Culture & the Libertarian Heritage

Wishing You a Free and Merry Christmas

by Doug Bandow December 1, 2000

CHRISTMAS IS THE TIME of goodwill, when everyone thinks of giving. And giving their own money, not other people’s money. Even in Washington, D.C. But in Washington, at least, Christmas is probably the only time of the year when anyone thinks about spending his own money.

Not Yours to Give

by David Crockett December 1, 2000

MR. SPEAKER — I have as much respect for the memory of the deceased, and as much sympathy for the suffering of the living, if suffering there be, as any man in this House, but we must not permit our respect for the dead or our sympathy for a part of ...

The Civil War and the American Mind

by Sheldon Richman November 1, 2000

THE CIVIL WAR and its militaristic effect on American society had important consequences for the nationalist collectivization of America that occurred in the following decades. It encouraged collectivist intellectuals to vigorously promote their reform visions and it won thinkers to the collectivist cause. It even convinced ...

Why the South Was Right, the North Wrong

by Doug Bandow November 1, 2000

THE VICTORS WRITE history books, and the dominant accounts of the Civil War reflect the victorious perspective: misguided Southerners sought to destroy democratic governance and preserve slavery. Led by the heroic Abraham Lincoln, Northerners responded by saving the Union and emancipating the slaves. And for leading his moral crusade, Lincoln is America’s greatest president, martyred ...

Strategies from the Past: Boycott, Part 2

by Wendy McElroy October 1, 2000

Part 1 | Part 2 Why, then, does boycott in the form of strikes and blacklists elicit such public condemnation? The 19th-century libertarian Steven Byington offered an explanation: The State is afraid of it. The boycott offers a means for making another do as you wish without calling in the States aid. Byington believed that the state recognized the ...

Morals and the Welfare State, Part 2

by F.A. Harper October 1, 2000

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 THE DECALOGUE serves as a guide to moral conduct which, if violated, brings upon the violator a commensurate penalty. There may be other guides to moral conduct which one might wish to add to the Golden Rule and ...

Strategies from the Past: Boycott, Part 1

by Wendy McElroy September 1, 2000

Part 1 | Part 2 The current disillusionment with politicians — which may be Clinton’s true legacy — will be positive only if it becomes disillusionment with the political means itself. Otherwise, people will continue to look primarily to the “state” for solutions instead of to “society.” State vs. society The German sociologist Franz Oppenheimer explained the difference between these two ...

Morals and the Welfare State, Part 1

by F.A. Harper September 1, 2000

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 TO MANY PERSONS, the welfare state has become a symbol of morality and righteousness. This makes those who favor the welfare state appear to be the true architects of a better world; those who oppose it, immoral rascals who might be expected to rob banks, or ...

Government: Creator of Uncertainty

by Sheldon Richman July 1, 2000

THE STOCK MARKET tumbles of recent months are a reminder that when it comes to economic phenomena, subjectivism reigns. One of the pillars of the Austrian school of economics is the principle that in explaining economic events, objective entities and quantities in themselves dont count. What counts is what human beings make of them. As F.A. Hayek wrote, It is ...

Democracy in America

by Alexis de Tocqueville May 1, 2000

In 1831, the French political writer Alexis de Tocqueville visited the United States of America, a nation in which the citizenry had rejected such things as income taxation, welfare, Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, public schooling, drug wars, economic regulations, gun control, and immigration controls. The following excerpts are taken from Tocqueville's book Democracy in America: "The Revolution of the United ...

Making Sense of Jewish Stereotypes

by Jeffrey A. Singer April 1, 2000

The stereotype is a printer's aid. This one-piece plate, cast in type metal from a mold taken of a printing surface, produces an unvarying form or pattern, having no individuality. It speeds the process of producing printed material. People use stereotyping to speed up thought processes in their daily lives - only they use a cognitive matrix instead of type ...

The Contagious Disease Acts

by Wendy McElroy March 1, 2000

The Contagious Disease Acts (1860s) in Britain occasioned "the western world's first feminine revolt of any stature." So wrote historian Michael Pearson in his book The Age of Consent: Victorian Prostitution and Its Enemies. The revolt was for sexual equality and against a double standard in the law. The 20-year crusade against the C.D. Acts was led by a ...