13. From "Vices Are Not Crimes: A Vindication of Moral Liberty" | Individualism: A Reader
561 views · Published 30 June 2015 · 8:35 · Indexed 4 November 2026
Channel: Libertarianism.org · 2015 · News & Politics
Prohibition a Failure, or The True Solution of the Temperance Question, Dio Lewis (Boston: James R. Osgood and Co., 1875) Lysander Spooner (1808-87) was an American lawyer, abolitionist, and radical libertarian who maintained that governments should be strictly limited to protecting the natural rights of individuals. Here Spooner argues that vices "are simply the errors which a man makes in his search after his own happiness," whereas crimes are actions that violate the rights of other people. He concludes that any effort to prohibit personal vices through the force of law is hypocritical, counter-productive, and profoundly unjust. The Libertarianism.org Readers series provides an introduction to the major ideas and thinkers in the libertarian tradition. Get paperback, e-book, and audiobook versions (including free .mp3 downloads) of Individualism: A Reader here: http://www.libertarianism.org/books/individualism-reader
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