Constitutions: No Authority

Guest post by Butler Shaffer. Originally published in The Voluntaryist, June 1987. I recently returned from a conference at which a participant took frenzied issue with me over the question of whether the Constitution is capable of protecting human liberty. I took the position that no Constitution can guarantee our freedoms, because it is impossible…

Mark Crovelli

“Toward Freedom” is an Everything-Voluntary.com series sharing personal stories about the journey toward freedom. Archived stories can be found here. Submit your story to the editor. Originally published at Voluntaryist.com. While most of my friends would find it difficult to imagine today, I have not always been a loudmouthed, pain-in-the-ass, libertarian anarchist. In fact, if…

The Inflation of Rights

Guest post by Sir Alfred Sherman. Originally published in The Voluntaryist, April 1987. In this essay I wish to argue that the inflation of rights, in the sense of hypertrophy of claims on society that the state is responsible for levying, is inherently self-defeating. It is bound to generate conflicts of rights that will end…