Never underestimate the power of bad ideas. They must be refuted again and again.

The most encouraging trend of our time is the widespread loss of faith in government. No longer do people look to the government as the great problem solver, economic planner, social unifier, or cultural czar. The government is more likely to be seen for what it is, a haven for grafters, liars, and would-be tyrants. Americans, like the Russians, no longer believe anything until it is officially denied.

American federalism was the embodiment of political tolerance and decentralization - the expression of the liberal conviction that society can manage itself and needs no central plan.

The state is a vast enterprise for declaring all sorts of things legal for itself that would be illegal for us.

The leviathan state, that monster devouring civilization in this century, is in the throes of death. This is not a wish or a prediction, but a conclusion drawn from a broad look at the trends of the last decade and a half, which, if we take the right steps, can continue on into the next century. What has happened around the world - nations states collapsing, markets outwitting planners, citizens rising up against government masters - can and is happening here at home.

Democracy has turned out to be not majority rule but rule by well-organized and well-connected minority groups who steal from the majority.

The state always poses a greater threat to society than whatever problem it purports to solve.