U.S. History

Presented as part of the Mises Institute’s Austrian Workshop seminar series on 22 June 2004 in Auburn, Alabama.

Presented as part of the Mises Institute’s Summer Seminar Series in Auburn, Alabama, on 31 May 2004.

Proposals for monetary reform are ubiquitous, but Murray N. Rothbard argued for the 100% gold coin standard.

Given the reality that markets are self-regulating, how did the US economy (not to mention economies of other nations) become a morass of hundreds of thousands of state, local, and federal regulations that govern things to the minutest detail? Furthermore, why have we not seen a revolt of business owners and consumers alike, who ultimately pay the price for the modern regulatory state? The answer is both simple— and complex.

Eric Mattei explains the implications of 'civil rights' interventions: some must serve others regardless of their own personal choices.

Sponsored by the Mises Institute and held in Atlanta, Georgia; 26-27 September 1997.

With a Republican president running sky-high debts, unleashing wars, imposing protectionist trade edicts, and risking the nation’s financial future, sometimes it feels like the 19th century all over again, specifically the year 1861 and following. The 1860 election of Abraham Lincoln sparked a secession movement in the southern states. In December, South Carolina seceded, and other Deep South states soon followed. Interstate commerce was disrupted, and many northeastern banks suspended specie payments. The atmosphere was one of grave political and economic crisis. Many feared war; many feared the unknown.

Gary Galles on Booker T. Washington: He encouraged business, industry and entrepreneurship, rather than political agitation.

This is a federal constitution. Federalism is the most important idea for liberty. You must maximize your choices and you need meaningful choices, made against a cultural background. Federalism requires such moral correctness that it makes it the most difficult system to maintain. Federalism always fights consolidation.

Albion’s Seed is a great book about the four migration folkways into the colonies from Great Britain during 1629 through 1775. The groups had many characteristics in common which may be what made future union possible, but the groups were also different. Puritans hated Quakers. Everybody hated Catholics. The competing regional cultures created quite a laissez-faire outcome between the community-based groups and more individualistic groups.