Liberty Matters: Classical Liberalism and the Problem of Class (Nov. 2016) (Indianapolis: Liberty Fund, 2016).

This online discussion is part of the series “Liberty Matters: A Forum for the Discussion of Matters pertaining to Liberty.” It is not well known that classical liberal thought has had a strong tradition within it of thinking about “class”, namely the idea that one group of people live off the labor and taxes of another group of people. In this discussion David Hart, the Director of Liberty Fund’s Online Library of Liberty, explores this “other tradition” of thinking about class which can be traced back to the 17th century and which was was taken up again by Murray Rothbard in the 1950s and 1960s in what he describes as the “Rothbardian synthesis” of classical liberal class analysis, Austrian economics, and New Left class analysis. He provides a brief survey of its history, examines some of the key concepts within this tradition, and raises some problems which contemporary scholars need to explore further, in particular the theoretical coherence and usefulness of the “Rothbardian synthesis.” He is joined in the discussion by Gary Chartier, Distinguished Professor of Law and Business Ethics at La Sierra University in Riverside, California; Steve Davies, the education director at the Institute of Economic Affairs in London; Jayme Lemke, a senior research fellow and associate director of academic and student programs at the Mercatus Center at George Mason University; and the independent scholar George H. Smith.

Encyclopedic Liberty: Political Articles in the Dictionary of Diderot and D’Alembert. By Denis Diderot and Jean Le Rond d’Alembert. Edited and with an Introduction by Henry C. Clark. Translated by Henry C. Clark and Christine Dunn Henderson (Indianapolis: Liberty Fund, 2016).

This anthology is the first endeavor to bring together the most significant political writing from the entire twenty-million-word compendium known as The Encyclopedia. It includes eighty-one of the most original, controversial and representative articles on political ideas, practices, and institutions, many translated into English for the first time. The articles cover such topics as the foundations of political order, the relationship between natural and civil liberty, the different types of constitutional regimes, the role of the state in economic and religious affairs, and the boundaries between manners, morals, and laws.

History has not been kind to the legacy of William Graham Sumner. In his time (1840-1910), Sumner was one of the most prestigious and widely read libertarian intellectuals in the United States. Beyond his more technical academic work Sumner also wrote passionately and voluminously in defense of laissez faireon a wide range of social issues. His popular critique of protectionism, "The –ism Which Teaches that Waste Makes Wealth" (1885) and his denunciation of imperialism in "The Conquest of the United States by Spain" (1898) are two of his most impressive polemical works. Sumner's most sustained investigation of questions of economic policy and distributive justice appeared in a collection essays What Social Classes Owe to Each Other (1883) which includes his most famous single essay – "The Forgotten Man" (1884). Unfortunately, Sumner's intellectual legacy suffered essentially the same fate as that of his contemporary Herbert Spencer, and for much the same reason. From near-ubiquity and respectability, Sumner's ideas have descended into obscurity and disrepute. To the extent he is remembered at all today, it is mostly for his alleged "social Darwinism." In this essayMatt Zwolinski, professor of philosophy at the University of San Diego, examines the charge of social Darwinism, and, more generally, the nature of Sumner's views on redistribution and our responsibilities toward the poor and vulnerable, and concludes that the charge of social Darwinism is mistaken as applied to Sumner, who is a principled libertarian, not a social Darwinist. Moreover, he is a libertarian who took special pains to demonstrate the ways in which a regime of liberty is especially beneficial to society's most vulnerable members. Matt is joined in the dicussion by Phillip W. Magness, a historian based in the Washington, D.C. region, Robert Leroux, professor of sociology at the University of Ottawa, Fabio Rojas, professor of sociology at Indiana University, and David M. Hart, the Director of the Online Library of Liberty Project. See the Archive of "Liberty Matters".

The Collected Works of Frédéric Bastiat. Vol. 3: Economic Sophisms and “What is Seen and What is Not Seen.” Jacques de Guenin, General Editor. Translated from the French by Jane and Michel Willems, with a foreword by Robert McTeer, and an introduction and appendices by the Academic Editor David M. Hart. Annotations and Glossaries by Jacques de Guenin, Jean-Claude Paul-Dejean, and David M. Hart. Translation Editor Dennis O’Keeffe. (Indianapolis: Liberty Fund, 2017).

Nicolas Buccola, a professor of political Science at Linfield College, discusses the moral problem Frederick Douglass raised in the 1850s about the justice of using violence to resist the evil of slavery. Douglass was radicalized both by his own experience of being a slave and using violence against a notorious “slave breaker,” as well as by the passage of the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 and how to oppose the state-sanctioned policy of kidnapping runaway slaves and returning them to their “owners.” Buccola points to a number of troubling aspects about Douglass “robust conception of duty to vindicate the natural rights” of slaves, especially as it relates to the present time. He is joined in the discussion by Helen J. Knowles is an assistant professor of political science at the State University of New York at Oswego, Peter C. Myers Professor of Political Science, University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire, and the independent scholar George H. Smith. See the Archive of “Liberty Matters.”

This is a discussion of George H. Smith’s new book The System of Liberty: Themes in the History of Classical Liberalism published by Cambridge University Press (2013). Smith describes how he came to write the book, the works of the history of political thought which inspired him (in particular the writings of the German legal historian Otto von Gierke), and the methodology he uses in approaching the history of ideas (Locke’s idea of “the presumption of coherence”). He demonstrates his approach with a brief discussion of one of the key ideas he has identified in the history of classical liberal thought, namley, the idea of “inalienable rights,” or to phrase it in the terminology of 17th century natural rights philosophers like Pufendorf, the distinction between “perfect and imperfect rights.” His essay is discussed by Jason Brennan, assistant professor of strategy, economics, ethics, and public policy at Georgetown University; David Gordon, Senior Fellow at the Ludwig von Mises Institute; and Ralph Raico, Professor Emeritus of History at the Buffalo State College. See the Archive of "Liberty Matters".

Today it is easy to be despondent about the prospects of bringing about radical change in public policy or the political and social order. Policies that are widely recognized to be foolish and self-defeating (such as the “war on drugs”) seem to be immoveable.  There are a plethora of analyses of faults in policy or in political institutions, but most of these lack the crucial ingredient of a plausible way of getting from A to B, from where we are now to somewhere better. However, history gives us a number of counterexamples that should lead us to think more carefully about how to understand both the need for certain kinds of political change and the ways of achieving this. One of the most striking of these counterexamples is the career of Richard Cobden and in particular the way that he pioneered forms of advocacy and organization in the Anti-Corn Law League in the late 1830s and early 1840s that were highly effective in his own time, had long-lasting effects, and are still relevant today. The Lead Essay has been written by Steve Davies who is education director at the Institute of Economic Affairs in London. The commentators are Gordon Bannerman who is a freelance writer and researcher, Professor Anthony Howe who is professor of modern history at the University of East Anglia, and Sarah Richardson who is associate professor of history at the University of Warwick. See the Archive of "Liberty Matters".

Liberty Matters: Israel M. Kirzner and the Entrepreneurial Market Process (March 2017) (Indianapolis: Liberty Fund, 2017).