Benjamin Tucker on anarchy
Benjamin Tucker64 quotes“An Anarchist is anyone who denies the necessity and legitimacy of government; the question of his methods of attacking it is foreign to the definition.”
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To force a man to pay for the violation of his own liberty is indeed an addition of insult to injury.
Benjamin TuckerBenjamin Tucker Aggression is simply another name for government. Aggression, invasion, government, are interconvertible terms. The essence of government is control, or the attempt to control.
Benjamin TuckerBenjamin Tucker But which is the State’s essential function, aggression or defence, few seem to know or care.
Benjamin TuckerBenjamin Tucker Peace and Liberty are companions. It is foolish in the extreme not only to resort to force before necessity compels, but especially to madly create the conditions that will lead to this necessity.
Benjamin TuckerBenjamin Tucker And this is the Anarchistic definition of the State: the embodiment of the principle of invasion in an individual, or a band of individuals, assuming to act as representatives or masters of the entire people within a given area.
Benjamin TuckerBenjamin Tucker [T]he State . . . gives idle capital the power of increase, and, through interest, rent, profit, and taxes, robs industrious labor of its products.
Benjamin TuckerBenjamin Tucker He who attempts to control another is a governor, an aggressor, an invader; and the nature of such invasion is not changed, whether it is made by one man upon another man … or by all other men upon one man, after the manner of a modern democracy.
Benjamin TuckerBenjamin Tucker Marx, as we have seen, solved it by declaring capital to be a different thing from product, and maintaining that it belonged to society and should be seized by society and employed for the benefit of all alike.
Benjamin TuckerBenjamin Tucker Mind your own business” is its own moral law. Interference with another’s business is a crime and the only crime, and as such may properly be resisted.
Benjamin TuckerBenjamin Tucker The right of the majority is absolute.
Benjamin TuckerBenjamin Tucker We are here to let in the light of Liberty upon political superstition.
Benjamin TuckerBenjamin Tucker I define Anarchism as the belief in the greatest amount of liberty compatible with equality of liberty; or, in other words, as the belief in every liberty except the liberty to invade.
Benjamin TuckerBenjamin Tucker If I can go through life free and rich, I shall not cry because my neighbor, equally free, is richer. Liberty will ultimately make all men rich; it will not make all men equally rich.
Benjamin TuckerBenjamin Tucker The shortest way to change a radical into a conservative, a liberal into a tyrant, a man into a beast, is to give him power over his fellows.
Benjamin TuckerBenjamin Tucker Give woman equality with man, by all means; but do it by taking power from man, not giving it to woman.
Benjamin TuckerBenjamin Tucker If the individual has a right to govern himself, all external government is tyranny. Hence the necessity of abolishing the State.
Benjamin TuckerBenjamin Tucker
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Nikita GandhiNikita Gandhi I want to fold you into my book, like a petal, so that you’d never leave.
Mira R. AridiMira R. Aridi It seems strange how we look in the same mirror, yet what stares back, is so painfully different.
Chris AllchinChris Allchin Do not measure yourself by success, failure, or a degree. Measure your life by the dreams you have.
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More on anarchy
The main question … is not what motive inspired the law, but what it will be possible for men of bad motive to do with the law.
Benjamin TuckerBenjamin Tucker The State is said by some to be a necessary evil; it must be made unnecessary.
Benjamin TuckerBenjamin Tucker Let those that merely talk and never think, That live in the wild anarchy of drink
Ben JonsonBen Jonson And so many of the people in the arena here, you know, were underprivileged anyway, so this is working very well for them.
Barbara BushBarbara Bush To live exhilaratingly in and for the moment is deadly serious work, fun of the most exhausting sort
Barbara Grizzuti HarrisonBarbara Grizzuti Harrison Are not laws dangerous which inhibit the passions? Compare the centuries of anarchy with those of the strongest legalism in any country you like and you will see that it is only when the laws are silent that the greatest actions appear.
Marquis de SadeMarquis de Sade The worst enemy of life, freedom and the common decencies is total anarchy; their second worst enemy is total efficiency.
Aldous HuxleyAldous Huxley As soon as liberty is complete it dies in anarchy.
Will DurantWill Durant
