In Defense of Freedom...

"Given that murder and theft are wrong—views not unique to libertarianism, of course—the libertarian contends that the state, which is to say those individuals who purport to act in the name of the common good, has no more right to seize the property of others, beat them, conscript them, or otherwise harm them than any other institution or individual has."

"Discovering just which functions of government are necessary, or showing how life can be led in the absence of institutional coercion altogether, is no easy task. Any power that the state assumes typically comes to be seen in retrospect as absolutely essential. America long got by well without a Federal Reserve or a Food and Drug Administration, yet today it is almost unthinkable that they could be abolished. "

"Consider the about-face that conservatives in this country have pulled with respect to the Department of Education—one could name other departments as well—which once was targeted for elimination and now is funded more generously than ever."

"Before Social Security, families and churches cared for the elderly. Now it is easier for young people to forget their parents and grandparents in old age; let the government take care of them."

"Social conservatives have long faced an apparent paradox. No matter how Christian the president and members of his party claim to be, no matter how many “solid” conservatives are elected Congress, the fabric of the social order continues to fray. At some point the question must be asked, is this because there still aren’t enough good people in government?—how many would ever be enough? Or is it because the state by nature, far from buttressing the organs of civilization and the way of life dear to conservatives, instead undermines those very things?"

"If there is a market for pornography there is sure to be a constituency for it, too. Moreover, the state produces far worse depravities of its own: Playboy may be bad, but one is not forced to subsidize it, unlike public-school sex ed, Andres Serrano’s “Piss Christ” (funded by the National Endowment for the Arts), and Lynndie England’s S&M jamboree with Iraqi prisoners of war."

"This is not a matter of imposing on anyone; libertarianism allows different standards to prevail in different places rather than dragging everyone down to the level of the state. The libertarian rests content to let Utah be Utah and San Francisco be San Francisco—and to let Iraq be Iraq. If the property owners of a neighborhood wanted to establish a certain set of common moral standards, they could do so. Other places could do differently. Libertarianism thus responds to the reality of difference, including profound cultural and religious difference, much better than other political philosophies, which are left trying to smash square pegs into round holes."

"Nor is there any need for conscription when people want to defend their homes; conscription is what states need to make people fight for causes in which they don’t believe."

"A libertarian order is not coming any time soon, but it should be plain to anyone who undertakes the investigation that the solution to war, bureaucracy, taxation, personal irresponsibility, and the rot of culture is not more government, it’s less."

-Daniel McCarthy