It struck me recently just how frequently we use the word “law” in our conversations. I read or hear, “That’s against the law” when someone wants someone else not to do something, and “There ought to be a law” when someone wants to further restrict others. I read arguments about what it really means to say that the Constitution is the highest law
In Abraham Lincoln’s June 16, 1858, speech upon being chosen as Illinois’ Republican nominee for U.S. Senate against Stephen Douglas, he cited Jesus’ words in the Bible that “a house divided against itself cannot stand.” Today, that principle is once again an ominous portent for America. We have piles of politicians who claim they will unify us,
It is hard not to notice the Biden administration’s clear demonstration of their disregard for Americans’ property rights and the Constitution. All one needs to do is read the Fifth Amendment’s Takings Clause while considering Biden’s extension of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) eviction moratorium. Why? It did so despite
Sociologist Mike Savage’s new book, The Return of Inequalilty , is the latest in a long line of unsuccessful attempts to demonize and eliminate inequality. James R. Rogers provides an interesting and useful discussion of it in his review, “ Is Inequality a Problem? ” on the Law and Liberty website. But what I was most struck by was the picture
Leonard Read knew the problems of socialism and saw what a threat its growth was to Americans’ well-being as well as their liberties. He also saw that the attempt to improve things that cannot work well, as is true of socialistic efforts, could even tempt lovers of liberty into undermining what they believe in. Read made his case in “I Don’t
President Joe Biden’s Federal Trade Commission (FTC) appointees have an affinity for returning to an earlier era’s antitrust enforcement, sometimes summarized as a “big is bad” or “neo-Brandeisian” approach. The most famous (or notorious) current example is the FTC’s opposition to the proposed merger between Microsoft and Activision. In their
All too often, unscrupulous businesses weaponize the United States’ antitrust laws—which are only supposed to be utilized to protect consumers against higher prices and other consequences of monopoly power—for their own self-serving purposes. Professor Thomas DiLorenzo explained this problem more than a third of a century ago in a piece titled
The 2023 graduation season is now underway. The famous, generous, and politically powerful (especially those currently in federal office, who are cheaper because they are banned from being paid for giving speeches) will be dispensing (often very limited) wisdom about the “real world” to hundreds of commencement audiences across America. Some of
Americans are in a time of rising labor unrest and activism, including multiple unionization campaigns, regulatory and legal changes to make it easier for unionization efforts to succeed, the “Fight for $15” minimum wage agitation, and the Hollywood writer’s strike. However, such discussions and campaigns seldom approach the issues involved from a
Americans have long thought of themselves as people of action. As Leonard Read noted in his article “How to Gain Liberty,” the sentiment “I want less talk and more action” is (or at least once was) common among Americans. It even extends to situations when people recognize that their liberties are threatened. But then the question arises as to
What is the Mises Institute?
The Mises Institute is a non-profit organization that exists to promote teaching and research in the Austrian School of economics, individual freedom, honest history, and international peace, in the tradition of Ludwig von Mises and Murray N. Rothbard.
Non-political, non-partisan, and non-PC, we advocate a radical shift in the intellectual climate, away from statism and toward a private property order. We believe that our foundational ideas are of permanent value, and oppose all efforts at compromise, sellout, and amalgamation of these ideas with fashionable political, cultural, and social doctrines inimical to their spirit.