Interesting post by Jake Desyllas. See below.

Update: see also A Critique of Stephan Kinsella’s Approach To Rights Theory August 6, 2025. Quick comment: he criticizes my approach to rights in ch. 4 of Legal Foundations of a Free Society, but it’s not clear what he disagrees with in my conclusion. Does he thinks that we do not have rights at all, or that we never acquire them? I’d be curious to see where he thinks my motivated reasoning was wrong, or what about it is incorrect other than how I got there.

I think a case can be made for rights, that they have to do with our nature as rational agents, and so on. I was talking to libertarians who already accept humans (a) have rights, and that (b) they must have them for some reason, and thus, (c) they must arise at some point. If you want to deny humans have rights, that rights can be justified, or that aggression can be justified, or that we have right but never acquire them or that we have them for no reason at all…. okay, let’s see it. Have at it. It seems uncontroversial to me to ask when and why we have rights, taking for granted that normal adult humans do have rights, when talking to people who already agree that adult humans have rights. But I obviously do not object to arguments about why rational adult human actors have rights, as I argue elsewhere (e.g. ch. 5, 6, etc. of Legal Foundations of a Free Society).

I do not know what he means that rights are inherent. Inherent in what? In being human? What about other forms of intelligent life? See:

• • KOL443 | Abortion: A Radically Decentralist Approach (PFS 2024)
  • Block, “Does Trespassing Require Human Action? Rejoinder to Kinsella and Armoutidis an Evictionism”
  • KOL465: Sheldon Richman on Corporations, Limited Liability, Price Controls, Thickism, Abortion, Pipes

h/t John Riganti

Dear Mr. Kinsella:

[continue reading…]

Update: As noted below, this piece was originally intended to appear in Elvira Nica & Gheorghe H. Popescu, eds., A Passion for Justice: Essays in Honor of Walter Block (New York: Addleton Academic Publishers, forthcoming), but I withdrew it and published it here. However, I have published this paper under a CC0 license so that my permission is not needed for republication or reuse, the editors of this book decided to use it in the book, so apparently a version now will appear in Elvira Nica & Gheorghe H. Popescu, eds., A Passion for Justice: Essays in Honor of Walter Block (New York: Addleton Academic Publishers, forthcoming 2025).

See also Block on Defamation (criticizing a recent piece by Walter arguing for expansion of defamation law).

Note: in this piece I forgot to mention Walter’s defense of suing some parties under defamation law, even though in principle he is against it: see Walter Block Defends His Libel Suit Against The New York Times; A Libertarian Analysis of Suing for Libel (“How … can I justify suing the New York Times for libel? It is simple. The libertarian case against suing for libel applies only to innocent people, and this newspaper does not at all qualify. Rather, this organization is a member in good standing of the ruling class, and all bets are off for criminals of that ilk.”); and Randy Barnett, “What’s Next for Libertarianism?”

One other update: re my mention of his “two teeth for a tooth” rule: I criticize it in KOL020 | “Libertarian Legal Theory: Property, Conflict, and Society: Lecture 3: Applications I: Legal Systems, Contract, Fraud” (Mises Academy, 2011):

And then there’s caveat emptor, which is the buyer beware. Was he defrauded, or did he—should he have known better? And then Walter Block and Murray Rothbard’s idea where they say, well, there should always be the two-teeth-for-a-teeth punishment rule. I mean I understand the sympathy there and the reasoning, but it seems to me a little mechanical and a little bit armchair. We can’t say it would be exactly two teeth for a tooth.

This is similar to some other criticisms I have made of Walter and also Rothbard for being too ad hoc. See, e.g., the section on “Incitement” below; Kinsella, “Causation and Aggression,” in Legal Foundations of a Free Society, p. 182 et seq.; also in ch. 24.

Update: Libertarian Answer Man: On Restitution going Beyond Two Teeth for a Tooth.

On disagreement with Block over pacifism etc., see Ammous vs. Block on Israel.

Re the “Incitement” section: see also “The Libertarian Case Against Punishing a ‘Conspiracy’” (2); as I commented there, “You set up the hypo but just announce the conclusion, as if it’s obvious, and present no argument.”

Also, on others who support voluntary slavery, e.g. Gerard Casey and Nozick, see KOL442 | Together Strong Debate vs. Walter Block on Voluntary Slavery (Matthew Sands of Nations of Sanity).

Errata:

N. 27, the link to “Libertarianism, Positive Obligations and Property Abandonment: Children’s Rights” is now bad as Walter’s has lost the domain to his website. See instead https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1889454

In n. 44, I should reference also Stephan Kinsella, “The Title-Transfer Theory of Contract,” Papinian Press Working Paper #1 (Sep. 7, 2024).

Also, I could have mentioned my disagreement with Walter’s “Ragnar” example as I note in On “Unowned” State Property, Legal Positivism, Ownership vs. Possession, Immigration, Public Roads, and the Bum in the Library.

Re McElroy and Hitler: “Why I Would Not Vote Against Hitler.” See https://stephankinsella.com/2023/09/libertarian-answer-man-voting-for-libertarians/#footnote_6_18425 and https://libertyunbound.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/Liberty_Magazine_May_1996.pdf; Walter Block, Why “Don’t Vote, It Only Encourages Them” Isn’t Libertarian  Oct 22, 2025.

❧

A Tour Through Walter Block’s Oeuvre

Stephan Kinsella[*]

[Note: This piece was originally intended to appear in Elvira Nica & Gheorghe H. Popescu, eds., A Passion for Justice: Essays in Honor of Walter Block (New York: Addleton Academic Publishers, forthcoming), but it has been withdrawn for various reasons so I am posting it here. This article is not a comprehensive overview of all of Walter’s publications, and does not include his pro-covid lockdown writing or more recent Israel-Gaza related publications. This is part of the reason for my withdrawing the piece. I could not in good faith omit discussion of these issues, but since I strongly disagree with Walter on these matters, it would be inappropriate to include such criticism in a book of essays in his honor.] ¹

I dare say no single person has ever read all of Walter Block’s massive corpus of publications. There are just too many. Walter’s writing spans a large number of topics in Austrian economics and libertarianism as well as in other areas, published over a more than fifty year period. This includes innumerable popular articles, 32 or so books, and hundreds of scholarly journal articles. His first articles were published in 1969; his first piece in a refereed journal was published in 1971,[2] a year before he received his Ph.D. As Walter tells his friends, one of his goals is to publish 1,000 articles in refereed journals and law reviews,^[3] and by his count, he’s currently at about 700. So he is on track to meet his goal in about twelve years. He’s only 82 now, after all. [continue reading…]

1. For his pro-lockdown and related writings, see Walter Block, “Forced Vaccinations,” LewRockwell.com (Feb. 4, 2013); see also Libertarianism and Compulsory Vaccinations and others listed here. And more recently, Walter Block, “A Libertarian Analysis of the COVID-19 Pandemic,” J. Libertarian Stud. 24 (2020): 206–37. Jeffrey Tucker criticized Walter for some of these views here; a few days later the same program had Walter on to defend his pro-Covid lockdown/mandate views he had expressed at the height of the pandemic lockdown period. Tucker also rightly called out Block for his illiberal and unlibertarian views on infectious diseases, including his bizarre defense of jailing “Typhoid Mary,” in The Downfall of the Gurus. See, e.g., Walter Block, “My Response to Jeffrey Tucker on COVID,” Epoch Times (Feb. 8, 2023; substack version); Jeffrey A. Tucker, “The Downfall of the Gurus,” Epoch Times (Jan. 23, 2023); Block’s appearance online talking about the Typhoid Mary issue. And Walter Block, “Rejoinder to Slenzok on COVID,” J.Libertarian Stud. 25 (1) (2021): 264–68. For the Israel stuff, see Walter E. Block & Alan G. Futerman, “Rejoinder to Hoppe on Israel vs. Hamas,” MEST Journal (2024) which is a response to Hans-Hermann Hoppe, “An Open Letter to Walter E. Block,” LewRockwell.com (Jan. 31, 2024). See also David Gordon and Wanjiru Njoya, “The Classical Liberal Case For Israel,” LewRockwell.com (Feb. 2, 2024; Mises.org version) and Walter’s response, Alan G. Futerman and Walter E. Block, “Rejoinder to Gordon and Njoya on Israel and Libertarianism,” MESTE Journal (Position Paper) (2024). Again, as noted above: I agree with Tucker, and with Hoppe, on the substance of the covid/infectious disease lockdown and Israel-Gaza issues, but it would be inappropriate of me to include this, with the necessary criticism it would entail, in a book of essays in his honor. [↩]

“Q – can you have a valid contract over things that don’t exist?

and especially if there’s no property title being transferred?

like it’s buying the idea of a kilometre? or a ‘rare sat’?”

Okay here’s how others might say: there is no thing to transfer so the contract is null and void, or something like that. That is because they think of contract as some kind of independent thing—a relationship, a legal “obligation.” And that one of the effects of a contract is that someone gets title to something that they agreed to, etc etc. This view of contract also thinks of the parties as being obligated to each other, and if they don’t perform their obligation they are in breach and owe damages, etc. [continue reading…]

Q: If I sign something that says “this person is allowed to kill me under xyz circumstances and he is owed $10 from my estate if he fulfills this” and, assuming I never renege, those circumstances arise and the person kills me, would the thing I signed be a valid defense against murder charges in a free society and/or an enforceable claim against the estate?

Kinsella:

I think in a free society, it would be a defense because it would indicate consent. (And yes, the estate owed the $10.)

Of course, in today’s world, it will still be murder [continue reading…]

Stephan Kinsella, “Patents, Pharma, Government: The Unholy Alliance,” Brownstone Institute (April 2024) (version below has hyperlinks converted to endnotes; all cited work is mine unless otherwise indicated)

See also

• Stephan Kinsella, “Decouple Trade and IP Protection,” Brownstone Institute (Dec. 4, 2024)
• Patents and Pharmaceuticals;
• Kinsella, “FDA and Patent Reform: A Modest Proposal” (May 5, 2023)
  • “Are Patents Needed to Make Up for FDA Kneecapping?” (July 2, 2011)

See also my comments in this Twitter thread:

It [banning pharma TV ads] is a crude proxy for removing the artificial power Big Pharma has because of government-granted patents combined with the socialized medical system and the government-regulated insurance and prescription and medical system. Better to just abolish all patents. Wouldn’t you agree?

Just like it would be just to take away Pharma patents and, with it, the ability to charge monopoly prices; or, barring that, as a second best, impose price controls or antitrust liability. See Price Controls, Antitrust, and Patents

Here’s a crazy idea. The state should STOP:

• issuing patents
• taxing corporations
• granting pharmacy tort/damage liability waivers
• subsidizing scientific research with tax dollars
• blocking drug reimports, i.e. blocking free trade in the name of supporting US patent pharma patent monopoly pricing (Cato on Drug Reimportation; Cato Tugs Stray Back Onto the Reservation; and Other Posts)
• paying for healthcare and drugs with socialized medical welfare systems (medicare, medicaid)
• pushing employer-funded medical insurance with antiquated and distorting tax regulations
• imposing unreasonable liability on doctors with ridiculous tort laws, requiring doctors to adopt risk-averse techniques like going along with whatever their medical associations, insurers, and Big Pharma recommend
• outlawing or regulating the sale of controlled prescription drugs by requiring consumers to have a “prescription” in order to purchase medicines or substances they prefer

THEN we can let Big Pharma advertise all they want as long as they have full liability and are not being subsidized by (a) taxpayer funded medical research, (b) taxpayer funded purchases from medicare/medicaid, (c) state-granted patent monopolies, and so on. In the meantime, these crooks don’t have much grounds for complaint, do they?

Patents, Pharma, Government: The Unholy Alliance

BY STEPHAN KINSELLA   APRIL 1, 2024   ECONOMICS, PHARMA   12 MINUTE READ

Dear Mr. Kinsella,

I’m a fan of your work, and appreciate your input into unalienable rights and the Blockean homestead problem. I’d like to add a bit of angel-pin nuance to them.

1) You’ve mentioned multiple times that the human physical body is unalienable, in the vein of Rothbard. I’d like to clarify that it is the mind/will, or in a quasi-Christian sense “soul”, that is unalienable, and not the physical body, since consensual organ sales and prostitution are perfectly fine in libertarianism (of course, this is for consensual transactions of one’s physical body, so stuff like infant circumcision is still out).

[continue reading…]

Q:

I have a question regarding your defence of the ‘Title Transfer Theory of Contract” pursuant to Ch. 9 of your book Legal Foundations of a Free Society.

The question is as follows: ‘Are you familiar with Lukasz Dominiak and Tate Fegley’s 2022 criticism of the title transfer theory of contract? [Łukasz Dominiak and Tate Fegley, “Contract Theory, Title Transfer, and Libertarianism,”] If so, what are your thoughts regarding the arguments made by Dominiak and Fegley? Do you feel that the title transfer theory of contract– as advanced by yourself, Rothbard and Evers– ought to be abandoned or amended in light of Dominiak and Fegley’s criticisms? Alternatively, do you believe that Dominiak and Fegley have erred in their analysis? If so, how?’

Thank you for your time Mr Kinsella, and I hope to hear from you soon. I am most interested to hear your views! 🙂 [continue reading…]

Q:

Hi Mr. Kinsella,

I just recently had a long conversation with my philosophy professor whose specialty is to study Kant’s works. He began to talk about the universalizability principle, ¹ so I asked him whether a State’s existence (which I clarified is an issue because one group of people essentially says “I can hit you but you can’t hit me”) can be coherently justified with a Kantian ethic. He said “yes,” which led to a long conversation and then me asking whether any initiation of force by one group of privileged individuals over a group of non-privileged individuals can be justified with a Kantian ethic. He proceeded to tell me that the initiation of force can be justified in circumstances in which the victimized party has no reason for resisting the force except for “it’s mine.” However, he also said that slavery is inconceivable because it treats people as a mere means, and gives people no “respect,” which they require for being autonomous beings. He also told me that Kant supported a confederation of nations and that any given maxim could be correct if it is conceivable that a “society” within a nation could exist that all adhere to this maxim. [continue reading…]

1. On this, see Kinsella, “The problem of particularistic ethics or, why everyone really has to admit the validity of the universalizability principle,” StephanKinsella.com (Nov. 10, 2011). [↩]

A.:

Dear Mr. Kinsella,

As you have pointed out BTC is not an ownable resource. [See KOL274 | Nobody Owns Bitcoin (PFS 2019)] I had a question about how this pertains to fraud.

Let’s say I buy an apple with BTC but the apple is rotten and the seller knows this. Has the apple seller engaged in fraud and therefore “stolen” my BTC? Since BTC is not ownable then it can’t strictly speaking be stolen right? Does this mean I can’t get my BTC back? [continue reading…]

Update: See also

• • The Libertarian Case for Gay Marriage
  • McElroy and Peron on Gay Marriage
  • Is Gay Marriage a Constitutional Right?

Q:

I  had a question on marriage contracts: are they enforceable contracts or just promises? I don’t see any title ownership claims being exchanged when the people just say “I will be faithful,” it sounds just like a promise, would this part of the marriage contract be enforceable and would someone who cheated be held liable for breaking this contract? I don’t see how they would… I don’t know what the wording is on the contracts, but I don’t see how someone should pay restitution or go through the legal trouble for cheating if it’s just breaking the promise. [continue reading…]