Freedom Daily Archive

The Free-Soil Movement, Part 1

by Wendy McElroy May 1, 2001

Part 1 | Part 2 In 1837, in order to encourage a westward migration of the poor and unemployed from the industrial East, the journalist Horace Greeley proclaimed, “Go West, young man, go forth into the Country.” The vast public lands in the West were seen as a safety valve for the increasing labor unrest of Eastern cities. Twenty-five years ...

Cause of Corrupt Government

by Clarence Manion May 1, 2001

A PRECISION TOOL designed for one purpose will be entirely ineffective — nay, it may even be destroyed — in an attempt to use it for another purpose. Every housewife knows that you cannot use an electric dishwasher as a garbage disposal unit. Yet the same American people who know so ...

Book Review: Government: Whose Obedient Servant?

by Richard M. Ebeling May 1, 2001

Government: Whose Obedient Servant? A Primer in Public Choice by Gordon Tullock, Arthur Seldon, and Gordon L. Brady (London: Institute of Economic Affairs, 2000); 184 pages; $15. IN SPITE OF THE COLOSSAL DISASTER of socialism throughout the world and the corrupt inefficiencies and distortions caused by the interventionist-welfare state, virtually every country in the world clings to various elements of these ...

Yahoo! We Have Free Speech

by Jacob G. Hornberger April 1, 2001

A RECENT RULING by a French Court in a lawsuit brought against Yahoo.com reflects the dramatically different way in which Americans and Europeans view the importance of individual liberty. The case involved Yahoo’s online auctions of Nazi memorabilia. In France, as in Germany, such sales constitute a severe criminal offense. While ...

Welfare State Morality

by Jacob G. Hornberger April 1, 2001

AS A COMPASSIONATE CONSERVATIVE, President Bush wants to give federal aid to faith-based organizations. His plan has drawn attacks from both leaders on the religious Right and civil libertarians on the Left. Religious leaders object to Bush’s plan on the ground that it will lead to governmental interference with religious organizations. The point they make ...

The Disunited States of Europe: The Politics of Power and Privilege, Part 2

by Richard M. Ebeling April 1, 2001

Part 1 | Part 2 FOR SIX DAYS, during December 6-12, 2000, the 15 member-nations of the European Union (EU) met in Nice, France, for a conference that was meant to set the direction and structure for the organization well into the 21st century. On the EU’s agenda were: (a) plans for expanding the European Union to include many of the ...

The Rule of Law, R.I.P.

by Sheldon Richman April 1, 2001

THERE IS LITTLE LEFT of the rule of law in the United States of America. To be sure, things are worse elsewhere, but that gives no comfort. We live under a regime in which the traditional features of the rule of law are largely absent. No one claims to be against the rule of law. Quite the contrary. But most ...

The Clinton Regime’s Final Bosh

by James Bovard April 1, 2001

“WE HAVE A NEW SENSE OF optimism in America.... America has come back under his regime,” declared White House press spokesman Jake Siewert at the final White House briefing of Clinton’s presidency. Siewert recognized his gaffe and quickly repeated himself, substituting the word “administration” for “regime.” But actually, the word “regime” is far more accurate, at least insofar as ...

FDR — The Man, the Leader, the Legacy, Part 12

by Ralph Raico April 1, 2001

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Table of Contents In granting official diplomatic recognition to the Soviet Union ...

Book Review: Revolutionary Language

by George Leef April 1, 2001

Revolutionary Language by David C. Calderwood (Lincoln, Neb.: iUniverse.com, Inc., 1999); 324 pages; $13.95. AN IMPORTANT but little-known battle between the forces of statism and the forces of liberty of the early 1990s pitted the “law-enforcement” community and national security paranoiacs against one man who happened to believe that people ought to be ...

Book Review: Basic Economics

by Richard M. Ebeling April 1, 2001

Basic Economics: A Citizen’s Guide to the Economy by Thomas Sowell (New York: Basic Books, 2000); 366 pages; $30. WHEN ADAM SMITH completed his criticisms of mercantilism, the 18th-century system of government planning and control, in The Wealth of Nations, he expressed a deep pessimism that the free-trade ideal that he had defended, instead of the regulated economy, would ever be ...

So Much for Compassionate Conservatism

by Jacob G. Hornberger March 1, 2001

DURING THE CONTROVERSY over Linda Chavezs appointment as secretary of labor, President Bush squandered an excellent opportunity to show some compassionate conservatism toward the tens of thousands of undocumented workers who have risked their lives to live and work in the United States. In the 1960s, I grew up on a farm on the Rio Grande outside of Laredo, Texas, ...