Harry Browne Quotes

The inescapable truth is: government does not have all the answers. In too many instances, government does not solve problems; it subsidizes them.

Government is not the answer to the problem - it IS the problem.

The government shouldn't run anything, because it cannot run anything.

Smaller government, more individual responsibility, more individual control creates more Republicans. More state power and ownership and control and top-down decision-making creates more Democrats.

I would much rather see responsibilities exercised by individuals than have them imposed by the government.

How do we turn our nation around? President Obama thinks the answer is more and more government. Government is not the answer. You are not doing anyone a favor by creating dependency, destroying individual responsibility.

The people of America need personal responsibility and freedom, not dependency on the government.

Big government doesn't work! It just doesn't work!

Government is an unnecessary evil. Human beings, when accustomed to taking responsibility for their own behavior, can cooperate on a basis of mutual trust and helpfulness.

The Chodorov Principle: For every social problem A caused by government program X, problem A can be solved by abolishing program X.

The office of government is not to confer happiness, but to give men opportunity to work out happiness for themselves.

There is no such thing as society. There are individual men and women, and there are families. And no government can do anything except through people, and people must look to themselves first.

The Republicans are the party that says that government doen't work, and then they get elected and prove it.

I don't believe in a government that protects us from ourselves.

Government is not the solution, but rather the cause of our problems.

It is certain, I think, that the best government is the one that governs the least. But there is a much-neglected corollary: the best citizen is the one who least needs governing.

No government has ever been beneficent when the attitude of government was that it was taking care of the people. The only freedom consists in the people taking care of the government.

Government is not a solution to our problem, government is the problem. […] Government does not solve problems; it subsidizes them. Government's view of the economy could be summed up in a few short phrases: If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. If it stops moving, subsidize it. […] The problem is not that people are taxed too little, the problem is that government spends too much.

I'm a little embarrassed about how long it took me to see the folly of most government intervention. It was probably 15 years before I really woke up to the fact that almost everything government attempts to do, it makes worse.

Nations are beginning to look to some vague organization, some nebulous course of humanity, to pay their bills and tell them what to do. This is not local self-government. It is not American. It is not the method which has made this country what it is. We can not maintain the western standard of civilization on that theory. If it is supported at all, it will have to be supported on the principle of individual responsibility.

The government can't solve every problem, but an enlightened government can make sure that people can work hard for their dreams and achieve them.

It is a dangerous notion that we need a government to protect us from ourselves.

The only thing I believe is individual responsibility doesn't mean the government is the answer to ever fear and every problem every individual has. We are the masters of our own destiny.

We demand entire freedom of action and then expect the government in some miraculous way to save us from the consequences of our own acts.... Self-government means self-reliance.

My political philosophy as a libertarian says that government has no business intervening in any consensual private behavior. My professional ethic as a thinker and writer, however, says that self-knowledge is our ultimate responsibility