Free Trade

About this Collection

One of the key concepts of economic freedom is free trade, which is the idea that there should be no restriction in the right and ability of individuals to exchange the products of their labor and industry with other people.

Key People

Titles & Essays

A – Z List

Commerce

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Economic History And Conditions

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Economic Theory. Demography

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Finance

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Great Britain

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History Of Scholarship And Learning. The Humanities

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Industries. Land Use. Labor

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Russia. Soviet Union. Former Soviet Republics.

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World History

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Not Categorized

Liberty Matters: Richard Cobden: Ideas and Strategies in Organizing the Free-Trade Movement in Britain (Jan. 2015)

Stephen Davies (author)

This online discussion is part of the series “Liberty Matters: A Forum for the Discussion of Matters pertaining to Liberty.” Here we examine the career of Richard Cobden and in particular the way that he pioneered forms of advocacy…

THE READING ROOM

The Best of the OLL No. 7: Adam Smith, “On Free Trade” (1776)

By: Adam Smith

This is part of “The Best of the Online Library of Liberty” which is a collection of some of the most important material in the OLL. This one comes from Adam Smith’s "Wealth of Nations” in which he defends the idea of free trade. It…
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Quotes

Free Trade

Adam Smith argues that retaliation in a trade war can sometimes force the offending country to lower its tariffs, but more often than not the reverse happens (1776)

Adam Smith

Economics

Adam Smith on Good Wine and Free Trade

Adam Smith

Free Trade

Adam Smith on the “liberal system” of free trade (1776)

Adam Smith

Free Trade

Bastiat on the most universally useful freedom, namely to work and to trade (1847)

Frédéric Bastiat

Free Trade

Bastiat on the spirit of free trade as a reform of the mind itself (1847)

Frédéric Bastiat

Free Trade

Condy Raguet argues that governments cannot create wealth by means of legislation and that individuals are better judges of the best way to use their capital and labor than governments (1835)

Condy Raguet

Free Trade

David Hume on how the prosperity of one’s neighbors increases one’s own prosperity (1777)

David Hume

Economics

Forrest McDonald argues that the Founding Fathers envisaged a new economic order based upon Lockean notions of private property and the creation of the largest contiguous area of free trade in the world (2006)

Forrest McDonald

Economics

Friedrich List and Manufacturing Power

Friedrich List

Free Trade

Guyot on the protectionist tyranny (1906)

Yves Guyot

Free Trade

Harriet Martineau condemns tariffs as a “vicious aristocratic principle” designed to harm the ordinary working man and woman (1861)

Harriet Martineau

Free Trade

Henry George on a “free trade America” as the real city set on a hill (1886)

Henry George

Free Trade

Henry George on how trade sanctions hurt domestic consumers (1886)

Henry George

Free Trade

Henry George on the scramble to get government favors known as trade “protection” (1886)

Henry George

War & Peace

James Mill likens the expence and economic stagnation brought about by war to a “pestilential wind” which ravages the country (1808)

James Mill

Property Rights

James Mill on the natural disposition to accumulate property (1808)

James Mill

Class

James Mill on the ruling Few and the subject Many (1835)

James Mill

Free Trade

Jane Haldimand Marcet, in a popular tale written for ordinary readers, shows the benefits to workers of foreign trade, especially at Christmas time (1833)

Jane Haldimand Marcet

Free Trade

John Taylor on how a republic can “fleece its citizens” just as well as a monarchy (1822)

John Taylor

Free Trade

Lord Kames argued that neither the King nor Parliament had the right to grant monopolies because they harmed the interests of the people (1778)

Henry Home, Lord Kames

Money & Banking

Ludwig von Mises shows the inevitability of economic slumps after a period of credit expansion (1951)

Ludwig von Mises

Free Trade

Mises on how the “boon” of a tariff privilege is soon dissipated (1949)

Ludwig von Mises

Free Trade

Molinari calls the idea of using tariffs to promote a nation’s economy “a monstrosity” (1852)

Gustave de Molinari

Free Trade

Nicholas Barbon on the mutual benefits of free trade even in luxury goods (“wants of the mind”) (1690)

Nicholas Barbon

Free Trade

Richard Cobden on how free trade would unite mankind in the bonds of peace (1850)

Richard Cobden

Class

Richard Cobden outlines his strategy of encouraging more people to acquire land and thus the right to vote in order to defeat the “landed oligarchy” who ruled England and imposed the “iniquity” of the Corn Laws (1845)

Richard Cobden

Free Trade

Richard Cobden’s “I have a dream” speech about a world in which free trade is the governing principle (1846)

Richard Cobden

War & Peace

The 10th Day of Christmas: Richard Cobden on public opinion and peace on earth (c. 1865)

Richard Cobden

Free Trade

The 9th Day of Christmas: Condy Raguet on the anti-Christian character of protection and the need for peace on earth (1832)

Condy Raguet

Economics

Voltaire on the Benefits which Trade and Economic Abundance bring to People living in the Present Age (1736)

Voltaire

Taxation

William Cobbett denounces the destruction of liberty during and after the Napoleonic Wars (1817)

William Cobbett

Free Trade

William Graham Sumner on free trade as another aspect of individual liberty (1888)

William Graham Sumner

The State

William Graham Sumner on the “do-nothing” state vs. ”the meddling” state (1888)

William Graham Sumner

Free Trade

William Grampp shows how closely connected Richard Cobden’s desire for free trade was to his desire for peace (1960)

William Dyer Grampp