 The only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilized community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others. His own good, either physical or moral, is not sufficient warrant.
John Stuart Mill
On Liberty (1859)
If a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer. Let him step to the music which he hears, however measured or far away.
Henry David Thoreau
Walden
The national budget must be balanced. The public debt must be reduced; the arrogance of the authorities must be moderated and controlled. Payments to foreign governments must be reduced. If the nation doesn't want to go bankrupt, people must again learn to work, instead of living on public assistance.
Marcus Tullius Cicero
55 BC
Liberals want the government to be your Mommy. Conservatives want government to be your Daddy. Libertarians want it to treat you like an adult.
Andre Marrou
Government cannot make man richer, but it can make him poorer.
Ludwig von Mises
Collectivism doesn't work because it's based on a faulty economic premise. There is no such thing as a person's 'fair share' of wealth. The gross national product is not a pizza that must be carefully divided because if I get too many slices, you have to eat the box. The economy is expandable and, in any practical sense, limitless.
P. J. O'Rourke
How to Explain Conservatism
Democracy is a pathetic belief in the collective wisdom of individual ignorance.
H. L. Mencken
It is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer, or the baker, that we expect our dinner, but from regard to their own interest. We address ourselves, not to their humanity but to their self-love, and never talk to them of our own necessities but of their advantages. Nobody but a beggar chooses to depend chiefly upon the benevolence of his fellow citizens.
Adam Smith
The Wealth of Nations
In matters of Power, let no more be heard of confidence in men, but bind him down from mischief by the chains of the Constitution.
Thomas Jefferson
Liberty means responsibility. That is why most men dread it.
George Bernard Shaw
Everything that is really great and inspiring is created by the individual who can labor in freedom.
Albert Einstein
Good intentions will always be pleaded for every assumption of authority. It is hardly too strong to say that the Constitution was made to guard the people against the dangers of good intentions. There are men in all ages who mean to govern well, but they mean to govern. They promise to be good masters, but they mean to be masters.
Daniel Lloyd Webster
If you have been voting for politicians who promise to give you goodies at someone else's expense, then you have no right to complain when they take your money and give it to someone else, including themselves.
Thomas Sowell
1992
The difference between libertarianism and socialism is that libertarians will tolerate the existence of a socialist community, but socialists can't tolerate a libertarian community.
David D. Boaz
1997
We contend that for a nation to try to tax itself into prosperity is like a man standing in a bucket and trying to lift himself up by the handle.
Winston Churchill
1903
The spirit of truth and the spirit of freedom – they are the pillars of society.
Henrik Ibsen
1877
Political power grows out of the barrel of a gun.
Mao Zedong
1938
Do not suppose that abuses are eliminated by destroying the object which is abused. Men can go wrong with wine and women. Shall we then prohibit and abolish women?
Martin Luther
'Solve' and 'Problems' are not in the constitution.
Doug Newman
The plans differ; the planners are all alike…
Claude Frederic Bastiat
Liberals believe government should take people's earnings to give to poor people. Conservatives disagree. They think government should confiscate people's earnings and give them to farmers and insolvent banks. The compelling issue to both conservatives and liberals is not whether it is legitimate for government to confiscate one's property to give to another, the debate is over the disposition of the pillage.
Walter Williams
The people of the various provinces are strictly forbidden to have in their possession any swords, bows, spears, firearms or other types of arms. The possession of these elements makes difficult the collection of taxes and dues, and tends to permit uprising.
Toyotomi Hideyoshi
August 29, 1558
When buying and selling are controlled by legislation, the first things to be bought and sold are legislators.
P. J. O'Rourke
Government's view of the economy could be summed up in a few short phrases: If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. And if it stops moving, subsidize it.
Ronald Reagan
1986
There is only one basic human right, the right to do as you damn well please. And with it comes the only basic human duty, the duty to take the consequences.
P. J. O'Rourke
1993
Whenever is found what is called a paternal government, there is found state education. It has been discovered that the best way to ensure implicit obedience is to commence tyranny in the nursery.
Benjamin Disraeli
1874
A sword never kills anybody; it is a tool in the killer's hand.
Lucius Annaeus Seneca
If you have ten thousand regulations, you destroy all respect for the law.
Winston Churchill
I have sworn upon the altar of god, eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man.
Thomas Jefferson
I should have loved freedom, I believe, at all times, but in the time in which we live I am ready to worship it.
Alexis de Tocqueville
The Government is like a baby's alimentary canal, with a happy appetite at one end and no responsibility at the other.
Ronald Reagan
If you think health care is expensive now, wait until you see what it costs when it's free.
P. J. O'Rourke
1993
The great virtue of a free market system is that it does not care what color people are; it does not care what their religion is; it only cares whether they can produce something you want to buy. It is the most effective system we have discovered to enable people who hate one another to deal with one another and help one another.
Milton Friedman
The single most exciting thing you encounter in government is competence, because it's so rare.
Daniel Patrick Moynihan
1976
There is no distinctly native American criminal class save Congress.
Mark Twain
Useless laws weaken the necessary laws.
Charles de Secondat Montesquieu
The main political problem is how to prevent the police power from becoming tyrannical. This is the meaning of all the struggles for liberty.
Ludwig von Mises
The desire of businessmen for profits is what drives prices down unless forcibly prevented from engaging in price competition, usually by governmental activity.
Thomas Sowell
It stands to reason that where there's sacrifice, there's someone collecting sacrificial offerings. Where there's service, there's someone being served. The man who speaks to you of sacrifice, speaks of slaves and masters. And intends to be the master.
Ayn Rand
All the Congress, all the accountants and tax lawyers, all the judges, and a convention of wizards all cannot tell for sure what the income tax law says.
Walter B. Wriston
A patriot must always be ready to defend his country against its government.
Edward Abbey
The government's War on Poverty has transformed poverty from a short-term misfortune into a career choice.
Harry Browne
An inevitable consequence of socialism is the division of society into two groups: those who are consuming government 'services' and those who are paying for them.
Lee Robinson
Private enterprise creates; government destroys. That is the great economic lesson of our times and all times.
Llewelyn H. Rockwell, Jr.
Government control gives rise to fraud, suppression of Truth, intensification of the black market and artificial scarcity. Above all, it unmans the people and deprives them of initiative, it undoes the teaching of self-help...
Mohandas Gandhi
... an increase in the power of the State ... does the greatest harm to mankind by destroying individuality which lies at the heart of all progress...
Mohandas Gandhi
The intent of the Second Amendment is to arm the people to frighten government and to keep it in check.
Ted Lang
Our legislators are not sufficiently apprized of the rightful limits of their power; that their true office is to declare and enforce only our natural rights and duties, and to take none of them from us.
Thomas Jefferson
Letter to F. W. Gilmer, 1816
Whensoever the General Government assumes undelegated powers, its acts are unauthoritative, void, and of no force.
Thomas Jefferson
Socialists like to tout their confiscation and redistribution schemes as noble and caring, but we should ask if theft is ever noble or caring.
Robert Hawes
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