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Kant’s Prolegomena and Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science.

It is here and in the Critique of Pure Reason that Kant attempted to rebuild modern philosophy from its foundations up in order to demonstrate that philosophers (like the rationalists Leibnitz and Descartes) and scietnists would not be able to provide final answers to their questions about the physical world, human nature, the mind, or the supreme being.

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The National System of Political Economy

A German historian who wrote in favor of protective tariffs and trade retaliations between industrial nations, even if they maintain free trade within each country. During the 1820s, he lived in Pennsylvania, where he contributed to the pro-tariff debates in the United States. His economic arguments were centered around refutations of Adam Smith.

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A Policy of Free Exchange

The companion volume to A Plea for Liberty which continued the argument against the Fabian Socialists and for a policy of strict non-intervention in the economy by the government.

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The Law of Intellectual Property (1855)

Although this is entitled volume 1 and a proposed list of contents for a volume 2 was appended to the work, no volume 2 ever appeared. Spooner takes a strong position on the perpetual property right of an author to his ideas in perpetuity with no government defined limit. The opening chapter has an interesting defence of property rights in general.

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Political Institutions, being Part V of the Principles of Sociology

This is part of Spencer’s most extensive treatment of sociology, The Principles of Sociology. It is the section dealing with the nature of political institutions such as political heads like chiefs and kings, consultative bodies, the military, and the judiciary. It also contains his most important discussion of the difference between the militant and the industrial types of societies.

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