Remembering Milton Friedman

I can remember precisely where I was the first time I met Milton Friedman. I was standing in the grand ballroom of the Fairmont Hotel atop Nob Hill. Earlier that day I was given a copy of the speech prepared by William Simon, the former Secretary of the Treasurer. And in reading the opening paragraph I was rather horrified at a joke that Simon was intending to tell. I don’t think it was mean-spirited but it did managed to insult a lot of people in the community. And I took the speech to my boss since we were the sponsors. He called Simon at the Fairmont and expressed concern.

Simon’s reply was: “No problem. If you don’ t like the jokes write me some new ones.” My boss hung up and looked at me. “If you don’t like the jokes then write him some new ones.” So I did. And that evening I was in the ballroom before the banquet began when someone brought over Milton and Rose Friedman to introduce them.

Of course I knew who they were. I had watched Free to Choose on television. I had read the book. I had read his earlier book Capitalism and Freedom. I had followed his career for years. So I was more than thrilled to meet someone I considered a hero.

Now so many news accounts of his life have referred to him as a “giant” in his field. He was called “larger than life”. So perhaps it would come to many as a great surprise that he was not much over 5 feet tall. And I have to admit that was the first thing that struck me when he came walking up to me with Rose at his size. And she stood no taller than he did. I was actually rather astounded by how short he was.

My first thought, which I did not express verbally, was: “Dr. Friedman, you write so much taller.” And he did. He wrote the words of greatness. He wrote about high ideals and principles like liberty.

So many publications in the last day have referred to him as a “conservative” yet he was no such thing. He was a great and passionate liberal, a real liberal, a classical liberal, a libertarian.

Many people forget that Friedman in his role as an adviser to Richard Nixon was a major proponent of abolishing military conscription. This was an issue which was strongly embraced by the New Left but they had no ability to implement it. But Friedman worked hard to end forced service to the military. And the Left typically ignored that or, more likely, just never bothered to find out the truth.

And in later years Friedman was one of the most vocal advocates of legalizing drugs. He said the war on drugs was a disaster. It eroded personal liberty, corrupted the police, expanded state power, wasted billions of dollars, made the streets less safe and made drug use more dangerous. And at the same time it managed to do almost nothing to prevent the use of drugs.

Friedman also was a major advocate of helping America’s poor by making it possible for t hem to get quality education, something denied in government schools, especially the schools of the inner city. He pushed for a voucher system where a portion of the funding the state would spend on a student’s education could be given directly to the parents to help them afford private education.

Of course the selfish teacher’s unions did not want competition. And if they had to screw over the poor they were happy to do so. Not only did Friedman push for school choice for the poor but he poured a great deal of his own money into establishing the Milton and Rose D. Friedman Foundation to educate and lobby for increased choice in education.

But it was clear that Milton Friedman was a man with a passion for the freedom and dignity of the individual. He was against conscription because it violated that freedom and that dignity. He was against the war on drugs because it made life far worse for the people it was ostensibly meant to help. He wanted all children to have access to a quality education and he knew enough economics to know that a state monopoly was not the means to achieve that end.

That evening we spoke briefly. And the name of a minor Austrian economist and vocal critic of Friedman’s came up. Friedman said something which I strongly disagreed with. But out of respect I didn’t challenge him. I read an interview with him recently where he said that one thing he missed as his fame spread was that people wouldn’t argue with him and tell him he was wrong. He said that one of the things he really appreciated about Rose, his wife of 68 years, was that she never hesitated to tell him he was wrong. After reading that I wish I had debated a bit but then again I’m glad I didn’t. Some years later it is I who changed my mind and have since come around to agreeing with Friedman.

It was 1988 and Sir Antony Fisher, the British businessman who helped found the Institute for Economic Affairs, had passed away. He had a magnificent apartment in San Francisco. In his will he had left his personal library to one of the many non profit organizations he had helped along the way. And it was necessary for someone to appraise the value of the collection. I was asked to do this. So for a full day I sat on the floor of the library scribbling notes and estimating values on the books in the collection. Behind me were the massive plate glass windows that gave a panoramic view of San Francisco Bay from the Golden Gate to Embarcadero. And I also knew that one floor down was the apartment of the Friedmans. So I just kept this fact in mind.

A year later I began organizing a conference that would take place at another city hotel. This was a massive event going for several days. All in all we had close to 40 speakers from around the world. And for the closing banquet I wanted Milton Friedman as a speaker. Of course Friedman was now world-famous. He had won his Nobel Prize in economics, his TV series Free to Choose and the subsequent book had been wildly popular. He had been honored by the president. He easily could command a speaking fee of $10,000 and often did.

So I sat down and wrote him a letter. I explained to him that at this conference there were few or no academics. These were not the elite of the business world. These were the average advocates of freedom. Most were working people. They held down jobs but they were passionate about the ideals that Friedman espoused. And I asked him if he would consider speaking. I pointed out that the hotel was just a few blocks from his home and he was free to talk on any topic he wished.

A week or so later I got a letter from Friedman telling me he would be happy to speak.


We had something like 400 people show up for the banquet that night. And it was such a thrill to have the hotel come and inform me that Dr. and Mrs Friedman had arrived. I went out to greet them and escort them back to our table. I remember walking into the main dining room with these two lovely people and the entire assembly of 400 standing and giving them a standing ovation. I brought them to our table and introduced them around to the other friends who were sitting there that night. In addition to Milton and Rose and myself, there was my dinner date, Frances Kendell and Leon Louw of South Africa, Barbara Branden the biographer of Ayn Rand; and Vince MIller and Jim Elwood of the International Society for Individual Liberty.

I know the food was wonderful but I don’t remember that. I just remember the thrill of having all that time sitting with Milton and Rose and the others and talking. And it was a double thrill since only a few months earlier we had seem that damned wall in Berlin dismantled by the people of Germany. The communist states had collapsed under their own dead weight.

In my introduction to Dr Friedman I said that if I were to build a a Mount Rushmore of liberty it would include him, FA Hayek, Ludwig Mises and Ayn Rand. He was most gracious in his thanks and then gave an “in-house” speech. That is he gave a speech to people who already agree with him on most issues. And he said that while he loved speaking to many different groups it was an evening like this that really gave him the ability to talk about anything he wanted. And so he talked about libertarianism itself, offering his advice and wisdom on where he thought libertarians sometimes go wrong.

He finished to another standing ovation and sat down. I announced that we would have a few announcements from Vince Miller and then Dr. Friedman would take questions from the floor. Vince made the announcements and one of them was to inform guests that we had parking vouchers for the hotel parking which gave people a discount on their parking. Dr. Friedman leaned over to me and said: “Make sure I get one of those.”

Now I was fully aware of what sort of fees this man could command easily at other dinners. And I knew he was giving his time and efforts freely and asking nothing in return. So I said: “Dr. Friedman. Don’t worry. We’ll be happy to pay your parking.”

He smiled and said: “Oh, I don’t mind paying. I just don’t want to pay full price.”

We both laughed at that and I pulled one of the vouchers out of my pocket and handed it to him. As I gave it to him I said: “Well, this has to be one of the cheapest honorariums you have ever received.”

And ever the gentleman he said: “Any good economist will tell you that there is a lot more to benefits than just monetary rewards.”

A good point of course. And a compliment to all those who had come to hear him speak.

I have seen Milton Friedman in action on numerous occasions and never once did I see him lose his temper. Surely he must have done so sometimes but I have never heard of it. I remember one day he was speaking at Stanford University at an event sponsored by student Republicans and student Libertarians. Friedman explained that while he was a small L libertarian he was a Republican but only out of practical necessity. (Of course this was long before the Republicans abandoned the ideas of small government and freedom in favor of Bushian socialism). And once again he was happy to take questions from the floor.

Now this was a public forum and the hall was packed. So there were many opponents of liberty in the audience advocating one form of state control or another. And they were not always polite in expressing there disagreements. But again Friedman was always the gentleman. If you watch the old Free to Choose series there was a debate that took place after each episode where Friedman would face some of his staunchest critics. Not once do I remember him losing his temper regardless of what was said.

I read the portraits painted of Friedman by the ideologues of the Left in their articles or on their blogs. They apparently share none of his gentlemanly traits and his general view of benevolence. And I know they never saw how gracious, kind, polite and truly benevolent Milton Friedman was. Instead they invented stories about him being an adviser to the dictatorship of General Pinochet.

I don’t want to imply that Milton Friedman was perfect. But I do think he was perfect gentleman. And while the economic community may wish to remember his theories and his papers and his history of monetary policy. What I remember is a gracious and kind man, with an infectious smile and a genuine sense of humor.