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Erik E. Lehmann · Max Keilbach Editors
From Industrial
Organization to
Entrepreneurship
A Tribute to David B. Audretsch
From Industrial Organization to Entrepreneurship
Erik E. Lehmann • Max Keilbach
Editors
From Industrial Organization

to Entrepreneurship
A Tribute to David B. Audretsch
Editors
Erik E. Lehmann Max Keilbach
Business and Economics Wedgebrook Music Productions
Augsburg University Berlin, Germany
Augsburg, Bayern, Germany
ISBN 978-3-030-25236-6 ISBN 978-3-030-25237-3 (eBook)

https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-25237-3
© Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2019

This work is subject to copyright. All rights are reserved by the Publisher, whether the whole or part of
the material is concerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation,
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The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this publication
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The publisher, the authors, and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in this book
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The registered company address is: Gewerbestrasse 11, 6330 Cham, Switzerland
Preface
A Festschrift to David B. Audretsch
The Festschrift may be an idea whose time has passed, but it is

still a lovely idea. There is still room for the human touch in
scientific writing.
Justine Cullinan
Dear David,
It’s been a long journey that we’ve been travelling together until now. And when we
issued the call for papers to attract contributors to this Festschrift, we realized that
we’re part of a much bigger Morgenland Ride and a lot of mates participate in this
journey with us. We were overwhelmed about the number and excitement of reac-
tions we received to our call for papers, and when reading through the contributions,
we realized how big the community has grown around you and how large of a body
of research has emerged. How did that happen? What’s your trick?
1. We believe that the first ingredient is curiosity. We have rarely met someone who
is so curious and open to new ideas. When people come into your office with
questions and new ideas, you are never judging or negative or ignoring them with
a “know-it-all” attitude. You would rather help put their ideas into perspective
and therefore giving them (and the people that came with them) value. Very
often, we saw people leaving the office with a smile and eagerness to work on
their ideas.
2. You also have trust and belief. You have an unconditional trust in your mates
which creates a strong base for letting ideas flow freely. We exchanged an
uncountable number of crazy ideas. Maybe in the end, a few of them were just
that—crazy ideas, but every idea is taken seriously by you and in the end, this
creates that “anything is possible” spirit which can drive a field. But this holds
vice versa: people can trust you in that you will never make them look silly or
foolish. A very important ingredient to create a strong team.
v
vi Preface
3. Then there is your enthusiasm and energy. The energy that emerges from you is
legendary. Where do you gain all of this energy from? This enthusiasm can be
intoxicating and the energy that comes with it inspires the people around you.
It simply makes anybody around you more energetic. Combine this with trust
and belief and there is no better way to thrive a team.
4. Finally, there is your brilliant spirit that channels all this. Maybe it is rather a
broad vision than a narrow research program. You carry at the same time a vision
that is open enough to allow new ideas to unfold but focused enough to create an
identifiable body of research. It is a knowledge or an intuition about what is
scientifically sound which made your research field grow bigger and bigger.
We also know that you can be mercilessly sharp in the details, in your arguments,
and in the conclusions. That is of course the key to scientific advancement
without which the other ingredients would be baseless and without cohesion.
These ingredients, and the way you put them together, make it a recipe for a
magic potion.
We know that a scientist often wears several hats – friend, teacher, mentor,
administrator, and researcher, among others. And while many prominent awards
honor the research role, like the Schumpeter School Award from the University of
Wuppertal, or the prestigious Global Award for Entrepreneurship Research by the
Swedish Foundation for Small Business Research, a Festschrift volume uniquely
recognizes the many facets of an outstanding and influential scientist, an excep-
tional scholar, a creator of a research field and a community, a mentor, and a friend.
“The idea behind a Festschrift is to honor the teacher, mentor and friend, not only
the researcher,” says Justine Cullinan, the Managing Editor of the Annals of the
New York Academy of Sciences, “a book of essays and papers contributed by the
honoree's students and colleagues, where even family members and close friends
contribute.”1
And so, this Festschrift aims to provide a short snapshot to highlight all of your
hats: starting in Part I with your family—Joanne and your kids—followed by close
friends staying side-by-side with you in all phases of your life and career. An out-
standing researcher is one that creates a research topic that stimulates the world of
academia. Part II is dedicated to you David, as a true pioneer in the fields of small
business and entrepreneurship research. However, a true scientist does not work in
isolation, but brings in other scholars to collaborate with and push the limits of the
field. The essays in Part III are dedicated to you as a creator of a community. While
the first three parts mostly express the roots of your work, the future of your legacy,
the wings, are laid down in Part IV.
1
Cited in: Ricki Lewis (2006), Festschriften Honor Exceptional Scientific Careers, Scholarly
Influences, The Scientist, download, https://www.the-scientist.com/profession/festschriften-
honor-exceptional-scientific-careers-scholarly-influences-57891, Accessed 15 October 2018.
Preface vii
We see from the contributions in this Festschrift that the fields of small business
and entrepreneurship research are thriving and we enjoy being a part of it. So we’re
glad to be able to present to you this Festschrift; a personal gift from your commu-
nity to you. We feel honored to be able to put these contributions together for you as
a symbol of our gratitude, to celebrate your incredible body of work and the immense
impact that you have had on all of our lives.
Happy Birthday David, from all of us. Thanks for great years we spent together.
The journey is not over, we keep travelling together, and we look forward to it.
Always Yours
Erik and Max
Augsburg, Bayern, Germany Erik E. Lehmann

Berlin, Germany Max Keilbach
Contents
Part I Family
Scenes from a Marriage�� 3
Joanne Audretsch
I Will Always Be Proud to Call Him My Father �� 11
James Audretsch
My Dad, the Athlete, Entertainer, Phrase Philosopher, Conformist
and Analogist�� 17
Christopher Audretsch
Perhaps David Audretsch Is Not a Good Man�� 21
Jack Harding
Henry David Bruce Audretsch: A Retrospective … Perhaps�� 27
Albert N. Link
Distinguished Professor Dr. David B. Audretsch: World Renowned
Researcher – Legendary Icon in Entrepreneurship �� 31
Donald F. Kuratko
A Journey Through Entrepreneurship�� 39
Mary Lindenstein Walshok
Part II Creating a Research Topic and a Field

The Symmetry of Acs and Audretsch: How We Met,
Why We Stuck and How We Succeeded�� 59
Zoltan J. Acs
Visions of the Past: David was Always There�� 71
Roy Thurik
ix
x Contents
Structural Change, Knowledge Spillovers and the Role of SMEs

and Entrepreneurship�� 77
Pontus Braunerhjelm
David B. Audretsch: Spilling Knowledge All Over the World �� 95
Per Davidsson
The Shape of Things to Come �� 99
Martin Prause and Jürgen Weigand
David Audretsch: A Source of Inspiration, a Co-author,
and a Friend�� 121
Enrico Santarelli
David: A Cultural Entrepreneur�� 125
Marco Vivarelli
David Audretsch and International Business: Bringing
It All Back Home�� 129
Saul Estrin and Daniel Shapiro
Regional Trajectories of Entrepreneurship and Growth �� 149
Michael Fritsch and Michael Wyrwich
David Audretsch and New Directions in Spillover
Academic Entrepreneurship �� 163
Mike Wright
David Audretsch – A Bibliometric Portrait of a Distinguished
Entrepreneurship Scholar�� 169
Charlie Karlsson and Björn Hammarfelt
David Audretsch: The Capacity to Design and to Influence
a Research Agenda �� 193
Maria Callejón
Education, Human Capital Spillovers and Productivity:
Evidence from Swedish Firm Level Production Functions�� 203
Johan E. Eklund and Lars Pettersson
Part III Creating a Community

Productivity Slowdown, Innovation and Industry Dynamics�� 229
Johannes Bersch, Josefine Diekhof, Bastian Krieger, Georg Licht,
and Simona Murmann
Dr. Audretsch: or How I Learned to Stop Worrying
and Love Doing Small Business Research �� 243
Julie Ann Elston
Contents xi
“I Want to, But I Also Need to”: Start-Ups Resulting

from Opportunity and Necessity�� 247
Marco Caliendo and Alexander S. Kritikos
Working with David on Both Sides of the Atlantic �� 267
Adam Lederer
Festschrift to David B. Audretsch �� 271
J. L. González-Pernía and Iñaki Peña-Legazkue
An Overview of the Economics of Entrepreneurship
and Small Business: The Legacy of David Audretsch�� 279
David Urbano and Sebastian Aparicio
Location and Firm Performance�� 307
Dirk Dohse and Johanna Schnier
The Inclusive Vision �� 319
Maria Minniti
You Made it the Best of Times�� 323
Sharon Alvarez
On Regional Innovator Networks as Hubs for Innovative Ventures �� 325
Uwe Cantner and Tina Wolf
The Emergence of Parental Entrepreneurship: Some Thoughts
About Family Life, Professional Careers and Entrepreneurship�� 349
Iris Kunadt
Financial and Institutional Reforms for an Entrepreneurial Society �� 359
Mark Sanders
Entrepreneurship in Public Policy Education: The Willy
Brandt School as a Case�� 369
Heike M. Grimm
Connecting People and Knowledge: Knowledge Spillovers,
Cognitive Biases, and Entrepreneurship�� 385
Werner Bönte and Diemo Urbig
Where Would I Be If My 25 Year-Old Self Was Aware
of the Gravitas of Dr. David Audretsch?�� 399
Brett Anitra Gilbert
The Multidisciplinary Entrepreneurship Scholar�� 403
Erik Stam
Thoughts About David�� 407
Sameeksha Desai
xii Contents
Part IV Creating the Future

Building Stronger Research Communities and Collaboration
Between Established and Young Scholars�� 413
Maksim Belitski
“Lessons from David Audretsch” in Festschrift for David Audretsch�� 421
Siri Terjesen
Off to New Shores: Knowledge Spillovers Between
Economics and Psychology or How I Published
with David Audretsch in PLOS One�� 425
Martin Obschonka
A Brief Case Study of the Audretsch Form of Davidial
Entrepreneurship Research Ecosystems�� 431
Allan O’Connor
David Audretsch Has Impacted My Academic Life in Many
Ways and I Would Like to Use This Opportunity to Thank Him
for His Tremendous Support�� 437
Kathrin Bischoff
David Audretsch: A Great Mind, An Outstanding Researcher,
and A Humble Individual�� 439
Mehmet Akif Demircioglu
Happy Birthday, David Audretsch: And All That Jazz�� 443
Monika Herzig
A Simple Behavioral Model of Stochastic Knowledge Accumulation�� 447
Torben Klarl and Matthias Menter
David Audretsch: A Literary Steckbrief�� 453
Sandra Schillo
Wings to Escape the Roots�� 459
Alexander Starnecker
Professor David Audretsch: My Doktorvater�� 465
Jagannadha Pawan Tamvada
Building Entrepreneurial Societies Through Entrepreneurial
Ecosystems and Business Incubators �� 467
Christina Theodoraki
David B. Audretsch, a Gatekeeper and Globetrotter�� 479
Silvio Vismara, Katharine Wirsching, and Jonah Otto
Part I
Family
Scenes from a Marriage
Joanne Audretsch
“Happy is the person who finds a true friend, and far happier is
that person who finds the true friend in their spouse.”
(paraphrased from Franz Schubert)
Abstract David Audretsch is a renowned scholar, teacher, mentor and friend to

many in the world. But he is also a husband, partner and father. He and I have expe-
rienced many years of adventures, ups and downs, joy and sadness, struggles and
achievements, births and deaths, all of which have served to enrich our lives on so
many levels. Life as a team has taken us to many places where we have shared
meaningful moments with colleagues and acquaintances but most importantly with
our boys and dear friends – cherished memories for which we are forever grateful.
My life’s adventure with this extraordinary and talented man with an over-sized
passport, a CV that runs seemingly forever, and a penchant for casual attire (aka
“the man in the robe”) started back in the ‘80’s. Let me take you with me on our
remarkable life’s journey.
The Courtship
May 1984. Back alley of 2723 Woodley Place, Washington, DC.

“Mel, what’s up? Can I help?” I asked my neighbor, who stood in the back alley,
seemingly at odds about something.
“Well, I can’t seem to get into my car... we have a friend of a friend staying with
us, and he parked his MG here but forgot to leave the keys. And I can’t seem to open
the door of my car enough to squeeze in!”
J. Audretsch (*)
Bloomington, IN, USA
© Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2019 3

E. E. Lehmann, M. Keilbach (eds.), From Industrial Organization to
Entrepreneurship, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-25237-3_1
4 J. Audretsch
“Let me drop you off at work then. It’s right on the way. Hop in!” As we drove
off, Mel added, “You should probably meet him. He’s looking for a place to stay,
and I know you have friends looking as well. He’s very nice.”
“Have him drop by then,” I replied, “and I’ll get in touch with the other guys.”
A day later, the doorbell rings. There stands a bearded man a bit over 6 feet tall,
late 20’s, slightly disheveled, with nice brown eyes and a friendly smile. “Hi! I’m
David,” he says, “a friend of the Rosenbergs. Mel said I should drop by and meet
you.” “Oh! You’re the guy with the sports car! Come in – would you like a drink?
We make pretty good frozen daiquiris here!”
And that’s how it began. Later that week, we went on a real date to a Vietnamese
restaurant in Georgetown, bopping around the city and cruising past the monuments
in that little white MG David cruised around in back then. At dinner, we discovered
many unusual commonalities in our lives; conversation flowed easily and a connec-
tion was made. So date #2 was set for the weekend: a trip to Assateague Island.
Despite the bright sunshine, our brains were a big foggy from previously-arranged
dates with other people the night before. The drive to Assateague passes through
lovely countryside, and sooner than we realized, several hours had passed and we
had arrived at this beautiful island populated by wild ponies. Soon we found a
picture-perfect beach set below a ridge. We parked and took our beach things to the
high dunes. My bathing suit was under my sundress, so as I undressed and set out
the towels, David arrived with the picnic basket. As he got undressed and turned, I
noticed that his bathing suit was inside out: the webbing, the pockets, the drawstring
were all simply hanging out. The wind suddenly whipped up and I said, “David,
look-- your bathing suit!” He looked at me and said, “Gee, you guys wear your suits
funny down here in Virginia!”
And so began our crazy, fun, and unexpected journey through life! (You can’t say
I wasn’t warned!)
The rest of the summer of 1984 passed with increasing speed. Although David
had come to DC to work for the International Trade Commission, he had also been
in pursuit of a girl (isn’t that always the story?!). I, too, was coming off a serious
relationship... and although our relationship was deepening with each passing
day, each home-cooked meal, each daiquiri party or G&T cocktail afternoon, I
strongly encouraged him to figure it out. Knowing this could simply be “a summer
love,” I personally tried to keep things as light as I could, despite the tell-tale feel-
ing that I was falling in love more and more with each passing day. As June rolled
over to July, we ended up spending more time together until it was everyday.
When August rolled around and it was time for David to return to Middlebury
College, he invited me along for the drive back. From there, our relationship
entailed daily conversations on the work WATS lines, monthly visits, and
Thanksgiving and Christmas holidays spent together. The relationship was deep-
ening as the months flew past.
Scenes from a Marriage 5
The Man Without a Passport
Argentina, Australia, Austria, the Bahamas, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, Columbia,

Costa Rica, Denmark, England, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, India,
Indonesia, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Japan, Korea, Lithuania, Mexico, The Netherlands,
New Zealand, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Puerto Rico, Russia, Saudi Arabia,
Scotland, Singapore, Spain, Thailand, Turkey, Tunisia... When we think of David,
we think of the man on the move, traveling from city to city, country to country,
continent to continent, in the pursuit of meaningful personal connections and con-
tributions to the world of ideas and science as he simultaneously shrugs off the
mantle of jet lag! But when I met David in 1984, he did not possess a passport. In
fact, he had only done a small amount of local travel as a child; his greatest travel
adventure was his post-college hiking trip to the California Sierra mountains. David
was a “stay-cation” kind of guy who really did not like change (Who knew?!). The
summer of 1984, when presented with an opportunity to work at the
Wissenschaftszentrum Berlin (WZB) for his upcoming sabbatical, he was a bit hesi-
tant: no passport, no living-abroad experience, no knowledge of the language ... But
with enthusiastic support and much encouragement on my part, he applied for a
passport and accepted a 2-year position at the WZB. Our life’s adventure was about
to begin in earnest!
The Proposal
In March, prior to his impending departure for Berlin in May, David and I rendez-
voused in the Bay area, where he was visiting his mother and I had just terminated
a cross-country trip with my roommate. We were staying with my friend’s parents
in the wine country near Santa Rosa. As we were preparing to go to dinner our first
night, David casually said, “You know, I was thinking... I’d like you to come to
Berlin with me. I thought maybe we could get married.” WHAT???!!! “What did
you just say?” I asked, a bit incredulously. “I said, I thought maybe we could get
married.” “Oh my God...!!! Well, I’m going to give you 24 hours to think about it,
and if you still want me to, then YES, I will! But after 24 hours, there’s no backing
out!” A day later, we sealed the deal – we agreed to a marriage but there were no
other details to report at that time.
And such was “the proposal” – nothing in today’s terms of young lovers staging
grand, romantic events on hot air balloons, underwater diving reefs or mountain
tops. No...this proposal was simple, honest, and from the heart. Although there was
no tangible evidence (i.e. a ring), I trusted in love and sold my car, moved my
belongings back to Rhode Island, packed two suitcases and left for a divided city
still in the throes of the Cold War where neither of us spoke the language or knew
the culture. This would be a deal breaker... or a deal maker. Only time would tell.
6 J. Audretsch
The Ring
The first months in Berlin were spent getting to know the city, the culture, and the
language. We both attended intensive Goethe Institute classes after which David
would then go off to the WZB to work and I would head back to do homework and
engage in the everyday tasks of life in a German city in the mid-1980’s, when stores
closed daily at 6 pm (promptly!) and were only opened until 1 or 2 pm on Saturdays –
nothing open on Sundays! Slowly, we acquired usable language skills which we
inflicted upon friends and strangers alike. We began to acclimate to our new culture
and were happy to embrace the habits and mores of our new home country. We both
greatly appreciated the different ways of life, the customs, and the social system of
our new “home” – for that was where our hearts were.
In December, David recognized the need for a token of his appreciation for our
upcoming marriage. We went “window shopping” in the Schloss Strasse near our
Schmiljanstrasse apartment. At a local jeweler, we found a modest, lovely, under-
stated sapphire ring that I thought would do a fine job representing our engagement
on an official level. Not being absolutely certain, we continued to shop but I still
hadn’t found anything I liked better as the holidays approached. I thought that per-
haps, maybe, I might find something under our very first Christmas tree on Christmas
day. I went down to the jeweler just before the holiday to see if the ring was still
there (we had asked them to hold it for us) but when I asked about it, our young
saleswoman just shook her head and said, “I’m so sorry... it’s been sold!” I was
extremely disappointed and truthfully, a bit sad. So I wasn’t surprised that Santa did
not leave an engagement ring under the tree or dangling from an ornament. Nor was
there one forthcoming on New Year’s Eve or New Year’s Day... I just thought we
would have to start looking again once the holidays were past.
One cold work-day afternoon in early January, I was home ironing when David
came home unexpectedly early. “Here,” he said, as he gingerly placed a small black
velvet box down on the ironing board. “What is it?” I asked, somewhat puzzled as I
gently opened the box. What did I find inside but “my” sapphire ring! “I bought it
before Christmas... that’s why it wasn’t there when you went back to ask. But I
wanted to surprise you so I didn’t give it to you for Christmas.” LOL... I must say, I
was indeed surprised! And I don’t think there are too many women who have
received their engagement rings while engaged in domestic labor... so David gets
point in the area of originality! (And for the record, I still iron his shirts to this day!
Could that have been the economist in him, not only considering division of labor
but also economies of scale? LOL! Who knows?)
The Marriage
Short, sweet, simple. We did try to romanticize the act by organizing a very small
“destination wedding” in Paris before it was trendy to do such a thing. But thanks to
French bureaucracy, life’s best-laid plans went awry so our planned May 1985 wed-
ding turned into a lesser battle with German bureaucracy – with greater success. On
July 25th, 1986, David and I stood side by side in the Standesamt of the Rathaus
Schoeneberg and said, “Ich bin ein Berliner!” Actually, we both said, “Ja!” and
exchanged rings and meaningful yet questioning glances, as neither of us com-
pletely understood German at the time and weren’t exactly sure what we’d commit-
ted to, except that we knew it was to a future, in sickness and in health, in good
times and in bad... And on that note, after we signed papers and received our
Stammbuch and its first official entry – our wedding certificate – we headed down
the stairs and out the front door to the same place JFK stood in November 1963. To
our surprise, we were personally heralded by the sounds of a lively brass band
headed up by David’s secretary and her hobby band, as we descended into the
weekly Friday market on the platz in front of the Rathaus. Our married life had
officially begun!
The Wall
As David’s two-year stint at the WZB was nearing a close, the decision needed to be
made: do we stay or do we go now? David’s work was starting to get published, and
he was discovering that he was as good at research as he was at teaching. After
much soul-searching and discussion, the decision was made: we would remain in
Berlin. David received a multi-year extension on his contract. Berlin had really now
become our home.
Since I would now be living in the city for an undetermined amount of time, I
realized I had only one real choice for a job: the occupying US Army, Berlin
Brigade. After a brief stint of 4 months commuting to my friend’s art gallery in
Paris, I finally received word that my security clearance was approved, so in January
1988 I began work for the Commander of Berlin’s Combat Support Battalion at the
old Prussian Army barracks in Lichterfelde. In January 1989, I began working for
the General Staff’s G-3 at Clay Allee Headquarters, learning an entire new lexicon,
lots of history and a very different kind of social order that affected our adopted city
of Berlin.
8 J. Audretsch
The Fall of the Wall
The winter of ‘89 was a fierce one, with early snow, wind that bit your cheeks, and
temperatures cold enough to start putting the area’s lakes into a deep freeze. The
evening of November 9th, we were out with WZB colleagues at the (original) Cafe
Einstein, discussing the weather as well as the recent events and unrest in Hungary
and East Germany. The Berliners in the group mused that despite the stirrings com-
ing out of the East Block and Gorbachev’s policy of glasnost, nothing was going to
happen. Life would certainly continue as it had since the Wall went up in August
1961. There was no way we would ever in our lifetimes see a solution to “the German
question.” After dinner, we all headed home through the icy streets. Upon returning
to our apartment in the Wiesbadenerstrasse, David hopped into the bath to relieve
the chill and I turned on the evening news. It was about 11 pm, more of less, and I
prepared for bed, I half-listened to the newscaster. Suddenly, an image caught my
eye and I turned up the volume, listening intently. My German was good but not
perfect, and I sometimes had trouble with “trennbar” verbs. Pictures of crowds gath-
ered at the Wall filled the screen, and I thought I understood: “The Wall has fallen.”
WHAT?! I listened again but I wasn’t certain, so I ran to the bathroom and implored
David to get out. After some grumbling, he did and standing in the doorway, drip-
ping, with a towel wrapped around him, he confirmed,” That’s what he said: the Wall
has fallen!” The utterly unthinkable had happened! The entire world changed in
those few short hours – all without a shot being fired or a life being lost. We were
living at the crossroads of history as an almost indescribable feeling of exhilaration
filled the city. The excitement of those heady first days slowly settled down as the
city – and the world – realized that this was real and the old world order as we knew
it was truly gone. But it was an extraordinary moment to have witnessed first-hand.
The Family
Summer of 1990 I discovered I was pregnant. On April 25th, 1991 our dear first-
born son, Alex, entered this world. We were overjoyed to be the parents of a healthy
boy who brought such joy to us as we stumbled through first-time parenthood in a
foreign country with no family support. But we took advantage of all Berlin had to
offer: walks through the Tiergarten and along the Spree, play times in the multitude
of lovely city parks, frequent visits to the Zoo, hours observing the cranes and work-
sites that peppered the center of the city as it prepared to resume its place as
Germany’s capital.
David continued his work, traveling, publishing, lecturing, mentoring. Time
passed and our wonderful son number two was born: James graced us with his com-
pany on a gray overcast Berlin day on February 26th, 1991. We now had two official
Berliners! Life continued much as it had when Alex was a baby except now it was
double the fun.
The Return of the Prodigal Academic
In 1996, opportunity presented itself in the form of a job offer from Georgia State
University. We had always said we would know when the time was right to return to
the US. And despite the politics of the time, we both felt that “the right time” had
come to leave our beloved Berlin. So in July 1996, we picked up and left our chang-
ing Berlin for a new life back in our home country.
Less than 2 years after landing in Atlanta and buying our first house, David
received an exceptional offer for an endowed chair at Indiana University. So the
summer of 1998 had us packed up once again and moving yet further west into the
country’s heartland. Shortly after our arrival in Bloomington, we were blessed with
the addition of another amazing son, Christopher, who came into the world on
September 5, 1998. Two Berliners and a Hoosier... our family was now complete!
David’s career continued its upward trajectory as we continued to juggle his
travel and our family life. In the year 2001, David was awarded the Global Award
for Entrepreneurship Research by the Swedish Foundation for Small Business
Research. – a great honor which he accepted with his usual combination of grati-
tude, humility and grace. A lecture circuit was part of the award, so Christopher and
I accompanied David on his speaking tour during a bout of unusually warm, sunny
and glorious spring weather.
In 2003, opportunity knocked once again. David was able to work out a plan to
retain his position at IU but still become Director at Max-Planck in Jena. It was an
ideal time for the family, so we rented a lovely apartment in Weimar and decamped
for 9 months. We continued to enjoy summers in Weimar throughout David’s tenure
there, as well as the company of a multitude of young doctoral and post-doc stu-
dents as well as new career academics who have since become dear friends. It was
an exciting chapter in our lives, and brought us back to Germany, which will always
hold a special place in our hearts.
As the decade of the naughts merged into the teens, David’s resume continued to
grow: more articles, more books, more interviews, more accolades. He was greatly
honored to receive an honorary doctorate from the University of Augsburg as well as
one from the University of Jonkoping. Other awards include the Schumpeter Prize
from the University of Wuppertal as well as a Distinguished Professor title awarded
by Indiana University. Associations with other institutions such as the WHU, the
Friedrich-Schiller-University of Jena, or the King Saud University, continued to add
to his world influence. Summers were spent enjoying the Max-Planck Institute, its
people and numerous conferences and events. The boys were privileged to be part of
European culture that included much travel as well as immersion into everyday
German life. We were fortunate that we were able to include the boys’ friends in
these visits as many of the boys’ 12life lessons stem from these shared adventures.
There is a family-written volume aptly entitled, “The Book of Transitions,” excerpts
of which are shared by the boys elsewhere in this volume. Some of the more famous
quotes include: “Do not EVER EVER cross over the white line!” “Boys, focus! We
are in transition.” “Do you see anybody else doing it? No... so don’t do it!”
10 J. Audretsch
David Audretsch, International Man of Mystery
Academics who know of David are aware of his storied academic credentials, and
rightfully in awe of his accomplishments. But those who really know David know
that this globe-trotting man with the ready grin and low-key nature, the backpack
holding the ever-present computer and passport, and his ubiquitous black carry-on
suitcase, is one of the most humble and unassuming people on the planet. He never
takes himself too seriously, doesn’t really like people who do, and is always ready
with a goofy joke: “Never let truth stand in the way of a good story!” is one of his
mantras. He is a ready mentor to anyone who asks. He is beyond generous with his
time and talents, always ready to help, assist, guide and mentor. His intellectual
largess spills over to his colleagues as well, always offered without pretension and
in the true spirit of academe: exchange of ideas and the pursuit of knowledge. Some
have speculated that David might actually be a spy... but those “in the know” realize
this cannot possibly be true. This is a man who has worn two different shoes to work
(without even noticing), who mixes plaids with stripes, who’s lost wallets (but never
keys!), whose favorite outfit is a “dressing gown,” and who wears his bathing suit
inside out. It’s probably not likely that he is a spy (but you never know – this just
might be the best disguise ever!)
Transitions
As time continues to fly by, we have seen our boys grow into amazing, funny, tal-
ented, loyal, kind and generous young men, much like their father. Once dark hair
(yes – there is still some!) now shows some gray. Amazingly, there aren’t too many
wrinkles. And the mind seems to still come up with new ideas and contributions.
Attitudes are definitely youthful yet mellowed by age and wisdom. After more than
three decades, I am fortunate enough that my adventures with this extraordinary,
humble, talented and generous man continue as we transition into a different phase
of life, back to just the two of us again, as it began back in the ‘80’s. If I could do it
all over again... I absolutely would! I consider myself one of the luckiest people I
know, being married to such a wonderful man who has remained my partner, my
best friend, my guide and support through life’s uneven terrain, and whose constant
love and generosity has been the anchor of our family. It has been an honor and a
privilege to call this man my husband. Who knew a simple “Ja” would have resulted
in such a magnificent, exciting roller coaster ride of life? No one knows what life
has in store for this next phase of life now that we are “empty-nesters.” But whatever
it is, I’m buckling my seat belt, holding on tight, and enjoying the ride into our
autumn years, knowing we will continue to travel the world and spend as much time
possible with our boys and those who are near and dear to us!
I Will Always Be Proud to Call Him My
Father
James Audretsch
Abstract Undoubtedly many know David Audretsch the prolific scholar, teacher
and administrator, but a few are even luckier to know a deeper facet of his life –
David Audretsch the father. This chapter, penned by one of his sons, provides an
in-depth and humorous look at the unique manner in which David has imparted
wisdom to his children and helped to mold them into the men that they have become.
Often humorous and light-hearted, but always sincere, the following pages illumi-
nate David as the caring father that those close to him and his family know him
to be.
“If you don’t like it, you can just quit,” he tells me. “You often feel like you’re
trapped, but it is an illusion. You can always just walk away.” This piece of advice
as I contend as perhaps the best he has preached, spoken to me the day before I leave
to Saudi Arabia as my father nears 64 years of age. Dad has always supported me,
ever since I can remember. Genuine, sincere, unconditional love and support. What
more could you ask for from a father?
I’ll outline this with an issue that affects every parent/child relationship – what
should the child do with his/her life? As one grows older, the question so fondly
asked to children, “What do you want to be when you grow up?”, morphs from
dreamlike childhood romanticism to existentially terrifying, leading one to manu-
facture responses to ward off whomever may ask the question. You have no idea
what you want to be when you grow up. You have no idea, and you’re sick of being
asked.
I think a lot of people might assume there was pressure to follow in my dad’s
footsteps in the scientific community, especially related to economics. Astoundingly,
I truly don’t know if it affects my father that none of his children pursued the same
interest that he did. I’d be surprised to know if it dismays him at all – there was not
even a hint of pressure growing up to fulfill this preordained trajectory. I very much
expect he wants us to live as he did – blazing our own trails as we navigate our
uncertain lives.
J. Audretsch (*)

12 J. Audretsch
Dealing much with this concept of life’s uncertainty is a book my Dad holds
most dear; it is a book he gifted to me on my 23rd birthday, “Zen and the Art of
Motorcycle Maintenance”. In this book a father embarks on a motorcycle road trip
with his son, navigating through the United States as they travel West from
Minnesota to California. Together the father and son voyage on a journey that is as
much emotional and spiritual as it is physical, symbolically climbing mountains and
traversing precarious terrain as their abstruse relationship unfolds. One of the mean-
ingful messages of this book is that you should find joy in whatever you may be
doing, especially the mundane. If you are repairing a motorcycle, a zen state should
be achieved during the repairing process itself, not only from the joy in the final
product. Particular striking is that Robert Pirsig, a man who wrote computer manu-
als for a living, authored Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance. I’m sure
Pirsig never thought that a profession of authoring computer manuals would be
succeeded by becoming a multi-million bestselling book author. When I’m unsure
of my career choices, my father often advises something like, “Where you are now,
the decisions you make, it never seems like the destination you’ll end up at… in a
roundabout way it will lead you there”.
This book substantially influenced my father’s ideals and beliefs. The reason he
considers himself a successful person is not necessarily because of his accomplish-
ments in academia (which he is very proud of though); it is because he enjoys the
processes of his career, from writing papers, to giving talks, to teaching students.
When one considers the fleeting evanescence of life and legacy, awards and achieve-
ments pale in comparison to the real honest-to-good enjoyment of the zen of living.
In the Summer of 2017, my final summer after undergraduate, I climbed Mt.
Kilimanjaro in Tanzania to conclude a 6-week adventure in the heart of the Serengeti.
It was a profound trip in many regards, but none so much as the random chain of
events would lead me to Saudi Arabia 3 months later. Another one of my father’s
conversations resonates with me: It’s little moments that can have the most influen-
tial and far reaching impact on your life. Instead of rigidly pursuing a specific goal,
you must be flexible and willing to reorient yourself.
Coincidentally in parallel, my father also embarked on a mountaineering trip in
the final summer of his undergraduate degree. He climbed Mt. Whitney, a several
week journey that culminated in the 14,505-foot ascent. His accidental death wish
came from drinking treacherous river water during one of the stops. Later, he would
be throwing up uncontrollably all night, draining the little energy that remained
from nearly 2 weeks of trekking. The only thing that saved his life, he says, is a fire
that his friend built that kept him on a warm lifeline through the night. Certainly an
apt metaphor for the uncertainty and unpredictability of life.
My father knew where he was going after this; he would begin a master’s degree
in Madison, Wisconsin. Yet, Mt. Whitney was still an ephemeral, epiphanius transi-
tion in his life. He remembers it vividly like the waking moments upon a dream, yet
recalls it with surreal blurriness as if spilling liquid on a watercolor painting. One
man left, and another returned from the mountain. It was a gradual metamorphosis,
the kind that one can only retrospectively look back upon and realize: yes, this
moment changed me.
I Will Always Be Proud to Call Him My Father 13
The fact that he even tells stories about this experience bespeaks it’s significance.
When it comes to his personal life, my father is oddly quiet, seeking comfort in soli-
tude. The man who so eagerly outbursts theatrical stories and witty jokes with his
family suddenly suppresses his tongue when discussing his childhood. As a man of
few words when it comes to his own history, his indulgence in telling a personal
story means that you should listen carefully, as you might not hear it again for years.
I think that he is proud of how he has shaped his own life, so he lives in the present
more than in the past. Things are very peaceful and routine in regards to his career
and family now; this structured happiness is desirable.
Things weren’t always this stable and happy. I remember some years when my
father wasn’t around that much. Overseas business was such a commonality that at
one point he only rented cars when he was home because it made more financial
sense than actually owning a car. I liked this side effect at the time because he rented
a convertible for my 12th birthday, and relayed my friends to laser tag back and
forth in it.
His most difficult sacrifices came from these overseas trips during my youth. It
wasn’t any particular large occasions; in fact, I know he valued the everyday
moments more than the overblown events. None hurt more-so than missing my soc-
cer games. It’s impossible to understand as a kid how nostalgically you’ll reminisce
these moments when you’re older. Especially as a parent, there’s an undeniable
allure of watching your kid participate in sports. These are moments where you can
watch your child grow in real time right before your eyes; you see them struggle
and undergo hardships, overcome challenges, compete, showcase their talents,
practice humility, experience passion and joy. Every time he missed one of my soc-
cer games, I could feel the regret in his voice from across the world, reconciling, “I
really wish I could have been there. I’ll be at the next one.” For me, that was always
enough, to hear the sincerity in his voice. For him, he would have done anything to
be there.
My father taught me a great deal about being a man, in traditional “father-to-son”
manner. He taught me how to drive a car, throw a baseball, catch a football, and grill
a steak; how to shave a beard, tie a tie, and drink a beer. He would drive me to school
before I was 16, take me to soccer practice, and cheer for me at soccer and ultimate
frisbee tournaments. Our family would often have dinner together at the dining
room, discussing events that occurred in the day. In many ways, we are the tradi-
tional twenty first century American family.
I vicariously feel nostalgia from remembering my Dad teach my younger brother
how to ride a bike in Weimar, and vaguely recall a memory of riding around our cul
de sac in Bloomington on training wheels. Many earlier childhood memories, like
competing with my brothers in algebra problems on the car-rides to school, reflect
our edified upbringing.
Most importantly, my father taught me about perspective. Why is perspective
valuable? When you lose perspective, you begin to lose the truth. You begin to force
yourself to do things that you don’t want to do and become unhappy. When my dad
considered job offers from different cities around the US, some paying substantially
more, he decided to stay in Bloomington. When he decided to stop working at Max
14 J. Audretsch
Planck in Jena, Germany (which sourced many of his overseas flights), it was
because he wanted to be in Bloomington more with his family. This is perspective;
he realized what would make him and his family happiest.
In my life, my father, best described using chremamorphism, is a compass. He is
a compass that provides me perspective. When I feel like I’ve lost my way, espe-
cially career related, I simply look to the compass to guide me in the right direction.
It is not perfect; the hands waver, uncertain of the right path. Sometimes they change
dramatically, sweeping in an arc around the circumference to point in an entirely
new direction. Even the cardinal labels “NESW” aren’t evenly spaced apart, dynam-
ically shifting around. “What good is a compass like this?” you might ask. Well,
what the compass does convey remarkably well is what directions not to take. My
father always seems to help orient me into avoiding the wrong directions; his advice
in completing an undergraduate education helped me keep as many doors open as
possible. My father taught me: perhaps most importantly in life is not making the
right choice, for it’s likely in the absence of foresight there are indistinguishably
many; it is avoiding the wrong ones.
The merit of this approach is in fact employed by companies engaged in recruit-
ing. The most valuable recruiting system is one that avoids bad employees, rather
than one that acquires the cream of the crop along with a few bad ones. The reason
being that the characteristic of bad (as an employee or a decision in a person’s life)
erodes the future substantially more than the difference between good and great. I
guess the reverberations of my father’s economics work do echo through me a
little bit.
Imagine you’re (potentially trapped) on a road trip with my dad and mom. You
can ask them to do complete tasks for the trip. If you know my dad, you surely
wouldn’t want him to navigate the directions (ironically he’s not much of a real
compass) or pack the essential items (you might end up with shorts and a t-shirt on
a ski trip, or a fur coat on the beach). Only my mother can pack right! To book the
accommodation, get snacks for the road, or remember to fill the car with gas – that’s
best left up to my Mom for your own safety and comfort. If you want to play a game
to pass the time in the car, my mom would think of one much better than my dad.
You might ask him to pick the destination. It will almost certainly involve nature,
hiking, probably on a mountain in a cabin, certainly remote. “The less people the
better,” I can almost hear him say. You ask to engage him in conversation during the
long ride up, because this is where he really excels – contemplative, insightful, and
interesting conversation.
The discrepancy between my father and mother’s personalities is unequivocally
humorous. Their success comes from the unlikely way they complement one
another, like the unsuspecting way a mouthful of peanut butter is washed down with
a glass of milk. Their personalities are comically different; any member of our fam-
ily can recall with a perplexed grin how my dad would host elaborate dinner parties
and mysteriously disappear halfway through the night – meanwhile, my mom
enthusiastically entertain the entire party.
I Will Always Be Proud to Call Him My Father 15
My father is big idea oriented and my mother small detail oriented. It is why,
against odds, they manage to have a successful marriage – that and the fact that I set
up Netflix on their TV.
I readily believe that my mother is a primary factor in how my father has been so
successful. You wouldn’t be able to write a complete biography on my father with-
out discussing their relationship in great depth. As an incredibly emotionally intro-
verted person, having my mother to talk to openly with must mean a great deal to
him. Through difficult times for both of them, like my mother’s grandmother pass-
ing away, they are always there for each other. They do get the small things wrong
sometimes, but every relationship has hills and valleys. It is incredibly admirable to
know, and really know for certain, in a time of need they would drop their current
activity in a heartbeat to be at each other’s side.
With their children, my parents witnessed different manifestations of themselves.
Different aspects of my father’s and mother’s personalities are more pronounced in
my brothers and me. My younger brother with a mix of softer and rigid aspects of
their personalities: pensive, mathematical, independent, composed, creative and
extremely gifted. Christopher definitely contains my dad’s mysteriousness. Myself
balanced: humorous, social, adaptable, patient, spontaneous, and creative. I thank
my mother for bestowing her socialness and my father for his insight. My older
brother with the most extreme aspects of both of my parents’ personalities: hyper
intense intelligence, curiosity, stubbornness and passion. Alex is blessed with bril-
liant traits and mildly cursed with others. Through their parenting, my father and
mother managed to raise us all to excel in whatever walk of life we find ourselves
in – and trust me, raising us was no easy task (wholly due to Alex and Christopher
no doubt). My father taught me lessons in philosophy, ideals, and morals that I will
pass onto my children. My brothers uniquely learned their own life altering
lessons.
Presently, when we talk these days, I notice a glossy translucence hovering over
my father’s eyes. He gets this way when he ponders, which, I might say, happens
somewhat often. There’s a sort of hazy mirror when he looks at me, like watching
your own reflection morph from ripples in a pond. Often I wonder what he is think-
ing about, but I don’t ask. I theorize it may be this:
Your lasting imprint on the world, beyond and exceeding the legacy of your
work, is in the nascent impressions of your children and generations to follow. My
father’s legacy will last far beyond his lifetime.
He is going to be 65 in a year. And what a remarkable life he’s had. Yes, he has
his share of faults. But what makes a man is not a collection of individual moments;
it’s something indescribably greater than the sum of his moments. From the aca-
demic intellectual community, to our local community, to our own friends and fam-
ily, David has forged lasting impressions and created meaningful impact in our
lives. I will always be proud to call him my father.
My Dad, the Athlete, Entertainer, Phrase
Philosopher, Conformist and Analogist
Christopher Audretsch
Abstract This chapter, authored by his son Christopher, portrays many of the
different sides to David. Giving insight behind the easy-going and mild-mannered
professor, Christopher details the complexity and multi-dimensional aspects of
his father that most do not know. From his wit to his disciplined nature and every-
thing in between, this chapter gives the reader a into the different areas of David’s
personality.
When I was a child, I harbored the idea that my dad was not a single person, but
rather some sort of amalgamation of thirteen different people in one body. My diag-
noses of multiple-personality-disorder may not have been completely spot-on, but
there is more than a kernel of truth to what I was thinking. My dad who calmly takes
his blood-pressure in the morning really can seem like a different person that my
dad who panics if he only gets to the airport 2 hours early. At the end of the day, my
dad’s quirky moods are what makes him unique, and I’m happy to say that they are
more endearing than annoying.
The Athlete
It is Sunday morning, and the athlete wakes up at 5:45 am and puts on his robe
(which, until his 64th birthday, was about 20 years old, and contained many holes
and other imperfections). He moves downstairs, makes a cup of green tea and brings
it to the living room, which houses the designated blood-pressure couch and moni-
tor. David sits on the couch, carefully placing his right leg over his left knee, while
his left leg rests comfortably on the carpet. This position has been anecdotally
shown to reduce blood pressure by up to 2%, so it is imperative that it mustn’t vary.
The athlete picks up his tea and leans back, resting for a bit; minutes away from the
performance, it is crucial that his pulse remains low and his blood
well-oxygenated.
C. Audretsch (*)

18 C. Audretsch
Now, it is time to don the equipment. The competitor rolls up the sleeve on his
robe and gently cuffs his right bicep with the monitoring band, taking care to move
slowly throughout the process – a jerky movement at this point could render his
entire relaxation routine useless. Content with the cuffing (firm and without play or
excessive pressure), the sportsman reaches down with his non-dominant hand to
press the “Start” button.
A gentle hum, and it begins. A pleasant buzzing in the upper arm – a feeling the
contestant has associated with intense concentration and excitement. Seconds pass,
and a twinge of anxiety attacks his mind – what if I don’t score well today? Though
startled for an instant, David regains his composure; years of eating flax seeds and
taking fish oil have given him a deep confidence in his ability. Clear in the mind, the
contestant focuses on breathing, inhaling for precisely 8 counts and exhaling for
4 — a method that has been taught to him by some of the most cutting-edge internet
articles on the planet. Omega-3 s circulate his bloodstream, providing a healthy fat
ratio in the man’s cells. Finally, the buzzing stops, and two numbers appear on the
monitor: 92 over 65. Extremely healthy by all metrics. A score that medical profes-
sionals praise, health-nuts aspire to, and the average joe would kill for. But David’s
record is 90 over 64.
Unsatisfied, the sportsman reaches down with his non-dominant hand to press
the “Start” button.
The Entertainer
It is impossible to be in the presence of both a bottle of Budweiser and my dad

without hearing: “How is American beer like making love in a canoe? They’re both
fucking close to water.”
If you’re lucky enough to be around him and his wife, you’ll inevitably be told
his favorite (fictional) story about her. “Do you know what Joanne said before we
saw the movie Lincoln? ‘Don’t tell me how it ends!’”
Like many fathers, mine believes that jokes and humorous quips get funnier the
more times they are told. When Joanne complains of a mess in the kitchen, David
will be the first to yell “It was Alex!” – despite (or rather precisely because of) Alex
being 2000 miles away and James and I being right there. In fact, my dad has a
whole genre of “blame-the-brother-who-isn’t-here” jokes; on a good night, he can
pump out over a dozen during a single dinner.
The Phrase Philosopher
Early on in my life, I was taught the importance of “knowing when to hold ‘em and
when to fold ‘em.” Any instance of a young person taking a risk is a fitting example
of how “the difference between old people and young people is that old people
My Dad, the Athlete, Entertainer, Phrase Philosopher, Conformist and Analogist 19
assume the null hypothesis is true; young people reject it.” By squinting your eyes a
little, my dad’s view on IU (“it’s all about the parking”) can be abstracted and
applied to whatever he deems fit. “Not good enough!” – a Davidism with long-
forgotten origins – now both applies to an unsatisfactory meal and verbally embod-
ies the idea of the invisible hand.
Success in life – be it finding love, a job, or a place to live – is simply a matter of
“choosing a large n.” As a frequent traveler, David has realized that a person’s iden-
tity depends on what country they are currently in; Joanne is correspondingly
referred to as “little”, “klein”, or “pequeña”. And if you ask my dad what freedom
is, he’ll give you an answer straight from a classic rock song: “Freedom’s just
another word for nothing left to lose”.
Transition David
Transition David materializes during or slightly before periods of extended travel

(particularly travel on public transportation with his family). Contrary to his usual
self, Transition David is high-strung, impatient, and, quite frankly, a bitch to be
around. Transition David can often be spotted at airport terminals, standing seri-
ously by his baggage and keeping precise track of both the minute hand on his
watch and the arrival status of his flight. What Transition David lacks in agreeability
and overall pleasantness, he makes up in his outstanding walking pace (over 7 miles
an hour!) and excellent flight-attendance record.
The Conformist
Spending 10 years abroad will change you. For my dad, it’s clear that that the
German spirit of ordentlichkeit rubbed off on him.
Perhaps the most ashamed of me my dad has ever been was at a train station in
Berlin, circa 2009. A foot or so before the platform stopped and the track began,
there was a yellow line signifying the limits of where one could stand. In fact, David
had drilled me for years about the importance of keeping my distance and specifi-
cally not crossing the yellow line at train stations.
So here I was, standing absentmindedly by the tracks (perhaps half a foot from
the yellow line), when I heard my dad tell me to move away from the line. In an act
of impulsion, undoubtably inspired by teenage rebellion and angst, I stepped for-
ward instead of backward, crossing the yellow line and my father’s boundaries. One
small step for me, but a complete destruction of the Weltanschauung that David had
tried to impart on my young mind.
Upon further reflection, many of David’s iconic comments from my childhood
echo the symbolism of not crossing the yellow line. For instance, he would scold me
for eccentric behavior on the U-Bahn by saying, “Do you see anybody else doing
20 C. Audretsch
[that]?” Or, upon not finishing my dessert, being told to eat my damn rote grütze. In
quintessential David style, these phrases were repeated constantly. And, to his
credit, I still remember them (and the idea of social ordentlichkeit) today.
The Analogist
Here are a few things that I’ve learned are like the Hunger Games:
Deciding which restaurant to eat at
Bidding No Trump in the game of Bridge
Applying to college
Flying with Delta
JFK Airport
Going to a gay bar in Berlin
Finding love
Being a professor
Grading students
Applying for jobs
Being married to Joanne
Another random document with
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consequence secured in your bill of rights, concerning which that
proposal is silent. Is that the language of the bill of rights in
England? Is it the language of the American bill of rights, that these
three rights, and these only, are valuable? Is it the language of men
going into a new government? Is it not necessary to speak of those
things before you go into a compact? How do these three things
stand? As one of the parties, we declare we do not mean to give them
up. This is very dictatorial; much more so than the conduct which
proposes alterations as the condition of adoption. In a compact,
there are two parties—one accepting, and another proposing. As a
party, we propose that we shall secure these three things; and before
we have the assent of the other contracting party, we go into the
compact, and leave these things at their mercy. What will be the
consequence? Suppose the other states will call this dictatorial: they
will say, Virginia has gone into the government, and carried with her
certain propositions, which, she says, ought to be concurred in by the
other states. They will declare, that she has no right to dictate to
other states the conditions on which they shall come into the union.
According to the honorable member’s proposal, the ratification will
cease to be obligatory unless they accede to these amendments. We
have ratified it. You have committed a violation, they will say. They
have not violated it. We say we will go out of it. You are then reduced
to a sad dilemma—to give up these three rights, or leave the
government. This is worse than our present confederation, to which
we have hitherto adhered honestly and faithfully. We shall be told we
have violated it, because we have left it for the infringement and
violation of conditions, which they never agreed to be a part of the
ratification. The ratification will be complete. The proposal is made
by one party. We, as the other, accede to it, and propose the security
of these three great rights; for it is only a proposal. In order to secure
them, you are left in that state of fatal hostility, which I shall as much
deplore as the honorable gentleman. I exhort gentlemen to think
seriously before they ratify this constitution, and persuade
themselves that they will succeed in making a feeble effort to get
amendments after adoption. With respect to that part of the proposal
which says that every power not granted remains with the people, it
must be previous to adoption, or it will involve this country in
inevitable destruction. To talk of it is a thing subsequent, not as one
of your inalienable rights, is leaving it to the casual opinion of the
congress who shall take up the consideration of the matter. They will
not reason with you about the effect of this constitution. They will
not take the opinion of this committee concerning its operation. They
will construe it as they please. If you place it subsequently, let me ask
the consequences. Among ten thousand implied powers which they
may assume, they may, if we be engaged in war, liberate every one of
your slaves, if they please. And this must and will be done by men, a
majority of whom have not a common interest with you. They will,
therefore, have no feeling for your interests.
It has been repeatedly said here that the great object of a national
government is national defence. That power which is said to be
intended for security and safety, may be rendered detestable and
oppressive. If you give power to the general government to provide
for the general defence, the means must be commensurate to the
end. All the means in the possession of the people must be given to
the government which is intrusted with the public defence. In this
state there are two hundred and thirty-six thousand blacks, and there
are many in several other states; but there are few or none in the
Northern States; and yet, if the Northern States shall be of opinion
that our numbers are numberless, they may call forth every national
resource. May congress not say, that every black man must fight? Did
we not see a little of this in the last war? We were not so hard pushed
as to make emancipation general: but acts of assembly passed, that
every slave who would go to the army should be free. Another thing
will contribute to bring this event about: slavery is detested; we feel
its fatal effects; we deplore it with all the pity of humanity. Let all
these considerations, at some future period, press with full force on
the minds of congress. Let that urbanity, which I trust will
distinguish America, and the necessity of national defence—let all
these things operate on their minds, and they will search that paper,
and see if they have power of manumission. And have they not, sir?
Have they not power to provide for the general defence and welfare?
May they not think that these call for the abolition of slavery? May
they not pronounce all slaves free, and will they not be warranted by
that power? There is no ambiguous implication, or logical deduction.
The paper speaks to the point. They have the power in clear,
unequivocal terms, and will clearly and certainly exercise it. As much
as I deplore slavery, I see that prudence forbids its abolition. I deny
that the general government ought to set them free, because a
decided majority of the states have not the ties of sympathy and
fellow-feeling for those whose interest would be affected by their
emancipation. The majority of congress is to the north, and the
slaves are to the south. In this situation, I see a great deal of the
property of the people of Virginia in jeopardy, and their peace and
tranquillity gone away. I repeat it again, that it would rejoice my very
soul that every one of my fellow-beings was emancipated. As we
ought with gratitude to admire that decree of Heaven which has
numbered us among the free, we ought to lament and deplore the
necessity of holding our fellow-men in bondage. But is it practicable,
by any human means, to liberate them, without producing the most
dreadful and ruinous consequences? We ought to possess them in
the manner we have inherited them from our ancestors, as their
manumission is incompatible with the felicity of the country. But we
ought to soften, as much as possible, the rigor of their unhappy fate.
I know that in a variety of particular instances, the legislature,
listening to complaints, have admitted their emancipation. Let me
not dwell on this subject. I will only add, that this, as well as every
other property of the people of Virginia, is in jeopardy, and put in the
hands of those who have no similarity of situation with us. This is a
local matter, and I can see no propriety in subjecting it to congress.
[Here Mr. Henry informed the committee, that he had a resolution
prepared, to refer a declaration of rights, with certain amendments
to the most exceptionable parts of the constitution, to the other
states in the confederacy, for their consideration, previous to its
ratification. The clerk then read the resolution, the declaration of
rights, and amendments, which were nearly the same as those
ultimately proposed by the convention, for the consideration of
congress. He then resumed the subject.] I have thus candidly
submitted to you, Mr. Chairman, and this committee, what occurred
to me as proper amendments to the constitution, and the declaration
of rights containing those fundamental, inalienable privileges, which
I conceive to be essential to liberty and happiness. I believe, that, on
a review of these amendments, it will still be found, that the arm of
power will be sufficiently strong for national purposes, when these
restrictions shall be a part of the government. I believe no
gentleman, who opposes me in sentiments, will be able to discover
that any one feature of a strong government is altered; and at the
same time your inalienable rights are secured by them. The
government unaltered may be terrible to America, but can never be
loved, till it be amended. You find all the resources of the continent
may be drawn to a point. In danger, the president may concentre to a
point every effort of the continent. If the government be constructed
to satisfy the people and remove their apprehensions, the wealth and
strength of the continent will go where public utility shall direct. This
government, with these restrictions, will be a strong government
united with the privileges of the people. In my weak judgment, a
government is strong, when it applies to the most important end of
all governments—the rights and privileges of the people. In the
honorable member’s proposal, jury trial, the press, and religion, and
other essential rights, are not to be given up. Other essential rights—
what are they? The world will say, that you intended to give them up.
When you go into an enumeration of your rights, and stop that
enumeration, the inevitable conclusion is, that what is omitted is
intended to be surrendered.
Anxious as I am to be as little troublesome as possible, I cannot
leave this part of the subject without adverting to one remark of the
honorable gentleman. He says, that, rather than bring the union into
danger, he will adopt it with its imperfections. A great deal is said
about disunion, and consequent dangers. I have no claim to a greater
share of fortitude than others; but I can see no kind of danger. I form
my judgment on a single fact alone, that we are at peace with all the
world; nor is there any apparent cause of a rupture with any nation
in the world. Is it among the American states that the cause of
disunion is to be feared? Are not the states using all their efforts for
the promotion of union? New England sacrifices local prejudices for
the purposes of union. We hear the necessity of the union, and
predilection for the union, re-echoed from all parts of the continent;
and all at once disunion is to follow! If gentlemen dread disunion,
the very thing they advocate will inevitably produce it. A previous
ratification will raise insurmountable obstacles to union. New York is
an insurmountable obstacle to it, and North Carolina also. They will
never accede to it till it be amended. A great part of Virginia is
opposed, most decidedly, to it, as it stands. This very spirit which will
govern us in these three states, will find a kindred spirit in the
adopting states. Give me leave to say, that it is very problematical
whether the adopting states can stand on their own legs. I hear only
on one side, but as far as my information goes, there are heart-
burnings and animosities among them. Will these animosities be
cured by subsequent amendments?
Turn away from American, and consider European politics. The
nations there, which can trouble us, are France, England, and Spain.
But at present we know for a certainty, that those nations are
engaged in a very different pursuit from American conquests. We are
told by our intelligent ambassador, that there is no such danger as
has been apprehended. Give me leave then to say, that dangers from
beyond the Atlantic are imaginary. From these premises, then, it may
be concluded, that, from the creation of the world to this time, there
never was a more fair and proper opportunity than we have at this
day to establish such a government as will permanently establish the
most transcendent political felicity. Since the revolution there has
not been so much experience. Since then, the general interests of
America have not been better understood, nor the union more
ardently loved, than at this present moment. I acknowledge the
weakness of the old confederation. Every man says, that something
must be done. Where is the moment more favorable than this?
During the war, when ten thousand dangers surrounded us, America
was magnanimous. What was the language of the little state of
Maryland? “I will have time to consider. I will hold out three years.
Let what may come I will have time to reflect.” Magnanimity
appeared everywhere. What was the upshot?—America triumphed. Is
there any thing to forbid us to offer these amendments to the other
states? If this moment goes away unimproved, we shall never see its
return. We now act under a happy system, which says, that a
majority may alter the government when necessary. But by the paper
proposed, a majority will forever endeavor in vain to alter it. Three-
fourths may. Is not this the most promising time for securing the
necessary alterations? Will you go into that government, where it is a
principle, that a contemptible minority may prevent an alteration?
What will be the language of the majority?—Change the government
—Nay, seven eighths of the people of America may wish the change;
but the minority may come with a Roman Veto, and object to the
alteration. The language of a magnanimous country and of freemen
is, Till you remove the defects, we will not accede. It would be in vain
for me to show, that there is no danger to prevent our obtaining
those amendments, if you are not convinced already. If the other
states will not agree to them, it is not an inducement to union. The
language of this paper is not dictatorial, but merely a proposition for
amendments. The proposition of Virginia met with a favorable
reception before. We proposed that convention which met at
Annapolis. It was not called dictatorial. We proposed that at
Philadelphia. Was Virginia thought dictatorial? But Virginia is now
to lose her pre-eminence. Those rights of equality, to which the
meanest individual in the community is entitled, are to bring us
down infinitely below the Delaware people. Have we not a right to
say, Hear our propositions? Why, sir, your slaves have a right to
make their humble requests. Those who are in the meanest
occupations of human life, have a right to complain. What do we
require? Not pre-eminence, but safety; that our citizens may be able
to sit down in peace and security under their own fig-trees. I am
confident that sentiments like these will meet with unison in every
state; for they will wish to banish discord from the American soil. I
am certain that the warmest friend of the constitution wishes to have
fewer enemies—fewer of those who pester and plague him with
opposition. I could not withhold from my fellow-citizens anything so
reasonable. I fear you will have no union, unless you remove the
cause of opposition. Will you sit down contented with the name of
union without any solid foundation?
Speech of John Randolph
Against the Tariff Bill, delivered in the House of Representatives of

the United States, April 15, 1824.
I am, Mr. Speaker, practising no deception upon myself, much less
upon the house, when I say, that if I had consulted my own feelings
and inclinations, I should not have troubled the house, exhausted as
it is, and as I am, with any further remarks upon this subject. I come
to the discharge of this task, not merely with reluctance, but with
disgust; jaded, worn down, abraded, I may say, as I am by long
attendance upon this body, and continued stretch of the attention
upon this subject. I come to it, however, at the suggestion, and in
pursuance of the wishes of those, whose wishes are to me, in all
matters touching my public duty, paramount law; I speak with those
reservations, of course, which every moral agent must be supposed to
make to himself.
It was not more to my surprise, than to my disappointment, that
on my return to the house, after a necessary absence of a few days,
on indispensable business, I found it engaged in discussing the
general principle of the bill, when its details were under
consideration. If I had expected such a turn in the debate, I would, at
any private sacrifice, however great, have remained a spectator and
auditor of that discussion. With the exception of the speech, already
published, of my worthy colleague on my right (Mr. P. P. Barbour), I
have been nearly deprived of the benefit of the discussion which has
taken place. Many weeks have been occupied with this bill (I hope
the house will pardon me for saying so) before I took the slightest
part in the deliberations of the details; and I now sincerely regret
that I had not firmness enough to adhere to the resolution which I
had laid down to myself, in the early stage of the debate, not to take
any part in the discussion of the details of the measure. But, as I
trust, what I now have to say upon this subject, although more and
better things have been said by others, may not be the same that they
have said, or may not be said in the same manner. I here borrow the
language of a man who has been heretofore conspicuous in the
councils of the country; of one who was unrivalled for readiness and
dexterity in debate; who was long without an equal on the floor of
this body; who contributed as much to the revolution of 1801, as any
man in this nation, and derived as little benefit from it; as, to use the
words of that celebrated man, what I have to say is not that which
has been said by others, and will not be said in their manner, the
house will, I trust, have patience with me during the time that my
strength will allow me to occupy their attention. And I beg them to
understand, that the notes which I hold in my hand are not the notes
on which I mean to speak, but of what others have spoken, and from
which I will make the smallest selection in my power.
Sir, when are we to have enough of this tariff question? In 1816 it

was supposed to be settled. Only three years thereafter, another
proposition for increasing it was sent from this house to the senate,
baited with a tax of four cents per pound on brown sugar. It was
fortunately rejected in that body. In what manner this bill is baited, it
does not become me to say; but I have too distinct a recollection of
the vote in committee of the whole, on the duty upon molasses, and
afterwards of the vote in the house on the same question; of the votes
of more than one of the states on that question, not to mark it well. I
do not say that the change of the vote on that question was affected
by any man’s voting against his own motion; but I do not hesitate to
say that it was effected by one man’s electioneering against his own
motion. I am very glad, Mr. Speaker, that old Massachusetts Bay,
and the province of Maine and Sagadahock, by whom we stood in the
days of the revolution, now stand by the south, and will not aid in
fixing on us this system of taxation, compared with which the
taxation of Mr. Grenville and Lord North was as nothing. I speak
with knowledge of what I say, when I declare, that this bill is an
attempt to reduce the country, south of Mason and Dixon’s line and
east of the Alleghany mountains, to a state of worse than colonial
bondage; a state to which the domination of Great Britain was, in my
judgment, far preferable; and I trust I shall always have the fearless
integrity to utter any political sentiment which the head sanctions
and the heart ratifies; for the British parliament never would have
dared to lay such duties on our imports, or their exports to us, either
“at home” or here, as is now proposed to be laid upon the imports
from abroad. At that time we had the command of the market of the
vast dominions then subject, and we should have had those which
have since been subjected, to the British empire; we enjoyed a free
trade eminently superior to any thing that we can enjoy, if this bill
shall go into operation. It is a sacrifice of the interests of a part of this
nation to the ideal benefit of the rest. It marks us out as the victims
of a worse than Egyptian bondage. It is a barter of so much of our
rights, of so much of the fruits of our labor, for political power to be
transferred to other hands. It ought to be met, and I trust it will be
met, in the southern country, as was the stamp act, and by all those
measures, which I will not detain the house by recapitulating, which
succeeded the stamp act, and produced the final breach with the
mother country, which it took about ten years to bring about, as I
trust, in my conscience, it will not take as long to bring about similar
results from this measure, should it become a law.
Sir, events now passing elsewhere, which plant a thorn in my
pillow and a dagger in my heart, admonish me of the difficulty of
governing with sobriety any people who are over head and ears in
debt. That state of things begets a temper which sets at nought every
thing like reason and common sense. This country is unquestionably
laboring under great distress; but we cannot legislate it out of that
distress. We may, by your legislation, reduce all the country south
and east of Mason and Dixon’s line, the whites as well as the blacks,
to the condition of Helots: you can do no more. We have had placed
before us, in the course of this discussion, foreign examples and
authorities; and among other things, we have been told, as an
argument in favor of this measure, of the prosperity of Great Britain.
Have gentlemen taken into consideration the peculiar advantages of
Great Britain? Have they taken into consideration that, not excepting
Mexico, and that fine country which lies between the Orinoco and
Caribbean sea, England is decidedly superior, in point of physical
advantages, to every country under the sun? This is unquestionably
true. I will enumerate some of those advantages. First, there is her
climate. In England, such is the temperature of the air, that a man
can there do more days’ work in the year, and more hours’ work in
the day, than in any other climate in the world; of course I include
Scotland and Ireland in this description. It is in such a climate only,
that the human animal can bear without extirpation the corrupted
air, the noisome exhalations, the incessant labor of these accursed
manufactories. Yes, sir, accursed; for I say it is an accursed thing,
which I will neither taste, nor touch, nor handle. If we were to act
here on the English system, we should have the yellow fever at
Philadelphia and New York, not in August merely, but from June to
January, and from January to June. The climate of this country
alone, were there no other natural obstacle to it, says aloud, You shall
not manufacture! Even our tobacco factories, admitted to be the
most wholesome of any sort of factories, are known to be, where
extensive, the very nidus (if I may use the expression) of yellow fever
and other fevers of similar type. In another of the advantages of
Great Britain, so important to her prosperity, we are almost on a par
with her, if we know how properly to use it. Fortunatos nimium sua
si bona norint—for, as regards defence, we are, to all intents and
purposes, almost as much an island as England herself. But one of
her insular advantages we can never acquire. Every part of that
country is accessible from the sea. There, as you recede from the sea,
you do not get further from the sea. I know that a great deal will be
said of our majestic rivers, about the father of floods, and his
tributary streams; but, with the Ohio, frozen up all the winter and
dry all the summer, with a long tortuous, difficult, and dangerous
navigation thence to the ocean, the gentlemen of the west may rest
assured that they will never derive one particle of advantage from
even a total prohibition of foreign manufactures. You may succeed in
reducing us to your own level of misery; but if we were to agree to
become your slaves, you never can derive one farthing of advantage
from this bill. What parts of this country can derive any advantage
from it? Those parts only, where there is a water power in immediate
contact with navigation, such as the vicinities of Boston, Providence,
Baltimore, and Richmond. Petersburg is the last of these as you
travel south. You take a bag of cotton up the river to Pittsburg, or to
Zanesville, to have it manufactured and sent down to New Orleans
for a market, and before your bag of cotton has got to the place of
manufacture, the manufacturer of Providence has received his
returns for the goods made from his bag of cotton purchased at the
same time that you purchased yours. No, sir, gentlemen may as well
insist that because the Chesapeake bay, mare nostrum, our
Mediterranean sea, gives us every advantage of navigation, we shall
exclude from it every thing but steam-boats and those boats called
κατ’ ἐξοχὴν, per emphasin, par excellence, Kentucky boats—a sort
of huge square, clumsy, wooden box. And why not insist upon it?
Hav’n’t you “the power to REGULATE COMMERCE”? Would not that too
be a “REGULATION OF COMMERCE?” It would, indeed, and a pretty
regulation it is; and so is this bill. And, sir, I marvel that the
representation from the great commercial state of New York should
be in favor of this bill. If operative—and if inoperative why talk of it?
—if operative, it must, like the embargo of 1807–1809, transfer no
small portion of the wealth of the London of America, as New York
has been called, to Quebec and Montreal. She will receive the most of
her imports from abroad, down the river. I do not know any bill that
could be better calculated for Vermont than this bill; because,
through Vermont, from Quebec, Montreal, and other positions on
the St. Lawrence, we are, if it passes, unquestionably to receive our
supplies of foreign goods. It will, no doubt, suit the Niagara frontier.
But, sir, I must not suffer myself to be led too far astray from the
topic of the peculiar advantages of England as a manufacturing
country. Her vast beds of coal are inexhaustible; there are daily
discoveries of quantities of it, greater than ages past have yet
consumed; to which beds of coal her manufacturing establishments
have been transferred, as any man may see who will compare the
present population of her towns with what it was formerly. It is to
these beds of coal that Birmingham, Manchester, Wolverhampton,
Sheffield, Leeds, and other manufacturing towns, owe their growth.
If you could destroy her coal in one day, you would cut at once the
sinews of her power. Then, there are her metals, and particularly tin,
of which she has the exclusive monopoly. Tin, I know, is to be found
in Japan, and perhaps elsewhere; but, in practice, England has now
the monopoly of that article. I might go further, and I might say, that
England possesses an advantage, quoad hoc, in her institutions; for
there men are compelled to pay their debts. But here, men are not
only not compelled to pay their debts, but they are protected in the
refusal to pay them, in the scandalous evasion of their legal
obligations; and, after being convicted of embezzling the public
money, and the money of others, of which they were appointed
guardians and trustees, they have the impudence to obtrude their
unblushing fronts into society, and elbow honest men out of their
way. There, though all men are on a footing of equality on the high
way, and in the courts of law, at will and at market, yet the castes in
Hindoostan are not more distinctly separated, one from the other,
than the different classes of society are in England. It is true that it is
practicable for a wealthy merchant or manufacturer, or his
descendants, after having, through two or three generations, washed
out, what is considered the stain of their original occupation, to
emerge, by slow degrees, into the higher ranks of society; but this
rarely happens. Can you find men of vast fortune, in this country,
content to move in the lower circles—content as the ox under the
daily drudgery of the yoke? It is true that, in England, some of these
wealthy people take it into their heads to buy seats in parliament.
But, when they get there, unless they possess great talents, they are
mere nonentities; their existence is only to be found in the red book
which contains a list of the members of parliament. Now, sir, I wish
to know if, in the western country, where any man may get beastly
drunk for three pence sterling—in England, you cannot get a small
wine-glass of spirits under twenty-five cents; one such drink of grog
as I have seen swallowed in this country, would there cost a dollar—
in the western country, where every man can get as much meat and
bread as he can consume, and yet spend the best part of his days, and
nights too, perhaps, on the tavern benches, or loitering at the cross
roads asking the news, can you expect the people of such a country,
with countless millions of wild land and wild animals besides, can be
cooped up in manufacturing establishments, and made to work
sixteen hours a day, under the superintendence of a driver, yes, a
driver, compared with whom a southern overseer is a gentleman and
man of refinement; for, if they do not work, these work people in the
manufactories, they cannot eat; and, among all the punishments that
can be devised (put death even among the number), I defy you to get
as much work out of a man by any of them, as when he knows that he
must work before he can eat.
In the course of this discussion, I have heard, I will not say with
surprise, because nil admirari is my motto—no doctrine that can be
broached on this floor, can ever, hereafter, excite surprise in my
mind—I have heard the names of Say, Ganilh, Adam Smith, and
Ricardo, pronounced not only in terms, but in a tone of sneering
contempt, visionary theorists, destitute of practical wisdom, and the
whole clan of Scotch and Quarterly Reviewers lugged in to boot. This,
sir, is a sweeping clause of proscription. With the names of Say,
Smith, and Ganilh, I profess to be acquainted, for I, too, am versed in
title-pages; but I did not expect to hear, in this house, a name, with
which I am a little further acquainted, treated with so little
ceremony; and by whom? I leave Adam Smith to the simplicity, the
majesty, and strength of his own native genius, which has canonized
his name—a name which will be pronounced with veneration, when
not one in this house will be remembered. But one word as to
Ricardo, the last mentioned of these writers—a new authority,
though the grave has already closed upon him, and set its seal upon
his reputation. I shall speak of him in the language of a man of as
great a genius as this, or perhaps any, age has ever produced; a man
remarkable for the depth of his reflections and the acumen of his
penetration. “I had been led,” says this man, “to look into loads of
books—my understanding had for too many years been intimate with
severe thinkers, with logic, and the great masters of knowledge, not
to be aware of the utter feebleness of the herd of modern economists.
I sometimes read chapters from more recent works, or part of
parliamentary debates. I saw that these [ominous words!] were
generally the very dregs and rinsings of the human intellect.” [I am
very glad, sir, he did not read our debates. What would he have said
of ours?] “At length a friend sent me Mr. Ricardo’s book, and,
recurring to my own prophetic anticipation of the advent of some
legislator on this science, I said, Thou art the man. Wonder and
curiosity had long been dead in me; yet I wondered once more. Had
this profound work been really written in England during the 19th
century? Could it be that an Englishman, and he not in academic
bowers, but oppressed by mercantile and senatorial cares, had
accomplished what all the universities and a century of thought had
failed to advance by one hair’s breadth? All other writers had been
crushed and overlaid by the enormous weight of facts and
documents: Mr. Ricardo had deduced, a priori, from the
understanding itself, laws which first gave a ray of light into the
unwieldy chaos of materials, and had constructed what had been but
a collection of tentative discussions, into a science of regular
proportions, now first standing on an eternal basis.”
I pronounce no opinion of my own on Ricardo; I recur rather to
the opinion of a man inferior, in point of original and native genius,
and that highly cultivated, too, to none of the moderns, and few of
the ancients. Upon this subject, what shall we say to the following
fact? Butler, who is known to gentlemen of the profession of the law,
as the annotator, with Hargrave, on lord Coke, speaking with Fox as
to political economy—that most extraordinary man, unrivalled for
his powers of debate, excelled by no man that ever lived, or probably
ever will live, as a public debater, and of the deepest political
erudition, fairly confessed that he had never read Adam Smith.
Butler said to Mr. Fox, “that he had never read Adam Smith’s work
on the Wealth of Nations.” “To tell you the truth,” replied Mr. Fox,
“nor I neither. There is something in all these subjects that passes my
comprehension—something so wide that I could never embrace them
myself, or find any one who did.” And yet we see how we, with our
little dividers, undertake to lay off the scale, and with our pack-
thread to take the soundings, and speak with a confidence peculiar to
quacks (in which the regular-bred professor never indulges) on this
abstruse and perplexing subject. Confidence is one thing, knowledge
another; of the want of which, overweening confidence is notoriously
the indication. What of that? Let Ganilh, Say, Ricardo, Smith, all
Greek and Roman fame be against us; we appeal to Dionysius in
support of our doctrines; and to him, not on the throne of Syracuse,
but at Corinth—not in absolute possession of the most wonderful and
enigmatical city, as difficult to comprehend as the abstrusest
problem of political economy which furnished not only the means
but the men for supporting the greatest wars—a kingdom within
itself, under whose ascendant the genius of Athens, in her most high
and palmy state, quailed, and stood rebuked. No; we follow the
pedagogue to the schools—dictating in the classic shades of
Longwood—(lucus a non lucendo)—to his disciples. * * *
But it is said, a measure of this sort is necessary to create
employment for the people. Why, sir, where are the handles of the
plough? Are they unfit for young gentlemen to touch? Or will they
rather choose to enter your military academies, where the sons of the
rich are educated at the expense of the poor, and where so many
political janissaries are every year turned out, always ready for war,
and to support the powers that be—equal to the strelitzes of Moscow
or St. Petersburg. I do not speak now of individuals, of course, but of
the tendency of the system—the hounds follow the huntsman
because he feeds them, and bears the whip. I speak of the system. I
concur most heartily, sir, in the censure which has been passed upon
the greediness of office, which stands a stigma on the present
generation. Men from whom we might expect, and from whom I did
expect, better things, crowd the ante-chamber of the palace, for every
vacant office; nay, even before men are dead, their shoes are wanted
for some barefooted office-seeker. How mistaken was the old
Roman, the old consul, who, whilst he held the plough by one hand,
and death held the other, exclaimed, “Diis immortalibus sero!”
Our fathers, how did they acquire their property? By
straightforward industry, rectitude, and frugality. How did they
become dispossessed of their property? By indulging in speculative
hopes and designs; seeking the shadow whilst they lost the
substance; and now, instead of being, as they were, men of
respectability, men of substance, men capable and willing to live
independently and honestly, and hospitably too—for who so
parsimonious as the prodigal who has nothing to give?—what have
we become? A nation of sharks, preying on one another through the
instrumentality of this paper system, which, if Lycurgus had known
of it, he would unquestionably have adopted, in preference to his
iron money, if his object had been to make the Spartans the most
accomplished knaves as well as to keep them poor.
The manufacturer of the east may carry his woolens or his cottons,
or his coffins, to what market he pleases—I do not buy of him. Self-
defence is the first law of nature. You drive us into it. You create
heats and animosities among this great family, who ought to live like
brothers; and, after you have got this temper of mind roused among
the southern people, do you expect to come among us to trade, and
expect us to buy your wares? Sir, not only shall we not buy them, but
we shall take such measures (I will not enter into the detail of them
now) as shall render it impossible for you to sell them. Whatever may
be said here of the “misguided counsels,” as they have been termed,
“of the theorists of Virginia,” they have, so far as regards this
question, the confidence of united Virginia. We are asked—Does the
south lose any thing by this bill—why do you cry out? I put it, sir, to
any man from any part of the country, from the gulf of Mexico, from
the Balize, to the eastern shore of Maryland—which, I thank Heaven,
is not yet under the government of Baltimore, and will not be, unless
certain theories should come into play in that state, which we have
lately heard of, and a majority of men, told by the head, should
govern—whether the whole country between the points I have
named, is not unanimous in opposition to this bill. Would it not be
unexampled, that we should thus complain, protest, resist, and that
all the while nothing should be the matter? Are our understandings
(however low mine may be rated, much sounder than mine are
engaged in this resistance), to be rated so low, as that we are to be
made to believe that we are children affrighted by a bugbear? We are
asked, however, why do you cry out? it is all for your good. Sir, this
reminds me of the mistresses of George II., who, when they were
insulted by the populace on arriving in London (as all such creatures
deserve to be, by every mob), put their heads out of the window, and
said to them in their broken English, “Goot people, we be come for
your goots;” to which one of the mob rejoined—“Yes, and for our
chattels too, I fancy.” Just so it is with the oppressive exactions
proposed and advocated by the supporters of this bill, on the plea of
the good of those who are its victims. * * *
I had more to say, Mr. Speaker, could I have said it, on this subject.
But I cannot sit down without asking those, who were once my
brethren of the church, the elders of the young family of this good old
republic of the thirteen states, if they can consent to rivet upon us
this system, from which no benefit can possibly result to themselves.
I put it to them as descendants of the renowned colony of Virginia; as
children sprung from her loins; if for the sake of all the benefits, with
which this bill is pretended to be freighted to them, granting such to
be the fact for argument’s sake, they could consent to do such an act
of violence to the unanimous opinion, feelings, prejudices, if you will,
of the whole Southern States, as to pass it? I go farther. I ask of them
what is there in the condition of the nation at this time, that calls for
the immediate adoption of this measure? Are the Gauls at the gate of
the capitol? If they are, the cacklings of the Capitoline geese will
hardly save it. What is there to induce us to plunge into the vortex of
those evils so severely felt in Europe from this very manufacturing
and paper policy? For it is evident that, if we go into this system of
policy, we must adopt the European institutions also. We have very
good materials to work with; we have only to make our elective king
president for life, in the first place, and then to make the succession
hereditary in the family of the first that shall happen to have a
promising son. For a king we can be at no loss—ex quovis ligno—any
block will do for him. The senate may, perhaps, be transmuted into a
house of peers, although we should meet with more difficulty than in
the other case; for Bonaparte himself was not more hardly put to it,
to recruit the ranks of his mushroom nobility, than we should be to
furnish a house of peers. As for us, we are the faithful commons,
ready made to hand; but with all our loyalty, I congratulate the house
—I congratulate the nation—that, although this body is daily
degraded by the sight of members of Congress manufactured into
placemen, we have not yet reached such a point of degradation as to
suffer executive minions to be manufactured into members of
congress. We have shut that door; I wish we could shut the other
also. I wish we could have a perpetual call of the house in this view,
and suffer no one to get out from its closed doors. The time is
peculiarly inauspicious for the change in our policy which is
proposed by this bill. We are on the eve of an election that promises
to be the most distracted that this nation has ever yet undergone. It
may turn out to be a Polish election. At such a time, ought any
measure to be brought forward which is supposed to be capable of
being demonstrated to be extremely injurious to one great portion of
this country, and beneficial in proportion to another? Sufficient for
the day is the evil thereof. There are firebrands enough in the land,
without this apple of discord being cast into this assembly. Suppose
this measure is not what it is represented to be; that the fears of the
south are altogether illusory and visionary; that it will produce all the
good predicted of it—an honorable gentleman from Kentucky said
yesterday—and I was sorry to hear it, for I have great respect for that
gentleman, and for other gentlemen from that state—that the
question was not whether a bare majority should pass the bill, but
whether the majority or the minority should rule. The gentleman is
wrong, and, if he will consider the matter rightly, he will see it. Is
there no difference between the patient and the actor? We are
passive: we do not call them to act or to suffer, but we call upon them
not so to act as that we must necessarily suffer; and I venture to say,
that in any government, properly constituted, this very consideration
would operate conclusively, that if the burden is to be laid on 102, it
ought not to be laid by 105. We are the eel that is being flayed, while
the cook-maid pats us on the head, and cries, with the clown in King
Lear, “Down, wantons, down.” There is but one portion of the
country which can profit by this bill, and from that portion of the
country comes this bare majority in favor of it. I bless God that
Massachusetts and old Virginia are once again rallying under the
same banner, against oppressive and unconstitutional taxation; for,
if all the blood be drawn from out the body, I care not whether it be
by the British parliament or the American congress; by an emperor
or a king abroad, or by a president at home.
Under these views, and with feelings of mortification and shame at
the very weak opposition I have been able to make to this bill, I
entreat gentlemen to consent that it may lie over, at least, until the
next session of congress. We have other business to attend to, and
our families and affairs need our attention at home; and indeed I, sir,
would not give one farthing for any man who prefers being here to
being at home; who is a good public man and a bad private one. With
these views and feelings, I move you, sir, that the bill be indefinitely
postponed.
Edward Everett.
The example of the Northern to the Southern Republics of America.

The great triumphs of constitutional freedom, to which our
independence has furnished the example, have been witnessed in the
southern portion of our hemisphere. Sunk to the last point of
colonial degradation, they have risen at once into the organization of
three republics. Their struggle has been arduous; and eighteen years
of checkered fortune have not yet brought it to a close. But we must
not infer, from their prolonged agitation, that their independence is
uncertain; that they have prematurely put on the toga virilis of
freedom. They have not begun too soon; they have more to do. Our
war of independence was shorter;—happily we were contending with
a government, that could not, like that of Spain, pursue an
interminable and hopeless contest, in defiance of the people’s will.
Our transition to a mature and well adjusted constitution was more
prompt than that of our sister republics; for the foundations had long
been settled, the preparation long made. And when we consider that
it is our example, which has aroused the spirit of independence from
California to Cape Horn; that the experiment of liberty, if it had
failed with us, most surely would not have been attempted by them;
that even now our counsels and acts will operate as powerful
precedents in this great family of republics, we learn the importance
of the post which Providence has assigned us in the world. A wise
and harmonious administration of the public affairs,—a faithful,
liberal, and patriotic exercise of the private duties of the citizen,—
while they secure our happiness at home, will diffuse a healthful
influence through the channels of national communication, and
serve the cause of liberty beyond the Equator and the Andes. When
we show a united, conciliatory, and imposing front to their rising
states we show them, better than sounding eulogies can do, the true
aspect of an independent republic; we give them a living example
that the fireside policy of a people is like that of the individual man.
As the one, commencing in the prudence, order, and industry of the
private circle, extends itself to all the duties of social life, of the
family, the neighborhood, the country; so the true domestic policy of
the republic, beginning in the wise organization of its own
institutions, pervades its territories with a vigilant, prudent,
temperate administration; and extends the hand of cordial interest to
all the friendly nations, especially to those which are of the
household of liberty.
It is in this way that we are to fulfil our destiny in the world. The
greatest engine of moral power, which human nature knows, is an
organized, prosperous state. All that man, in his individual capacity,
can do—all that he can effect by his fraternities—by his ingenious
discoveries and wonders of art,—or by his influence over others—is
as nothing, compared with the collective, perpetuated influence on
human affairs and human happiness of a well constituted, powerful
commonwealth. It blesses generations with its sweet influence;—
even the barren earth seems to pour out its fruits under a system
where property is secure, while her fairest gardens are blighted by
despotism;—men, thinking, reasoning men, abound beneath its
benignant sway;—nature enters into a beautiful accord, a better,
purer asiento with man, and guides an industrious citizen to every
rood of her smiling wastes;—and we see, at length, that what has
been called a state of nature, has been most falsely, calumniously so
denominated; that the nature of man is neither that of a savage, a
hermit, nor a slave; but that of a member of a well-ordered family,
that of a good neighbor, a free citizen, a well informed, good man,
acting with others like him. This is the lesson which is taught in the
charter of our independence; this is the lesson which our example is
to teach the world.
The epic poet of Rome—the faithful subject of an absolute prince—
in unfolding the duties and destinies of his countrymen, bids them
look down with disdain on the polished and intellectual arts of
Greece, and deem their arts to be
To rule the nations with imperial sway;
To spare the tribes that yield; fight down the proud;
And force the mood of peace upon the world.

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From Industrial Organization to

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