Hobson's choice
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- This article is about the aphorism. There are also a play and several movies titled Hobson's Choice based on it.
In colloquial English, a Hobson's choice is an apparently free choice that is really no choice at all.
The first written reference to the source of the phrase is in Joseph Addison's paper, The Spectator (14 October 1712). It also appears in Thomas Ward's poem England's Reformation, written in 1688, but not published until after his death. Ward writes:
- Where to elect there is but one, 'tis Hobson's choice -- take that or none.
The phrase originates from Thomas Hobson (1544–1630), who lived in Cambridge, England. Hobson was a stable manager renting out horses to travellers; the site of his stables is now part of St. Catharine's College. After customers began requesting particular horses again and again, Hobson realized certain horses were being overworked. He decided to begin a rotation system, placing the well-rested horses near the stable door, and refused to let out any horse except in its proper turn. He offered customers the choice of taking the horse in the stall nearest the door or taking none at all.
Hobson's Choice is somewhat different from a Catch-22 situation, where both (or all) choices available contradict each other.
Henry Ford was said to have sold the Ford Model T with the famous Hobson's choice of "Any color so long as it's black" [1]. (In reality, the Model T was available in a modest palette of colors, but the rapid production required quick-drying paint, which at the time was available in only one color—black.)
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Modern usage
Hobson's choice is often used not to mean a false illusion of choice, but simply a choice between two undesirable options, like the Kobayashi Maru. The difference between this and the original meaning of Hobson's Choice is subtle, so the confusion is perhaps understandable. (Indeed, if the horse in the stall nearest the door is in poor shape, the traditional usage of Hobson's Choice becomes the more common use, since having an unhealthy horse and having no horse at all are both undesirable.)
A modern phrase that more accurately fits Thomas Ward's poem would be the phrase "Take it or leave it". While another common phrase that could be said to generalize Ward’s point is "Beggars can't be choosers".
On occasion, writers wrongly use the term "Hobbesian Choice" instead of "Hobson's Choice", evidently confusing philosopher Thomas Hobbes for Thomas Hobson.
Hobson's Choice in politics
Some suggest that voting in a two-party system, like that of the United States, is Hobson's Choice. They believe that two candidates typically have far more similarities than dissimilarities, and that in fact the two-party system gives the candidates an incentive to be as similar as possible, in order to appeal to as many centrist or "swing" voters as possible.
Hobson's Choice in law
Then-Associate Justice William H. Rehnquist used the term in his dissenting opinion in City of Philadelphia v. New Jersey (1978), 437 U.S. 617, and in citing a lower court ruling in his majority opinion in Upjohn Co. v. United States (1981), 449 U.S. 383.
Justice White, in the case of Chadha and the INS v. The House of Representatives 462 U.S. 919 (1983), used the term in his dissent. In using it, he was arguing that denying the House of Representatives the power to place veto provisions over the administrative agencies responsible for enacting the laws passed, would leave the House with the Hobson's Choice of either refraining from delegating the necessary authority, or abdicating its law-making function to the executive branch and independent agencies.
The Maryland Court of Appeals used the term and explained its origins as applied to a jury's decision making ability when a prosecutor's unwillingness to pursue a lesser-included offense (e.g. second-degree murder or manslaughter), requiring a jury to convict a defendant of the greater crime (e.g. first-degree murder) or nothing at all. See Hook v. State, 315 Md. 25, 28 (1989).
Hobson's Choice in media
The New American, published by the John Birch Society, used the term "Hobson's Choice" to describe mainstream media outlets that purport to offer a range of choices to viewers/readers, while in reality doling out the same homogenized propaganda.
- Americans have more than one TV channel and more than one newspaper. Yet they all seem to parrot the same Establishment line.
- The media mavens kindly present "conservative" and "liberal" solutions to the problems of the day. But often genuine solutions are either not mentioned or viewed as outside the "mainstream".
- --The New American, Feb. 10, 2003, v19 (both quotes).
Although the editors of The New American use the term in a way that implies fraud or deceit as an essential element in a Hobson's Choice, it is in fact true that this particular instance of a Hobson's Choice could be argued to entail such tricks.