Mr. Thompson’s willingness to deal with Galt and his belief that a deal is possible are revealing. Thompson is an unprincipled pragmatist. He believes that ideas, theories, and principles have no role in human life. Action is all that matters. It doesn’t matter to Thompson that Galt holds ideas regarding the nature of man, rights, society, and government that diametrically oppose the ideas embodied in the looters’ system. Thompson believes that the looters will make some concessions to economic freedom, Galt will accept the chance to run the economy, and both sides will strike a deal. Galt will then figure out some way to make the mongrel system of clashing principles work.
Ferris and his faction, which advocates terror, show much greater philosophical understanding than Mr. Thompson. Because the looters, including Mr. Thompson, have no intention of relinquishing power, no possibility of compromise with an advocate of individual rights and political freedom exists. Galt is their deadliest foe. If he succeeds, a place doesn’t exist for the looters or their power-lusting policies in the free society to come. Galt, therefore, must be killed. The pro-terror faction is right—there is no middle ground between freedom and dictatorship. Individuals either have rights or they are slaves. Looters either maintain their dictatorship, or Galt’s ideas lead to freedom. A compromise between these contradictory alternatives isn’t possible.
The events in this chapter make clear one of Ayn Rand’s ongoing themes: Humans face a fundamental choice between the intellect and brute force. The men of reason, like Galt and the strikers, understand that the mind functions independently. A human being can only survive by means of his mind, so he must be free to act on his own best judgment. Political freedom is a logical necessity for survival. The men who reject reason, like the looters, have no means to survive. They can’t cure diseases, invent airplanes, run a transcontinental railroad, or build the John Galt Line. Conquering the men of the mind is the only way the irrational brutes can survive. The naked tyranny of dictatorship is the logical outcome of rejecting the mind as man’s means of survival. Men live by reason, or they attempt to live by force. There is no third alternative. Hence, Rand paints the sad spectacle of the brutes seeking to force the mind to become economic dictator.
