Those who, like the late Joseph Schumpeter, have watched the apparently relentless disintegration of capitalism, and have concluded that socialism will work, albeit with painful disadvantages, will heave a long sad sigh of regret at the passing of the happy and prosperous capitalist way of life. They will, as people must, accept what appears from their perspective inevitable, and try to make the best of the gray and level fife of socialism. Schumpeter, however, was no defeatist. He was a perceptive analyst of human affairs. I deny entirely that this term is applicable to a piece of analysis.
Defeatism denotes a certain psychic state that has meaning only in reference to action.
Facts in themselves and inferences from them can never be defeatist or the opposite whatever that might be. The report that a given ship is sinking is not defeatist. But it can also rush to the pumps. Those who love liberty more than equality, those who are uneasy with unlimited government, those who have faith in man's ability to shape his own destiny, those who have marveled at the miracle of the market will join me in this call for renewal of this simple, reasonable, versatile and open system of capitalism which has worked, is working, and will work if freed from the fetters of limitless state intervention. The choice, I believe, is ours.