“The state is not the source of individual rights or of social community. It presupposes that these exist and are worth protecting, and that individuals reciprocally benefit from their interactions with one another…. The state becomes a moral imperative precisely because there is something of value that is worth protecting from the unbridled use of force by those who forsake tradition, family, and friends. A set of forced exchanges from existing rights does not create the original rights so exchanged… A forced exchange does not create culture and sense of community, it protects them by removing the need for compelling or allowing everyone to act as a policeman in his own estate.”

Richard Epstein, Takings: Private Property and the Power of Eminent Domain

In my latest National Post column I say the Texas judge who struck down Obamacare should not be called part of a political conspiracy against the poor and the sick.

“pessimism is as likely to mislead a contemporary critic as optimism.”

Author’s 1914 Introduction to Albert Venn Dicey The Law of the Constitution