Quotation of the Day…

(Don Boudreaux)

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… is from page 105 of Benjamin Rogge’s 1973 paper “Education in a Free Society,” as this paper is reprinted in A Maverick’s Defense of Freedom, the 2010 collection of Rogge’s essays that is edited by Dwight Lee (original emphasis):

We repeat: the task of educating individuals for freedom, if done at all, will be best done by  private agencies and institutions, manned by individuals deeply committed to that cause. Admittedly, in a free society there will also exist private educational programs dedicated to restricting or eliminating freedom, alike manned by deeply committed individuals. Without being so naive as to believe that the truth must always win in an open contest, we still insist that the risk in this arrangement is far less than the risk run in a system where the agency of coercion (the state) is expected to educate the citizenry in the desirability of limiting the power of the state – a most unlikely act of self-denial!