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Wilson, somewhere, has exactly this story -- that the original expression was "laissez
nous faire" -- but the point was NOT to eliminate government, it was a request to Colbert
to stop activist intervention. That is, set the rules and enforce them, don't constantly
intervene. Any businessman understands the importance of property and contract law, and
that markets are social institutions, so, as I recall, Wilson was emphasizing that the
term did not carry the meaning so often given to it today--the notion of an unregulated
economy (e.g. Iraq under American "control" as a recent cartoon suggested) -- but rather a
more subtle and sophisticated understanding of the interaction between civil authority and
markets.
 
Fred Carstensen 
Economics 
 
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