Freedom Daily Archive

A Free Market in Human Organs

by Ron Brown February 1, 1996

The liver transplant performed on former baseball great Mickey Mantle last year gives us an opportunity to review and challenge the statist notion that it is perfectly fine for an individual to donate a human organ to another person but sinister and evil, not to mention illegal, to sell it for profit. Recall that ...

Book Review: Austrian Economics for Investors

by Richard M. Ebeling February 1, 1996

Austrian Economics for Investors: Ludwig von Mises Goes to Wall Street by Mark Skousen (Potomac, Md.: Phillips Publishing, Inc., 1995); 46 pages; $10. Dr. Mark Skousen is that rarest of free-market economists. He cannot only write serious and original contributions to economic theory, he can also write popular works that ...

The White Rose: A Lesson in Dissent

by Jacob G. Hornberger January 1, 1996

The date was February 22, 1943. Hans Scholl and his sister Sophie, along with their best friend, Christoph Probst, were scheduled to be executed by Nazi officials that afternoon. The prison guards were so impressed with the calm and bravery of the prisoners in the face of impending death that ...

Optimism and Concern in Contemporary America

by Richard M. Ebeling January 1, 1996

I was about fifteen years old, in the mid-1960s, when I became interested in free-market, libertarian ideas. I was initially influenced by Henry Hazlitt, who at that time still had a weekly column in Newsweek . I found his book Economics in One Lesson in a used bookstore, and after reading it, I decided that I wanted ...

Washington Gibberish

by Sheldon Richman January 1, 1996

If English is ever declared the official language of the United States, the biggest upheaval will be in Washington, D.C. That's because they don't speak English in Washington. They speak gibberish. You may not realize that, because gibberish has the same-sounding words and grammatical structure as English. When you hear gibberish, you think you're hearing English. But you're not. ...

Vigilant Distrust, Part 2

by John C. Sparks January 1, 1996

Part 1 | Part 2 As years passed, it was customary for communities in the new land of America to set up local governments. Since the attraction of political power is a highly contagious disease anywhere, there were numerous instances of the political misuse of power. It is an axiom that politicians are always with us-and ready, willing, and ...

The White Rose

by Hans and Sophia Scholl January 1, 1996

Nothing is so unworthy of a civilized nation as allowing itself to be "governed" without opposition by an irresponsible clique that has yielded to base instinct. It is certain that today every honest German is ashamed of his government. Who among us has any conception of the dimensions of shame that will befall us and our children when one ...

A Different Vision for Schools

by Rodney D. Lewis January 1, 1996

Perhaps every one of us might agree that the education of our children is a priority. For that reason, we have entrusted the state to fulfill this need by providing public schooling. But what do we want of a school? Is it to teach reading, writing, and arithmetic? Is it to teach history, philosophy, or logic? Is it to teach foreign ...

Book Review: Shakedown

by Richard M. Ebeling January 1, 1996

Shakedown: How the Government Screws You from A to Z by James Bovard (New York: Viking, 1995); 132 pages; $14.95. So you think you are free! So you think that you possess certain constitutional rights that safeguard your liberty from abusive intrusion from the oppressive hand of government! Well, think again! Most of us believe that we have freedom of speech. A newspaper ...

Trial by Jury

by Jacob G. Hornberger December 1, 1995

After a nine-month trial, the jury found O.J. Simpson not guilty of the murders of Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald Goldman. There was anger and outrage among most white Americans. The evidence clearly seemed to point to the defendant's guilt. The feeling was that a jury composed largely of black Americans acquitted Simpson simply due to his race. Amidst all ...

Practicing the Principle of Freedom — At Home and Abroad

by Richard M. Ebeling December 1, 1995

As an advocate of individual freedom, I consider all forms of government interference in people's lives, other than those minimally essential for the protection of life, liberty, and property, to be morally wrong, politically harmful, and economically counterproductive. As part of that political philosophy, I believe that the government ...

Individual Rights or Civil Rights?

by Sheldon Richman December 1, 1995

Civil rights and affirmative action are getting their closest reexamination in years. Unfortunately, the reexamination is not close enough. With scant exception, no one is willing to go to the core of the issue and condemn the entire rotten regime for what it is — massive violation of individual rights. The way civil rights are defined today confronts us ...