Guest post by Auberon Herbert. Excerpted from his 1908 essay “A Plea for Voluntaryism” found in The Voluntaryist Creed. Endless are the evils that power brings with it, both to those who rule and are ruled. If you hold power, your first aim and end are necessarily to preserve that power. With power, as you fondly imagine, you possess all…
Tag: slavery
Living Slavery And All That
Guest post by Alan P. Koontz. Originally published in The Voluntaryist, August 1985. In various forums, at least since the birth of the [Libertarian Party], Murray Rothbard has invoked what he calls the “slavery analogy,” to point up the morality of political voting. The question is: Does the slavery analogy really help in this way?…
Frederick Douglass and Modern Slavery
Guest post by Chris Sullivan. Drapetomania was a supposed mental disorder that caused slaves to run away from their masters. Anyone paying attention to the emigration of many Americans to freer countries might think that drapetomania is striking the wealthier classes. A man who knew something about drapetomania – in fact he had it, even…
Scope and Scale
Guest post by Larkin Rose. Why would anyone ever give up his freedom, in favor of having a master? Because aspiring tyrants are very good at deceiving people into thinking that it’s for their own good. It’s sad that this ever works, since it’s akin to a slave-master convincing a slave that the purpose of…
Applying Liberty Personally
Guest post by Spencer Morgan. After several years of involvement with freedom-oriented political efforts in Utah, there are some strategic lessons that have become evident to me, and the application of which I believe will help spread and build a much more viable culture of liberty here.Taking a look at the typical approach to liberty,…
America as an Historical Advance in Political Ethics
Guest post by Spencer Morgan. As an advocate of stateless human organization, or voluntaryism, I’ve often been faced with the dilemma of how to evaluate America in light of that ethical position. Is there any amount of reverence or appreciation warranted or does the nationalistic mythology about freedom need to be entirely discarded? Below are…
Button Pushing and the Radical Libertarian
Post by Skyler J. Collins. Originally written August 2011. Since I once claimed to be a radical libertarian, the question presents itself, “What is a radical libertarian?” Though I’ll give my own thoughts on the question, I could not answer this any better than one of the greatest of radical libertarians, Murray Rothbard: The true…
Defining a Free Society
Guest post by Brian Lobb. What is a “free society”? Some people think that having economic freedom while controlling others socially is freedom. On the opposite side, certain folks think that having social freedom while controlling their neighbors’ pocketbook is freedom. Neither stance is freedom when you really break it down. To have a truly…
Chapter 26 – Why Do We Hurt Our Children?
Table of ContentsPrevious – Section Five – Chapter 25 – “Childhood: The Unexplored Source of Knowledge” by Alice Miller 26 Why Do We Hurt Our Children? by James Kimmell As a psychologist who specialized in working with emotionally disturbed children, and as a person who has a special fondness for children, it is extremely troublesome…
Chapter 12 – What is the Free Market?
Table of ContentsPrevious – Section Three – Chapter 11 – “I, Pencil” by Leonard E. Read 12 What is the Free Market? by Murray N. Rothbard The Free Market is a summary term for an array of exchanges that take place in society. Each exchange is undertaken as a voluntary agreement between two people or…