Free Society

Libertarianism, Birth Control, and Religious Accommodations

by Laurence M. Vance August 3, 2022

Who would have thought that birth control would be in the news in 2022? The House of Representatives recently passed the Right to Contraception Act (H.R.8373). The bill “sets out statutory protections for an individual's right to access and a health care provider's right to provide contraception and related information.” The vote was 228–195, with just eight Republicans voting ...

America’s Culture of Death

by Jacob G. Hornberger August 1, 2022

In the wake of another mass shooting, this one in Uvalde, Texas, there have been the standard, predictable calls for gun control. The idea is that if more stringent gun-control laws are enacted, there will be fewer mass shootings. That’s simply ludicrous reasoning. When a person wants to kill a lot of people, he is going to be able to ...

It’s Up to Them

by Laurence M. Vance August 1, 2022

President Joe Biden has done it again. He’s committed another gaffe. But this comes as no surprise since he acknowledged during a stop on his book tour in 2018 that he was “a gaffe machine,” and has not stopped proving the truth of that statement ever since. In late December of last year, Biden spoke with state governors on a ...

Out of Control Government and Isaiah’s Job

by Richard M. Ebeling August 1, 2022

It is very difficult to be a classical liberal or libertarian and not experience bouts of disappointment, frustration, and outright pessimism. The world around us seems to be going to hell in a handbasket. Government continues to grow and, apparently, is out of control. For example, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) released its semiannual Budget and Economic Outlook, 2022-2032 in ...

Declare Your Independence from Tyranny, America

by John W. Whitehead July 1, 2022

Imagine living in a country where armed soldiers crash through doors to arrest and imprison citizens merely for criticizing government officials. Imagine that in this very same country, you’re watched all the time, and if you look even a little bit suspicious, the police stop and frisk you or pull you over to search you on the off chance you’re ...

Would You Abdicate If You Could Be the Dictator?

by Richard M. Ebeling July 1, 2022

Leonard E. Read, the founding and long-serving first president of the Foundation for Economic Education (FEE), once told a story about when he first met the famous Austrian economist Ludwig von Mises. It was in 1940, shortly after Mises had arrived in the United States from war-torn Europe. Read had invited Mises to Los Angeles to deliver a talk ...

Everybody’s Guilty

by John W. Whitehead June 24, 2022

“In a closed society where everybody's guilty, the only crime is getting caught.”—Hunter S. Thompson The burden of proof has been reversed. No longer are we presumed innocent. Now we’re presumed guilty unless we can prove our innocence beyond a reasonable doubt in a court of law. Rarely, are we even given the opportunity to do so. Although the Constitution requires the ...

The Stultification of American Conscience

by Jacob G. Hornberger June 1, 2022

One of the fascinating consequences of public (i.e., government) schooling is that it molds the minds of children in such a way that by the time they become adults, their minds inevitably mirror whatever narrative the authorities happen to be advancing at any particular time. In fact, the indoctrination is oftentimes so effective that most of them have no ...

When the Government Plays God

by John W. Whitehead May 6, 2022

Abortion on demand is the ultimate State tyranny; the State simply declares that certain classes of human beings are not persons, and therefore not entitled to the protection of the law. The State protects the ‘right’ of some people to kill others, just as the courts protected the ‘property rights’ of slave masters in their slaves. ...

Federal Testing Debacle Multiplied COVID Carnage

by James Bovard May 1, 2022

On a bitter cold January afternoon, lines of people awaiting free COVID tests stretched around the block at a Rockville, Maryland, public library. Looking at the scene reminded me of seeing East Germans lined up in endless queues in the 1980s to receive their potato and sauerkraut rations. But few of the people docilely waiting in Rockville recognized that ...

In the Beginning: The Mont Pelerin Society, 1947

by Richard M. Ebeling May 1, 2022

Seventy-five years ago, there occurred an important event in the post–World War II revival of free-market liberal ideas. Over the first ten days of April 1947, 39 people from Europe and the United States met in a hotel in Switzerland at a mountain place known as Mont Pelerin. They came together to discuss the future of economic, social, and ...

We’re Only as Free as the Government Allows

by John W. Whitehead April 27, 2022

“Rights aren’t rights if someone can take them away. They’re privileges. That’s all we’ve ever had in this country, is a bill of temporary privileges. And if you read the news even badly, you know that every year the list gets shorter and shorter. Sooner or later, the people in this country are gonna realize the government … doesn’t ...