Civil Liberties & Privacy

Guns and Privacy

by Scott McPherson January 1, 2003

Ask a member of the mainstream political Left whether he would be willing to have a camera installed in his house by the government with the explicit purpose of monitoring his activities for any potential wrongdoing. Like any self-respecting human being, he would very likely recoil in disgust against so blatant a violation of his privacy. Next, assure him that, ...

The Real State of the Union

by Scott McPherson December 27, 2002

In late January, President Bush will speak to the nation from the House of Representatives in his annual state of the Union address. By the tens of millions Americans will tune in to hear the president outline his legislative agenda for the coming year and congratulate himself on his past ...

Economic Liberty and the Constitution, Part 7

by Jacob G. Hornberger December 1, 2002

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 1895 the New York legislature enacted a law ...

Book Review: The Myth of Ownership

by George Leef December 1, 2002

The Myth of Ownership — Taxes and Justice by Liam Murphy and Thomas Nagel (Oxford University Press, 2002); 190 pages; $25. During the Vietnam War, a popular protest slogan went “Fighting for peace is like drinking for sobriety.” After reading The Myth of Ownership, I feel like making a sign reading, “Taxing for justice is like fighting for peace and drinking ...

So Goes the American Dream

by Bart Frazier November 4, 2002

The American dream once was a reality. A man was free to use his resources any way he saw fit to provide for himself and his family. Whether his resources were personal skills or material in nature, he was free to use them whichever way he wanted, as long as he did not infringe ...

Economic Liberty and the Constitution, Part 6

by Jacob G. Hornberger November 1, 2002

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 the late 1800s, the state of New York ...

Political Plundering of Property Owners

by James Bovard November 1, 2002

For the first 175 years of the American republic, it was clearly recognized that government should not casually seize people’s property and give it to other people for their private use. The Supreme Court ruled in 1937 that “one person’s property may not be taken for the benefit of another private person ...

NO to Ballistic Fingerprinting

by Bart Frazier October 17, 2002

Over the past nine days, a methodical killer has shot 10 people in the Washington, D.C., metropolitan area, killing 8 of them. There is scant evidence and police are having a hard time finding the killer, as is often the case when crimes appear to be completely random and without motive. One ...

Economic Liberty and the Constitution, Part 5

by Jacob G. Hornberger October 1, 2002

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 the Slaughterhouse Cases (1872), the U.S. Supreme Court, ...

Coming Assaults on America

by Sheldon Richman October 1, 2002

What do the coming war against Iraq and the pending threat to medical privacy have in common? Both give the lie to the belief that we Americans live under a system of limited, representative government. The civics textbooks are hooey, but they serve a purpose as a sedative for the next ...

What Dionne Warwick Reveals about the Drug War

by Sheldon Richman September 13, 2002

The American Inquisition got another one last month. Singer Dionne Warwick, who was found with nearly a dozen marijuana cigarettes at the Miami airport recently, had her charges dropped in return for promising to undergo “drug treatment” and to make anti-drug public-service announcements. Let’s not dwell on the fact that a ...

Economic Liberty and the Constitution, Part 4

by Jacob G. Hornberger September 1, 2002

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 After the end of the Civil War, the “carpetbag” ...