Wednesday, April 18, 2012

India Supreme Court Judge Influenced by Murray Rothbard

Shikha Dalmia at Reason reports that in a recent India Supreme Court decision relating to an education act, a dissenting judge quoted Murray Rothbard on the evils of government education:
What is interesting is that the dissenting judge actually quoted Murray Rothbard on the evils of government education in his opinion. By name. He said:
Mr. Murray N. Rothbard, an eminent educationist and professor in economics, in his book, "Education: Free and Compulsory," cautioned that progressive education may destroy the independent thought in the child and a child has little chance to develop his systematic reasoning powers in the study of definite courses. The book was written after evaluating the experiences of various countries, which have followed free and compulsory education for children for several years. Prohibition of holding back in a class may, according to the author, result that bright pupils are robbed of incentive or opportunity to study and the dull ones are encouraged to believe that success, in the form of grades, promotion etc., will come to them automatically. The author also questioned that since the State began to control education, its evident tendency has been more and more to act in such a manner so as to promote repression and hindrance of education, rather than the true development of the individual. Its tendency has been for compulsion, for enforced equality at the lowest level, for the watering down of the subject and even the abandonment of all formal teaching, for the inculcation of obedience to the State and to the "group," rather than the development of self-independence, for the deprecation of intellectual subjects. 
I am of the view that the opinions expressed by the academicians like Rothbard command respect and cannot be brushed aside as such because, much more than anything, the State has got a constitutional responsibility to see that our children are given quality education. Provisions of the statute shall not remain a dead letter, remember we are dealing with the lives of our children, a national asset, and the future of the entire country depends upon their upbringing. Our children in the future have to compete with their counter-parts elsewhere in the world at each and every level, both in curricular and extra-curricular fields. Quality education and overall development of the child is of prime importance upon which the entire future of our children and the country rests.

Dalima, of course, does take the mandatory Ed Crane inspired swipe at Rothbard (hopefully that will be over soon) and writes:
 Regardless of what one thinks of Rothbard, can using him to warn of the dangers of a public education whose goal is to produce good, compliant, state-loving citizens rather than free-thinking individuals be all that bad?  Can one ever imagine even Justice Clarence Thomas using Rothbard to attack public schools in this country?
To which I reply, regardless of what one thinks of Reason, can they be all bad when they properly recognize the influence Rothbard is having on a present day judge? Can one ever imagine Ed Crane doing the same?

4 comments:

  1. Reason and the Cato types insert these snarky lines about Paul, Mises, Rothbard, and other austrians because after all the millions given to them by the Koch brothers and years of sucking up to establishment views, the Ron Paul austrian revolution and sites like lewrockwell and this one are far more influential.

    Reason tried for years to portray itself as this hipster cool magazine, especially with the leather jacket guy, and yet who have the overwhelming majority of youth involved in politics chosen to follow? Not anyone associated with Reason mag, but the same guy Reason did their best to destroy in 2008 over the newsletter nonsense.

    What sites do these young people read? It isn't Reason, but instead lewrockwell, anti-war.com, econpolicyjournal, tomwoods.com, etc. The irony is that Reason's constant attacks on Ron Paul and the austrians did not discredit the austrians from the libertarian movement, but instead discredited themselves from being part of the libertarian movement they failed to deliver after decades of trying with far more resources.

    I have noticed some articles attempting to latch on to the Paul movement, but the problem is the damage has been done. Isn't it funny how blowback and the negative side effects of intervention work?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Really, last time i checked Lew, like Hoppe and others were Paleolibertarians. Rothbard had endorsed Pat Buchanan, just look at how much Tom Woods agrees with Patand never really presses him on anything when he talks about him, exactly what is libertarian about him. James Buchanan is a lot more libertarian yet i have yet to hear Woods talk about him.

      Delete
    2. anonymous @ 4:56am - You think Tom Woods and Murray Rothbard aren't libertarian? Is this your first time on economicpolicyjournal.com?

      Delete