We Win!(author Jim Powell on liberty and his new book 'The Triumph of Liberty') (Brief Article) (Interview)

• Author: Doherty, Brian

"Liberty is a rare and precious thing," writes Jim Powell in his new book, The Triumph of Liberty (Free Press). Through dozens of engaging biographical sketches of figures ranging from Erasmus to Mary Wollstonecraft to Ludwig Von Mises, Powell chronicles how liberty--"freedom from fraud and coercion of every kind"--became a universally accepted (if not practiced) concept. The individuals he discusses, Powell says, "made it possible for millions of us to do what was unthinkable in ages past: enjoy life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." For his part, Powell has been thinking about liberty for a long time. In the 1 960s, he served as an editor of the pathbreaking student journal New Individualist Review at the University of Chicago; more recently, he's been an editor at Laissez-Faire Books and a senior fellow at the Cato Institute. He spoke with Associate Editor Brian Doherty via phone.

Q: Given the 20th century's history of bloody statism, in what sense has liberty triumphed?

A: The earliest figure I write about in my book is Cicero, since he was the earliest for whom I could find reliable biographical sources. Look at his Rome: Slavery is universal, no individual rights, no trial by jury; private property was not secure (though property law was being developed). Rome relied on continuing conquest, constant war. From that perspective, we've come a long way.

Q: If liberty's advantages are so great, why is it so often fleeting?

A: Lots of people, both for reasons of idealism and reasons of self-interest, promote expanded government power, which throughout history has been the greatest single threat to liberty. We are dealing with either idealists like egalitarians, who want to do various...