Quote #2

'Objectivism says the sole purpose of government is to protect individual rights. I would say the primary purpose of government is to protect individual rights. And any other activities that the government may claim justification for doing must not be of an order that violates anybody's rights. For example, some national weather disaster in which certain problems can arise that the marketplace has no way to respond to quickly enough. Or diseases that travel across borders and don't respect passport laws. I will leave the door open for emergency situations that I just can't imagine being resolved in a market context. If they could be, then they should be. But the fact of emergencies should not be made as justification for violating individual rights, so as you can see, it's a very tiny difference.'[2]

More from Nathaniel Branden

  1. 'When your principles seem to be demanding suicide, clearly it's time to check your premises'[3]
  2. 'Most of the failings of Objectivism all pertain directly or indirectly to issues of psychology.'[1]
  3. '[F]or somebody who presents herself as a champion of the joy of living, [Rand] has very rigid rules about the path you must walk on in you…
  4. 'I'm very aware of that over-application of the trader principle, as if that's all you need to know to understand human relationships. Good…
  5. 'Objectivism comes on, sometimes, as if the most important issue you have to understand is the issue of egoism versus altruism. But that's …
  6. 'Ernest Van Den Haag, a sociologist, wrote a fascinating book called The Jewish Mystique. I read that book, got a lot out of it, and went o…
  7. 'In order to have any sense of control over our own life, we need to know that we're able to make sense out of our experience, in all of it…
  8. '[H]e has been a very underestimated man by his opponents. I think that his understanding and handling of our relationship with the Soviet …

All Nathaniel Branden quotes