The Collected Works of Leonard E. Read Quotes

“Under our form of government we count, we do not weigh, opinion. The fact, therefore, that a certain sound principle may long be recognized as such by an economic-informed few is of little consequence. If the majority is wrong in its thinking, then the direction of the whole is more than likely to be equally wrong.”
― Leonard Read, The Collected Works of Leonard E. Read

“You have put to words what I have always believed.” The magnification of one’s own tiny light is the cause of this; hero worship is the temporary consequence.”
― Leonard Edward Read, The Collected Works of Leonard E. Read

“The Negro slave, for instance, if asked to list the restraints exercised over him would have had little to offer. He could not clearly define and describe a status unknown to him. A relatively free American, after having experienced a fair measure of liberty, and then suddenly put in the same bondage as the Negro slave, would have been better able to differentiate between his new slave status and the freedom he had earlier known. But many present-day Americans, when asked the question “What liberties have you lost?” are stumped for an answer. A creeping slavery progressively removes the contrasting experience that would give the basis for a full answer. They cannot, any more than the slave, discriminate between what is and what might have been in the area of the personally unknown. No better testimony of this point is required than the common reaction when anyone raises any question about the long-established public education system. It has become so much a part of the mores, so sanctified by years of acceptance and tradition, that any alternative to “education” under the principles of violence is quite beyond comprehension.”
― Leonard Edward Read, The Collected Works of Leonard E. Read

“Half the world’s rubber. c. Three-fourths the world’s silk. d. One-third the world’s coal. e. Two-thirds the world’s crude oil. Is it not possible that there is some factor in our system that is responsible for this approach to a national plenty? Perhaps we think it is one thing when it really is something none of us identify. What is this “X” factor, this mystery factor? Is not a search for it advisable?”
― Leonard Read, The Collected Works of Leonard E. Read

“Certainly, the voice of the demagogue, who depends for his political ascendency upon existing discontent, or discontent he can create, has reached the ears of millions through the radio. In pre-radio days that type of person got little more than soapbox hearing, principally because he, with his nitwit ideas could never make enough money to get himself beyond city parks. In those days the man who couldn’t look after himself had little chance of promising many others how well he could look after them. But today, if he doesn’t get free time on the air, his followers will ante enough two-bit pieces to assure the American public of his Messianic message”
― Leonard Read, The Collected Works of Leonard E. Read