Spencer Heath Archive

Item 1484

Carbon of letter from Heath to Arthur S. Madsen, 4 Great Smith Street, London, S.W.I.

June 15, 1953

 

 

My dear Arthur Madsen:

I thank you very much for your letter of last December 22, in care of The Freeman. I don’t know why yours of October 2 failed to reach me at my home address in Mary­land, but I spend a good deal of time in and out of my New York address as above and most of my mail has been coming here of late.

I infer from your caption over Mr. Gaffney’s article in your December issue that at your last writing you had not read very far into my review of Progress and Poverty and that your impressions of it must have been gained from the first part of Mr. Gaffney’s perfervid remarks upon it.

It was only a short time ago that Mr. Gaffney’s article first came to my attention. John Chamberlain thought, the misleading quotations and imputations in his first para­graph notwithstanding, that on the whole some rejoinder from me would be in order and well worthy of equally conspicuous even if much smaller space in your columns.

Accordingly, I have set down my best-considered comments, and John Chamberlain has been kind enough not only to pro­pose but also to forward them to you.

I was very well pleased at the mostly serious temper of Mr. Gaffney’s last two pages. I can only hope (for the sake of truth) that you and other Henry George men will go as far as Mr. Gaffney in entertaining basic con­ceptions so far contrary from his long cherished ones, and that whatever of the “whole discussion” you may publish may be as among friends holding to the same ideal even though choosing quite contrary roads to reach the common goal.

As far back as the early thirties I began to believe in the providence of a far more realistic than the poli­tical and coercive method of seeking the ends towards which Henry George aspired. The enclosed leaflet entitled, “Why the Henry George Idea Does Not Prevail,” written in 1938, is but one evidence of my many urbane attempts towards a more creative (and thus spiritual) mode of approach.

Until this current review my emphasis was always on the constructive side of Henry George’s philosophy, in spite of his proposed political methods identical with those of all the Marxians whom he hoped to oppose and defeat.

Needless to say, it was not until I ceased exalting his ultimate aims and challenged his proposed enforce­ment and his logic underlying it, that any such serious attention to constructive ideas could be obtained. It seems just too bad that we must have so much heat in our journey towards the light. If I have in some degree followed Mr. Gaffney’s temper I hope he will soon forgive me, as I have forgiven him.

I cordially reciprocate your kind sentiments and recollections of my visit to you and your dear colleague, John Paul, and the very learned and kindly Mr. Lester, all of whom were so very lovely to me in London some twenty years ago. And I remember also with pleasure your visit here in 1933.

I can assure you my sympathy for the goal of Freedom through rent coming to be recognized as the legitimate recompense for public services, and through the automatic creation of rent by performing services instead of taking taxes by force without reference to any corresponding services.

It is pleasant to be again in communication with you and in the cordiality of friendship, however diverse may be the roads we choose – the means we seek to see employed — to reach the common goal.

Sincerely,

 

SH-s

Enc.

“Private Property in Land Explained”

“Questions for Land Owners”

“The Administration of Property as Community Services”

“Why the Henry George Idea Does Not Prevail”