The “left” used to believe in freedom.

I encourage everyone to surf the Ludwig von Mises Institute website. It is one of the best, if not the best, collection of pro-freedom essays and scholarly work anywhere.

Today, I came across an article originally published in 1952, written by Dean Russell. The essay is captioned "The First Leftist."

A snippet:

It is true that this organized force of government can be used, and should be used, to restrain and punish persons who commit evil acts — murder, theft, defamation, and such — against their fellow men; but this force that is government cannot be used to force persons to be good or brave or compassionate or charitable or virtuous in any respect. All virtues must come from within a person; they cannot be imposed by force or threats of force. Since that is so, it follows that almost all human relations and institutions should be left completely outside the authority of government, with no government regulation whatever. But this seems to be a difficult idea for most persons to grasp.

Indeed, it is.