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The Rebirth of Anarchism
From 1920 through the 50s anarchist philosophy was sparse. There were a few notable minarchists and quasi-anarchists, such as H. L. Menchen, Franz Oppenheimer, and Leopold Kohr. Albert Jay Nock was an "Old Right" anarchist, as was Frank Chodorov. And there was Robert LeFevre. The year 1943 heralded things to come. Three radical libertarian books, all by women, broke the fascist ice of the New Deal. These were The God of the Machine by Isabelle Patterson, The Discovery of Freedom by Rose Wilder Lane, and The Fountainhead by Ayn Rand. Suddenly libertarianism was no longer warmed over 19th century class struggle bromides. It was now, finally, expressed clearly as a free market, radical capitalist libertarianism. Americans rediscovered what Voltairine de Cleyre had told them half a century earlier - that libertarian capitalism and individual rights were an American tradition.
Does man have a right to exist for his own sake - or is he born in bondage, as an indentured servant who must keep buying his life by serving the tribe but can never acquire it free and clear?
This is the first question to answer. The rest is consequences and practical implementations. The basic issue is only: Is man free?
In mankind's history, capitalism is the only system that answers: Yes.
Capitalism is a social system based on the recognition of individual rights, including property rights, in which all property is privately owned.
The recognition of individual rights entails the banishment of physical force from human relationships: basically, rights can be violated only by means of force. In a capitalist society, no man or group may initiate the use of physical force against others. - Ayn Rand, What is Capitalism?
Published 1965
Now capitalism was out of the closet; never again could reasonable people claim that liberty and capitalism were incompatable. On the contrary, "capitalism is the fullest expression of anarchism, and anarchism is the fullest expression of capitalism." (Rothbard)
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