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THE REAL ROOT OF EVIL 119
of what she wrote struck readers as pure assertion. “Her statement that
these rights are granted to man by the fact of birth as a man not by an
act of society, is illogical jargon,” wrote one, advising, “If Miss Rand is
to get anywhere she must free herself from theological implications.”
Another respondent was “favorably impressed by the goals which she
seeks to attain, but the line of logic which she uses seems to me to be
very weak.” Such readers thought Rand left a critical question unanswered:
Why did “no man have the right to initiate physical force”? Out
of thirteen readers, only four recommended supporting the work in its
present form. 49
Rand, who saw herself as helping the unenlightened at FEE, was
entirely unprepared for this criticism. She was livid, telling Read, his
actions were “a most serious refl ection on my personal integrity and a
most serious damage to my professional reputation.” She was particularly
angered that the FEE readers evaluated her work as if she had
requested fi nancial backing. She informed Read, “I do not submit books
for approval on whether I should write them—and my professional
standing does not permit me to be thought of as an author who seeks
a foundation’s support for a writing project.” Not only had Read disregarded
her role as ghost, but now he had downgraded her from instructor
to pupil and “smeared” her reputation. Rand demanded an apology
and the names of the people who had written the comments on her
work. Read refused both. 50 The breach would never heal.
Rand’s break with Read drew her closer to Rose Wilder Lane, whom
she had heard about through Isabel Paterson. The two established a
correspondence shortly after Rand moved to California, but had never
met. A magazine writer with a vaguely socialist background, Lane was
the daughter of the famous children’s author Laura Ingalls Wilder.
Although she took no public credit, Lane was essentially a coauthor of
the best-selling Little House on the Prairie series. She wove her libertarianism
delicately through the nostalgic books, fi lling her fi ctional Fourth
of July orations with musings on freedom and limited government and
excising from her mother’s past examples of state charity. 51 In 1943 she
published The Discovery of Freedom, a historically grounded defense of
individualism.
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