"The Natural Right to Labor" - not quite what the trade unions had in mind for "Labor Day" The American radical individualist Lysander Spooner (1808-1887) argued that a person could not exercise their "natural right to labor" unless they could also exercise their "natural right to make contracts" which more often than not was restricted by "arbitrary legislation". This is of course exactly what the union movement does not want to permit - individual work contracts between employers and employees. Their preference is for government enforced, industry or company-wide "contracts" which bypass any individual agreements. Happy Labor Day! "Labor is one of the means, which every man has a natural right to employ for the acquisition of property. But in order that a man may enjoy his natural right to labor, and to acquire all the property that he honestly can by it, it is indispensable that he enjoy fully and freely his natural right to make contracts; for it is only by contract that he can procure capital on which to bestow his labor. And in order that he may obtain capital on the best possible terms, it is indispensable that his natural right of contract be entirely unrestricted by any arbitrary legislation; also that all the contracts he makes be held obligatory fully to the extent, and only to the extent, to which, according to natural law, they can be binding."
Posted on: Sun, 01 Sep 2013 14:08:22 +0000
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