange for that which has no value? Evidently, Walker believes that people are willing to make such exchanges. Contrary to Walker’s belief, money’s function as a medium of exchange cannot be separated from its function as a store of value. This is true not only for full-weight metallic coin but also for inconvertible paper money. (Generally, losing value over time at various rates, inconvertible paper money stores value poorly and becomes a poor medium of exchange.)
    Moreover, Walker states, “When a commodity comes to serve as a store of value, it ceases to be money.” Gold in hoards, treasures, plate, and ornamentation is not money. (At the other extreme is Murray Rothbard, who claims that gold is money whatever its form.) Walker is unclear whether gold coins held in reserves by banks for payment of their notes and checkable deposits are money. Based on his argument, bank reserves should not be considered money.
    On the other hand, being a good economist, he asserts that gold’s ability to be used as a store of value is an important attribute that qualifies it as money. Is this not confusing? Gold stores value, but once it is coined and used to buy something or pay a debt, it ceases to store value. However, if the recipient puts the coin in his pocket and does not spend it for a year, i.e., hoards it, it ceases being money and becomes a store of value. (This is akin to the gold-is-sterile argument against the gold standard.)
    To add to the confusion of gold being either money or ornamentation, i.e., a store of value, Walker describes the use of gold as jewelry, such as ring-money worn as rings or necklaces, being used as money. Presumably, when the owner was wearing the ring-money on his finger, it was a store of value, but not money. However, when he took the ring off and bought an item with it, the gold ring ceased storing value and became money. (How long does a gold coin have to remain in one’s purse before it ceases being money and becomes a store of value? Walker does not say.)
    In summary, Walker argues that money does not measure value; it merely serves a common denominator by which the values of various goods and services are compared. Furthermore, money does not and cannot store value, although the material of which it is made can often store value. On these two points, most economists who support the gold standard disagree. However, most economists who support inconvertible paper money agree with Walker.

Copyright © 2017 by Thomas Coley Allen.

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Mencken on Utopia

Mencken on Utopia

Thomas Allen

    In 1926, H. L. Mencken (1880-1956) wrote Notes on Democracy in which he expressed his views on democracy and related issues. He was a journalist, satirist, and critic and a libertarian and one of the leaders of the Old Right. In his book, he describes utopia, pages 115-124. Below is an overview of his discussion of utopia; my comments are in brackets.
    Mencken notes that in the United States, “every office-holder, when he takes oath to support the Constitution, must swear on his honour that, summoned to the death-bed of his grandmother, he will not take the old lady a bottle of wine. He may say so and do it, which makes him a liar, or he may say so and not do it, which makes him a pig.” [When Mencken wrote, the Constitution contained an amendment that prohibited the sale of alcohol — the Prohibition amendment. Much of Mencken’s hostility toward democracy and, to a slightly lesser degree, toward religion, seems to result from Prohibition. At least, Prohibition is often his prime example of democracy run amuck.]
    In spite of this dilemma, “idealists, chiefly professional Liberals, . . . argue that it is the duty of a gentleman to go into politics.” To which, Mencken replies that this remedy “is quite as absurd as all the other sure cures that Liberals advocate. When they argue for it, they simply argue . . . that the remedy for prostitution is to fill the bawdy-houses with virgins. . . . [This] device would accomplish very little: either the virgins would leap out of the windows, or they would cease to be virgins.” Then he adds, “The same alternatives confront the political aspirant who is what is regarded in America as a gentleman — that is, one who is not susceptible to open bribery in cash. The moment his leg goes over the political fence he finds the mob confronting him, and if he would stay within he must adapt himself to its tastes and prejudices. In other words, he must learn all the tricks of the regular mountebanks.” That is, he must either respond to the mob and serve it or lose his job.
    Mencken supports his argument with some examples. He notes, “It is an axiom of practical politics, indeed, that the worst enemies of political decency are the tired reformers — and the worst of the worst are those whose primary thirst to make the corruptible put on incorruption was accompanied by a somewhat sniffish class consciousness.” One example is Theodore Roosevelt entering “politics as a sword drawn against demagogy.” Yet he became a “violent and shameless demagogue.” [We may be seeing the same happening with Donald Trump. He entered the political arena as an outsider who was going to “drain the swamp,” end American foreign entanglements and wars, rebuild America, and control and limit immigration. Yet he has expanded America’s wars and filled his administration with swamp monsters. Most of the real outsiders that he appointed, he has since removed. He continues America’s Israeli-first foreign policy instead of adopting an America-first foreign policy. He is beginning to soften on immigration and give into the establishment on that issue and others. He is acting ever more like the typical establishment politician.]
    Mencken admits that a gentleman may enter politics under democracy. However, “it is almost impossible for him to stay there and remain a gentleman.” He continues, “The haughty amateur, at the start, may actually make what seems to be a brilliant success, for he is commonly full of indignation, and so strikes out valiantly, and the mob crowds up because it likes a brutal show. . . . If he retains his rectitude he loses his office, and if he retains his office he has to dilute his rectitude with the cologne spirits of the trade.” [Much of what Mencken is describing can be written about Donald Trump, a gentleman by Mencken’s definition and an amateur politician. Will he remain a gentleman or will he become another sleazy politician catering to the mob, or, more correctly, the minority that manipulates the mob? This minority resides in the old news media, the leadership of the Democratic and Republican parties, the military-industrial complex, most big businesses and big banks, the globalists, and a host of their demagogues.]
    In a democracy, “the man of native integrity is either barred from the public service altogether or subjected to almost irresistible temptations after he gets in. The competition of less honourable men is more than he can bear. He must stand against them before the mob, and the sempiternal prejudices of the mob run their way.”
    Democracy in the United States is worse than it is in Great Britain because the United States have no aristocracy to check the mob. For the most part, American Presidents were not intellectuals, and most avoid intelligent men. Likewise, has been the average American governor.
    Moreover, “[t]he judiciary, under the American system, sinks quite as low.” The U.S. Supreme Court “carries on its dull and preposterous duties quite outside the stream of civilized thought, and even outside the stream of enlightened juridical thought.” Furthermore, “few American judges ever contribute anything of value to legal theory. . . . The Constitution apparently has no more meaning to them than it has to a Prohibition agent. They have acquiesced almost unanimously in the destruction of the First, Second, Fourth, Fifth and Sixth Amendments, and supinely connived at the invasion of the Fourteenth and Fifteenth.” [What would Mencken think about what the Supreme Court has done to the Bill of Rights in recent decades with the War on Drugs and the War or Terrorism?] America’s mediocre judiciary results from the average judge being a trailer instead of a leader when he was a practicing lawyer. [When the judiciary does lead with its activist judges, the results are usually worse than when it restricts itself to being a follower.] “The judicial office is not attractive, as a rule, to the better sort of lawyers.” Moreover, “judges are so often chosen for purely political reasons, even for the Supreme Court of the United States, that the lawyer of professional dignity and self-respect hesitates to enter into the competition. Thus the bench tends to be filled with duffers, and many of them are also scoundrels, as the frequent complaints against their extortions and tyrannies testify.” [An example of such a Supreme Court judge was Earl Warren, whom President Eisenhower appointed to pay Warren for delivering California's convention delegation to Eisenhower. Warren’s court was notorious for tyrannical, despotic rulings that are still destroying the country.] Mencken notes, “In the States, where judges are commonly elected by popular vote, the shyster has every advantage over the reputable lawyer, including that of yearning for the judicial salary with a vast and undivided passion. And when it comes to the Federal courts, once so honourable, he has every advantage again, including the formidable one of knowing how to crook his knee gracefully to the local dispenser of Federal patronage (in the South often a worthless Negro) and to the Methodist wowsers of the Anti-Saloon League.” [America’s judiciary, especially the federal courts, has deteriorated even more since Mencken wrote.]
    Mencken admits that the shyster does not always prevail. “[A] man of unquestionable integrity and ability occasionally gets to the bench, even of the State courts.” [Today, many State courts, especially the higher courts, have a larger percentage of competent judges of integrity than the federal courts.]

Copyright © 2017 by Thomas Coley Allen.

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