From its earliest decades, the defenders of freedom — known historically as “classical liberals,” “radicals,” and “libertarians,” have sought to reduce and limit the war-making powers of the state. This is an unceasing theme across the ranks of the classical liberals, who come from many different nations and who, by today’s mainstream political standards, would nearly all be considered radical anti-war activists. Below is just a sampling of thoughts from these liberals. Many are well known among our readers, such as Frédéric Bastiat and Herbert Spencer. Others are more obscure today, such as Richard Cobden and Charles Dunoyer, but were influential in their day. Not surprisingly, we find that Ludwig von Mises, as a standard bearer of radical 19th century liberalism, held similar views.
“Not war, but peace is the father of all things. ... Peace is always better than war.” — Ludwig von Mises
“The ‘true secret’ of despots ... is to employ one nation in cutting the throats of another, so that neither may have time to reform the abuses in their own domestic government.” — Richard Cobden
“What is the production of the standing armies of Europe? It is consisted in massacres, rapes, pillages, conflagrations, vices and crimes, the deprivation, ruin and enslavement of the peoples. The standing armies have been the shame and the scourge of civilization.” — Charles Dunoyer
“When once a standing army is established in any country, the people lose their liberty.” — George Mason
“I would disband the army ... except for some specialized divisions ... and conscription would be abolished.” — Frédéric Bastiat
“You will never find me, in this case or in any other, on the conqueror’s side. ... To me it is a proven fact, and I venture to say a scientifically proven fact, that the colonial system is the most disastrous illusion ever to have led nations astray.” — Frédéric Bastiat
“Attempts have been made to extenuate and gloss over the true motive of colonial policy with the excuse that its sole object was to make it possible for primitive peoples to share in the blessings of European civilization. ... Could there be a more doleful proof of the sterility of European civilization than that it can be spread by no other means than fire and sword?” — Ludwig von Mises
“No one has a right to thrust himself into the affairs of others in order to further their interest, and no one ought, when he has his own interests in view, to pretend that he is acting selflessly only in the interest of others.” — Ludwig von Mises
“The result of British imperialism was that the spirit of industry became a principle more hostile, more of an enemy to civilization, than the spirit of rapine itself.” — Charles Dunoyer
“News had come that some of our troops [in Afghanistan] were in danger. At the Athenaeum Club a well-known military man — then a captain but now a general — drew my attention to a telegram containing this news, and read it to me in a manner implying the belief that I should share his anxiety. I astounded him by replying — ‘When men hire themselves out to shoot other men to order, asking nothing about the justice of their cause, I don’t care if they are shot themselves.’” — Herbert Spencer
“War ... is harmful, not only to the conquered but to the conqueror. Society has arisen out of the works of peace; the essence of society is peacemaking. Peace and not war is the father of all things. Only economic action has created the wealth around us; labor, not the profession of arms, brings happiness. Peace builds, war destroys.” — Ludwig von Mises
“We have manifested an insatiable love of territorial aggrandizement. In the insolence of our might and without waiting for the assaults of our envious enemies, we have sallied forth in search of conquest or rapine, and carried bloodshed into every quarter of the globe.” — Richard Cobden
“But what are we to say of a nation [namely, the United Kingdom] which lives under a perpetual delusion that it is about to be attacked ... and which has mechanical power and wealth to which no other country offers any parallel?” — John Bright
“Large armaments necessarily entail heavy taxes [and this taxation is] a crying injustice inflicted upon the poor to the advantage of the rich.” — Frédéric Bastiat
“A State of War, implying an unlimited power of disposition over the lives and goods of the majority, allows the governing class to increase State employments at will. ... The human balance sheet under a State of War thus favors the governor at the expense of the governed.” — Gustave de Molinari
“Modern war is not a war of royal armies. It is a war of the peoples, a total war. It is a war of states which do not leave to their subjects any private sphere; they consider the whole population a part of the armed forces. Whoever does not fight must work for the support and equipment of the army. Army and people are one and the same. The citizens passionately participate in the war. For it is their state, their God, who fights.” — Ludwig von Mises
“It is not fair to call [the republic of the American revolutionaries] a dream or even an ideal; it was a possibility which was within our reach if we had been wise enough to grasp and hold it. ... There were to be no armies except a militia. ... They would have no court and no pomp; no orders, or ribbons, or decorations, or titles. ... There was to be no grand diplomacy, because they intended to mind their own business and not be involved in any of the intrigues to which European statesmen were accustomed. There was to be no balance of power and no ‘reason of state’ to cost the life and happiness of citizens. ... It is by virtue of these ideals that we have been ‘isolated,’ isolated in a position which the other nations of the earth have observed in silent envy; and yet there are people who are boasting of their patriotism, because they say that we have taken our place now amongst the nations of the earth by virtue of [the Spanish-American War]. ... To hold such an opinion as that is to abandon all American standards, to put shame and scorn on all that our ancestors tried to build up here.” — William Graham Sumner
“I am called unpatriotic — well, I am content to be so called.” — Herbert Spencer
“I have no doubt that the conservative classes of this country will yet look back with great regret to their acquiescence [to the Spanish-American War] and the doctrines and precedents which have been silently established. Let us be well assured that self-government is not a matter of flags and Fourth of July orations.” — William Graham Sumner
“I am sorry for the Spaniards — I am sorry for the Greeks; I deplore the fate of the Jews; the people of the Sandwich Islands are groaning under the most detestable tyranny; Baghdad is oppressed; I do not like the present state of the Delta; Tibet is not comfortable. Am I to fight for all these people? The world is bursting with sin and sorrow. Am I to be champion of the Decalogue, and to be eternally raising fleets and armies to make all men good and happy? We have just done saving Europe, and I am afraid that the consequence will be, that we shall cut each other’s throats. No war, dear Lady Grey! — No eloquence; but apathy, selfishness, common sense, arithmetic!” — Sydney Smith
