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Individualism, and its economic corollary, laissez-faire liberalism, has not always taken on a conservative hue, has not always functioned, as it often does today, as an apologist for the status quo. On the contrary, the revolution of modern times was originally, and continued for a long time to be, laissez-faire individualist. Its purpose was to

[A selection from Education: Free and Compulsory . ] One of the most important facts about human nature is the great diversity among individuals. Of course, there are certain broad characteristics, physical and mental, which are common to all human beings. But more than any other species, individual men are distinct and separate individuals. Not

[A selection from Education: Free and Compulsory . ] The Reverend George Harris described the effects of compulsory education in imposing uniformity and enforced equality (soon after the establishment of compulsion): Education is already so generally provided in America and other countries [1897], that, without forecasting imaginary conditions,

[This article is excerpted from An Austrian Perspective on the History of Economic Thought (1995), volume 2, chapter 9: “Roots of Marxism: Messianic Communism,” section 3, “The Conspiracy of the Equals.”  Inspired by the works of Mably and especially Morelly , a young journalist from Picardy decided, amidst the turmoil of the French Revolution, to

1. The Value of Exchange How did money begin? Clearly, Robinson Crusoe had no need for money. He could not have eaten gold coins. Neither would Crusoe and Friday, perhaps exchanging fish for lumber, need to bother about money. But when society expands beyond a few families, the stage is already set for the emergence of money. To explain the role

Government paper, as pernicious as it may be, is a relatively straightforward form of counterfeiting. The public can understand the concept of “printing dollars” and spending them, and they can understand why such a flood of dollars will come to be worth a great deal less than gold, or than uninflated paper, of the same denomination, whether

[This essay was originally published as a minibook by the Constitutional Alliance of Lansing, Michigan, 1969.] We live in a world of euphemism. Undertakers have become “morticians,” press agents are now “public relations counselors” and janitors have all been transformed into “superintendents.” In every walk of life, plain facts have been wrapped

Excerpt from The Case Against the Fed We get closer to the nub of the problem when we realize that, historically, there has existed a very different type of “bank” that has no necessary logical connection, although it often had a practical connection, with loan banking. Gold coins are often heavy, difficult to carry around, and subject to risk of

Excerpt from The Case Against the Fed Central Banking began in England, when the Bank of England was chartered in 1694. Other large nations copied this institution over the next two centuries, the role of the Central Bank reaching its now familiar form with the English Peel Act of 1844. The United States was the last major nation to enjoy the

“To suppose all consumers to be dupes, and all merchants and manufacturers to be cheats, has the effect of authorizing them to be so, and of degrading all the working members of the community.” Anne Robert Jacques Turgot’s career in economics was brief but brilliant, and in every way remarkable. In the first place, he died rather young, and