“Defence was an afterthought, prompted by necessity; and its introduction as a State function, though effected doubtless with a view to the strengthening of the State, was really and in principle the initiation of the State's destruction. Its growth in importance is but an evidence of the tendency of progress toward the abolition of the State.”
The Relation of the State to the Invididual (1890)
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Benjamin Ricketson Tucker50
American journalist and anarchist 1854–1939Related quotes
Roy A. Childs, Jr. (1949–1992) American libertarian essayist and critic
“Autarchy and the Statist Abyss,” 1968
“The U. N. is as effective as its member states allow it to be.”
Desmond Tutu (1931) South African churchman, politician, archbishop, Nobel Prize winner
This is actually a common observation, which has been made by many people, and thus far no published source has been found attributing it to Tutu. The earliest published variant thus far found was in Public Affairs Vol. 21 (1978) by the Gokhale Institute of Public Affairs, p. 102:<br>: The United Nations is an inter-governmental body. It is made up of member states, and it can only be as effective as its member states allow it to be.<br>A variant was also prominent in Ch. 6 of the Preventing Deadly Conflict : Final Report (1997) by the Carnegie Commission on Preventing Deadly Conflict http://wwics.si.edu/subsites/ccpdc/pubs/rept97/finfr.htm:<br>: The main responsibility for addressing global problems, including deadly conflict, rests on governments. Acting individually and collectively, they have the power to work toward solutions or to hinder the process. The UN, of course, is only as effective as its member states allow it to be. <br class="br">Misattributed
Václav Havel (1936–2011) playwright, essayist, poet, dissident and 1st President of the Czech Republic
Living in Truth (1986), An Anatomy of Reticence
Benjamin Ricketson Tucker (1854–1939) American journalist and anarchist
The Relation of the State to the Invididual (1890)
Peter Kropotkin (1842–1921) Russian zoologist, evolutionary theorist, philosopher, scientist, revolutionary, economist, activist, geogr…
X, Closing lines
The State — Its Historic Role (1897)
Walter Bagehot book The English Constitution
No. I, "The Cabinet", p. 14
The English Constitution (1867)
W. Ross Ashby (1903–1972) British psychiatrist
Source: Design for a Brain: The Origin of Adaptive Behavior (1952), p. 238
Hermann Rauschning (1887–1982) German politician
Source: The Revolution of Nihilism: Warning to the West (1939), p. 27
Thomas Paine (1737–1809) English and American political activist
1770s, Common Sense (1776)
Context: Society in every state is a blessing, but government even in its best state is but a necessary evil; in its worst state an intolerable one; for when we suffer, or are exposed to the same miseries BY A GOVERNMENT, which we might expect in a country WITHOUT GOVERNMENT, our calamity is heightened by reflecting that we furnish the means by which we suffer.