Quotes:
Introduction
What we have in common.
Top Ten List
Liberals and Libertarians
Can Agree On These
Quotes
Mahatma Ghandi;
Henry David Thoreau;
The Tao Te Ching
Ghandi defended the rights of the minority against the coercive predations of the majority, and held that individuals were ultimately responsible for asserting and defending their own individual freedom. He spoke for personal responsibility and feared that even democracy could degenerate into mob rule. More quotes can be found at the Ghandi's Words website.
Freedom is like birth. Till we are fully free, we are slaves.
No charter of freedom will be worth looking at which does not ensure the same measure of freedom for the minorities as for the majority.
Freedom received through the efforts of others, however benevolent, cannot be retained when such effort is withdrawn.
No society can possibly be built on a denial of individual freedom
Complete independence does not mean arrogant isolation or a superior disdain for all help.
Independence means voluntary restraints and discipline, voluntary acceptance of the rule of law.
I do not regard capital to be enemy of labor.
Coercion cannot but result in chaos in the end.
One who uses coercion is guilty of deliberate violence. Coercion is inhuman.
Corruption and hypocrisy ought not to be inevitable products of democracy, as they undoubtedly are today.
Democracy is an impossible thing until the power is shared by all, but let not democracy degenerate into mobocracy.
Thoreau strived to live a life of simplicity and self-honesty in harmony with nature. Here is what he said about government. Source: _On The Du ty of Civil Disobedience_, 1849
I heartily accept the motto, "That government is best which governs least"; and I should like to see it acted upon more rapidly and systematically. Carried out, it finally amounts to this, which also I believe--"That government is best which governs not at all"; and when men are prepared for it, that will be the kind of government which they will have.
Government is at best but an expedient; but most governments are usually, and all governments are sometimes, inexpedient. The objections which have been brought against a standing army, and they are many and weighty, and deserve to prevail, may also at last be brought against a standing government.
The character inherent in the American people has done all that has been accomplished; and it would have done somewhat more, if the government had not sometimes got in its way. Trade and commerce, if they were not made of india-rubber, would never manage to bounce over obstacles which legislators are continually putting in their way; and if one were to judge these men wholly by the effects of their actions and not partly by their intentions, they would deserve to be classed and punis hed with those mischievious persons who put obstructions on the railroads.
There will never be a really free and enlightened State until the State comes to recognize the individual as a higher and independent power, from which all its own power and authority are derived, and treats him accordingly.
(The Tao favors a minimalist approach to governance, one which allows the people to solve their own problems. The verses quoted are from various translations of 57, 58, and 75.)
The government that seems the most unwise,
Oft goodness to the people best supplies;
That which is meddling, touching everything,
Will work but ill, and disappointment bring.
If rulers take too much grain
People rapidly starve;
If rulers take too much freedom
People easily rebel;
If rulers take too much happiness.
People gladly die.
By not interfering the sage improves the people's lives.
The more morals and taboos there are,
The more cruelty afflicts people;
The more guns and knives there
are,
The more factions divide people;
The more arts and skills there are,
The more change obsoletes people;
The more laws and taxes there are,
The more theft corrupts people.
Yet take no action, and the people nurture each other;
Make no laws, and the people deal fairly with each other;
Own no interest, and the people cooperate with each other;
Express no desire, and the people harmonize with each other.
Future Directions
Mary Ruwart's book points out that libertarianism is at its heart a peaceful, healing philosophy. A libertarian isn't just a principled agent of change like those who fought against the British, against slavery, and against the draft. A libertarian is also someone who lives in harmony with his community. We don't say enough about that, and I think it is part of the reason why we libertarians sometimes have trouble talking with liberals. So where somebody else might fill a space such as this with Thomas Jefferson, Patrick Henry, Lysander Spooner, Thomas Paine and so on, I'll try to do something a little different. This week: Mahatma Ghandi! Coming up: Jes us Christ, Richard Bach...