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260
LEGACIES
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are slightly embarrassed or hesitant to openly advocate capitalism.
‘Freedom’ is the bill of goods we try to sell to the fl ower children and the
leftists.” Continuing in a Randian vein, he noted, “If we wish to advocate
capitalism, we must advocate it from a moral stand—we must assert
that production is right for man, that rational self-interest is right for
man, that aside from (and in addition to) the fact that man should be
free, he should also be selfi sh and productive.” 37 Here the restrictions
that Rand put on libertarianism were clear. Rand had made capitalism a
sacrosanct ideal for most libertarians, an allegiance that rapidly marginalized
leaders like Karl Hess who hoped to draw libertarians to the left.
Rand’s insistence on capitalism lay at the core of her appeal to libertarians,
for it was part of a larger morality that many libertarians asserted
was essential to their movement. By itself libertarianism spoke only of
freedom, of minding your own business, there ain’t no such thing as
a free lunch. As SIL News asked in one of its fi rst issues, “The essence
of the philosophy is the radical advocacy of freedom. . . . At this point a
very serious question must be raised. After freedom . . . what?” 38 It was
this philosophic hole at the center that made libertarianism such an
excellent partner to conservatism. Tradition and religion fi lled in where
libertarianism was silent. When libertarians rejected conservatism, they
needed something to take its place.
For many this role was fi lled by Objectivism. Rand’s moralism
grounded and bounded libertarian freedoms by emphasizing rationality,
self-interest, individual rights, and capitalism. SIL News asserted,
“Certain values are right for man, and certain values are wrong. Certain
actions benefi t him, and certain destroy him. Turning man loose to
follow his own whims . . . a ‘do your own thing’ approach . . . will not by
itself achieve human well-being.” 39 Echoing the magazine’s stance, the
budding journalist Robert Bidinotto electrifi ed the second annual East
Coast Libertarian Think-In with an infl ammatory speech attacking
hippies and drug use. Bidinotto, then an anarchist, nonetheless argued
that Rand’s rationalist morality was the proper basis for libertarianism.
Objectivism helped him cast stones at others on moral grounds, even
while he advocated complete political freedom. 40
This is not to say that Objectivism and Rand were without controversy
in libertarian circles. Rand’s ubiquity made her a convenient target for
disgruntled and sarcastic libertarians. In a disapproving article SIL News
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