The object and practice of liberty lies in the limitation of governmental power.

The object and practice of liberty lies in the limitation of governmental power.

One of the most fashionable notions of our times is that social problems like poverty and oppression breed wars. Most read more

One of the most fashionable notions of our times is that social problems like poverty and oppression breed wars. Most wars, however, are started by well-fed people with time on their hands to dream up half-baked ideologies or grandiose ambitions, and to nurse real or imagined grievances.

Democracy: In which you say what you like and do what you're told.

Democracy: In which you say what you like and do what you're told.

I was really too honest a man to be a politician and live.

I was really too honest a man to be a politician and live.

No serious historian of politics would imagine that he had accounted for the protective tariff of the system of bounties read more

No serious historian of politics would imagine that he had accounted for the protective tariff of the system of bounties or subsidies, for the monetary and banking laws, for the state of law in regard to corporate privileges and immunities, for the actual status of property rights, for agricultural or for labor policies, until he had gone behind the general claims and the abstract justifications and had identified the specifically interested groups which promoted the specific law.

It is the fundamental theory of all the more recent American law...that the average citizen is half-witted, and hence not read more

It is the fundamental theory of all the more recent American law...that the average citizen is half-witted, and hence not to be trusted to either his own devices or his own thoughts.

People unfit for freedom - who cannot do much with it - are hungry for power. The desire for freedom read more

People unfit for freedom - who cannot do much with it - are hungry for power. The desire for freedom is an attribute of a "have" type of self. It says: leave me alone and I shall grow, learn, and realize my capacities. The desire for power is basically an attribute of a "have not" type of self.

In a democracy dissent is an act of faith. Like medicine, the test of its value is not in its read more

In a democracy dissent is an act of faith. Like medicine, the test of its value is not in its taste, but in its effects.

We trained hard - but it seemed that every time we were beginning to form up into teams we were read more

We trained hard - but it seemed that every time we were beginning to form up into teams we were reorganized. I was to learn later in life that we tend to meet any new situation by reorganizing, and what a wonderful method it can be for creating the illusion of progress while actually producing confusion, inefficiency, and demoralization.