Editing Murray Rothbard (section)

== Views ==
=== Austrian economics ===
{{Austrian School sidebar|people}}
Rothbard was an advocate and practitioner of the [[Austrian School]] tradition of his teacher [[Ludwig von Mises]]. Like Mises, Rothbard rejected the application of the [[scientific method]] to economics and dismissed [[econometrics]], empirical and statistical analysis, and other tools of mainstream social science as outside the field (economic history might use those tools, but not Economics proper).<ref name="mises.org">Rothbard, Murray (1976). [https://mises.org/rothbard/praxeology.pdf ''Praxeology:  The Methodology of Austrian Economics''] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140731160019/http://mises.org/rothbard/praxeology.pdf |date=July 31, 2014 }}. Mises.org</ref> He instead embraced [[praxeology]], the strictly ''[[A priori and a posteriori|a priori]]'' methodology of Mises. Praxeology conceives of economic laws as akin to geometric or mathematical [[axiom]]s: fixed, unchanging, objective, and discernible through logical reasoning.<ref name="mises.org"/>{{Third-party inline|date=March 2023}}

According to Misesian economist [[Hans-Hermann Hoppe]], eschewing the scientific method and [[empiricism]] distinguishes the Misesian approach "from all other current economic schools", which dismiss the Misesian approach as "dogmatic and unscientific." [[Mark Skousen]] of [[Chapman University]] and the [[Foundation for Economic Education]], a critic of mainstream economics,<ref name="mises">{{cite web|url=https://mises.org/media/2938/Where-Modern-Economics-Went-Wrong|website=mises.org|title=Where Modern Economics Went Wrong|access-date=August 28, 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140916033639/http://mises.org/media/2938/Where-Modern-Economics-Went-Wrong|archive-date=September 16, 2014|url-status=dead}}</ref> praises Rothbard as brilliant, his writing style persuasive, his economic arguments nuanced and logically rigorous and his Misesian methodology sound.<ref name=":3">Mark Skousen. ''[https://books.google.com/books?id=6sisXMv_AecC&pg=PA390 The Making of Modern Economics] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160527151449/https://books.google.com/books?id=6sisXMv_AecC&lpg=PP1&pg=PA390 |date=May 27, 2016 }}'' (M.E. Sharpe, 2009, p. 390). Skousen writes that Rothbard "refused to write for the academic journals."</ref> But Skousen concedes that Rothbard was effectively "outside the discipline" of mainstream economics and that his work "fell on deaf ears" outside his ideological circles. Rothbard wrote extensively on [[Austrian business cycle theory]] and, as part of this approach, strongly opposed [[central banking]], [[fiat money]], and [[fractional-reserve banking]], advocating a [[gold standard]] and a 100% reserve requirement for banks.<ref name="Mystery" />{{rp|pages=89–94, 96–97}}<ref name="Gordon" /><ref name="golddollar">{{cite web |url=https://mises.org/daily/1829 |first=Murray |last=Rothbard |title=The Case for a 100 Percent Gold Dollar |year=1991 |orig-year=1962 |publisher=Ludwig von Mises Institute |access-date=August 13, 2013 |archive-date=August 1, 2013 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130801065845/http://mises.org/daily/1829 |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=http://archive.lewrockwell.com/north/north769.html |title=What Is Money? Part 5: Fractional Reserve Banking |first=Gary |last=North |author-link=Gary North (economist) |publisher=LewRockwell.com |date=October 10, 2009 |access-date=August 13, 2013 |archive-date=March 13, 2014 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140313211006/http://archive.lewrockwell.com/north/north769.html |url-status=live }}</ref>

==== Polemics against mainstream economics ====
Rothbard wrote a series of [[polemic]]s in which he deprecated a number of leading modern economists. He vilified [[Adam Smith]], calling him a "shameless plagiarist"<ref>{{cite book |first=Murray |last=Rothbard |title=An Austrian Perspective on the History of Economic Thought |publisher=Ludwig von Mises Institute |location=Auburn, AL |date=2006 |orig-date=1995 |isbn=0-945466-48-X |volume=1 |page=435}}</ref> who set economics off track, ultimately leading to the rise of [[Marxism]].<ref>{{cite book |first=Murray |last=Rothbard |title=An Austrian Perspective on the History of Economic Thought |publisher=Ludwig von Mises Institute |location=Auburn, AL |date=2006 |orig-date=1995 |isbn=0-945466-48-X |volume=1 |page=453}}</ref> Rothbard praised Smith's contemporaries, including [[Richard Cantillon]], [[Anne Robert Jacques Turgot]] and [[Étienne Bonnot de Condillac]], for developing the [[subjective theory of value]]. In response to Rothbard's charge that Smith's ''[[The Wealth of Nations]]'' was largely plagiarized, [[David D. Friedman]] castigated Rothbard's scholarship and character, saying that he "was [either] deliberately dishonest or never really read the book he was criticizing".<ref>[[Gerard Casey (philosopher)|Casey, Gerard]] (2010). ''Murray Rothbard''. New York: The Continuum International Publishing Group. p. 112. {{ISBN|978-1-4411-4209-2}}.</ref> Tony Endres called Rothbard's treatment of Smith a "travesty".<ref>Tony Endres, review of ''Classical Economics: An Austrian Perspective'', History of Economics Review, http://www.hetsa.org.au/pdf-back/23-RA-7.pdf {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140127064606/http://www.hetsa.org.au/pdf-back/23-RA-7.pdf |date=January 27, 2014 }}</ref>

Rothbard was equally scathing in his criticism of [[John Maynard Keynes]],<ref>[https://mises.org/resources/5223/Keynes-the-Man Keynes the Man] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110902064513/http://mises.org/resources/5223/Keynes-the-Man |date=September 2, 2011 }}, originally published in ''Dissent on Keynes: A Critical Appraisal of Keynesian Economics'', Edited by Mark Skousen. New York: Praeger, 1992, pp. 171–98; Online ed. at The [[Ludwig von Mises Institute]]</ref> calling him weak on economic theory and a shallow political opportunist. Rothbard also wrote more generally that Keynesian-style governmental regulation of money and credit created a "dismal monetary and banking situation". He called [[John Stuart Mill]] a "wooly man of mush" and speculated that Mill's "soft" personality led his economic thought astray.<ref>Gordon, David (1999). [https://mises.org/misesreview_detail.aspx?control=151&sortorder=issue "John Stuart Mill on Liberty and Control."] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140914004452/https://mises.org/misesreview_detail.aspx?control=151&sortorder=issue |date=September 14, 2014 }} The Mises Review</ref> Rothbard was critical of monetarist economist [[Milton Friedman]]. In his polemic "Milton Friedman Unraveled", he called Friedman a "statist", a "favorite of the establishment", a friend of and an "apologist" for [[Richard Nixon]], and a "pernicious influence" on public policy.<ref>Ruger, William (2013). Meadowcroft, John, ed. ''Milton Friedman. Major Conservative and Libertarian Thinkers''. New York: Bloomsbury. p. 174 {{ISBN?}}</ref><ref>Rothbard, Murray (1971). [http://archive.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/rothbard43.html "Milton Friedman Unraveled."] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140313192641/http://archive.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/rothbard43.html |date=March 13, 2014 }} LewRockwell.com</ref> Rothbard said that libertarians should scorn rather than celebrate Friedman's academic prestige and political influence. Noting that Rothbard has "been nasty to me and my work", Friedman responded to Rothbard's criticism by calling him a "cult builder and a dogmatist".<ref>Doherty, Brian (1995). [http://reason.com/archives/1995/06/01/best-of-both-worlds/3 "Best of Both Worlds."] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190405013824/http://reason.com/archives/1995/06/01/best-of-both-worlds/3 |date=April 5, 2019 }} ''Reason''</ref>

In a memorial volume published by the Mises Institute, Rothbard's protégé and libertarian theorist [[Hans-Hermann Hoppe]] wrote that ''[[Man, Economy, and State]]'' "presented a blistering refutation of all variants of mathematical economics" and included it among Rothbard's "almost mind-boggling achievements". Hoppe lamented that, like Mises, Rothbard died without winning the [[Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences|Nobel Prize]] and, while acknowledging that Rothbard and his work were largely ignored by academia, called him an "intellectual giant" comparable to [[Aristotle]], [[John Locke]], and [[Immanuel Kant]].<ref name="Murray Memoriam">{{cite book|last=Rockwell|first=Llewellyn|title=Murray N. Rothbard In Memoriam|year=1995|publisher=Mises Institute|location=Auburn, Alabama|pages=33–37|url=http://library.freecapitalists.org/books/Murray%20N%20Rothbard/memoriam.pdf|access-date=December 16, 2014|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141220074229/http://library.freecapitalists.org/books/Murray%20N%20Rothbard/memoriam.pdf|archive-date=December 20, 2014|url-status=dead}}</ref>

====Disputes with other Austrian economists====
Georgetown Professor [[Randy Barnett]] says, regarding Rothbard's "insistence on complete ideological purity", that "[a]lmost every intellectual who entered his orbit was eventually spun off, or self emancipated, for some deviation or another. For this reason, the circle around Rothbard was always small."<ref>https://scholarship.law.georgetown.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1860&context=facpub</ref> Although he self-identified as an Austrian economist, Rothbard's methodology was at odds with that of many other Austrians. In 1956, Rothbard deprecated the views of Austrian economist [[Fritz Machlup]], stating that Machlup was no praxeologist and calling him instead a "positivist" who failed to represent the views of Ludwig von Mises. Rothbard noted that, in fact, Machlup shared the opposing positivist view associated with economist [[Milton Friedman]].<ref>In "Defense of 'Extreme Apriorism' Murray N. Rothbard" ''Southern Economic Journal'', January 1957, pp. 314–20</ref> Mises and Machlup had been colleagues in 1920s Vienna before each relocated to the United States, and Mises later urged his American protege [[Israel Kirzner]] to pursue his PhD studies with Machlup at [[Johns Hopkins University]].<ref>{{cite web|last=Kirzner|first=Israel|title=Interview of Israel Kirzner|url=https://www.mises.org/journals/aen/aen17_1_1.asp|publisher=Mises Institute|access-date=June 17, 2013|archive-date=February 10, 2008|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080210215643/http://www.mises.org/journals/aen/aen17_1_1.asp|url-status=live}}</ref>{{Third-party inline|date=April 2023}}

According to libertarian economists [[Tyler Cowen]] and Richard Fink,<ref name=ERE>{{cite journal|last=Tyler Cowen and Richard Fink|title=Inconsistent Equilibrium Constructs: The Evenly Rotating Equilibrium Economy of Mises and Rothbard|journal=American Economic Review|volume=75|issue=4|pages=866–69|year=1985|jstor=1821365}}</ref> Rothbard wrote that the term ''evenly rotating economy'' (ERE) could be used to analyze complexity in a world of change. Mises introduced ERE as an alternative nomenclature for the mainstream economic method of [[static equilibrium]] and [[general equilibrium]] analysis. Cowen and Fink found "serious inconsistencies in both the nature of the ERE and its suggested uses". With the sole exception of Rothbard, no other economist adopted Mises' term, and the concept continued to be called "equilibrium analysis".<ref>{{cite journal|last=Gunning|first=Patrick|title=Mises on the Evenly Rotating Economy|journal=Journal of Austrian Economics|volume=3|issue=3|url=https://mises.org/periodical.aspx?Id=4|date=November 23, 2014|access-date=September 13, 2014|archive-date=September 14, 2014|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140914050526/https://www.mises.org/periodical.aspx?Id=4|url-status=live}}</ref>

In a 2011 article critical of Rothbard's "reflexive opposition" to inflation, ''[[The Economist]]'' noted that his views were increasingly gaining influence among politicians and laypeople on the right. The article contrasted Rothbard's categorical rejection of inflationary policies with the monetary views of "sophisticated Austrian-school monetary economists such as [[George Selgin]] and [[Lawrence H. White]]", [who] follow [[Friedrich Hayek|Hayek]] in treating stability of nominal spending as a monetary ideal—a position "not all that different from [[Scott Sumner|Mr [Scott] Sumner]]'s".<ref>{{Cite news |date=June 22, 2011 |title=Missing Milton Friedman |newspaper=The Economist |url=https://www.economist.com/democracy-in-america/2011/07/22/missing-milton-friedman |access-date=2023-03-12 |issn=0013-0613 |archive-date=March 12, 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230312073452/https://www.economist.com/democracy-in-america/2011/07/22/missing-milton-friedman |url-status=live }}</ref> According to economist Peter Boettke, Rothbard is better described as a [[Property rights (economics)|property rights]] economist than as an Austrian economist. In 1988, Boettke noted that Rothbard "vehemently attacked all of the books of the younger Austrians".<ref name="Boettke Nomos">{{cite journal|last=Boettke|first=Peter|title=Economists and Liberty: Murray N. Rothbard|journal=Nomos|year=1988|pages=29ff|url=https://www.academia.edu/2800511|access-date=November 17, 2013|archive-date=May 3, 2023|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230503213135/https://www.academia.edu/2800511|url-status=live}}</ref>

=== Ethics ===
[[File:Ludwig von Mises.jpg|thumb|upright|[[Ludwig von Mises]]]]
Although Rothbard adopted Ludwig von Mises' [[deductive]] methodology for his social theory and economics,<ref>Grimm, Curtis M.; Hunn, Lee; Smith, Ken G. ''Strategy as Action: Competitive Dynamics and Competitive Advantage''. New York: Oxford University Press. 2006. p. 43 {{ISBN?}}</ref> he parted with Mises on the question of ethics. Specifically, he rejected Mises' conviction that ethical values remain subjective and opposed [[utilitarianism]] in favor of principle-based, [[natural law]] reasoning. In defense of his free-market views, Mises employed utilitarian economic arguments to contend that interventionist policies worsened society. Rothbard countered that interventionist policies do, in fact, benefit some people, including certain government employees and beneficiaries of social programs. Therefore, unlike Mises, Rothbard argued for an objective, natural-law basis for the free market.<ref name="Essential" />{{rp|pages=87–89}} He called this principle "[[self-ownership]]", loosely basing the idea on the writings of [[John Locke]] and also borrowing concepts from [[classical liberalism]] and the anti-imperialism of the [[Old Right (United States)|Old Right]].<ref name="Enemy"/>{{rp|page=134}}

Rothbard accepted the [[labor theory of property]] but rejected the [[Lockean proviso]], arguing that if an individual mixes his labor with unowned land, then he becomes the proper owner eternally and that after that time, it is private property which may change hands only by trade or gift.<ref>{{cite journal|doi=10.1111/j.1536-7150.2004.00298.x|title=31 Reckoning with Rothbard|year=2004|last1=Kyriazi|first1=Harold|journal=American Journal of Economics and Sociology|volume=63|issue=2|pages=451–84}}</ref> Rothbard was a strong critic of [[egalitarianism]]. The title essay of Rothbard's 1974 book ''[[Egalitarianism as a Revolt Against Nature and Other Essays]]'' held: "Equality is not in the natural order of things, and the crusade to make everyone equal in every respect (except before the law) is certain to have disastrous consequences."<ref>George C. Leef, [http://www.fee.org/the_freeman/detail/egalitarianism-as-a-revolt-against-nature-and-other-essays-by-murray-rothbard-edited-by-david-gordon#axzz2i8c6D5oO "Book Review of ''Egalitarianism as a Revolt Against Nature and Other Essays'' by Murray Rothbard", edited by David Gordon (2000 ed.)] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131019180503/http://www.fee.org/the_freeman/detail/egalitarianism-as-a-revolt-against-nature-and-other-essays-by-murray-rothbard-edited-by-david-gordon#axzz2i8c6D5oO |date=October 19, 2013 }}, ''[[The Freeman]]'', July 2001.</ref> In it, Rothbard wrote: "At the heart of the egalitarian left is the pathological belief that there is no structure of reality; that all the world is a tabula rasa that can be changed at any moment in any desired direction by the mere exercise of human will."<ref>Rothbard, Murray (2003). [http://archive.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/rothbard31.html "Egalitarianism as a Revolt Against Nature and Other Essays"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150618045321/http://archive.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/rothbard31.html |date=June 18, 2015 }}, essay published in full at [[Lewrockwell.com]]. See also Rothbard's essay [https://mises.org/daily/3007 "The Struggle Over Egalitarianism Continues"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140914021835/https://mises.org/daily/3007 |date=September 14, 2014 }}, the 1991 introduction to republication of ''Freedom, Inequality, Primitivism, and the Division of Labor'', [[Ludwig Von Mises Institute]], 2008.</ref> [[Noam Chomsky]] critiqued Rothbard's ideal society as "a world so full of hate that no human being would want to live in it{{nbsp}}... First of all, it couldn't function for a second—and if it could, all you'd want to do is get out, or commit suicide or something."<ref>{{cite book |last1=Schoeffel |first1=John |last2=Chomsky |first2=Noam |title=Understanding Power: The Indispensable Chomsky |date=2011 |publisher=ReadHowYouWant.com |isbn=978-1-4587-8817-7 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=TykKulVqY9UC |language=en |access-date=October 31, 2015 |archive-date=August 6, 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200806062507/https://books.google.com/books?id=TykKulVqY9UC |url-status=live }}</ref> The philosopher James. W. Child has even questioned whether Rothbard and other 
similar libertarians can sustain a standard of fraud.<ref> Child, James W. (1994). Can libertarianism sustain a fraud standard? Ethics 104 (4):722-738. https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/abs/10.1086/293652?journalCode=et </ref><ref>Ferguson, Benjamin. (2018). CAN LIBERTARIANS GET AWAY WITH FRAUD? Economics and Philosophy, 34(2), 165–184.
https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/economics-and-philosophy/article/can-libertarians-get-away-with-fraud/3324B0979DFF2E87514B8172240BA8B3</ref>

=== Anarcho-capitalism ===
{{anarcho-capitalism sidebar|people}}
{{anarchism US|people}}
According to [[anarcho-capitalist]]s, various theorists have espoused legal philosophies similar to [[anarcho-capitalism]]; however, Rothbard was credited with coining the terms "anarcho-capitalist" and "anarch-capitalism" in 1971 (though "anarchocapitalism [sic]" had been attested earliest in [[Karl Hess]]'s 1969 essay ''The Death of Politics''<ref name = "HessDoP">{{cite web|url= http://fare.tunes.org/books/Hess/dop.html|title= The Death of Politics|last= Hess|first= Karl|orig-date= March 1969|date= 2003|website= Faré's Home Page|publisher= Playboy|access-date= 9 October 2023|quote= Laissez-faire capitalism, or '''anarchocapitalism''' [sic], is simply the economic form of the libertarian ethic. Laissez-faire capitalism encompasses the notion that men should exchange goods and services, without regulation, solely on the basis of value for value. It recognizes charity and communal enterprises as voluntary versions of this same ethic. Such a system would be straight barter, except for the widely felt need for a division of labor in which men, voluntarily, accept value tokens such as cash and credit. Economically, this system is anarchy, and proudly so.|archive-date= August 2, 2019|archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20190802164945/http://fare.tunes.org/books/Hess/dop.html|url-status= live}}</ref><ref name = "Johnson2015">{{cite web|url= https://c4ss.org/content/39997|title= Karl Hess on Anarcho-Capitalism|last= Johnson|first= Charles|date= 28 August 2015|website= Center for a Stateless Society|access-date= 9 October 2023|quote= In fact, the earliest documented, printed use of the word "anarcho-capitalism" that I can find [...] actually comes neither from Wollstein nor from Rothbard, but from Karl Hess's manifesto "The Death of Politics," which was published in ''Playboy'' in March, 1969.]|archive-date= October 4, 2023|archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20231004131548/https://c4ss.org/content/39997|url-status= live}}</ref>{{Self-published inline|date=November 2023}}).<ref name = "Leeson">{{cite book |last=Leeson |first=Robert |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=_pQ4DwAAQBAJ&pg=PA180 |title=Hayek: A Collaborative Biography, Part IX: The Divine Right of the 'Free' Market |publisher=Springer |year=2017 |isbn=978-3-319-60708-5 |page=180 |quote=To the original 'anarchocapitalist' (Rothbard coined the term) [...]. |access-date=November 27, 2023 |archive-date=April 25, 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230425065230/https://books.google.com/books?id=_pQ4DwAAQBAJ&pg=PA180 |url-status=live }}</ref><ref name = "Flood2010">Flood, Anthony (2010). [http://anthonyflood.com/rothbardknowyourrights.htm Untitled preface to Rothbard's "Know Your Rights"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110811135031/http://anthonyflood.com/rothbardknowyourrights.htm |date=August 11, 2011 }}, originally published in ''WIN: Peace and Freedom through Nonviolent Action'', Volume 7, No. 4, 1 March 1971, 6–10. Flood's quote: "Rothbard's neologism, 'anarchocapitalism,' probably makes its first appearance in print here."</ref>{{Self-published inline|date=November 2023}} He synthesized elements from the Austrian School of economics, [[classical liberalism]] and 19th-century American [[individualist anarchist]]s into a right-wing form of anarchism.<ref>''Blackwell Encyclopaedia of Political Thought'', 1987, {{ISBN|978-0-631-17944-3}}, p. 290; quote: "A student and disciple of the Austrian economist Ludwig von Mises, Rothbard combined the laissez-faire economics of his teacher with the absolutist views of human rights and rejection of the state he had absorbed from studying the individualist American anarchists of the 19th century such as Lysander Spooner and Benjamin Tucker."</ref><ref>{{Cite book|last=Robert Leeson|title=Hayek: A Collaborative Biography, Part IX: The Divine Right of the 'Free' Market|publisher=Springer|year=2017|isbn=978-3-319-60708-5|page=180|quote=To the original 'anarchocapitalist' (Rothbard coined the term) [...].}}</ref><ref name=":11" /> According to his protégé [[Hans-Hermann Hoppe]], "[t]here would be no [[anarcho-capitalist]] movement to speak of without Rothbard".<ref name="H-H Hoppe">{{cite web |last=Hoppe |first=Hans-Hermann |author-link=Hans-Hermann Hoppe |date=December 31, 2001 |title=Anarcho-Capitalism: An Annotated Bibliography |url=http://archive.lewrockwell.com/hoppe/hoppe5.html |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140111070712/http://archive.lewrockwell.com/hoppe/hoppe5.html |archive-date=January 11, 2014 |access-date=June 2, 2013}}</ref> [[Lew Rockwell]] in a memoriam called Rothbard the "conscience" of all the various strains of what he described as "libertarian anarchism", and said their advocates had often been personally inspired by his example.<ref>Rockwell, Llewellyn (1995).  [http://library.freecapitalists.org/books/Murray%20N%20Rothbard/memoriam.pdf "Murray N. Rothbard: In Memoriam."] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141220074229/http://library.freecapitalists.org/books/Murray%20N%20Rothbard/memoriam.pdf |date=December 20, 2014 }} p. 117</ref>

During his years at graduate school in the late 1940s, Rothbard considered whether strict adherence to libertarian and ''[[laissez-faire]]'' principles required the abolition of the state altogether. He visited [[Baldy Harper]], a founder of the [[Foundation for Economic Education]],<ref name="The Encyclopedia of Libertarianism by Hamowy">{{cite book|editor=[[Ronald Hamowy]]|title=The Encyclopedia of Libertarianism|date= 2008|publisher=Sage|location=Thousand Oaks, CA|isbn=978-1-4129-6580-4|page=623|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=yxNgXs3TkJYC&q=libertarian+encyclopedia|access-date=November 4, 2020|archive-date=April 15, 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210415022033/https://books.google.com/books?id=yxNgXs3TkJYC&q=libertarian+encyclopedia|url-status=live}}{{Cite news | last = Rothbard | first = Murray N.| title = Floyd Arthur 'Baldy' Harper, RIP | work = Mises Daily | date = August 17, 2007 }}</ref> who doubted the need for any government whatsoever. Rothbard said that during this period, he was influenced by 19th-century [[American individualist anarchists]] like [[Lysander Spooner]] and [[Benjamin Tucker]] and the Belgian economist [[Gustave de Molinari]] who wrote about how such a system could work.<ref name="Essential"/>{{rp|pages=12–13}} Thus, he "combined the ''laissez-faire'' economics of Mises with the absolutist views of human rights and rejection of the state" from individualist anarchists.<ref name="Miller">{{cite book|title=Blackwell Encyclopaedia of Political Thought|publisher=[[Blackwell Publishing]]|year=1991|isbn=978-0-631-17944-3|editor-last=Miller|editor-first=David|editor-link=David Miller (political theorist)|page=290}}</ref> [[Edward Stringham]] opined that: "In the late 1940s, Murray Rothbard decided that that [sic] private-property anarchism was the logical conclusion of free-market thinking [...]."<ref name = "Stringham2007">{{cite book|last= Stringham|first= Edward Peter|year= 2007|title= Anarchy and the Law: The Political Economy of Choice|chapter = Chapter 1: Introduction|chapter-url= https://deliverypdf.ssrn.com/delivery.php?ID=241124005024104084119023003122010066007003009040033092067067101077117023028084030102114017055054029044016124100023087125120022008000007082048031117095082018065072020041095026023125102088018095067108021106075117108123010108108003084003077099006003082&EXT=pdf&INDEX=TRUE|page= 3|location= New Brunswick, NJ|publisher= Transaction Publishers}}</ref>

Rothbard began to consider himself a "private property anarchist"{{citation needed|date=November 2023}} and published works about private property anarchism in 1954;<ref name = "Stringham2007"/> later, in 1971, he began to use "[[anarcho-capitalist]]" to describe his political ideology.<ref name = "Flood2010"/><ref name="Crocetta">Roberta Modugno Crocetta, [https://mises.org/journals/scholar/roberta.pdf Murray Rothbard's anarcho-capitalism in the contemporary debate. A critical defense] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121110173459/http://mises.org/journals/scholar/roberta.pdf |date=November 10, 2012 }}, [[Ludwig Von Mises Institute]].</ref><ref name="Exclusive Interview">{{cite journal|last=Oliver|first=Michael|title=Exclusive Interview With Murray Rothbard|journal=The New Banner: A Fortnightly Libertarian Journal|date=February 25, 1972|url=http://archive.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/rothbard103.html|quote=Capitalism is the fullest expression of anarchism, and anarchism is the fullest expression of capitalism.|access-date=February 2, 2016|archive-date=June 18, 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150618045309/http://archive.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/rothbard103.html|url-status=live}}</ref> In his anarcho-capitalist model, the system of private property is upheld by private firms, such as hypothesized protection agencies, which compete in a free market and are voluntarily supported by consumers who choose to use their protective and judicial services. Anarcho-capitalists describe this as "the end of the state [[monopoly on force]]".<ref name="Crocetta"/> In this way, Rothbard differed from Mises, who favored a state to uphold markets.<ref name=":11">{{Cite journal |last=Jensen |first=Jacob |date=April 2022 |title=Repurposing Mises: Murray Rothbard and the Birth of Anarchocapitalism |url=https://muse.jhu.edu/article/855169 |journal=Journal of the History of Ideas |language=en |volume=83 |issue=2 |pages=315–32 |doi=10.1353/jhi.2022.0015 |pmid=35603616 |s2cid=248985277 |issn=1086-3222 |access-date=April 17, 2023 |archive-date=July 12, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220712160927/https://muse.jhu.edu/article/855169 |url-status=live }}</ref>

In an unpublished article, Rothbard wrote that economically speaking, [[individualist anarchism]] differs from anarcho-capitalism and jokingly pondered whether libertarians should adopt the term nonarchist. Rothbard concluded the article by affirming that he is neither an anarchist nor an "artist" but a middle-of-the-roader on the archy question.<ref name="Are Libertarians 'Anarchists'">Rothbard, Murray (1950s). [http://archive.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/rothbard167.html "Are Libertarians 'Anarchists'?"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170113130534/http://archive.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/rothbard167.html |date=January 13, 2017 }} Lew Rockwell.com. Retrieved September 4, 2020.</ref>{{Third-party inline|date=March 2023}} In ''Man, Economy, and State'', Rothbard divides the various kinds of state intervention into three categories: "autistic intervention" (interference with private non-economic activities), "binary intervention", (exchange between individuals and the state); and "triangular intervention" (state-mandated exchange between individuals). Sanford Ikeda wrote that Rothbard's typology "eliminates the gaps and inconsistencies that appear in Mises's original formulation".<ref>Ikeda, Sanford, ''Dynamics of the Mixed Economy: Toward a Theory of Interventionism'', Routledge UK, 1997, p. 245.</ref><ref>Rothbard, Murray. [https://mises.org/rothbard/mes/chap14.asp Chapter 2 "Fundamentals of Intervention"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140914010730/https://mises.org/rothbard/mes/chap14.asp |date=September 14, 2014 }} from ''Man, Economy and State'', [[Ludwig von Mises Institute]].</ref> Rothbard writes in ''[[Power and Market]]'' that the role of the economist in a free market is limited, but it is much larger in a government that solicits economic policy recommendations. Rothbard argues that self-interest, therefore, prejudices the views of many economists in favor of increased government intervention.<ref>Peter G. Klein, [https://www.mises.org/story/2318 "Why Intellectuals Still Support Socialism"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090430203330/http://mises.org/story/2318 |date=April 30, 2009 }}, [[Ludwig von Mises Institute]], November 15, 2006</ref><ref>[https://www.mises.org/rothbard/mes/chap19.asp ''Man, Economy, and State'', Chapter 7 – Conclusion: Economics and Public Policy] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140914010150/https://www.mises.org/rothbard/mes/chap19.asp |date=September 14, 2014 }}, [[Ludwig Von Mises Institute]].</ref>

=== Race, gender, and civil rights ===
Michael O'Malley, associate professor of history at [[George Mason University]], describes Rothbard's tone toward the [[civil rights movement]] and the [[women's suffrage]] movement as "contemptuous and hostile".<ref name=":5">O'Malley, Michael (2012). ''Face Value: The Entwined Histories of Money and Race in America.'' Chicago, Illinois: University of Chicago Press. pp. 205–07</ref> Rothbard criticized women's rights activists, attributing the growth of the [[welfare state]] to politically active [[spinster]]s "whose busybody inclinations were not fettered by the responsibilities of home and hearth".<ref>{{cite book |last=Rothbard |first=Murray |year=2017 |title=The Progressive Era |url=https://mises.org/library/book/progressive-era |publisher=[[Ludwig von Mises Institute]] |location=Auburn, AL |pages=332 |isbn=978-1610166744 |access-date=August 19, 2024 |archive-date=October 23, 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201023131723/https://cdn.mises.org/The%20Progressive%20Era_0.pdf |url-status=live }}</ref> Rothbard argued that the [[Progressivism|progressive movement]], which he regarded as a noxious influence on the United States, was spearheaded by a coalition of Yankee Protestants (people from the six [[New England]] states and [[upstate New York]] who were [[Protestants]] of [[English-Americans|English descent]]), Jewish women and "lesbian spinsters".<ref>Murray N. Rothbard (August 11, 2006). [https://mises.org/daily/2225 "Origins of the Welfare State in America"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141011063900/http://mises.org/daily/2225 |date=October 11, 2014 }}. ''mises.org''.</ref>

Rothbard, still on the theme of [[feminism]], wrote that "too many American men live in a matriarchy, dominated first by Momism, then by female teachers, and then by their wive", and that women were advantaged because they were supported by their husbands.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Rothbard |first=Murray Newton |date=May 1970 |title=The Great Women’s Liberation Issue: Setting It Straight |url=https://www.rothbard.it/articles/women-liberation.pdf |publisher=Individualist}}</ref>  Rothbard's negative view of feminism can also be found in the 1991 article ''The Great Thomas & Hill Show: Stopping The Monstrous Regiment'', where he wrote "At the risk of alienating my atheist libertarian friends, I think it increasingly clear that conservatives are right: that some religion is going to be dominant in every society. And that if Christianity, for example, is scorned and tossed out, some horrendous form of religion is going to take its place: whether it be Communism, New Age occultism, feminism, or Left-Puritanism. There is no getting around this basic truth of human nature."<ref>{{Cite web |last=Rothbard |first=Murray Newton |date=December 1991 |title=THE GREAT THOMAS & HILL SHOW: STOPPING THE MONSTROUS REGIMENT |url=https://archive.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/ir/Ch69.html |website=archive.lewrockwell.com}}</ref>

Rothbard called for the elimination of "the entire 'civil rights' structure," which he said "tramples on the property rights of every American." He consistently favored repeal of the [[1964 Civil Rights Act]], including Title VII regarding employment discrimination,<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://archive.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/ir/Ch69.html|title=The Great Thomas & Hill Show: Stopping the Monstrous Regiment|website=archive.lewrockwell.com|access-date=July 31, 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170418134336/https://archive.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/ir/Ch69.html|archive-date=April 18, 2017|url-status=dead}}</ref> and called for overturning the ''[[Brown v. Board of Education]]'' decision on the grounds that state-mandated integration of schools violated libertarian principles.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.lewrockwell.com/2015/11/lew-rockwell/open-borders-assault-private-property/|title=Open Borders Are an Assault on Private Property – LewRockwell LewRockwell.com|access-date=July 31, 2016|archive-date=June 4, 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160604161028/https://www.lewrockwell.com/2015/11/lew-rockwell/open-borders-assault-private-property/|url-status=live}}</ref> In an essay called "Right-wing Populism", Rothbard proposed a set of measures to "reach out" to the "middle and working classes", which included urging the police to crack down on "street criminals", writing that "cops must be unleashed" and "allowed to administer instant punishment, subject of course to liability when they are in error". He also advocated that the police "clear the streets of bums and vagrants."<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://archive.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/ir/Ch5.html|title=Right-Wing Populism|website=archive.lewrockwell.com|access-date=July 31, 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160524131828/http://archive.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/ir/Ch5.html|archive-date=May 24, 2016|url-status=dead}}</ref><ref name=":15">{{Cite book |last=Massimino |first=Cory |title=Routledge handbook of anarchy and anarchist thought |date=2021 |publisher=Routledge, Taylor & Francis group |isbn=978-1-138-73758-7 |editor-last=Chartier |editor-first=Gary |series=Routledge handbooks |location=London |chapter=Two cheers for Rothbardianism |editor-last2=Van Schoelandt |editor-first2=Chad}}</ref>

Rothbard held strong opinions about many leaders of the civil rights movement. He considered black separatist [[Malcolm X]] to be a "great black leader" and integrationist [[Martin Luther King Jr.]] to be favored by whites because he "was the major restraining force on the developing Negro revolution".<ref name="Enemy" />{{rp|page=167}} Jacob Jensen writes that Rothbard's commentary from the 1960s, approving of both "black power" and "white power" in separated communities, amounted to support for [[racial segregation]].{{Sfn|Jensen|2022|p=325–326}} In 1993, Rothbard rejected the vision of a "separate black nation", asking, "Does anyone really believe that ... New Africa would be content to strike out on its own, with no massive "foreign aid" from the U.S.A.?"<ref>Rothbard, Murray N. (February 1993). [http://archive.lewrockwell.com/1970/01/murray-n-rothbard/their-malcolm-and-mine/ "Their Malcolm ... and Mine."] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220330013408/http://archive.lewrockwell.com/1970/01/murray-n-rothbard/their-malcolm-and-mine/ |date=March 30, 2022 }} LewRockwell.com</ref> Rothbard also suggested that opposition to Martin Luther King Jr., whom he demeaned as a "coercive integrationist", should be a litmus test for members of his "[[paleolibertarian]]" political movement.<ref>Rothbard, Murray (November 1994). [http://archive.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/ir/Ch16.html "Big-Government Libertarians."] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170131223653/http://archive.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/ir/Ch16.html |date=January 31, 2017 }} ''LewRockwell.com''</ref>

Rothbard is described by the historian John P. Jackson Jr. as espousing [[antisemitism]] despite Rothbard's own background as a secular Jew.<ref name=":7" /> One former student described Rothbard as privately using the anti-Jewish slur "[[kike]]s" repeatedly.<ref name=":7" /> Rothbard also befriended the [[Holocaust denial|Holocaust deniers]] [[Willis Carto]] and [[Harry Elmer Barnes]].<ref name=":7">{{cite journal | url=https://muse.jhu.edu/article/804147 | title=The Pre-History of American Holocaust Denial | journal=American Jewish History | year=2021 | volume=105 | issue=1 | pages=25–48 | last1=Jackson | first1=John P. Jr | doi=10.1353/ajh.2021.0002 | s2cid=239763082 | access-date=October 23, 2022 | archive-date=September 4, 2021 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210904004649/https://muse.jhu.edu/article/804147 | url-status=live }}</ref>

=== Views on war ===
Like [[Randolph Bourne]], Rothbard believed that "war is the health of the state". According to David Gordon, this was the reason for Rothbard's opposition to aggressive [[foreign policy]].<ref name="Gordon"/> Rothbard believed that stopping new wars was necessary and that knowing how the government had led citizens into earlier wars was important. Two essays expanded on these views: "War, Peace, and the State" and "Anatomy of the State". Rothbard used insights from [[Vilfredo Pareto]], [[Gaetano Mosca]], and [[Robert Michels]] to build a model of state personnel, goals, and ideology.<ref>{{cite web |first=Joseph R. |last=Stromberg |url=http://antiwar.com/stromberg/?articleid=4296 |title=Murray Rothbard on States, War, and Peace: Part I |date=January 10, 2005 |publisher=[[Antiwar.com]] |orig-year=first published June 12, 2000 |access-date=May 1, 2009 |archive-date=August 23, 2011 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110823091728/http://antiwar.com/stromberg/?articleid=4296 |url-status=live }} Also see [http://www.antiwar.com/stromberg/?articleid=4420 Part II] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090417215914/http://antiwar.com/stromberg/?articleid=4420 |date=April 17, 2009 }}, originally published June 20, 2000.</ref><ref>See both essays: Rothbard, Murray. [http://www.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/rothbard26.html "War, Peace, and the State"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130515223625/http://www.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/rothbard26.html |date=May 15, 2013 }}, first published 1963; [http://www.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/rothbard62.html "Anatomy of the State"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120908063653/http://www.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/rothbard62.html |date=September 8, 2012 }}, first published 1974.</ref>{{Third-party inline|date=March 2023}}

Rothbard's colleague Joseph Stromberg notes that Rothbard made two exceptions to his general condemnation of war: "the [[American Revolution]] and the [[Historical negationism#United States history|War for Southern Independence]], as [[Lost Cause of the Confederacy|viewed from the Confederate side]]", referring to the [[American Civil War]].<ref>Stromberg, Joseph (June 12, 2000). [http://antiwar.com/stromberg/?articleid=4296 "Murray N. Rothbard on States, War, and Peace: Part I."] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110823091728/http://antiwar.com/stromberg/?articleid=4296 |date=August 23, 2011 }} Antiwar.com</ref> Rothbard condemned the "[[Names of the American Civil War|Northern war]] against slavery", saying it was inspired by "fanatical" religious faith and characterized by "a cheerful willingness to uproot institutions, to commit mayhem and mass murder, to plunder and loot and destroy, all in the name of high moral principle".<ref>Rothbard, Murray (1991). [http://www.lewrockwell.com/1970/01/murray-n-rothbard/whats-a-just-war/ "Just War."] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130713063612/http://www.lewrockwell.com/1970/01/murray-n-rothbard/whats-a-just-war/ |date=July 13, 2013 }} [[LewRockwell.com]]</ref><ref>Denson, J. (1997). ''[https://books.google.com/books?id=0MJCDZBbxJcC Costs of War: America's Pyrrhic Victories] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160527101804/https://books.google.com/books/about/Costs_of_War.html?id=0MJCDZBbxJcC |date=May 27, 2016 }}''. (pp. 119–33). New Brunswick, New Jersey: Transaction Publishers.</ref><ref>[[Dilorenzo, Thomas]] (January 28, 2006). [http://www.lewrockwell.com/lrc-blog/more-from-rothbard-on-war-religion-and-the-state/ "More from Rothbard on War, Religion, and the State."] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140203050801/http://www.lewrockwell.com/lrc-blog/more-from-rothbard-on-war-religion-and-the-state/ |date=February 3, 2014 }} LewRockwell.com</ref> He celebrated [[Jefferson Davis]], [[Robert E. Lee]], and other prominent Confederates as heroes while denouncing [[Abraham Lincoln]], [[Ulysses S. Grant]], and other Union leaders, who he said had "opened the Pandora's Box of genocide and the extermination of civilians".<ref name="Denson1999">{{cite book|last=Denson|first=John V.|title=The Costs of War: America's Pyrrhic Victories|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=aSOZAwAAQBAJ&pg=PA133|year=1999|publisher=Transaction Publishers|isbn=978-0-7658-0487-7|page=133|access-date=June 28, 2017|archive-date=October 16, 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191016074010/https://books.google.com/books?id=aSOZAwAAQBAJ&pg=PA133|url-status=live}}</ref><ref name="Barr2014">{{cite book|last=Barr|first=John McKee|title=Loathing Lincoln: An American Tradition from the Civil War to the Present|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=gvPpAgAAQBAJ&pg=PA265|date= 2014|publisher=LSU Press|isbn=978-0-8071-5384-0|page=265|access-date=June 28, 2017|archive-date=October 16, 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191016074127/https://books.google.com/books?id=gvPpAgAAQBAJ&pg=PA265|url-status=live}}</ref> Rothbard saw [[secession]] movements as a tool for undermining and disintegrating the state, according to historian [[Quinn Slobodian]], who wrote that "Rothbard's life was marked by a search for signs of potential secession" and that "When he found them, he did his best to deepen them."<ref name=":14" />

=== Historical revisionism ===
Rothbard embraced "[[historical revisionism]]" as an antidote to what he perceived to be the dominant influence exerted by corrupt "court intellectuals" over mainstream historical narratives.<ref name=":7" /><ref name="Enemy" />{{rp|pages=15, 62, 141}}<ref name=":0">Rothbard, Murray (February 1976). [https://mises.org/daily/1541/ "The Case for Revisionism."] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140914001700/https://mises.org/daily/1541/ |date=September 14, 2014 }} Mises.org</ref> His friend [[Harry Elmer Barnes]], the Holocaust-denying historian, used similar language, "court historians".<ref name=":7" /> Rothbard wrote that these mainstream intellectuals distorted the historical record in favor of "the state" in exchange for "wealth, power, and prestige" from the state.<ref name="Enemy" />{{rp|page=15}} Rothbard characterized the revisionist task as "penetrating the fog of lies and deception of the State and its Court Intellectuals, and to present to the public the true history".<ref name=":0" />

Rothbard worked with antisemitic writers in developing an isolationist revisionist history of [[World War II]].<ref name=":7" /> He was influenced by and called a champion of Barnes.<ref name=":0" /><ref name=":16"/><ref>{{cite book |last=Raimondo |first=Justin |title=An Enemy of the State: The Life of Murray N. Rothbard |publisher=Prometheus Books |year=2000 |isbn=978-1-61592-239-0 |location=Amherst, NY |pages=15, 62, 141 |oclc=43541222 |author-link=Justin Raimondo}} Raimondo describes Rothbard as a "champion of Henry Elmer Barnes, the dean of world-war revisionism".</ref> Rothbard favorably cited Barnes' view that "the murder of Germans and Japanese was the overriding aim of World War II".{{citation needed|date=December 2023}} In an obituary for Barnes, Rothbard wrote: "Our entry into World War II was the crucial act in foisting a permanent militarization upon the economy and society, in bringing to the country a permanent garrison state, an overweening military–industrial complex, a permanent system of conscription. It was the crucial act in creating a mixed economy run by Big Government, a system of [[state monopoly capitalism]] run by the central government in collaboration with Big Business and Big Unionism."<ref name="Barnes RIP">{{cite web |last=Rothbard |first=Murray N. |year=2007 |title=Harry Elmer Barnes, RIP |url=http://www.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/rothbard165.html |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121017030255/http://www.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/rothbard165.html |archive-date=October 17, 2012 |access-date=April 3, 2009 |publisher=Ludwig von Mises Institute |orig-year=1968}} Article originally appeared in ''[[Left and Right: A Journal of Libertarian Thought]]''.</ref> Besides broadly supporting his historical views, Rothbard promoted Barnes as an influence for future revisionists.<ref name=":1">Rothbard, Murray (1968). 
[https://web.archive.org/web/20180903114940/https://www.lewrockwell.com/1970/01/murray-n-rothbard/cold-war-myths/ "Harry Elmer Barnes as Revisionist of the Cold War."] In: ''Harry Elmer Barnes: Learned Crusader'', edited by A.E. Goddard. Colorado Springs: Ralph Myles. Archived from [https://www.lewrockwell.com/1970/01/murray-n-rothbard/cold-war-myths/ the original.]</ref>

Rothbard's endorsement of World War II revisionism and his association with Barnes and other Holocaust deniers have drawn criticism. [[Kevin D. Williamson]] wrote an opinion piece published by ''[[National Review]]'' which condemned Rothbard for "making common cause with the 'revisionist' historians of the [[Third Reich]]", a term he used to describe American Holocaust deniers associated with Rothbard, such as [[James J. Martin (historian)|James J. Martin]] of the [[Institute for Historical Review]]. The piece also characterized "Rothbard and his faction" as being "culpably indulgent" of [[Holocaust denial]], the view which "specifically denies that the Holocaust actually happened or holds that it was in some way exaggerated".<ref name=":17">[[Kevin D. Williamson|Williamson, Kevin D]]. (January 23, 2012). [http://www.nationalreview.com/nrd/articles/293707/courting-cranks/page/0/3?cb=1 "Courting the Cranks."]''[[National Review]]'', January 2013 ed., p. 4 {{Subscription required}} {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171020023729/http://www.nationalreview.com/nrd/articles/293707/courting-cranks/page/0/3?cb=1 |date=October 20, 2017 }}</ref> In an article for Rothbard's 50th birthday, Rothbard's friend and [[Buffalo State College]] historian [[Ralph Raico]] stated that Rothbard "is the main reason that revisionism has become a crucial part of the whole libertarian position".<ref>{{cite web|last=Raico|first=Ralph|title=Rothbard at his Semi-Centennial|url=https://mises.org/daily/4436/Murray-Rothbard-at-His-Semicentennial|publisher=Mises Institute|access-date=November 15, 2013|date=May 23, 2010|archive-date=November 10, 2013|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131110032255/http://mises.org/daily/4436/Murray-Rothbard-at-His-Semicentennial|url-status=live}}</ref>

=== Middle East conflict ===
Rothbard's ''[[The Libertarian Forum]]'' blamed the Middle East conflict on Israeli aggression "fueled by American arms and money". Rothbard warned that the Middle East conflict would draw the United States into a world war. He was [[anti-Zionist]] and opposed United States involvement in the Middle East. Rothbard said the [[Camp David Accords]] betrayed Palestinian aspirations and opposed [[1982 Lebanon War|Israel's 1982 invasion of Lebanon.]]<ref>{{cite book |last=Perry |first=Marvin |title=The Conservative Press in Twentieth-Century America |publisher=Greenwood Publishing Group |year=1999 |isbn=978-0-313-21390-8 |editor1-last=Lora |editor1-first=Ronald |page=[https://books.google.com/books?id=Ioakmq8yxA4C&pg=PA372 372] |chapter=''Libertarian Forum'' 1969–1986 |editor2-last=Longton |editor2-first=William Henry}}</ref>

In his essay, "War Guilt in the Middle East", Rothbard wrote that Israel refused "to let these refugees return and reclaim the property taken from them," <ref>{{cite journal |last=Rothbard |first=Murray N. |date=Autumn 1967 |title=War Guilt in the Middle East |url=https://mises.org/journals/lar/pdfs/3_3/3_3_4.pdf |url-status=live |journal=Left and Right |volume=3 |issue=3 |pages=20–30 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131012124114/http://www.mises.org/journals/lar/pdfs/3_3/3_3_4.pdf |archive-date=October 12, 2013 |access-date=September 13, 2014}} Reprinted in {{cite book |last=Rothbard |first=Murray N. |title=Left and Right: A Journal of Libertarian Thought (The Complete Edition, 1965–1968) |publisher=Ludwig von Mises Institute |year=2007 |isbn=978-1-61016-040-7 |location=Auburn, AL |oclc=741754456}}</ref> and took negative views of a [[two state solution]] for the [[Israeli–Palestinian conflict]]. He wrote: "On the one hand there are the Palestinian Arabs, who have tilled the soil or otherwise used the land of Palestine for centuries; and on the other, there are a group of external fanatics, who come from all over the world, and who claim the entire land area as 'given' to them as a collective religion or tribe at some remote or legendary time in the past. There is no way the two claims can be resolved to the satisfaction of both parties. There can be no genuine settlement, no 'peace' in the face of this irrepressible conflict; there can only be either a war to the death, or an uneasy practical compromise which can satisfy no one."<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Rothbard |first1=Murray N. |date=April 1994 |title=The Vital Importance of Separation |journal=The Rothbard-Rockwell Report}}</ref>

=== Children's rights and parental obligations ===
In the ''Ethics of Liberty'', Rothbard explores issues regarding [[children's rights]] regarding self-ownership and contract.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.l4l.org/library/chilroth.html |title=Children's Rights versus Murray Rothbard's ''The Ethics of Liberty'' |first=John |last=Walker |year=1991 |publisher=[[Libertarians for Life]] |access-date=August 13, 2013 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120910134053/http://www.l4l.org/library/chilroth.html |archive-date=September 10, 2012 |url-status=dead }}</ref> These include support for a woman's right to abortion, condemnation of parents showing aggression towards children and opposition to the state forcing parents to care for children. He also holds children have the right to [[Runaway (dependent)|run away]] from parents and seek new guardians as soon as they are able to choose to do so. He argued that parents have the right to put a child out for [[adoption]] or sell the rights to the child in a voluntary contract in what Rothbard suggests will be a "flourishing free market in children". He believes that [[Child-selling|selling children]] as consumer goods in accord with market forces—while "superficially monstrous"—will benefit "everyone" involved in the market: "the natural parents, the children, and the foster parents purchasing".<ref name="Children and Rights">{{cite book|author=Murray N Rothbard|title=The Ethics of Liberty|chapter=14 'Children and Rights'|isbn=978-0814775592|year=1982|publisher=LvMI|chapter-url-access=registration|chapter-url=https://archive.org/details/ethicsofliberty00roth}}</ref><ref>See also: [[Ronald Hamowy|Hamowy, Ronald]] (editor) (2008). [https://books.google.com/books?id=yxNgXs3TkJYC ''The Encyclopedia of Libertarianism''] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230109234738/https://books.google.com/books?id=yxNgXs3TkJYC |date=2023 }}, [[Cato Institute]], Sage, pp. 59–61, {{ISBN|978-1-4129-6580-4}} {{OCLC|233969448}}</ref>

In Rothbard's view of parenthood, "the parent should not have a legal obligation to feed, clothe, or educate his children, since such obligations would entail positive acts coerced upon the parent and depriving the parent of his rights."<ref name="Children and Rights"/> Thus, Rothbard stated that parents should have the legal right to let any infant die by starvation and should be free to engage in other forms of [[child neglect]]. However, according to Rothbard, "the purely free society will have a flourishing free market in children". In a fully libertarian society, he wrote, "the existence of a free baby market will bring such 'neglect' down to a minimum".<ref name="Children and Rights"/> Economist Gene Callahan of [[Cardiff University]], formerly a scholar at the Rothbard-affiliated Mises Institute, wrote that Rothbard allowed "the logical elegance of his legal theory" to "trump any arguments based on the moral reprehensibility of a parent idly watching her six-month-old child slowly starve to death in its crib".<ref name="Callahan">{{cite journal |last=Callahan |first=Gene |date=February 2013 |title=Liberty versus Libertarianism |journal=[[Politics, Philosophy & Economics (journal)|Politics, Philosophy & Economics]] |volume=12 |issue=1 |pages=48–67 |doi=10.1177/1470594X11433739 |s2cid=144062406 |issn=1470-594X |oclc=828009007}}</ref>

=== Retributive theory of criminal justice ===
In ''The Ethics of Liberty'', Rothbard advocates for a "frankly [[Retributive justice|retributive]] theory of punishment" or a system of "a tooth (or two teeth) for a tooth".<ref>{{cite book |chapter-url=https://mises.org/rothbard/ethics/thirteen.asp |chapter=Punishment and Proportionality |pages=85–97 |author=Rothbard, Murray |title=The Ethics of Liberty |publisher=New York University Press |year=1998 |isbn=978-0-8147-7506-6 |access-date=September 13, 2014 |archive-date=November 17, 2014 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141117215622/http://mises.org/rothbard/ethics/thirteen.asp |url-status=live }}</ref> Rothbard emphasizes that all punishment must be proportional, stating that "the criminal, or invader, loses his rights to the extent that he deprived another man of his".<ref name=":6">Morimura, Susumu (1999). "Libertarian theories of punishment." In P. Smith & P. Comanducci (Eds.), ''Legal Philosophy: General Aspects: Theoretical Examinations and Practical Application'' (pp. 135–38). New York: Franz Steiner Verlag.</ref> Applying his retributive theory, Rothbard states that a thief "must pay double the extent of theft". Rothbard gives the example of a thief who stole $15,000 and says he would have to return the stolen money and provide the victim an additional $15,000, money to which the thief has forfeited his right. The thief would be "put in a [temporary] state of enslavement to his victim"{{citation needed|date=December 2023}} if he is unable to pay him immediately. Rothbard also applies his theory to justify beating and torturing violent criminals, although the beatings are required to be proportional to the crimes for which they are being punished.

==== Torture of criminal suspects ====
In chapter twelve of ''Ethics'',<ref name=SelfDefense>{{cite book |chapter-url=https://mises.org/rothbard/ethics/twelve.asp |chapter=Self-Defense |pages=77–84 |author=Rothbard, Murray |title=The Ethics of Liberty |publisher=New York University Press |year=1998 |isbn=978-0-8147-7506-6 |access-date=September 13, 2014 |archive-date=September 14, 2014 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140914010256/https://mises.org/rothbard/ethics/twelve.asp |url-status=live }}</ref> Rothbard turns his attention to suspects arrested by the police.<ref name="Callahan" /> He argues that police should be able to torture certain types of criminal suspects, including accused murderers, for information related to their alleged crimes. Writes Rothbard: "Suppose ... police beat and torture a suspected murderer to find information (not to wring a confession, since obviously a coerced confession could never be considered valid). If the suspect turns out to be guilty, then the police should be exonerated, for then they have only ladled out to the murderer a parcel of what he deserves in return; his rights had already been forfeited by more than that extent. But if the suspect is not convicted, then that means that the police have beaten and tortured an innocent man, and that they in turn must be put into the dock for criminal assault".<ref name=SelfDefense/> Gene Callahan examines this position and concludes that Rothbard rejects the widely held belief that torture is inherently wrong, no matter who the victim. Callahan goes on to state that Rothbard's scheme gives the police a strong motive to [[Frameup|frame]] the suspect after having tortured him or her.<ref name="Callahan" />

=== Science and scientism ===
In an essay condemning "[[scientism]] in the study of man", Rothbard rejected the application of [[causal determinism]] to human beings, arguing that the actions of human beings—as opposed to those of everything else in nature—are not determined by prior causes, but by "[[Libertarianism (metaphysics)|free will]]".<ref>Rothbard, Murray (1960). [https://mises.org/rothbard/mantle.asp "The Mantle of Science."] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140914002839/https://mises.org/rothbard/mantle.asp |date=September 14, 2014 }} Reprinted from ''Scientism and Values'', Helmut Schoeck and James W. Wiggins, eds. (Princeton, NJ: D. Van Nostrand), 1960, pp. 159–80, {{ISBN|978-0405004360}}; ''The Logic of Action One: Method, Money, and the Austrian School'' (Cheltenham UK: Edward Elgar, 1997), pp. 3–23. {{ISBN|978-1858980157}}</ref> He argued that "determinism as applied to man, is a self-contradictory thesis, since the man who employs it relies implicitly on the existence of free will"{{citation needed|date=December 2023}}. Rothbard opposed what he considered the overspecialization of the academy and sought to fuse the disciplines of economics, history, ethics and political science to create a "science of liberty". Rothbard described the moral basis for his [[anarcho-capitalist]] position in two of his books: ''[[For a New Liberty]]'', published in 1973; and ''[[The Ethics of Liberty]]'', published in 1982. In his ''[[Power and Market]]'' (1970), Rothbard describes how a stateless economy might function.{{Third-party inline|date=April 2023}}