Quotation of the Day…

(Don Boudreaux)

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… is from page 549 of Phillip Magness’s, Art Carden’s, and Ilia Murtazashvili’s superb Spring 2022 Independent Review paper, “‘The Danger of Deplorable Reactions’: W. H. Hutt on Liberalism, Populism, and the Constitutional Political Economy of Racism“:

Classical liberals argue that constraints on “one person, one vote” majoritarianism are critical to avoid populism. What prevailing perspectives do not do, but Hutt did, is explain the underlying sources of illiberal populism. His perspective recognized that the necessity of putting democracy in chains depends in part on the historical context. Where pressure for retribution and redistribution are strongest, constraints are more critical. Where capitalism and its opportunities are robust, constraints are less critical because the populism that will emerge is less likely to involve substantial conflict, violence, and large-scale expropriation of wealth.

DBx: W.H. Hutt (1899-1988), pictured here, was a serious, deeply humane, and thoroughly liberal scholar who thought with much more care than does the typical scholar about the practical design and details of changes in government policies.

Phil’s, Art’s, and Ilia’s Independent Review paper is part of their important research into the work of Hutt. Among other outcomes, this research clears Hutt of the scurrilous charge – made by wholly unserious ‘scholars,’ and swallowed and peddled by yet other wholly unserious ‘scholars’ – that Hutt was a racist.