Freedom Daily Archive

America’s Wars and the Los Angeles Riots, Part 1

by Jacob G. Hornberger December 1, 1992

Part 1 | Part 2 For much of the 20th century, the United States government has waged its Wars on Poverty, Drugs, and Illiteracy. And there is no better evidence of the failure of these wars than the riots that occurred in Los Angeles. The principles that undergird America's economic system in our time are radically different from those under ...

“Competing Capitalism” and the New Rationales for Economic Collectivism

by Richard M. Ebeling December 1, 1992

Since the collapse of the communist governments in Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union, the West has basked in the glory of the triumph of democracy and capitalism over dictatorship and socialism. The need for "market relationships" and a capitalist economy to assure both economic prosperity and political ...

The Rise, Fall, and Renaissance of Classical Liberalism, Part 3: The 20th Century

by Ralph Raico December 1, 1992

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 The First World War was the watershed of the twentieth century. Itself the product of antiliberal ideas and policies, such as militarism and protectionism, the Great War fostered statism in every form. In Europe and America, the trend towards state intervention accelerated, as governments conscripted, censored, inflated, ran up mountains ...

Book Review: Russia Transformed

by Richard M. Ebeling December 1, 1992

Russia Transformed: Breakthrough to Hope by James H. Billington (New York: The Free Press, 1992); 202 pages; $19.95. Earlier this year, the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C., hosted an exhibit of previously secret documents from the Soviet archives. One of them was an order sent by Lenin on August 11, 1918, to ...

Electing Our Daddy

by Jacob G. Hornberger November 1, 1992

For 125 years, the American people elected a president. During that time, the powers of the president were extremely limited. The American people did not permit the passage, for example, of income taxation, drug laws, and welfare laws. They also refused to permit a large standing military force. And they did not allow their government to engage in foreign ...

Some Warnings for the East: What Former Socialist Countries Need to Know

by Richard M. Ebeling November 1, 1992

For the last three years, the Eastern European countries and the republics of the former Soviet Union have been trying to escape from their socialist past. Democratic governments have been elected, and market reforms have been promised. Yet, in each of these countries, the socialist economic structures still exist ...

The Dead End of Head Start

by Llewellyn H. Rockwell Jr. November 1, 1992

Head Start is the only one of Lyndon Baines Johnson's welfare programs that works, or so we're told. The New York Times calls it "the Great Society jewel." And our Republican president, George Bush, asked for "record spending" on Head Start in his new budget. He even crawled around on the floor at a Head Start center, talking ...

Liberty’s Guilded Door

by Wall Street Journal November 1, 1992

Hong Kong's administration calls it a success to have finally deterred Vietnamese boat people from seeking asylum in the British Crown Colony. Hong Kong's authorities announced proudly that for the first time in seven years, the number of new Vietnamese refugee arrivals in Hong Kong dropped to zero. The reason is not that Communist Vietnam has suddenly become a realm ...

Book Review: Forbidden Grounds

by Richard M. Ebeling November 1, 1992

Forbidden Grounds: The Case Against Employment Discrimination Laws by Richard A. Epstein (Cambridge: Harvard University Press 1992); 530 pages; $39.95. In the 1960s, many conservatives opposed the civil-rights acts and forced-integration laws that were passed. Some of these conservatives may have been racists who ...

The Crisis in Conservatism

by Jacob G. Hornberger October 1, 1992

The end of the Cold War has brought a deep crisis to the conservative movement in America. For over four decades, the communist threat was the glue that bound conservatives together. However, now that communism no longer poses a direct threat to the United States, deep cracks have appeared in the conservative movement. Why? The reason is that conservatives have ...

Forward to the Past: From Central Planning to the Redistributive State

by Richard M. Ebeling October 1, 1992

At the dawn of the 20th century, in 1899, the French social psychologist Gustave Le Bon looked into the future and described "the immediate fate of the nation which shall first see the triumph of Socialism....The people will of course commence by despoiling and then shooting a few thousands of employers, ...

The Rise, Fall, and Renaissance of Classical Liberalism, Part 2: Triumphs and Challenges

by Ralph Raico October 1, 1992

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 As the nineteenth century began, classical liberalism — or just liberalism as the philosophy of freedom was then known — was the specter haunting Europe — and the world. In every advanced country the liberal movement was active. Drawn mainly from the middle classes, it included people from widely contrasting religious ...