30 Quotes by Tom G. Palmer

What libertarians assert is simply that differences among normal adults do not imply different fundamental rights.

The reason the government sells the census as your ticket to getting goodies - rather than as your civic duty - is that distributing goodies is now all the government does.

It is precisely because neither individuals nor small groups can be fully self-sufficient that cooperation is necessary to human survival and flourishing.

Group personification obscures, rather than illuminates, important political questions.

If an individual is born with the obligation to obey, who is born with the right to command?

Libertarians argue that no normal adult has the right to impose choices on other normal adults, except in abnormal circumstances, such as when one person finds another unconscious and administers medical assistance or calls an ambulance.

Guardians are necessary for children and abnormal adults, because they cannot make responsible choices for themselves.

It is obvious that different individuals require different things to live good, healthy, and virtuous lives.

Equality of rights means that some people cannot simply impose obligations on others, for the moral agency and rights of those others would then be violated.