Laws are fetters. The obligation to respect the property rights of others, the obligation to keep one's contractual promises, these are fetters - restraints on one's freedom. They just happen to be restraints or fetters that we have found to be beneficial because they lead to a more productive and efficient economy. That's why we prize them. "Unfettered capitalism" is an oxymoron in that regard.
OK, sure, I guess if you want to call all laws "fetters" or chains, you can. After all, as you point out, even laws that protect your (and my) life, liberty, and property do restrain me (and you) from at least some activities.
But I would not call such laws chains (nor would I feel them to be such). Such laws are not chains, but protections and guarantors of liberty. They are not adopted, fundamentally, out of considerations of efficiency and productivity, but rather as requirements of the very structure of moral, ordered liberty under nature or nature's God envisioned in the Declaration. That is why I prize them. Basic principles of natural law require that I respect the life of another, the fruits of another's labor, and the associations entered into by another. I am not less free, in my view, by respecting in someone else that which I ask all to respect in me.
(Of course laws are only weak guarantors of liberty, relative to religion, custom, culture and morality of society as a whole. If laws are our only restraints, we will hardly have liberty.)
Why does everyone think that "unchained" or "unfettered" capitalism means "lawless capitalism" (which is indeed an oxymoron)? I guess "unfettered" really is a problem word, since it seems to equate to "lawless" in the mind of so many. I guess "free market capitalism" works better.
But since when is "capitalism" such a dirty-word, evil thing that it must be "fettered" or chained even to be acceptable?? I think this is an example of the statist or leftist position winning the debate by emotionalizing or demonizing the very terms of discussion. "Unfettered capitalism" is probably a carefully chosen phrase, useful to push all the right emotional buttons, judging by the reaction here.
I prefer my capitalism--and myself--unfettered.