Russ Roberts is on the hunt for free-market
folk songs, and is having difficulty finding any. Bryan Caplan, meanwhile,
takes up the call by pointing to some excellent punk
rock for classical liberals.
Let me, then, swing this discussion toward a third, unlikely source of
inspiration -- libertarian showtunes.In particular, I'm thinking of one of the
most criminally overlooked Broadway productions of the 1970s -- Shenandoah.
The story of a Virginia family
set against the backdrop of the early days of
the Civil War, the show propounds
a combination of libertarian themes that you don't see too often in Civil War
stories. It was anti-war, anti-interventionist, anti-slavery, but
also PRO-secession. It is, in a nutshell, the story of a man who decides he'd rather
secede from any country at all than have his six sons conscripted to fight for
a cause none of them believe in.
Shenandoah wasn't ground-breaking and revolutionary, like Sondheim's shows
of the time. It didn't have the show-stopping dance numbers of A Chorus Line
or Bob Fosse's best work. It wasn't gaudy and over-the-top like Andrew Lloyd
Weber's Jesus Christ Superstar and Evita.
But one thing this show did have going for it were some powerful themes of
individualism. Adapted from the equally libertarian Jimmy Stewart movie and
starring John Cullum (best known for his later television work, and
particularly his turn as Holling Vencour on Northern Exposure,)
Shenandoah's original cast recording was a major formative influence on me
as a kid, and it remains one of my favorite guilty pleasures to this day.
To begin with, you have the show’s best known song, "Freedom,"
which is, admittedly, more than a bit hokey, but whose lyrics would function
perfectly well as a summary of Harry Browne’s How I Found Freedom In An
Unfree World:
Freedom ain't a state like Maine or Virginia
Freedom ain't across some county line
Freedom is a flame that burns within ya
Freedom's in the state of mind
(Chorus) Freedom, freedom,
Freedom, freedom
Freedom is a flame that burns within ya
Freedom's in the state of mind
Freedom ain't a boat that's leaving without ya
Freedom ain't a place ya float to find
Freedom's in the how ya think about ya
Freedom's in the state of mind
(Chorus)
You can't get to freedom by riding on a train
The only way to freedom is right on through your brain
Freedom is a notion sweeping the nation
Freedom is the right of all mankind
Freedom is a body's imagination
Freedom is a state of mind
Freedom, freedom
Freedom, freedom
Freedom is a notion sweeping the nation
Freedom is a body's imagination
Freedom is a full-time occupation
Freedom's in the state of mind
Then
there’s the powerful anti-war polemic, "I've Heard It All Before,"
which really gives Cullum the chance to show off his operatic range over
cascading piano fills:
Stand and show your colors
Let's all go to war
The Lord will surely bless us
I've heard it all before
I’ve heard it all a hundred times
I’ve heard it all before
They’ve always got some holy cause
To march you off to war
Tyranny or justice, anarchy or law
We must defend our honor
I’ve heard it all before
I’ve heard it all a hundred times
I’ve heard it all before
They’ve always got a holy cause
That’s worth the dying for
Someone writes a slogan
Raises up a flag
Someone finds an enemy to blame
The trumpet sounds, the call to arms
To leave the cities and the farms
And always, the ending is the same
The same,
The SAME!
The same…
The dream has turned to ashes
The wheat has turned to straw
And someone asks the question
“What was the dying for?”
The living can’t remember
The dead no longer care
But next time it won’t happen
Upon my soul, I swear
I’ve heard it all a hundred times
I’ve heard it all before
Don’t tell me it’s different now!
I’ve heard it all
I’ve heard it all
I've heard it all before
But, finally, the piece de resistance, is the "Meditation." Half a
song, and half a monologue, it closes out the show's first half with Cullum
talking to his late wife's headstone, reminiscing on how the family got to be
where it is, before ultimately closing with a declaration that comes damn close
to being an anarcho-capitalist anthem:
You
know, Martha
It's getting harder and harder
to find someone to talk to
Virginia's gone crazy, Martha
Everybody's screaming 'States rights!'
...and war....
And the family, well,
We're trying awful hard to stay out of it
But sooner or later
They'll be calling me a traitor
Your friends, Martha, and mine
But they'll never take our sons
to face those Yankee guns
and be targets in a long grey line
They'll say we made life here in Virginia
and we owe the Commonwealth a thing or two
Well, if anyone here
owes anyone here
Virginia should be owing me and you
Remember how it used to be
when it was only you and me, Martha?
Remember when we didn't know
how to make potatoes grow
back a hundred years ago, Martha?
Well, we settled in a corner
of the Shenandoah Valley
and we started on a penny and crumb
You were sweet as clover
and I was green all over
Everywhere except in my thumb
I think of how it used to be
The way we struggled, Martha
You and me
Well, I took an axe and I chopped us a clearing
Hung up a door on a maple frame
Raised up a roof and got us out of the weather
And then came Jacob and James
Jacob and James
and April rains
and frost and snow
and growing pains
You brought me drink and I planted an acre
Sowed us the seeds we were counting on
And it seems we could grow more than beans by the acre
Welcome Nathan and John
Jacob and James,
Nathan and John,
Blessed are those
Heaven smiles upon
Root out the weeds, the stumps and rocks,
Put out the mule and the plow
Got a Jenny and Henry Anderson now
An apple tree with a fruited bough
A loving wife with child again
And I'm thinking I should sleep with the cow, Martha
Yonder in the barn with the cow
Now, send for the Doc
Vicar West'll bring him
Pour me a drink and I'll drink for joy
Pad up the bedroom,
Roll up the gingham
Name him Robert, he's a boy
Jacob and James
Nathan and John
Jenny and Henry
and Robert
and then,
...you were gone, Martha
And me?
I got 28 years in this farm
My blood, my sweat and my tears in this farm
And no one's gonna come along and say
That I owe any part
Not the TINIEST part
to anyone in any single way
This farm don't belong to Virginia
My sons bleed,
but not for the South
This land here
...is Andersonland!
By the strength of my hand
and the sweat of my brow
for as long
as the Lord
will allow
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