Now at last the federal minister responsible for the wheat board, Ralph Goodale, has given the definitive answer to this question: "Because I say so." Notwithstanding widespread farmer discontent with the status quo, legislation introduced late last month would retain the board's monopoly over both grains whole and intact, just like the bill that preceded it, which died with the election call. Indeed, he's even added a provision, not contained in the original, that would allow the board to expand its monopoy to include other crops, such as canola and flax. You can't say he hasn't been listening. Well, yes you can, but chances are he wouldn't hear you.

Mind you, Goodale would say that he was only bowing to the farmers' will : "empowering" them, I believe he said. The legislation would make the board, for the first time, a board, with 15 directors, two-thirds of whom would be elected by farmers. Any decision to take more crops under the board's wing would be made by a democratic vote of the board, just as the board could, in theory, vote to exclude the existing grains from its purview.

And besides, hadn't farmers voted 63 per cent to keep the wheat board?

Well, yes, but that wasn't the issue that has inflamed the west and divided farmers. Almost no one wants to scrap the board outright. What the dissidents want, rather, is the option: either to sell their grain through the wheat board, or to sell it themselves on the open market, if they can get a better price -- as, it seems, they can. It is the board's statutory monopoly, the so-called "single desk" system, that has come under fire, not the existence of the board itself.

Yet the question that Goodale put to farmers was whether to keep the board or abolish it. Period. No dual market option: just the monopoly or bust. Even so, a remarkable 37 per cent of those who voted were so fed up with the board, a 62-year-old institution that farmers have always been told was set up to protect their interests, as to do away with it altogether. That three farmers in eight would take such a bold leap into the unknown hardly counts as a stirring vote of confidence. Had the question asked, as it should, what to do with the board's monopoly, it's safe to predict a majority for abolition.

But then, even to put the question that way presumes the answer it seeks: that the majority of producers should be entitled to bind the minority to their preference. It hardly mollifies farmers who resent being told how and when they can sell their own grain that henceforth they will be "empowered" to tell other farmers what to do with theirs. Whether the marketing of grain for export should or should not be a monopoly, or whether canola or flax or any other crop should be added to the list of controlled substances, it is scarcely an improvement to have the matter decided by majority rule, if it should properly have been a matter of individual choice from the start.

The solution Goodale prefers -- democratic collectivism -- is familiar enough. It is the same beloved of enthusiasts of parent-teacher associations, as the answer to poor schools, or putting consumer activists on the board of Canada Post, as the remedy for slow mail. In place of choice, it offers voice.

You say you don't like how your kid is taught? Get involved! Can't get a letter delivered on time? Put a note in the suggestion box. In time, if you are diligent and adept at politics, you might be able to persuade a majority to your point of view. Instead of forcing everyone to do things in the same old way, we will force them to do things in the same new way. That's democracy.

But the case for markets, the case for choice, the case the wheat board's critics make, is explicitly and avowedly anti-democratic. Democracy is a wonderful thing, at least compared to tyranny. But it is still about one group of people telling another, smaller group of people what to do. That's fine, for that narrow range of social and economic questions that may only be addressed by coercive means, where the only issue is how best to go about coercing one another. But most such decisions do not need to be taken collectively, nor -- if we value individual freedom -- should they be.

We do not hold a referendum on whether to drink Coke or Pepsi. We let each person decide for themselves -- even if their tastes are in the minority.

There is no reason to do otherwise when it comes to selling grain.