Guarding Personal Liberty Against the Government

I have just begun reading the landmark work by Milton and Rose Friedman entitled Free to Choose. Though I haven’t even finished 20 pages, it has already reminded me how much I enjoyed my Economics 110 class at BYU nearly 15 years ago. (Sure, my chemical engineering classes were totally awesome too…)

The law school here at University of Louisville is named after Louisville native and former US Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis. The opening quote in Free to Choose is from one of the cases that came before the High Court: Olmsted v. United States. In dissension he stated:

“Experience should teach us to be most on our guard to protect liberty when the government’s purposes are beneficial. Men born to freedom are naturally alert to repel invasion of their liberty by evil-minded rulers. The greater dangers to liberty lurk in insidious encroachment by men of zeal, well-meaning but without understanding.”

There are some fundamental differences between the US and the rest of the world that truly makes this a wonderful place. I plan to devote several future posts to this discussion. I welcome feedback and dialogue with any readers out there.