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The Voluntaryist

“If one takes care of the means, the end will take care of itself.” -Gandhi

Statement of Purpose: Voluntaryists are advocates of non-political, non-violent strategies to achieve a free society.
We reject electoral politics, in theory and in practice, as incompatible with libertarian principles. Governments must cloak their actions in an aura of moral legitimacy in order to sustain their power, and political methods invariably strengthen that legitimacy.

Voluntaryists seek instead to delegitimize the State through education, and we advocate withdrawal of the cooperation and tacit consent on which State power ultimately depends.


WE ARE NOT TAX EXEMPT
As you view our website, please remember that it is a labor of love and search for the truth. If you find anything of value here, please let us know by clicking on the Support Us button below. Your gifts to our work are not tax-deductible. Our efforts are bound by conscience and goodwill, not government regulation or political privilege. We refuse to be numbered or supervised by any government agency.

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Carl Watner, Voluntaryist, Father, Mentor, Husband, and Friend

With great emotion, I share with you the passing of my long-time mentor and friend, Carl Watner. He died peacefully, surrounded by his family, on December 8th after facing down cancer. One could say the cancer won, but this man represented the spirit of voluntaryism and that spirit has become more powerful than I had imagined. I believe that increase will only be accelerated as we realize that it’s all on us now. Thank you, Carl, for adding so much meaning to my life! –Dave the webmaster
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The voluntaryist email group is an occasional forum for announcements, short articles, and other items of interest to voluntaryists. If you would like to join our email group and receive notification when a new issue of our newsletter is posted, click the button below. All back issues of our newsletter are archived digitally with free access. Download the most recent issue, Issue 200. Here is the latest email newsletter.
THE VOLUNTARYIST NEWSLETTER
The Voluntaryist was published continuously from October 1982 through December 2020. Each issue has been archived and can be found by accessing our Table of Contents. I MUST SPEAK OUT, a book-length anthology of articles from the first one hundred issues is available here or may be ordered via our BOOKS page. In addition. flash drives of Issues 1-190 may be ordered for $150 each postpaid. Volume II of I MUST SPEAK OUT contains the best articles from Issue 101 forward. Please click the link to purchase it from Liberty Under Attack.
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THE VOLUNTARYIST COLLECTION

Carl Watner, long-time libertarian and proponent of a voluntary society based on private property, donated over 175 titles from his personal library to The Mises Institute’s Ward and Massey Libraries. The collection is dedicated to the literature of the voluntaryists, past and present. The collection includes a rare first edition of The Collected Works of Lysander Spooner (six volumes). To make it more special, Rothbard signed volume I, along with George Smith, Leonard Liggio, Joe Peden, Mike Coughlin, Charles Shively (editor of the series), Daniel Siegel, Wendy McElroy, Chuck Hamilton, John Mueller, and Bob LeFevre.

 

Quote of the Day
[V]oting or otherwise participating in the U.S. electoral system are activities that a majority of Americans seldom engage in.
- Robert A. Williams, GARRISON STATE HEGEMONY IN U.S. POLITICS (2021), p. 8.

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