Kinda hard, this time, to separate the “run up” from the quote that Dr. Boudreaux picks out so I’ve included it as well as the observation by Broudreaux himself (emphasis mine):
…is from page 168 of the 1981 Liberty Fund edition of Felix Morley‘s 1959 volume, Freedom and Federalism; here, Morley is discussing Franklin Roosevelt’s preposterous if much-applauded two “freedoms from” – Freedom from Want and Freedom from Fear – in Roosevelt’s January 1941 “Four Freedoms” speech:
Moreover, though this does not bother the communists, there is an obvious tendency which makes freedom from want and freedom from fear mutually contradictory, as soon as they are regarded as dominant government responsibilities. As Robespierre soon discovered, dissenters must be terrorized if egalitarianism is to be enforced.
It is in the nature of the State – whose foundational means of acting is the use of force – to make all people who disobey its diktats fearful. State officials achieve their and their principals’ ends not through voluntary exchange but by making people fear the painful consequences that befall all who disobey these officials’ commands.
Again, if I have to remind some readers, our Founding Fathers knew that a Government that was built on positive rights (i.e., Government HAS to either do things for you or give you) was doomed to failure because there could never be sufficient resources to accomplish it (Socialist and Communists believe otherwise; Venezuela is merely the last example that proves their rule). Their intent was, from the get go, was to clear a space in which you could, as the saying went “be all you can be” by installing an ethos and foundation of negative Rights (i.e., that Government CAN’T do things to you like restrict your speech and determine your religious beliefs and conscience).
It is a sad state of affairs that the Left is turning the tide against our founding ideals – the turning of “the good” into evil.
