All Posts Tagged With: "individual rights"
Neoconservatism: An Obituary for an Idea
It has always been hard to pin down just what “conservatism” stands for, what with people of such widely divergent views as Barry Goldwater, Jerry Falwell, and both George Bushes described by that term. The relatively recent addition to the political lexicon of “neoconservatism” complicates matters further. What do “neocons” believe? Where do their ideas [...]
24Aug2011 | George C. Leef | 4 comments | ContinuedNot All Choices Are Equal
Opponents of the freedom philosophy never run out of insipid rebuttals. The latest to have a go at it is Martin Wolf of the Financial Times. Wolf ponders the question, “What is the role of the state,” and notes that a “strand” of classical liberalism (or libertarianism) “believes the answer is to define the role [...]
24Nov2010 | Sheldon Richman | 10 comments | ContinuedLeviathan: The Growth of Local Government and the Erosion of Liberty
Does government have too much power? Certainly—just think of all the freedom Americans have lost on account of the income tax, Social Security, Department of Labor regulations, the threat of antitrust prosecution, and so on. Note that in my short list of examples, each one is due to action by the federal government. In Leviathan, [...]
12Jul2010 | George C. Leef | 0 comments | ContinuedThe Private Road to Freedom
There is not a state in the union that does not struggle from year to year to build and maintain roads in something resembling an efficient, timely, or competent fashion. State legislatures and city governments raise only a chuckle from their constituents when suggesting that this time, this budget, they will get it right. In [...]
29Jun2010 | Scott McPherson | 1 comment | ContinuedPrincipled Parties
Imagine a political movement that says it’s committed to “equal rights”—and means it. Not just equality in a few cherry-picked rights but all human rights, including the most maligned, property rights. Imagine a movement whose raison d’être is to oppose any and all special privileges from government for anybody. When it comes to political parties, [...]
1Jan2010 | Lawrence W. Reed | 5 comments | ContinuedKelo v. City of New London: Do We Need Eminent Domain for Economic Growth?
The Supreme Court continues to give politicians free rein to trample the rights of individuals except in cases where the justices think that the rights are fundamental. Property rights are not regarded as fundamental, and the Court will accept almost any justification, no matter how nave and intellectually feeble, for government encroachments on them.
1Nov2005 | George C. Leef | 0 comments | ContinuedThe Supreme Court and the End of Limited Government
The Supreme Court ruling permitting governments
forcibly to transfer property through eminent
domain from one private party to another
for the sake of economic development did not come out
of the blue. Although the Takings Clause in the Fifth
Amendment to the U.S. Constitution specifies “nor shall
private property be taken for public use without just
compensation,” the “Court long ago rejected any literal
requirement that condemned property be put into use
for the general public” (Hawaii Housing Authority v. Midkiff,
1984, cited in the current case, Kelo v. City of New
London).
The Effrontery of the "Open Space" Movement
New Hampshire is called the “Live Free or Die”
state. It has garnered such a reputation as a bastion
of freedom that the Porcupine members
of the Free State Project selected it as the place to which
they would like to relocate in order to live more independently
and more productively.
Why Classical Liberals Care about the Rule of Law (And Hardly Anyone Else Does)
In 1776 John Adams declared that America was “a
nation of laws, not men.” Politicians of all persuasions
have used Adams’s phrase ever since to claim
the moral high ground. Such rare agreement among the
political classes, even if only rhetorical, is an indication
of the power of the idea of the rule of law.
Basis of Liberty
In one of his fables Aesop said: “A horse and a stag,
feeding together in a rich meadow, began fighting
over which should have the best grass.The stag with
his sharp horns got the better of the horse. So the horse
asked the help of man. And man agreed, but suggested
that his help might be more effective if he were permitted
to ride the horse and guide him as he thought best.
So the horse permitted man to put a saddle on his back
and a bridle on his head.Thus they drove the stag from
the meadow. But when the horse asked man to remove
the bridle and saddle and set him free, man answered, ‘I
never before knew what a useful drudge you are. And
now that I have found what you are good for, you may
rest assured that I will keep you to it.’”
Property Protects
Opponents of authentic liberalism have long held that the state must be powerful enough to protect the powerless from the ravages of private property. The Supreme Court’s decision in the Kelo eminent-domain case last summer shows what that principle is worth. To recap, the city of New London, Connecticut, condemned 15 working-class homes for an [...]
1Sep2005 | Sheldon Richman | 0 comments | ContinuedFreedom and Majority Rule
The publisher of the London Times came to this country a few years after World War I. A banquet in his honor was held in New York City, and at the appropriate time Lord Northcliffe rose to his feet to propose a toast. Prohibition was in effect, you will recall, and the beverage customarily drunk [...]
1Jun2005 | Edmund A. Opitz | 0 comments | ContinuedBook Reviews – April 2003
Guns and Violence: The English Experience by Joyce Lee Malcolm Harvard University Press • 2002 • 352 pages • $28.00 Reviewed by Clayton Cramer Joyce Lee Malcolm’s new book is not the masterpiece that her previous book, To Keep and Bear Arms: The Origins of an Anglo-American Right, was. Still, there is much to commend, [...]
1Apr2003 | FEE Admin | 0 comments | ContinuedHijacking a Principle
This publication would not normally take notice of a Republican politician’s embarrassing moment. But former Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott’s apparent retroactive endorsement of Strom Thurmond’s 1948 segregationist presidential campaign is relevant to Ideas on Liberty. It is relevant for this reason: the cause of liberty has been gravely harmed by the association of certain [...]
1Mar2003 | Sheldon Richman | 0 comments | ContinuedThe Danger of National Identification
It seems innocuous. What could be so sinister about finding out who people are? But the national identification regime that some in government and the media want to establish in response to the September 11 terrorist attacks would likely do much to threaten individual privacy and security while doing little in itself to prevent terrorism. [...]
1Oct2002 | David M. Brown | 4 comments | ContinuedThe Contradictions of Capitalism
We advocates of individual rights and free markets can’t win the intellectual debate with the ideological left. That’s because there is no intellectual debate with the left. There can’t be a debate since the opponents of capitalism are simply not open to rational discussion. They know that capitalism is inherently evil, and no argument, no [...]
1Aug2002 | James Peron | 0 comments | ContinuedChicken or Egg: Rights and Government
A theme of prominent contemporary political thinking is that our rights are gifts from government. Famous academics such as Stephen Holmes and Cass R. Sunstein have argued as much in their book, The Cost of Rights (W. W. Norton, 1999). As they put it, “individual rights and freedoms depend fundamentally on vigorous state action” (p. [...]
1Jul2002 | Tibor R. Machan | 1 comment | Continued-
The Latest
Contraception: Insuring the Uninsurable
Update below. Controversy rages over the Obama administration’s mandate that all employers – including... Read More
The Snow Plowers’ Petition
The following might have happened in a small college town in upstate New York… In a cold and snowy... Read More
Super Bowl versus Education?
In the spirit of Super Bowl weekend I’d like to deconstruct a Facebook status update that a friend... Read More
Capitalism, Corporatism, and the Freed Market
When a front-running presidential contender tells the country that thanks to Barack Obama, “[w]e are... Read More
Creating Jobs versus Creating Value
Picking on New York Times columnist Paul Krugman is one of the largest participation sports on the Internet.... Read More
