Top 127 Quotes & Sayings by Harry Browne

Everything you want in life has a price connected to it. There's a price to pay if you want to make things better, a price to pay just for leaving things as they are, a price for everything.

A Libertarian society of unfettered individualism spreads its benefits to virtually everyone - not just those who have the resources to seize political power.

Whatever the price, identify it now. What will you have to go through to get where you want to be? There is a price you can pay to be free of the situation once and for all. It may be a fantastic price or a tiny one - but there is a price.

A fair trial is one in which the rules of evidence are honored, the accused has competent counsel, and the judge enforces the proper courtroom procedures - a trial in which every assumption can be challenged.

The government's War on Poverty has transformed poverty from a short-term misfortune into a career choice.

The Constitution isn't written in Chinese, Swahili or Sanskrit. It's in plain English.

Libertarians know that a free country has nothing to fear from anyone coming in or going out - while a welfare state is scared to death of poor people coming in and rich people getting out.

Like many people, most Libertarians feel empathy and sympathy for less fortunate people. But they know you can't have perfection in a world of limited resources.

Whenever I say that America has become an empire, someone is sure to say I'm being ridiculous.

You are where you are today because you have chosen to be there.

Communities don't think, don't believe, don't want, don't have needs, don't have interests and don't make decisions. Only individuals have minds that generate desires and needs - and only individuals can make choices and decisions.

A great burden was lifted from my shoulders the day I realized that no one owes me anything.

There was no military reason to drop atomic bombs on Japan. They were used as terrorist weapons - killing innocent people to influence other people.

I'm old enough to remember the end of World War II. On Aug. 14, 1946, a year after the Japanese were defeated, most newspapers and magazines had single articles commemorating the end of the war.

Security... it's simply the recognition that changes will take place and the knowledge that you're willing to deal with whatever happens.

While most people in TV, radio, and the press have treated me wonderfully, some of the most important people want to pretend I don't exist.

I'm sorry that I can't snap my fingers and undo 50 years of bad American foreign policy.

America rules the world - by force.

If younger people see older people who haven't planned ahead and have to rely on charity, the young will be more likely to provide for the future. Today when someone plans poorly, the only consequence people see is a demand for more government.

Libertarians understand a very simple fact of life: Government doesn't work. It can't deliver the mail on time, it doesn't keep our cities safe, it doesn't educate our children properly.

Each person is living for himself; his own happiness is all he can ever personally feel.

Everything we know about human nature and about government tells us that individuals using their own money will achieve far more good for themselves and far more for others than politicians spending money they didn't have to work to earn.

Everyone will experience the consequences of his own acts. If his act are right, he'll get good consequences; if they're not, he'll suffer for it.

Since no one but you can know what's best for you, government control can't make your life better.

When people do things for you, it's because they want to - because you, in some way, give them something meaningful that makes them want to please you, not because anyone owes you anything.

But, actually, it is only Americans who say that our freedoms and prosperity are the reason foreigners hate us. If you ask the foreigners, they make it clear that it's America's bullying foreign policy they detest.

You can't give the government the power to do good without also giving it the power to do bad - in fact, to do anything it wants.

Freedom and responsibility aren't interconnected things. They are the same thing.

Voluntary association produces the free market - where each person can choose among a multitude of possibilities.

In the 1880s, people all over the world looked to America for inspiration. Its very existence was proof that it was possible to have a relatively free and peaceful country. No income tax, no foreign wars, no welfare state, no intrusions on civil liberties.

You don't need an explanation for everything, Recognize that there are such things as miracles - events for which there are no ready explanations. Later knowledge may explain those events quite easily.

Some people object to libertarian ideas because there are too many irresponsible people in the world - people who will cause trouble if the government doesn't restrain them.

Government is force, pure and simple. There's no way to sugar-coat that. And because government is force, it will attract the worst elements of society - people who want to use government to avoid having to earn their living and to avoid having to persuade others to accept their ideas voluntarily.

For most of our history, Americans enjoyed both liberty and security from foreign threats.

You owe it to yourself to be the best person possible. Because if you are, others will want to be with you, want to provide you with the things you want in exchange for what you're giving to them.

It has long been apparent that many people in the media don't believe you're competent to make your own decisions.

Forcing people to be generous isn't humanitarian, effective, compassionate or moral. Only acts that are truly voluntary for all concerned can be truly compassionate.

The communitarians may say you've been enjoying too much individual freedom, and that you must give up some of that for the benefit of the community. But they really mean that they want more power over your life - to force you to subsidize, obey and conform to their choices.

Only free people have an incentive to be virtuous. Only people who bear the consequences of their own acts will care about those consequences and try to learn from their mistakes.

The Bill of Rights isn't some legalistic fine print. It was written to make our lives freer, more prosperous, and happier. By forsaking it, America has become no better than any other country in the world.

The important thing is to concentrate upon what you can do - by yourself, upon your own initiative.

The American way was for commerce, personal relationships, and religion to be voluntary. No one was forced to participate in something he didn't want.

It is well known that in war, the first casualty is truth - that during any war truth is forsaken for propaganda.

What we really need is compassion of the mind - compassion for others that is directed intelligently and produces truly compassionate results.

Left-wing politicians take away your liberty in the name of children and of fighting poverty, while right-wing politicians do it in the name of family values and fighting drugs. Either way, government gets bigger and you become less free.

I found that I was getting a warm reception for my message of freeing you from the income tax, releasing you from Social Security, ending the insane war on drugs, restoring gun rights, and reducing the federal government to just its constitutional functions.

World War II has always been of great interest to me. I've known for decades that it was just one more war the politicians suckered us into.

You don't have to buy from anyone. You don't have to work at any particular job. You don't have to participate in any given relationship. You can choose.

Contrary to all the blather we here about the unique goodness of the American people or our religious heritage or anything else, the one thing that set this country apart from all others was the Bill of Rights.

The police can't stop an intruder, mugger, or stalker from hurting you. They can pursue him only after he has hurt or killed you. Protecting yourself from harm is your responsibility, and you are far less likely to be hurt in a neighborhood of gun-owners than in one of disarmed citizens - even if you don't own a gun yourself.

The first step in freeing yourself from social restrictions is the realization that there is no such thing as a safe code of conduct - one that would earn everyone's approval. Your actions can always be condemned by someone - for being too bold or too apathetic, for being too conformist or too nonconformist, for being too liberal or too conservative. So it's necessary to decide whose approval is important to you.

You have only one life, and no one else will live it for you. Shouldn't you take the time right now to figure out what that life is all about?

Conservatives say the government can't end poverty by force, but they believe it can use force to make people moral. Liberals say government can't make people be moral, but they believe it can end poverty. Neither group attempts to explain why government is so clumsy and destructive in one area but a paragon of efficiency and benevolence in the other.

In my experience, people who are truly compassionate rarely use the word "compassion." Those who do talk compassion generally intend to be compassionate with your money, not their own. It's wrong for someone to confiscate your money, give it to someone else, and call that 'compassion'.

Whatever the issue, let freedom offer us a hundred choices, instead of having government force one answer on everyone.

It's important to realize that whenever you give power to politicians or bureaucrats, it will be used for what they want, not for what you want.

So what is government?... Very simply, it is an agency of coercion. Of course, there are other agencies of coercion - such as the Mafia. So to be more precise, government is the agency of coercion that has flags in front of its offices.

Disarmed citizens encourage crime and violence. Armed citizens encourage criminals to find a safer line of work.

Not only can no one predict the future, we don't understand the present - and there isn't even any certainty about the past.

The government is good at one thing. It knows how to break your legs, and then hand you a crutch and say, "See if it weren't for the government, you wouldn't be able to walk".