The Redemption of Paper Money Excerpted from the book; Individual Liberty: Selections From the Writings of Benjamin R. Tucker Vanguard Press, New York, 1926 Kraus Reprint Co., Millwood, NY, 1973. In a paper entitled "Banking and the State," read before the Single Tax Club of Chicago, Mr. A. W. Wright took the position, which he considered of the greatest importance, that paper money must always be subject to immediate redemption, the sole reason assigned for that contention being that nothing but public confidence can make paper money possible. The editor of Liberty took issue with him on that point: It remains to be proved that immediate redemption is essential to public confidence. It is, of course, true that certainty of ultimate redemption is such an essential. But this is the most that can be claimed. A run on a bank o...
On Picket Duty. Bullion thinks that civilization consists in teaching men to govern themselves and then letting them do it. A very slight change suffices to make this stupid statement an entirely accurate one, after which it would read: Civilization consists in teaching men to govern themselves by letting them do it.—Liberty, August 20, 1881.(52 ¶ 1) People in general, and the governmental Socialists in particular, think they see a new argument in favor of their beloved State in the assistance which it is rendering to the suffering and starving victims of the Mississippi inundation. Well, such work is better than forging new chains to keep the people in subjection, we allow; but it is not worth the price that is paid for it. The people cannot afford to be enslav...