Lysander Spooner

Lysander Spooner (1808–1887) is the American individualist anarchist and legal theorist known mainly for setting up a commercial post office in competition with the government and thereby being shut down. But he was also the author of some of the most radical political and economic writings of the 19th century, and continues to have a huge influence on libertarian thinkers today. He was a dedicated opponent of slavery in all its forms — even advocating guerrilla war to stop it — but also a dedicated opponent of the federal invasion of the South and its postwar reconstruction. See Let’s Abolish Government, a collection selected personally by Murray Rothbard as Spooner’s best work.

Articles

On Voting
Mises Wire Lysander Spooner
[ From No Treason No. VI: The Constitution of No Authority .] Listen to the Audio Mises Wire version of this article. All the voting that has ever taken place under the Constitution, has been of such...
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Publications

Vices are NOT Crimes
Lysander Spooner
Introduction by Murray Rothbard: We are all indebted to Carl Watner for uncovering an unknown work by the great Lysander Spooner, one that managed to escape the editor of Spooner’s Collected Works. Both the title and the substance of “Vices are not
Let’s Abolish Government
Lysander Spooner
Lysander Spooner (1808–1887) is the American individualist anarchist and legal theorist known mainly for setting up a commercial post office in competition with the government and thereby being shut down. But he was also the author of some of the

Media

On Voting
Lysander Spooner

Since each person votes for different reasons, we can't morally say that the outcome of an election binds people to any specific law or policy.

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