There is no more dangerous menace to civilization than a government of incompetent, corrupt, or vile men.

It is important to remember that government interference always means either violent action or the threat of such action. Government is in the last resort the employment of armed men, of policemen, gendarmes, soldiers, prison guards, and hangmen. The essential feature of government is the enforcement of its decrees by beating, killing, and imprisoning. Those who are asking for more government interference are asking ultimately for more compulsion and less freedom.

A new type of superstition has got hold of people's minds, the worship of the state.

It is a rule of law alone which hinders the rulers from turning themselves into the worst gangsters.

War can really cause no economic boom, at least not directly, since an increase in wealth never does result from the destruction of goods.

If one rejects laissez faire on account of man's fallibility and moral weakness, one must for the same reason also reject every kind of government action.

Socialism is not an alternative to capitalism it is an alternative to any system under which men can live as human beings.

Society has arisen out of the works of peace; the essence of society is peacemaking.

By ‘the objective exchange-value of money’ we are accordingly to understand the possibility of obtaining a certain quantity of other economic goods in exchange for a given quantity of money; and by ‘the price of money’ this actual quantity of other goods.

The oldest and most popular instrument of etatistic monetary policy is the official fixing of maximum prices. High prices, thinks the etatist, are not a consequence of an increase in the quantity of money, but a consequence of reprehensible activity on the part of ‘bulls’ and ‘profiteers’; it will suffice to suppress their machinations in order to ensure the cessation of the rise of prices. Thus it is made a punishable offence to demand, or even to pay, ‘excessive’ prices.