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Milton Friedman on The free society

Fortunately, we are waking up. We are again recognizing the dangers of an overgoverned society, coming to understand that good objectives can be perverted by bad means, that reliance on the freedom of people to control their own lives in accordance with their own values is the surest way to achieve the full potential of a great society.

Context. From the closing pages of Free to Choose (1980), written with Rose D. Friedman, in the chapter “The Tide Is Turning”.

Free to Choose
Book, 1980, Ch. 10 “The Tide Is Turning”, pp. 309–310
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Cite this passage

Milton Friedman, “Free to Choose” (1980), Ch. 10 “The Tide Is Turning”, pp. 309–310. https://miltonfriedman.org/quotes/fortunately-waking-up-dangers-overgoverned-society-1980

Quoted for commentary and research. Rights in the underlying work remain with its rights holder, so cite the work itself, not only this page.

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He also said

  1. A society that puts equality—in the sense of equality of outcome—ahead of freedom will end up with neither equality nor freedom. The use of force to achieve equality will destroy freedom, and the force, introduced for good purposes, will end up in the hands of people who use it to promote their own interests. On the other hand, a society that puts freedom first will, as a happy by-product, end up with both greater freedom and greater equality.
    Free to Choose
    Book, 1980, Ch. 5 “Created Equal”, p. 148
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  2. The society doesn’t have concerns. It has governments, it has laws, it has parliaments. Only people have concerns. People do certain things through government. And I’m not going to talk about society having values. Society doesn’t have values. People have values.

    Context. In the panel discussion, asked whether he holds that any concern with inequality of outcome is illegitimate. He asks, “Concerned with whom? By whom?”, and the questioner answers, “Concerned by the society.”

    Created Equal
    Television, 1980, PBS, vol. 5, at 33:42
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  3. The rule of law does not guarantee freedom, since general laws as well as personal edicts can be tyrannical. But increasing reliance on the rule of law clearly played a major role in transforming Western society from a world in which the ordinary citizen was literally subject to the arbitrary will of his master to a world in which the ordinary citizen could regard himself as his own master.

    Context. From the first of two New York Times op-ed essays written at Ely, Vermont, in October 1971, after the August 15 wage-price freeze and as the Nixon administration’s Phase II pay board and price board took over.

    Morality and Controls: I
    Column, 1971, The New York Times, October 28, 1971; reprinted in the Congressional Record, Senate, October 29, 1971, pp. 38201 to 38202, introduced by Senator Mark O. Hatfield of Oregon, who dates the two essays to “the October 28 and 29 editions of the New York Times”, under the header “[From the New York Times, Oct. 28, 1971]”, Congressional Record, October 29, 1971, pp. 38201–38202
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