Originally Written by Wang Dingding and Li Weilian
Translated from Chinese by Ma Jun
Wang:
Prof. Buchanan looks still as strong and simple as a farmer albeit a bit meager.At the same time you can find strong scholarly temperament from his simplicity. He always loves land, labour and liberty because of the effect of the countryside of Tennessee where he was raised up. I learn by reading 2 of his biographies that he lives a pure-hearted life. He lives , thinks and gets along with people with genuinely in the same way as a soft-spoken and timid farmer. There is a related story here. On the morning of June 9th just before starting the journey, I faxed the 5-page 7-quesrion final draft of questionnaire to Betty. Then I switched to think about proposing questions to Professor North (Owning to the “crazy extension” of Professor North’s research area recently I decided to consider the questionnaires for Professor North and Professor Simmon simultaniously, the latter is really a scientist who won Nobel Award in Economics by accident). We received the fax from Betty next morning unexpectedly when Xiao Li were packing our luggage. Betty wrote that: “Dear Dingding, thanks very much for sending the questionaire to me and asking me to deliver it to Prof. Buchanan. I’m sorry I couldn’t have done that for you. In fact, it is Professor Buchanan himself who found your survey at the first time for he consistently comes to the office at 6 a.m. everyday. Furthermore, Prof. Buchanan had already answered your questions and typed it when I arrived office at 8 am which indicates that he loves your questions. Of course we hope you will not cancel this journey to visit us. You can discuss with him more deeply by visiting here. By the way, shall we request you to re-schedual your appointment from 2p.m. to 9a.m.? Because the next day is National Day, we’ll have a recess then. Usually the efficiency will be slower before the recess in the office. Finally, it’s important to answer your question in your last email: gentlemen here never wear ties in the office. Looking forward to meeting you. Betty. The attached is the letter from Prof. Buchanan.” It is encouraging to receive this fax. I answered Betty in the following way: “Dear Betty, what a pleasantly surprising fax you send me. I will try hard to find some new questions for Prof. Buchanan and ask for his opinion in person. In the mean time, I of course have no problem to be in your office at 9a.m. Even Prof. Buchanan in his age and with his longevity can go to work at 6a.m. everyday. What a shame if a young man in fifties still follow convention to pay a visit at 10a.m.?”
Buchanan’s characteristics of field has something with the fact that he spends most of his academic carrer in Virgina. We have an old saying in Chinese, “Yi Fang Shui Tu Yang Yi Fang Ren”, that is to say, people’s characteristics and his thoughts have close relationship with their living environments. I always love to cite “Yan Zhao Duo Bei Ge, Qi Lu Duo Hong Ru (Another Chinese saying, i.e., people from Yan and Zhao are characteristic of solemn warriors. People form Qi and Lu are characteristic of cultured wits. Yan, Zhao, Qi and Lu are all ancient states of China----the translator)” to demonstrate this argument. As for Americans, Virginia is the candle of politicians. Almost one quarter of American Presidents were bred in this place. Four of the 5 top earliest Presidents originated from Virginia----George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison and James Vernon. Furthermore, George Mason who ever took part in drafting out Constitution of Philadelphia is also included. American historians always say that “we cannot fancy an American without Virginia”. Here is the boundary of South and North。Historical reliques and well-known battlefields can be found everywhere. The climatic and human environment here-----Men tend to be over sober, and women tend to be over romantic, the combination of both is just “politics”. just like the house style here which embodies strong influences of Virginian humanist politician Jefferson.. Crimson heavy brick walls serve as foils to white Victorian porch surrounded by graceful corridor posts (pillars?). Jefferson is the rare thinker who can enjoy the title of “renaissance character” in American history (different from the Europe). He was very fond of architecture and art in his lifetime and ever introduced several hundreds of Italian artisans to Virginia to sculpt marbles. Till now, the offsprings of these Italian artisans live in a small city of Virginia. In the epitaph Jefferson wrote for himself, except for being American President and Governor of Virginia, only three things were mentioned: drafting out Independence Declaration, sculpting the Virginia Statue of “Religious Liberty”, and establishing Virginian University.
The life in Virginia made Buchanan’s economic thought classical, especially apt to such classical masters as Adam Smith and David Hume et al. This tendency of backtracking to Classics became much more evident in his late years’ works（Politics by Principle, Not Interest，1998；Liberty, Market, and State,1986;TheLimits of Liberty，1975）. At last, I believe that Buchanan’s political economy thoughts reflect the influences of his family background. His grandfather had ever been Governor of Tennessee. It is said in a report that, “little Buchanan grew up in his grandfather’s study room fully stuffed by dark-yellow file bags. ” Moreover, Buchanan family has some blood relationship with President Buchanan of last century.(has a modest lineage to President Buchanan of last century?)
Buchanan said he continued to buy landed property in his hometown as long as he could afford. Now he has owned a sizeable piece of land. He loves land, loves doing farm work in person. He goes shares with a farmer without any for-profit purpose, just out of his loveness for autarkical life. Nevertheless he didn’t forget to emphasize that he was still a believer of division of labour theory of Adam Smith while he talked about his preference. His preference for fields reminded me of Heidegger in his old age, whose affections for land led to extremely deep thoughts. I indeed dug up some elements of German philosophy in Buchanan’s thoughts. My excavation work gained sufficient affirmation and high praise from Professor Buchanan when I interviewed with him. I must confess my own feeling to the audiences: Professor Buchanan is a economist with the most philosophic temperament among Americans although he always regards himself as an economist; as for me , maybe I am an economist who is fond of philosophic issues mostly among Chinese Economists although I always regard myself as a philosopher rather than an economist.