Buffett's dad was the Ron Paul of his day
byPhilip Klein Senior Editorial Writer
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In recent days, the Buffett name has become synonymous with support for higher taxes, but a long time ago, it was associated with fierce opposition to federal taxation and big government.
Warren Buffett may be a committed liberal Democrat, but his father, Howard Buffett, was a four-term Republican member of Congress (1943-49 and 51-53), a John Bircher who fought FDR and warned that the expansion of government was eroding individual liberty.
“Today’s situation is the result of an alarming and devious governmental intervention in the economic affairs of the nation for objectives not contemplated by the men who wrote the Constitution,” Buffett lamented in a lecture excerpted in the December 1956 issue of the libertarian journal The Freeman. “Historically, in America the producer was protected by government in the enjoyment of the fruits of his labors. That protection of his property explains the glorious material progress already recounted.”
In the lecture, Buffett went on to observe that, “The last 40 years have seen a gigantic expansion of political power over economic affairs by the federal government. This change is linked by many scholars to the passage of the income tax law in 1913.”
Buffett first ran for Congress in 1942 as a Republican sacrificial lamb in Nebraska’s second district when FDR was a popular wartime leader, Warren Buffett biographer Roger Lowenstein recounts. “I am fully aware of the odds against a Republican candidate today,” Howard said in his stump speech. “He fights against the most powerful Tammany political machine the world has ever known. The ruthless gang, under cover of war, is making plans to fasten the chains of political servitude around America’s neck.”
He won a surprise victory, and during his time in Congress and in articles and speeches in the decades that followed, Buffett laid out a political philosophy that closely resembles Rep. Ron Paul, R-Tex, today. The elder Buffett was for limited government at home, non-interventionism abroad, and a gold standard. Along these lines, he was a campaign director for the conservative non-interventionist Robert Taft in the 1952 GOP nomination battle against the establishment candidate, Dwight D. Eisenhower.
According to Lowenstein, “Unshakably ethical, Howard refused offers of junkets and even turned down a part of his pay. During his first term, when congressional salary was raised from $10,000 to $12,500, Howard left the extra money in the Capitol disbursement office, insisting that he had been elected at the lower salary.” His wife said he considered only one issue when deciding whether or not to vote for a bill: “Will this add to, or subtract from, human liberty?”
He attacked the Truman doctrine on the floor of Congress, declaring, "Even if it were desirable, America is not strong enough to police the world by military force. If that attempt is made, the blessings of liberty will be replaced by coercion and tyranny at home. Our Christian ideals cannot be exported to other lands by dollars and guns."
In a 1948 article promoting the gold standard (PDF), Buffett explained his opposition to the Marshall Plan, making what today would be considered a “crony capitalism” critique.
“There are businesses that are being enriched by national defense spending and foreign handouts,” said Buffett. “These firms, because of the money they can spend on propaganda, may be the most dangerous of all. If the Marshall Plan meant $100 million worth of profitable business for your firm, wouldn't you Invest a few thousands or so to successfully propagandize for the Marshall Plan? And if you were a foreign government, getting billions, perhaps you could persuade your prospective suppliers here to lend a hand in putting that deal through Congress.”
Buffett also wrote an article opposing the draft in a 1962 issue of the New Individualist, his piece squeezed in between contributions from legendary free market economist Milton Friedman and libertarian intellectual Murray Rothbard. (Rothbard had high praise for Buffett).
In the article, Buffett acknowledged that, “the bitter truth is this: that for 30 years we have been marched towards collectivism despite occasional repulses by conservative forces.” He didn’t spare his own party from criticism. “Since the ’thirties the Republican Party has had no coherent or recognizable political faith,” he wrote. “When out of power it has occasionally brilliantly resisted the collectivist drive. But mostly it has collaborated with the Democrats in diminishing individual freedom, calling such action bi-partisan.”
Warren Buffett admired his father, but drifted apart from him ideologically as he came of age. “Perhaps to spare his father anguish,” Lowenstein noted, “Warren didn’t change parties or publicly acknowledge the switch until Howard’s death.”
