Admiral Ben Moreell

Admiral Ben Moreell (September 14, 1892 – July 30, 1978) was the chief of the U.S. Navy's Bureau of Yards and Docks and of the Civil Engineer Corps. Best known to the American public as the Father of the Navy's Seabees.

Moreell's life spanned eight decades, two world wars, a great depression and the evolution of the United States as a superpower.

Moreell wrote articles for The Freeman, a publication of the Foundation for Economic Education, a group that advocates free markets and libertarian philosophy.

Moreell writes in 1956 of the dangerous direction Americans are taking and and how it parallels the fall of the Roman Republic and eventually the fall of the Empire.

There are four steps that Americans can do to push back:

"First- Let us stop this headlong rush toward collectivism. Let there be no more special privileges for employers, employees, farmers, businessmen or any other groups. This is the easiest step of all. We need only refrain from passing more socialistic laws.

Second- Let us undertake at once an orderly demobilization of many of the existing powers of government by the progressive repeal of those socialistic laws which we already have. This will be a very difficult step because every pressure group in the nation will fight to retain its subsidies, monopoly privileges and protection. But if freedom is to live, all special privileges must go.

Third- Of the powers that remain in government, let us return as many as possible to the states. For on the local level, the people will be able to apply more critical scrutiny to the acts of their government agents.

Fourth- Above all, let us resolve that never again will we yield to the seduction of the government panderer who comes among us offering 'bread and circuses,' paid for with our own money, in return for our sovereign rights!"

Admiral Ben Moreell The Freeman, Volume: 6, Issue: 1