Patronage is the sword and cannon by which war may be made on the liberty of the human race.
John Tyler, speech in Congress (February 24, 1834) against the policies of President Andrew Jackson. Seven and a half years later, as president of the United States, Tyler would veto a revival of the national bank, opposition to which was one of Jackson’s most memorable policies.
The right to buy weapons is the right to be free.
Alfred Elton van Vogt, “The Weapon Shop,” in Astounding Science Fiction (December 1942).
The future is already here — it’s just not very evenly distributed.
William Gibson, repeatedly said on radio in 1993.
Wealth can only be accumulated by the earnings of industry and the savings of frugality.
President John Tyler (1841–1845), first annual message to Congress (June 1, 1841).
[T]here are prices too high to pay to save the United States. Conscription is one of them. Conscription is slavery, and I don’t think that any people or nation has a right to save itself at the price of slavery for anyone, no matter what name it is called. We have had the draft for twenty years now; I think this is shameful. If a country can’t save itself through the volunteer service of its own free people, then I say: Let the damned thing go down the drain!
Robert A. Heinlein, Guest of Honor Speech at the 29th World Science Fiction Convention, Seattle, Washington (1961).
We live in fascinating times.
Socialism is the theory that the desire of one man to get something he hasn’t got is more pleasing to a just God than the desire of some other man to keep what he has got.
H.L. Mencken, A Little Book in C Major (1916), p. 51.
Rascals are always sociable — more’s the pity! and the chief sign that a man has any nobility in his character is the little pleasure he takes in others’ company.
Arthur Schopenhauer, Aphorismen zur Lebensweisheit (On The Wisdom of Life: Aphorisms), Vol. 1, Ch. 5, § 9.
To hurt in any degree the interest of any one order of citizens, for no other purpose but to promote that of some other, is evidently contrary to that justice and equality of treatment which the sovereign owes to all the different orders of his subjects.
Adam Smith, An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations (1776).
If we wish to gain insight into the essence of nationality, we must proceed not from the nation but from the individual. We must ask ourselves what the national aspect of the individual person is and what determines his belonging to a particular nation.
Ludwig von Mises, Nation, State and Economy (1919; 1983, Leland B. Yeager, trans.), p. 34.