Spencer Heath Archive

Item 2193

Random taping of Heath by Spencer MacCallum at a seminar at the Foundation for Economic Education (FEE), Irvington, New York, from conversation with economist Sylvester Petro. The example Heath gives here is himself, during World War I.

June 26, 1957

I made a little money as a patent attorney, and I found that the really good enterpriser wants a patent because he’s not enterprising; he doesn’t want to have to be enterprising. A man I knew who made many advances, many inventions, many devices for economy and efficiency, came under the ban of Franklin Roosevelt, who was Assistant Secretary of the Navy, because he was a monopolist. He got so far ahead of everybody else, he was a “monopolist.” So, Mr. Franklin sends his would-be competitors — he wants to build up some competitors. He sends people from another trade in to spy on this man with orders to show them everything he’s got. So the enterprising man shows these people all these things, and one of them says, “Well now, you say you don’t depend on patents?” “No; mainly I take out patents just to keep other people from stopping me. I never bothered anybody about it, never depended on any patents.” “Well, then don’t your competitors follow you in all this?” “Why, sure they do! That’s what keeps them behind — where they belong!