What It Means to Be a Libertarian: A Personal Interpretation - Softcover

Murray, Charles

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0767900391 ISBN 13: 9780767900393

Publisher: Crown, 1997

Synopsis

Charles Murray believes that America's founders had it right--strict limits on the power of the central government and strict protection of the individual are the keys to a genuinely free society. In What It Means to Be a Libertarian, he proposes a government reduced to the barest essentials: an executive branch consisting only of the White House and trimmed-down departments of state, defense, justice, and environment protection; a Congress so limited in power that it meets only a few months each year; and a federal code stripped of all but a handful of regulations.
Combining the tenets of classical Libertarian philosophy with his own highly-original, always provocative thinking, Murray shows why less government advances individual happiness and promotes more vital communities and a richer culture. By applying the truths our founders held to be self-evident to today's most urgent social and political problems, he creates a clear, workable vision for the future.

About this title

From the Publisher:

Introduction

In the last quarter of the eighteenth century the American Founders created asociety based on the belief that human happiness is intimately connected withpersonal freedom and responsibility. The twin pillars of the system theycreated were limits on the power of the central government and protection ofindividual rights.

A few people, of whom I am one, think that the Founders' insights are as truetoday as they were two centuries ago. We believe that human happiness requiresfreedom and that freedom requires limited government. Limited government meansa very small one, shorn of almost all the apparatus we have come to take forgranted during the last sixty years.

Most people are baffled by such a view. Don't we realize that this ispostindustrial America, not Jefferson's agrarian society? Don't we realize thatwithout big government millions of the elderly would be destitute, corporationswould destroy the environment, and employers would be free once more to exploittheir workers? Where do we suppose blacks would be if it weren't for thegovernment? Women? Haven't we noticed that America has huge social problemsthat aren't going to be dealt with unless the government does something aboutthem?

This book tries to explain how we can believe that the less government, thebetter. Why a society run on the principles of limited government would advancehuman happiness. How such a society would lead to greater individualfulfillment, more vital communities, a richer culture. Why such a society wouldcontain fewer poor people, fewer neglected children, fewer criminals. How sucha society would not abandon the less fortunate but would care for them betterthan does the society we have now.

Many books address the historical, economic, sociological, philosophical, andconstitutional issues raised is pages. A bibliographic essay at the end of thebook points you to some of the basic sources, but the book you are about toread contains no footnotes. It has no tables and but a single graph. My purposeis not to provide proofs but to explain a way of looking at the world.

Copyright ©1997 by Charles Murray.

From the Back Cover:

For the legions of Americans expressing or exploring libertarian beliefs, Charles Murray has created a radical, compassionate blueprint for solving today's most urgent social and political problems.

Murray believes that America's founders had it right -- that strict limits on the power of the central government and strict protection of the individual are the keys to a genuinely free society. In What It Means to Be a Libertarian, he proposes a government reduced to the barest essentials: an executive branch consisting only of the White House and trimmed-down departments of state, defense, justice, and environmental protection; a Congress so limited in power that it meets only a few months each year; and a federal code stripped of all but a handful of regulations. Combining the tenets of classical libertarian philosophy with his own provocative thinking, Murray shows why less government advances individual happiness and promotes more vital communities and a richer culture.

About this edition

• Publisher: Crown
• Publication date: 1997
• ISBN 10: 0767900391
• ISBN 13: 9780767900393
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 208