KOL338 | Human Action Podcast Ep. 308 with Jeff Deist: Rothbard on Punishment, Property, and Contract

Kinsella On Liberty

Kinsella on Liberty Podcast, Episode 338. From Human Action Podcast Ep. 308, "Rothbard's The Ethics of Liberty with Stephan Kinsella" (May 27, 2021), with Jeff Deist, discussing Rothbard’s Ethics of Liberty, chapters 9, 13, 19, et pass. (PDF). Shownotes: Lawyer and legal theorist Stephan Kinsella joins the show as we dive into Part II of Rothbard's The Ethics of Liberty, grappling with the foundational issues of crime, proportionality, and contract. When is property justly held? When may injuries to a person or property be addressed with force, and how much force? How do we deal with one another contractually, in terms of promises and expectation? How do we resolve disputes privately? Rothbard presents a remarkable exposition of a theory of liberty, a normative justification for laissez-faire which was sorely lacking. Kinsella does a remarkable job of explaining Rothbard's concepts with force and clarity, so you won't want to miss this episode! Transcript below. Youtube: https://youtu.be/AkEdMTDrPfY Raw video (unedited): Related Links Rothbard on the “Original Sin” in Land Titles: 1969 vs. 1974 (Nov. 5, 2014) KOL146 | Interview of Williamson Evers on the Title-Transfer Theory of Contract A Libertarian Theory of Contract: Title Transfer, Binding Promises, and Inalienability, Journal of Libertarian Studies 17, no. 2 (Spring 2003): 11-37 A Libertarian Theory of Punishment and Rights, 30 Loy. L.A. L. Rev. 607-45 (1997) Fraud, Restitution, and Retaliation: The Libertarian Approach KOL197 | Tom Woods Show: The Central Rothbard Contribution I Overlooked, and Why It Matters: The Rothbard-Evers Title-Transfer Theory of Contract Justice and Property Rights: Rothbard on Scarcity, Property, Contracts… KOL004 | Interview with Walter Block on Voluntary Slavery TRANSCRIPT Rothbard on Punishment, Property, and Contract Stephan Kinsella with Jeff Deist The Human Action Podcast, Mises Institute May 27, 2021 00:00:08 JEFF DEIST: Kinsella, you ready, Freddy? 00:00:09 STEPHAN KINSELLA: I’m ready. I guess I can take my mask off. 00:00:12 JEFF DEIST: What is it? I can’t see. What’s it got on it? 00:00:16 STEPHAN KINSELLA: V for Vendetta. 00:00:17 JEFF DEIST: Oh yeah, yeah. 00:00:19 STEPHAN KINSELLA: I got it backwards. That’s why. 00:00:21 00:00:24 JEFF DEIST: I love that movie. I like Stephen Fry generally, and it’s got a very young, cute Natalie Portman. 00:00:30 STEPHAN KINSELLA: She had her day. 00:00:31 JEFF DEIST: Before she was in all those – I think she was in Star Wars movies at some point. 00:00:35 STEPHAN KINSELLA: Yep. 00:00:37 JEFF DEIST: And then she became sort of a Hillary person. 00:00:41 STEPHAN KINSELLA: True. 00:00:42 JEFF DEIST: All right, we good, Clay? 00:00:44 Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back once again to the Human Action podcast. If you have been following along—you should be following along—you’ll know that we’ve been working our way through some various Rothbard texts in the past few weeks. And at some point we announced that we are going to tackle The Ethics of Liberty, which, after Man, Economy, and State might be the most treatise-like or full-length work of Rothbard’s for our purposes. 00:01:09 And we started the analysis of this book last week with Dr. Walter Block. We went through part one of the book, which deals in natural law. If you haven’t seen that show, be sure and go back and take a look because it’s got a lot of Walter Blockisms, and we wrestled with a lot of things conceptually in that show. But part two of the book where Rothbard lays out a theory of liberty is really the meat of it. 00:01:32 And I thought there would be nobody better for our purposes this week than our friend, Stephan Kinsella who is, of course, someone most of you probably already know or are familiar with. He’s not just an IP lawyer.