65 Quotes by Murray N. Rothbard



  • Author Murray N. Rothbard
  • Quote

    Furthermore, those seeking government privileges, or lucrative posts in the bureaucracy, perform an economic role entirely different from that of people genuinely engaged in trade; those so engaged oppose interference with their trade. It is highly misleading to lump the two together into the term “merchants.

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  • Author Murray N. Rothbard
  • Quote

    One gratifying aspect of our rise to some prominence is that, for the first time in my memory, we, ‘our side,’ had captured a crucial word from the enemy . . . ‘Libertarians’ . . . had long been simply a polite word for left-wing anarchists, that is for anti-private property anarchists, either of the communist or syndicalist variety. But now we had taken it over...

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  • Author Murray N. Rothbard
  • Quote

    For while libertarians have too often been opportunists who lose sight of or under-cut their ultimate goal, some have erred in the opposite direction: fearing and condemning any advances toward the idea as necessarily selling out the goal itself. The tragedy is that these sectarians, in condemning all advances that fall short of the goal, serve to render vain and futile the cherished goal itself.

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  • Author Murray N. Rothbard
  • Quote

    Of all the numerous forms that governments have taken over the centuries, of all the concepts and institutions that have been tried, none has succeeded in keeping the State in check.

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