Freedom Daily Archive

The Libertarian Legacy of R.C. Hoiles, Part 2

by Wendy McElroy July 1, 2010

Part 1 | Part 2 Hoiles began his newspaper career by working for the Alliance Review (Ohio), a daily owned by his brother Frank. In 1919, he and Frank bought the Lorain Times Herald, (Ohio), of which R.C. owned two-thirds. In 1921, they each purchased a one-third share in the Mansfield News (Ohio), ...

Leading Humanity out of the Darkness, Part 1

by Jacob G. Hornberger June 1, 2010

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 The ancient Chinese symbol for “crisis” perfectly depicts the situation currently facing the American people. That symbol was actually composed of two separate symbols. One was the symbol for “danger” and the other was the symbol for “opportunity.” The danger we face as Americans comes in the ...

Capitalism and the Free Market, Part 2

by Sheldon Richman June 1, 2010

Part 1 | Part 2 The taint of government intervention into economic activity carried over to the British North American colonies. The radical nature of the American Revolution has masked the class struggle within American colonial society between what historian Merrill Jensen called “radicals” and “conservatives” in his book The Articles of Confederation: An Interpretation of the Social-Constitutional History ...

Federal Make-Work Jobs Betray Teenagers

by James Bovard June 1, 2010

Politicians now pretend that government spending can solve any and all ills. Sloshing out federal funds for local summer job programs exemplifies this delusion. Uncle Sam first began bank-rolling summer jobs for urban teens in 1964. It was decided that government should hire any low-income teen who couldn’t find a job on his own. Soon, with the usual bureaucratic imperialism, ...

Unnatural Law, Natural Tyranny, Part 3

by William L. Anderson June 1, 2010

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 It is not surprising that the viewpoints discussed in Part 2 also would transform criminal law. Americans had inherited from Great Britain the common law, in which the criminal portion was based on the doctrine of malum in se. That meant that criminal acts, such as murder, robbery, and other ...

Lessons for America from Germany’s Hyperinflation, Part 2

by Jim Powell June 1, 2010

Part 1 | Part 2 By November 1922, the German economy was collapsing. Industries shut down. The government committed itself to paying money to the thousands of workers who became unemployed. Within six months, the government was providing a trillion marks a month in emergency credits to failing banks, railroads, manufacturing businesses, and agricultural cooperatives. On July 1, 1923, ...

The Libertarian Legacy of R.C. Hoiles, Part 1

by Wendy McElroy June 1, 2010

Part 1 | Part 2 The libertarian publishing giant Raymond Cyrus Hoiles created the newspaper and media chain known as Freedom Communications. He was an immensely successful businessman who opposed all governmental privileges for business. As a self-made man, he deeply respected the “working man” and willingly did the “grunt work” involved in ...

The Real Culprit in the Housing Crisis

by George Leef June 1, 2010

The Housing Boom and Bust by Thomas Sowell (Basic Books, 2009); 192 pages. Throughout Thomas Sowell’s long career, he has tried to get Americans to grasp some simple but crucial truths about economics and government policy. One of those lessons is central to this book, namely that it is a mistake to judge policy enactments on the basis of their stated, ...

Liberalism Is the Enemy of the Poor

by Jacob G. Hornberger May 1, 2010

I was a liberal back in my late 20s. I was practicing law in my hometown of Laredo, Texas, where I was serving on the board of trustees for the local Legal Aid Society, a government agency that provided free legal services for the poor. I also served as the local representative for the ACLU. I believed that government’s ...

Capitalism and the Free Market, Part 1

by Sheldon Richman May 1, 2010

Part 1 | Part 2 Writing in the Guardian last January under the headline “Caribbean Communism v. Capitalism,” respected journalist Stephen Kinzer began his article like this (https://tinyurl.com/y8wfrxb): Visiting unhappy Cuba is especially thought-provoking for anyone familiar with its unhappy neighbours. Cubans live difficult lives and have much to complain about. So do Jamaicans, Dominicans, Haitians, Guatemalans, Hondurans, Salvadorans, and ...

Bringing Freedom and Prosperity to Afghanistan

by James Bovard May 1, 2010

The Obama administration is seeking to rechristen the Afghan debacle it inherited from the Bush administration. Obama’s efforts to legitimize the U.S. occupation of Afghanistan simply ignore the previous record of American actions in that nation. But the past debacles ensure the failure of Obama’s ramped-up interventions. Afghanistan was recently judged to be the second most corrupt nation on Earth. ...

Unnatural Law, Natural Tyranny, Part 2

by William L. Anderson May 1, 2010

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 While the founding of the United States (and its legal system based on the English common law) was carried out by people who believed strongly in natural law, nonetheless the seeds of dissent were already being sown in England. Jeremy Bentham, a philosopher who also had a strong effect on ...