View source for Murray Rothbard

{{Short description|American economist (1926–1995)}}
{{Use mdy dates|date=August 2022}}
{{Infobox economist
| image            = Rothbard '70s.jpg
| image_size       =
| caption          = Rothbard in the 1970s
| birth_name       = Murray Newton Rothbard
| birth_date       = {{birth date|mf=yes |1926|03|02}}
| birth_place      = [[New York City]], U.S.
| death_date       = {{Death date and age|mf=yes |1995|01|07|1926|03|02}}
| death_place      = New York City, U.S.
| resting_place    = Oakwood Cemetery, [[Unionville, Virginia]], U.S.
| institution      = [[Brooklyn Polytechnic Institute]]<br />[[University of Nevada, Las Vegas]]
| school_tradition = [[Austrian School]]
| influences       = {{flatlist|
* [[Aristotle]]
* [[Aquinas]]
* [[Bastiat]]
* [[Böhm-Bawerk]]
* [[Gaetanus|Cajetan]]
* [[Richard Cantillon|Cantillon]]
* [[Frank Chodorov|Chodorov]]
* [[Étienne Bonnot de Condillac|Condillac]]
* [[Sam Francis (writer)|Francis]]
* [[Garet Garrett|Garrett]]
* [[Grotius]]
* [[Henry Hazlitt|Hazlitt]]
* [[J. Locke|Locke]]
* [[H. L. Mencken|Mencken]]
* [[Carl Menger|Menger]]
* [[L. von Mises|Mises]]
* [[A. J. Nock|Nock]]
* [[Franz Oppenheimer|Oppenheimer]]
* [[Isabel Paterson|Paterson]]
* [[H. Spencer|Spencer]]
* [[Lysander Spooner|Spooner]]
* [[Henry David Thoreau|Thoreau]]
* [[Benjamin Tucker|Tucker]] 
* [[Anne Turgot|Turgot]]
* [[de Vitoria|Vitoria]]
}}
| contributions    = [[Anarcho-capitalism]]<br>[[Historical revisionism]]<br>[[Paleolibertarianism]]<br>[[Left-libertarianism#Market-oriented left-libertarianism|Left-libertarianism]]<br>[[Right-libertarianism]]<br>[[Title-transfer theory of contract]]
| awards           =
| signature        = Murray Rothbard Signature.png
| repec_prefix     =
| repec_id         =
| movement         = [[Libertarianism in the United States|American libertarianism]]
| party            = [[Republican Party (United States)|Republican]] {{small|(before 1952)}}<br>[[Peace and Freedom Party|Peace and Freedom]] {{small|(1968–1974)}}<br>[[Libertarian Party (United States)|Libertarian]] {{small|(1974–1989)}}
| organization     = [[Center for Libertarian Studies]]<br />[[Cato Institute]]<br />[[Mises Institute]]
| notable_students = [[Hans-Hermann Hoppe]]<br>[[Samuel Edward Konkin III]]<br>[[Walter Block]]
|field=[[Economic history]]<br>[[Ethics]]<br>[[History of economic thought]]<br>[[Legal philosophy]]<br>[[Political philosophy]]<br>[[Praxeology]]|education=[[Columbia University]] ([[Bachelor of Arts|BA]], [[Master of Arts|MA]], [[PhD]])}}
'''Murray Newton Rothbard''' ({{IPAc-en |ˈ|r|ɒ|θ|b|ɑːr|d}}; March 2, 1926&nbsp;– January 7, 1995) was an American [[economist]]<ref name="nytimes">{{cite web|first=David|last=Stout|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1995/01/11/obituaries/murray-n-rothbard-economist-and-free-market-exponent-68.html|title=Obituary: Murray N. Rothbard, Economist And Free-Market Exponent, 68|work=[[The New York Times]]|date=January 11, 1995|access-date=July 3, 2025|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190905034710/https://www.nytimes.com/1995/01/11/obituaries/murray-n-rothbard-economist-and-free-market-exponent-68.html|archive-date=September 5, 2019}}</ref> of the [[Austrian School]],<ref>{{cite book |title=Biographical Dictionary of American Economists |publisher=Thoemmes |last=Lewis |first=David Charles |chapter= Rothbard, Murray Newton (1926–1995) |editor=Ross Emmett |year=2006 |isbn=978-1-84371112-4}}</ref><ref>{{cite encyclopedia |first=F. Eugene |last=Heathe |date=2007 |encyclopedia=Encyclopedia of Business Ethics and Society |title=Anarchism |publisher=Sage |page=[https://books.google.com/books?id=5m9yq0Eu-vsC&pg=PT159 89]}}</ref><ref name=":12">[[Ronald Hamowy]], ed., 2008, ''[https://books.google.com/books?isbn=1412965802 The Encyclopedia of Libertarianism]'', [[Cato Institute]], Sage, {{ISBN|1-41296580-2}}, p. 62: "a leading economist of the Austrian school"; pp. 11, 365, 458: "Austrian economist".</ref> [[Economic history|economic historian]],<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Bessner |first1=Daniel |title=Murray Rothbard, Political Strategy, and the Making of Modern libertarianism |journal=Intellectual History Review |date=December 8, 2014 |volume=24 |issue=4 |pages=441–56 |doi=10.1080/17496977.2014.970371 |s2cid=143391240}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last1=Matthews |first1=Peter Hans |last2=Ortmann |first2=Andreas |title=An Austrian (Mis)Reads Adam Smith: A Critique of Rothbard as Intellectual Historian |journal=Review of Political Economy |date=July 2002 |volume=14 |issue=3 |pages=379–92 |doi=10.1080/09538250220147895|citeseerx=10.1.1.535.510 |s2cid=39872371}}</ref> [[Political philosophy|political theorist]],<ref name="Enemy">{{cite book |last= Raimondo |first=Justin |author-link=Justin Raimondo |title=An Enemy of the State: The Life of Murray N. Rothbard |publisher=Prometheus Books |location=Amherst, [[New York (state)|NY]] |year=2000 |isbn=978-1-61592-239-0}}</ref> and [[Activism|activist]]. Rothbard was a central figure in the 20th-century [[American libertarian movement]], particularly its [[Right-libertarianism|right-wing]] strands, and was a founder and leading theoretician of [[anarcho-capitalism]].<ref name="Hamowy" /><ref name=":11" /><ref>{{Cite book |last=Newman |first=Saul |title=The Politics of Postanarchism |date=2010 |page=43 |publisher=Edinburgh University Press |doi=10.3366/edinburgh/9780748634958.001.0001 |isbn=978-0-7486-3495-8}}</ref> He wrote over twenty books on political theory, history, economics, and other subjects.<ref name="Hamowy">{{cite book |last=Doherty |first=Brian |author-link=Brian Doherty (journalist) |chapter=Rothbard, Murray (1926–1995) |editor-first=Ronald |editor-last=Hamowy |editor-link= Ronald Hamowy |title=The Encyclopedia of Libertarianism |publisher=Sage Publications |location=Thousand Oaks, CA |year=2008 |isbn=978-1-4129-6580-4 |pages=10, 441–43}}</ref>

Rothbard argued that all services provided by the "monopoly system of the corporate state"<ref>Rothbard, Murray. [http://archive.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/rothbard40.html "The Great Society: A Libertarian Critique" ] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150618045339/http://archive.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/rothbard40.html |date=June 18, 2015 }}, Lew Rockwell.</ref> could be provided more efficiently by the private sector and wrote that the [[State (polity)|state]] is "the organization of robbery systematized and writ large".<ref>{{cite book |first= Murray |last= Rothbard |chapter=The Myth of Neutral Taxation |title= The Logic of Action Two: Applications and Criticism from the Austrian School |publisher= Edward Elgar |location= Cheltenham, UK |year= 1997 |isbn=978-1858985701 |page=67}} First published in ''The Cato Journal'', Fall 1981.</ref><ref name="Hans-Hermann Hoppe">{{cite book |chapter-url=https://mises.org/rothbard/ethics/hoppeintro.asp |chapter=Introduction |title=The Ethics of Liberty |first=Hans-Hermann |last=Hoppe |publisher=[[Ludwig von Mises Institute]] |author-link=Hans-Hermann Hoppe |year=1998 |access-date=September 13, 2014 |archive-date=September 14, 2014 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140914001855/https://mises.org/rothbard/ethics/hoppeintro.asp |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{cite book |chapter= The Nature of the State |chapter-url= https://mises.org/rothbard/ethics/twentytwo.asp |title= The Ethics of Liberty |first= Murray |last= Rothbard |year= 2002 |orig-year= 1982 |publisher= [[New York University Press]] |location= New York |isbn= 978-0814775066 |pages= 167–68 |access-date= September 13, 2014 |archive-date= September 14, 2014 |archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20140914001703/https://mises.org/rothbard/ethics/twentytwo.asp |url-status= live }}</ref> He called [[fractional-reserve banking]] a form of fraud and opposed [[central bank]]ing.<ref name= Mystery>{{cite book |last=Rothbard |first=Murray |year=2008 |orig-year=1983 |title=The Mystery of Banking |url=https://mises.org/document/614/Mystery-of-Banking-The |publisher=[[Ludwig von Mises Institute]] |location=Auburn, AL |edition=2nd |pages=111–13 |isbn=978-1933550282 |access-date=September 13, 2014 |archive-date=September 14, 2014 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140914003927/https://mises.org/document/614/Mystery-of-Banking-The |url-status=live }}</ref> He categorically opposed all [[Military interventionism|military]], political, and [[economic interventionism]] in the affairs of other nations.<ref name= "Casey">{{cite book |first1=Gerard |last1=Casey |author-link= Gerard Casey (philosopher) |editor1-first=John |editor1-last= Meadowcroft |year=2010 |title=Murray Rothbard |series= Major Conservative and Libertarian Thinkers |volume=15 |publisher=Continuum |location=London |pages=4–5, 129 |isbn=978-1441142092}}</ref><ref>Klausner, Manuel S. (Feb. 1973). [https://web.archive.org/web/20210913075343/https://reason.com/1973/02/01/the-new-isolationism/ "The New Isolationism."] An Interview with Murray Rothbard and [[Leonard Liggio]]. ''[[Reason (magazine)|Reason]]''. [https://reason.com/issue/february-1973/ Full issue.] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210913075646/https://reason.com/issue/february-1973/ |date=September 13, 2021}}</ref>

Rothbard followed [[Ludwig von Mises]]’ [[praxeology]], a deductive method that interprets economic behavior as purposeful [[Human Action|human action]]. Rothbard taught economics at a Wall Street division of [[New York University]], later at [[Brooklyn Polytechnic]], and after 1986 in an endowed position at the [[University of Nevada, Las Vegas]].<ref name="Enemy" /><ref name=":10" /> Partnering with the oil billionaire [[Charles Koch]], Rothbard was a founder of the [[Cato Institute]] and the [[Center for Libertarian Studies]] in the 1970s.<ref name="Hamowy" /> He broke with Cato and Koch, and in 1982 joined [[Lew Rockwell]] and [[Burton Blumert]] to establish the [[Mises Institute]] in [[Alabama]].<ref name=":12" />{{Sfn|Hawley|2016|p=128-129, 164}}<ref name=":18">{{Cite book |last=Wasserman |first=Janek |title=Marginal Revolutionaries: How Austrian economists fought the war of ideas |date=2019 |publisher=Yale University Press |isbn=978-0-300-24917-0 |location=New Haven |pages=257}}</ref>

While he was a right-libertarian, Rothbard was a critic of [[Milton Friedman]], [[Ayn Rand]], and [[Adam Smith]]. Rothbard opposed [[egalitarianism]] and the [[civil rights movement]], and blamed women's voting and activism for the growth of the [[welfare state]].<ref name=":11" /><ref name=":8" /><ref name=":5" /> Later in his career, Rothbard advocated a libertarian alliance with [[paleoconservatism]] (which he called [[paleolibertarianism]]), favoring [[right-wing populism]] and describing [[David Duke]] and [[Joseph McCarthy]] as models for political strategy.<ref name="Paul Newsletters">{{cite journal |last1=Sanchez |first1=Julian |last2=Weigel |first2=David |date=January 16, 2008 |title=Who Wrote Ron Paul's Newsletters? |url=http://reason.com/archives/2008/01/16/who-wrote-ron-pauls-newsletter/singlepage |url-status=live |journal=[[Reason (magazine)|Reason]] |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131002130521/http://reason.com/archives/2008/01/16/who-wrote-ron-pauls-newsletter/singlepage |archive-date=October 2, 2013 |access-date=August 14, 2013}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book |last1=Zwolinski |first1=Matt |title=The Individualists: Radicals, Reactionaries, and the Struggle for the Soul of Libertarianism |last2=Tomasi |first2=John |publisher=Princeton University Press |year=2023 |isbn=978-0-691-15554-8 |location=United Kingdom |page=244}}</ref><ref name=":8">{{Cite book |last=Hawley |first=George |title=Right-wing critics of American conservatism |date=2016 |isbn=978-0-7006-2193-4 |location=Lawrence |publisher=University Press of Kansas |pages=159–167}}</ref><ref name=":15" /> In the 2010s, he received renewed attention as an influence on the [[alt right|alt-right]].<ref name=":11" /><ref>{{cite journal |first=Quinn |last=Slobodian |author-link=Quinn Slobodian |title=Anti-'68ers and the Racist-Libertarian Alliance: How a Schism among Austrian School Neoliberals Helped Spawn the Alt Right |journal=Cultural Politics |volume=15 |issue=3 |date=November 2019 |pages=372–86 |doi=10.1215/17432197-7725521|s2cid=213717695}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |first=Melinda |last=Cooper |title=The Alt-Right: Neoliberalism, Libertarianism and the Fascist Temptation |journal=[[Theory, Culture & Society]] |volume=38 |issue=6 |date=November 2021 |pages=29–50 |doi=10.1177/0263276421999446|s2cid=233528701 }}</ref>

== Life and work ==
=== Education ===
Rothbard's parents were David and Rae Rothbard, [[Jewish]] immigrants to the United States from Poland and Russia, respectively. David was a chemist.<ref>{{cite web |url= https://mises.org/etexts/hhhonmnr.asp |title=Murray N. Rothbard: Economics, Science, and Liberty |first= Hans-Hermann |last=Hoppe |year= 1999 |publisher=The Ludwig von Mises Institute |access-date =September 13, 2014 |archive-date=November 2, 2014 |archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20141102050422/https://mises.org/etexts/hhhonmnr.asp |url-status= live}} Reprinted from ''15 Great Austrian Economists'', edited by Randall G. Holcombe.</ref> Rothbard attended [[Birch Wathen Lenox School]], a private school in New York City.<ref name= "Raimondo2000-34">{{cite book |last=Raimondo|first= Justin |title=An Enemy of the State: The Life of Murray N. Rothbard |url= https://books.google.com/books?id=YBsyVMg5HToC&pg=PA34|year=2000 |publisher=Prometheus Books, Publishers|isbn= 978-1-61592-239-0|page=34|access-date=June 28, 2017|archive-date=October 16, 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191016074108/https://books.google.com/books?id=YBsyVMg5HToC&pg=PA34|url-status= live}}</ref> Rothbard later said he much preferred Birch Wathen to the "debasing and egalitarian [[public school system]]" he had attended in the [[Bronx]].<ref name= OldRight>{{cite web|last= Rothbard |first=Murray|title= Life in the Old Right|url= https://www.lewrockwell.com/1970/01/murray-n-rothbard/life-in-the-old-right/ |publisher= Lew Rockwell |access-date=March 16, 2015|archive-date= September 6, 2017 |archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20170906090636/https://archive.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/rothbard45.html|url-status= live}}</ref>

Rothbard wrote of having grown up as a "[[Right-wing politics|right-winger]]" (adherent of the "[[Old Right (United States)|Old Right]]") among friends and neighbors who were "[[communists]] or [[Fellow traveler|fellow-travelers]]". He was a member of the [[New York Young Republican Club]] in his youth.<ref name="auto">{{Cite web | work = NYYRC |url= https://nyyrc.com/history/ |title=History|access-date= October 15, 2019|archive-date= October 12, 2019|archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20191012210513/https://nyyrc.com/history/ |url-status= live}}</ref> Rothbard described his father as an [[Individualism|individualist]] who embraced [[minimal government]], [[Free market|free enterprise]], [[private property]] and "a determination to rise by one's own merits ...  [A]ll [[socialism]] seemed to me monstrously coercive and abhorrent."<ref name= OldRight /> In 1952, his father was trapped during a labor strike at the Tide Water Oil Refinery in New Jersey, which he managed, confirming their dislike of [[organized labor]].<ref name=":13">{{Cite book |last=Doherty |first=Brian |title=Radicals for capitalism : a freewheeling history of the modern American libertarian movement |date=2007 |publisher=PublicAffairs |isbn=978-1-58648-350-0 |location=New York |oclc=76141517}}</ref>

Rothbard attended [[Columbia University]], receiving a Bachelor of Arts degree in mathematics in 1945 and a PhD in economics in 1956. His first political activism came in 1948, on behalf of the [[Jim Crow laws|segregationist]] South Carolinian [[Strom Thurmond]]'s presidential campaign. In the [[1948 United States presidential election|1948 presidential election]], Rothbard, "as a Jewish student at Columbia, horrified his peers by organizing a Students for [[Strom Thurmond]] chapter, so staunchly did he believe in [[states' rights]]", according to ''[[The American Conservative]]''.<ref>{{cite magazine |last=McCarthy |first=Daniel |date=March 12, 2007 |title=Enemies of the State |url=http://www.amconmag.com/article/2007/mar/12/00027/ |url-status=dead |magazine=[[The American Conservative]] |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110605015227/http://www.amconmag.com/article/2007/mar/12/00027/ |archive-date=June 5, 2011 |access-date=August 13, 2013}}</ref> The delay in receiving his PhD was due in part to conflict with his advisor, Joseph Dorfman, and in part to [[Arthur Burns]]'s rejecting his dissertation. Burns was a longtime friend of the Rothbard family and their neighbor at their [[Manhattan]] apartment building. It was only after Burns went on leave from the Columbia faculty to head [[President Eisenhower]]'s [[Council of Economic Advisers]] that Rothbard's thesis was accepted, and he received his doctorate.<ref name= "Enemy"/>{{rp|pages= 43–44}}<ref name= French>French, Doug (December 27, 2010) [https://mises.org/daily/4919/Burns-Diary-Exposes-the-Myth-of-Fed-Independence Burns Diary Exposes the Myth of Fed Independence] {{Webarchive |url=  https://web.archive.org/web/20140914010342/https://mises.org/daily/4919/Burns-Diary-Exposes-the-Myth-of-Fed-Independence |date=September 14, 2014}}, [[Ludwig von Mises Institute]]</ref> Rothbard later said that all his fellow students were extreme [[leftists]] and that he was one of only two Republicans at Columbia at the time.<ref name="Enemy"/>{{rp |page=4}}

=== Marriage, Volker Fund, and academia ===
During the 1940s, Rothbard vetted articles for [[Leonard Read]] at the [[Foundation for Economic Education]] think tank, became acquainted with [[Frank Chodorov]], and read widely in libertarian-oriented works by [[Albert Jay Nock]], [[Garet Garrett]], [[Isabel Paterson]], [[H. L. Mencken]], and Austrian School economist [[Ludwig von Mises]].<ref name="Enemy"/>{{rp |page=46}}<ref name=":13" /> Rothbard was greatly influenced by reading Mises's book ''[[Human Action]]'' in 1949.<ref name=":18" /> In the 1950s, when Mises was teaching in the Wall Street division of the [[New York University Stern School of Business]], Rothbard attended his unofficial seminar.<ref name=":12" /><ref name=":14" /> Rothbard wanted to promote libertarian activism; by the mid-1950s, he helped form the Circle Bastiat, a libertarian and anarchist social group in New York City.<ref name=":12" /><ref name=":13" /> He also joined the [[Mont Pelerin Society]] in the 1950s.<ref name=":14">{{Cite book |last=Slobodian |first=Quinn |title=Crack-up capitalism: market radicals and the dream of a world without democracy |date=2023 |publisher=Metropolitan Books, Henry Holt and Co. |isbn=978-1-250-75390-8 |edition=1st |location=New York}}</ref>

Rothbard attracted the attention of the [[William Volker Fund]], a group that provided financial backing to promote right-wing ideologies in the 1950s and early 1960s.<ref>David Gordon, 2010, ed., [https://mises.org/document/5777/Strictly-Confidential-The-Private-Volker-Fund-Memos-of-Murray-N-RothbardStrictly Confidential: The Private Volker Fund Memos of Murray N. Rothbard] {{Webarchive |url= https://web.archive.org/web/20140914002006/https://mises.org/document/5777/Strictly-Confidential-The-Private-Volker-Fund-Memos-of-Murray-N-Rothbard |date=September 14, 2014}} Quote from Rothbard: "The Volker Fund concept was to find and grant research funds to hosts of libertarian and right-wing scholars and to draw these scholars together via seminars, conferences, etc."</ref><ref name=":12" /> The Volker Fund paid Rothbard to write a textbook to explain ''Human Action'' in a form that could be used to introduce college undergraduates to Mises's views; a sample chapter he wrote on money and credit won Mises's approval. For ten years, the Volker Fund paid him a retainer as a "senior analyst".<ref name="Enemy" />{{rp |page=54}} As Rothbard continued his work, he enlarged the project. The result was his book ''[[Man, Economy, and State]]'', published in 1962. Upon its publication, Mises praised Rothbard's work effusively.<ref name="Essential">{{cite book |last= Gordon |first=David |author-link=David Gordon (philosopher) |title=The Essential Rothbard |publisher= [[Ludwig von Mises Institute]] |location=Auburn, Alabama |year=2007 |isbn= 978-1-933550-10-7 |oclc= 123960448 |url= https://cdn.mises.org/The%20Essential%20Rothbard_4.pdf |access-date=July 7, 2021 |archive-date=May 22, 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210522113238/https://cdn.mises.org/The%20Essential%20Rothbard_4.pdf |url-status=live}}</ref>{{rp|page=14}} In contrast to Mises, who considered security the primary justification for the state, Rothbard in the 1950s began to argue for a privatized market for the military, police and judiciary.<ref name=":11" /> Rothbard's 1963 book ''[[America's Great Depression]]'' blamed government policy failures for the [[Great Depression]], and challenged the widely held view that [[capitalism]] is unstable.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Kaldis |first=Byron |title=Encyclopedia of Philosophy and the Social Sciences |publisher=[[Sage Publications]] |year=2013 |isbn=978-1506332611 |location=United States |page=44}}</ref>

[[File:Murray Rothbard.jpg|thumb|left|upright=0.8|Rothbard in the mid-1950s]]
In 1953, Rothbard married JoAnn Beatrice Schumacher (1928–1999),<ref>{{Cite web|url = https://mises.org/library/joann-beatrice-schumacher-rothbard-1928-1999|title = JoAnn Beatrice Schumacher Rothbard (1928–1999)|date = October 30, 1999|access-date = July 20, 2020|archive-date = August 4, 2020|archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20200804030902/https://mises.org/library/joann-beatrice-schumacher-rothbard-1928-1999 |url-status = live}}</ref> whom he called Joey, in New York City.<ref name= "Essential" />{{rp |page= 124}} She was a historian, Rothbard's personal editor, and a close adviser as well as hostess of his Rothbard Salon. They enjoyed a loving marriage, and Rothbard often called her "the indispensable framework" of his life and achievements. According to her, the Volker Fund's patronage allowed Rothbard to work from home as a freelance theorist and pundit for the first 15 years of their marriage.<ref>Scott Sublett, "Libertarians' Storied Guru", ''Washington Times'', July 30, 1987</ref>

The Volker Fund collapsed in 1962, leading Rothbard to seek employment at various New York academic institutions. He was offered a part-time position teaching economics to engineering students at [[Brooklyn Polytechnic Institute]] in 1966 at age 40. The institution had no economics department or economics majors, and Rothbard derided its social science department as "[[Marxism|Marxist]]". [[Justin Raimondo]], his biographer,{{Sfn|Hawley|2016|p=162}} writes that Rothbard liked teaching at Brooklyn Polytechnic because working only two days a week gave him the freedom to contribute to developments in libertarian politics.<ref name="Enemy" /> Rothbard continued in this role until 1986.<ref name="nytimes"/><ref name= Klein>Peter G. Klein, ed., F.A. Hayek, ''The Fortunes of Liberalism: Essays on Austrian Economics and the Ideal of Freedom'', [[University of Chicago Press]], 2012, [https://books.google.com/books?id=hrS-xhUGKHIC&pg=PA54 p. 54] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230503213142/https://books.google.com/books?id=hrS-xhUGKHIC&pg=PA54 |date=May 3, 2023 }}, {{ISBN|0-22632116-9}}</ref> Then 60 years old, Rothbard left Brooklyn Polytechnic Institute for the [[Lee Business School]] at the [[University of Nevada, Las Vegas]] (UNLV), where he held the title of S.J. Hall Distinguished Professor of Economics, a chair endowed by a libertarian businessman.<ref>Rockwell, Llewellyn H. (May 31, 2007). [https://mises.org/daily/2584/ "Three National Treasures."] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140914010718/https://mises.org/daily/2584/ |date= September 14, 2014}} Mises.org</ref><ref name=":10">{{cite book |editor1-first= Bruce |editor1-last= Frohnen |editor2-first= Jeremy |editor2-last= Beer |editor3-first=Jeffrey O. |editor3-last= Nelson |chapter= Rothbard, Murray (1926–95) |title= American Conservatism: An Encyclopedia |publisher= ISI Books |location= Wilmington, [[Delaware|DE]] |year= 2006 |isbn= 978-1-932236-43-9 |page=750 | quote = Only after several decades of teaching at the Polytechnic Institute of New York did Rothbard obtain an endowed chair, and like that of Mises at NYU, his own at the University of Nevada at Las Vegas was established by an admiring benefactor.}}</ref>

According to Rothbard's friend, colleague, and fellow Misesian economist [[Hans-Hermann Hoppe]], Rothbard led a "fringe existence" in academia, but he was able to attract a large number of "students and disciples" through his writings, thereby becoming "the creator and one of the principal agents of the contemporary libertarian movement".<ref name=":9">Hoppe, Hans-Hermann (1999). [https://mises.org/etexts/HHHonMNR.pdf "Murray N. Rothbard: Economics, Science, and Liberty."] {{Webarchive|url= https://web.archive.org/web/20140224060422/http://mises.org/etexts/hhhonmnr.pdf |date= February 24, 2014}} Mises.org</ref> Libertarian economist Jeffrey Herbener, who called Rothbard his friend and "intellectual mentor", said in a memoriam that Rothbard received "only ostracism" from mainstream academia.<ref>Herbener, J. (1995). L. Rockwell (ed.), [http://library.freecapitalists.org/books/Murray%20N%20Rothbard/memoriam.pdf ''Murray Rothbard, In Memoriam''] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141220074229/http://library.freecapitalists.org/books/Murray%20N%20Rothbard/memoriam.pdf|date=December 20, 2014}}. Auburn, AL.: [[Ludwig von Mises Institute]]. p. 87</ref> Rothbard kept his position at UNLV from 1986 until his death.<ref name="nytimes" />

=== Old Right ===
Throughout his life, Rothbard engaged in a number of different political movements to promote [[Old Right (United States)|Old Right]] and libertarian principles. George Hawley writes that "unfortunately for Rothbard, the Old Right was ending as an intellectual and political force just as he was maturing as an intellectual", with the militantly [[Anti-communism|anticommunist]] conservative movement exemplified by [[William F. Buckley Jr.]] supplanting the Old Right's isolationism.<ref name=":8" />

Rothbard was an admirer of Senator [[Joseph McCarthy]]—not for McCarthy's [[Cold War]] views, but for his [[demagogue]]ry, which Rothbard credited for disrupting the establishment consensus of what Rothbard called "corporate liberalism".<ref name=":8" /> Rothbard contributed many articles to Buckley's ''[[National Review]]'', but his relations with Buckley and the magazine soured as he criticized the conservative movement for militarism.<ref name=":8" /> Specifically, Rothbard opposed how such militarism could justify and expand the state's power.<ref name=":11" />

Rothbard befriended the [[Holocaust denial|Holocaust denier]] [[Harry Elmer Barnes]] in 1959.<ref name=":7" /> In a 1966 issue of [[Robert LeFevre]]'s ''Rampart Journal of Individualist Thought'' devoted to [[historical revisionism]], Rothbard argued that Western democracies had been to blame for starting World War I, World War II, and the Cold War.<ref name=":7" /> Rothbard published works by Barnes in his journals before and after Barnes died in 1968, including posthumously in the [[Cato Institute]]'s journal.<ref name=":7" />

=== Conflict with Ayn Rand ===
[[file:Ayn Rand (1943 Talbot portrait).jpg|thumb|upright=0.9|[[Ayn Rand]], the founder of [[Objectivism]]]]
In 1954, Rothbard, along with several other attendees of Mises's seminar, joined the circle of novelist [[Ayn Rand]], the founder of [[Objectivism]]. He soon parted from her, writing, among other things, that her ideas were not as original as she proclaimed but similar to those of [[Aristotle]], [[Thomas Aquinas]], and [[Herbert Spencer]].<ref name="Enemy" />{{rp|pages=109–14}} In 1958, after the publication of Rand's novel ''[[Atlas Shrugged]]'', Rothbard wrote her a "fan letter", calling the book "an infinite treasure house" and "not merely the greatest novel ever written, [but] one of the very greatest books ever written, fiction or nonfiction." He also wrote: "[Y]ou introduced me to the whole field of natural rights and natural law philosophy," prompting him to learn "the glorious natural rights tradition."<ref name="Enemy" />{{rp|pages=121, 132–34}}<ref name="Burns">{{cite book |last=Burns |first=Jennifer |author-link=Jennifer Burns (historian) |title=Goddess of the Market: Ayn Rand and the American Right |title-link=Goddess of the Market |publisher=Oxford Univ. Press |year=2009 |isbn=978-0-19-532487-7}}</ref>{{rp|pages=145, 182}}<ref>[https://mises.org/journals/jls/21_4/21_4_3.pdf "Mises and Rothbard Letters to Ayn Rand"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140711225127/http://mises.org/journals/jls/21_4/21_4_3.pdf|date=July 11, 2014}}, ''[[Journal of Libertarian Studies]]'', Volume 21, No. 4 (Winter 2007): 11–16.</ref> Rothbard rejoined Rand's circle for a few months but soon broke with Rand again over various differences, including his defense of his interpretation of [[anarchism]].

Rothbard later satirized Rand's acolytes in his unpublished one-act farce ''Mozart Was a Red''<ref>[[Chris Matthew Sciabarra]], ''[https://books.google.com/books?id=Ly9S2quKl1EC&pg=PA165 Total Freedom: Toward a Dialectical Libertarianism]'', Penn State Press, 2000. p. 165, {{ISBN|0-27102049-0}}</ref> and his essay "The Sociology of the Ayn Rand Cult".<ref name="Burns" />{{rp|page=184}}<ref name="Mozart">[http://archive.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/mozart.html ''Mozart Was a Red: A Morality Play in One Act''] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150914051843/http://archive.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/mozart.html|date=September 14, 2015}}, Lew Rockwell, by Murray N. Rothbard, early 1960s, with an introduction by [[Justin Raimondo]]</ref><ref>Rothbard, Murray (1972). [http://archive.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/rothbard23.html "The Sociology of the Ayn Rand Cult."] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161202100419/http://archive.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/rothbard23.html|date=December 2, 2016}}, Lew Rockwell.</ref> He characterized Rand's circle as a "dogmatic, personality cult". His play parodies Rand (through the character Carson Sand) and her friends and is set during a visit from Keith Hackley, a fan of Sand's novel ''The Brow of Zeus'' (a play on ''Atlas Shrugged'').<ref name="Mozart" />

=== New Left outreach ===
By the late 1960s, according to ''The American Conservative'', Rothbard's "long and winding yet somehow consistent road had taken him from anti-[[New Deal]] and anti-interventionist [[Robert A. Taft]] supporter into friendship with the quasi-pacifist [[Nebraska]] Republican Congressman [[Howard Buffett]] (father of [[Warren Buffett]]) then over to the League of [[Adlai Stevenson II|(Adlai) Stevensonian]] Democrats and, by 1968, into tentative comradeship with the anarchist factions of the [[New Left]]."<ref>{{cite magazine |last=Kauffman |first=Bill |author-link=Bill Kauffman |date=May 19, 2008 |title=When the Left Was Right |url=http://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/when-the-left-was-right/ |url-status=live |magazine=[[The American Conservative]] |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131104203634/http://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/when-the-left-was-right/ |archive-date=November 4, 2013 |access-date=August 13, 2013}}</ref> Rothbard joined the [[Peace and Freedom Party]] and contributed writing to [[New Left|the New Left]] journal ''[[Ramparts (magazine)|Ramparts]]''.<ref name=":8" />

Rothbard later criticized the New Left for supporting a "[[People's Republic]]"-style [[Egalitarianism as a Revolt Against Nature and Other Essays ]].{{Independent source inline|date=June 2023}} It was during this phase that he associated with [[Karl Hess]] (a former [[Barry Goldwater]] speechwriter who had rejected conservatism)<ref name=":8" /> and founded ''[[Left and Right: A Journal of Libertarian Thought]]'' with [[Leonard Liggio]] and George Resch. Raimondo described Rothbard during this time as "a man of the Old Culture: he believed that it was possible to be a revolutionary, an anarchist, ''and'' lead a bourgeois life", and wrote that the "respectably dressed, if a bit rumpled" Rothbard was "immune to the blandishments of sixties youth culture".<ref name=":8" /> During this time, Rothbard proposed that black Americans should embrace [[Black separatism|racial separatism]] and [[secession]].<ref name=":14" /> He was frustrated that blacks and whites in the New Left instead decided to work together for egalitarian goals.<ref name=":14" /> In the 1970s, Rothbard turned sharply against the left and described state-enforced equality as evil.<ref name=":8" /><ref name=":14" />

=== Libertarianism and Cato Institute ===
{{Libertarianism US|intellectuals}}
From 1969 to 1984, Rothbard edited ''[[The Libertarian Forum]]'', also initially with Hess (although Hess's involvement ended in 1971).<ref>{{cite news |last=Riggenbach |first=Jeff |date=May 13, 2010 |title=Karl Hess and the Death of Politics |newspaper=Mises Institute |url=https://mises.org/daily/4330 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131021020555/http://mises.org/daily/4330 |archive-date=October 21, 2013 |access-date=August 13, 2013 |publisher=Ludwig von Mises Institute}}</ref> Despite its small readership, it engaged conservatives associated with the ''[[National Review]]'' in nationwide debate. Rothbard rejected the view that [[Ronald Reagan]]'s 1980 presidential election was a victory for libertarian principles, and he attacked Reagan's economic program in a series of ''Libertarian Forum'' articles. In 1982, Rothbard called Reagan's claims of spending cuts a "fraud" and a "hoax" and accused Reaganites of doctoring the economic statistics to give a false impression that their policies successfully reduced inflation and unemployment.<ref>Ronald Lora, William Henry Longton, editors, ''The Conservative Press in Twentieth-Century America'', Chapter "The Libertarian Forum", Greenwood Publishing Group, 1999, [https://books.google.com/books?id=Ioakmq8yxA4C&dq=Murray+Rothbard+nonintervention+foreign+policy&pg=PA372 p. 372] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160510233147/https://books.google.com/books?id=Ioakmq8yxA4C&pg=PA372&dq=Murray+Rothbard+nonintervention+foreign+policy&hl=en&sa=X&ei=0HT4UbrPAsKCyAHn44HIAg&ved=0CGQQ6AEwCQ |date=2016}}, {{ISBN|0313213909}},</ref> He further criticized the "myths of [[Reaganomics]]" in 1987.<ref name="mises3">{{cite web |date=June 9, 2004 |title=The Myths of Reaganomics &#124; Mises Institute |url=https://mises.org/library/myths-reaganomics |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171020062853/https://mises.org/library/myths-reaganomics |archive-date=October 20, 2017 |access-date=August 28, 2017 |website=mises.org}}</ref>

Rothbard criticized the "frenzied nihilism" of [[left-wing libertarians]] but also criticized [[right-wing libertarians]] who were content to rely only on education to bring down the state; he believed that libertarians should adopt any moral tactic available to them to bring about liberty.<ref>{{cite book |last=Perry |first=Marvin |title=The Conservative Press in Twentieth-Century America |publisher=Greenwood Publishing Group |year=1999 |isbn=978-0-313-21390-8 |editor1-last=Lora |editor1-first=Ronald |location=Westport, Connecticut |page=369 |chapter=Libertarian Forum 1969–1986 |oclc=40481045 |editor2-last=Henry |editor2-first=William Longton}}</ref> Imbibing Randolph Bourne's idea that "war is the health of the state", Rothbard opposed all wars in his lifetime and engaged in anti-war activism.<ref name="Gordon">{{cite web |last=Gordon |first=David |author-link=David Gordon (philosopher) |title=Biography of Murray N. Rothbard (1926–1995) |date=February 26, 2007 |url=https://mises.org/about/3249 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120202054227/http://mises.org/about/3249 |archive-date=February 2, 2012 |access-date=August 13, 2013 |publisher=[[Ludwig von Mises Institute]]}}</ref>

During the 1970s and 1980s, Rothbard was active in the [[Libertarian Party (United States)|Libertarian Party]]. He was frequently involved in the party's internal politics. Rothbard founded the [[Center for Libertarian Studies]] in 1976 and the ''[[Journal of Libertarian Studies]]'' in 1977. He was one of the founders of the [[Cato Institute]] in 1977 (whose funding by [[Charles Koch]] was a major infusion of money for libertarianism){{Sfn|Hawley|2016|p=129, 164}} and "came up with the idea of naming this libertarian think tank after ''[[Cato's Letters]]'', a powerful series of British newspaper essays by John Trenchard and Thomas Gordon which played a decisive influence upon America's Founding Fathers in fomenting the Revolution".<ref name="Burris">{{cite web |last=Burris |first=Charles |date=February 4, 2011 |title=Kochs v. Soros: A Partial Backstory |url=http://archive.lewrockwell.com/lrc-blog/kochs-v-soros-a-partial-backstory/ |access-date=August 14, 2013 |publisher=[[LewRockwell.com]] |archive-date=March 14, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220314082157/http://archive.lewrockwell.com/lrc-blog/kochs-v-soros-a-partial-backstory/ |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=25 years at the Cato Institute: The 2001 Annual Report |url=http://www.cato.org/pubs/papers/25th_annual_report.pdf |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070508204943/http://www.cato.org/pubs/papers/25th_annual_report.pdf |archive-date=May 8, 2007 |access-date=August 18, 2013 |pages=11–12}}</ref>

From 1978 to 1983, Rothbard was associated with the [[LPRadicals|Libertarian Party Radical Caucus]], allying himself with [[Justin Raimondo]], [[Eric Garris]] and [[Williamson Evers]]. He opposed the "low-tax liberalism" espoused by 1980 Libertarian Party presidential candidate [[Ed Clark]] and Cato Institute president [[Ed Crane (Libertarian)|Edward H Crane III]]. According to Charles Burris, "Rothbard and Crane became bitter rivals after disputes emerging from the 1980 LP presidential campaign of Ed Clark carried over to strategic direction and management of Cato".<ref name="Burris" />

[[James Wasserman|Janek Wasserman]] wrote, "The tempestuous tale of the Rothbard-Koch-Cato relationship has been told and retold because of its floridness."<ref name=":18" /> Rothbard sought to cultivate radical anarcho-capitalists, while Crane and Koch wanted a more reformist approach to influence government and gain political power.<ref name=":18" /> Rothbard was removed from Cato's board in 1981.<ref name=":18" /> Wasserman described the split as "the first of many examples of Austrian and libertarian schisms in the United States".<ref name=":18" />

=== Mises Institute ===
In 1982, following his split with the Cato Institute, Rothbard co-founded the [[Ludwig von Mises Institute]] in [[Auburn, Alabama]], (with [[Lew Rockwell]] and [[Burton Blumert]])<ref>{{cite web |date=September 19, 2018 |title=The Story of the Mises Institute |url=https://mises.org/wire/story-mises-institute |publisher=Ludwig von Mises Institute |access-date=February 8, 2022 |archive-date=August 23, 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200823180918/https://mises.org/wire/story-mises-institute |url-status=live }}</ref> and was vice president of academic affairs until 1995.<ref name="nytimes" /> Rothbard also founded the institute's ''[[The Review of Austrian Economics|Review of Austrian Economics]]'', a [[heterodox economics]]<ref>Lee, Frederic S., and Cronin, Bruce C. (2010). [http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1536-7150.2010.00751.x/pdf "Research Quality Rankings of Heterodox Economic Journals in a Contested Discipline."] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180311153929/http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1536-7150.2010.00751.x/pdf|date=March 11, 2018}}  ''American Journal of Economics and Sociology''. 69(5): 1428</ref> journal later renamed the ''[[Quarterly Journal of Austrian Economics]]'', in 1987.<ref name="Gordon" /> Rothbard "worked closely with Lew Rockwell (joined later by his long-time friend Blumert) in nurturing the Mises Institute and the publication, ''The Rothbard-Rockwell Report''; which after Rothbard's 1995 death evolved into the website, ''LewRockwell.com''", according to the website.<ref name="Burris" />

Rothbard and other Mises Institute scholars criticized libertarian groups funded by the [[Koch Brothers|Koch brothers]], referring to them as the "Kochtopus".{{Sfn|Hawley|2016|p=128}} In contrast to some other libertarian groups, the Mises Institute "pushed more politically marginal positions like the virtues of secession, the need for a return to the gold standard, and opposition to racial integration", according to historian [[Quinn Slobodian]].<ref name=":14" /> Rothbard split with the Radical Caucus at the 1983 national convention over cultural issues and aligned himself with what he called the "[[Right-wing populism|right-wing populist]]" wing of the party, notably [[Lew Rockwell]] and [[Ron Paul]], who [[Ron Paul presidential campaign, 1988|ran for president on the Libertarian Party ticket in 1988]].

=== Paleolibertarianism ===
[[File:Lewrockwell.jpg|thumb|150px|[[Lew Rockwell]]]]
In 1989, Rothbard left the Libertarian Party and began building bridges to the post-[[Cold War]] anti-interventionist right, calling himself a [[paleolibertarian]], a conservative reaction against the [[cultural liberalism]] of mainstream libertarianism.<ref name="Paul Newsletters" /><ref>Rothbard, Murray (November 1994). [http://archive.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/ir/Ch16.html "Big Government Libertarianism"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170131223653/http://archive.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/ir/Ch16.html|date=January 31, 2017}}, LewRockwell.com</ref> Paleolibertarianism sought to appeal to disaffected working-class whites through a synthesis of cultural conservatism and libertarian economics. According to [[Reason (magazine)|''Reason'']], Rothbard advocated right-wing populism in part because he was frustrated that mainstream thinkers were not adopting the libertarian view and suggested that former Ku Klux Klan Grand Wizard [[David Duke]], as well as Wisconsin Senator [[Joseph McCarthy]],<ref name=":4">{{cite news |last=Rothbard |first=Murray |date=2010 |title=A Strategy for the Right |newspaper=Mises Institute |url=https://mises.org/library/strategy-right |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201030205243/https://mises.org/library/strategy-right |archive-date=October 30, 2020 |access-date=September 18, 2020 |publisher=[[mises.org]]}}</ref> were models for an "Outreach to the Rednecks" effort that a broad libertarian/paleoconservative coalition could use. Working together, the coalition would expose the "unholy alliance of 'corporate liberal' Big Business and media elites, who, through big government, have privileged and caused to rise up a parasitic Underclass". Rothbard blamed this "underclass" for "looting and oppressing the bulk of the middle and working classes in America".<ref name="Paul Newsletters" /> Regarding Duke's political program, Rothbard asserted that there was "nothing" in it that "could not also be embraced by paleoconservatives or paleolibertarians; lower taxes, dismantling the bureaucracy, slashing the welfare system, attacking [[affirmative action]] and racial set-asides, calling for equal rights for all Americans, including whites".<ref name="lewrockwell">{{cite web |last=Rothbard |first=Murray |date=January 1992 |title=Right-wing Populism |url=http://archive.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/ir/Ch5.html |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160524131828/http://archive.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/ir/Ch5.html |archive-date=May 24, 2016 |access-date=August 14, 2013 |publisher=[[LewRockwell.com]]}} Originally published in the January 1992 Rothbard-Rockwell Report.</ref> He also praised the "racialist science" in Charles Murray's controversial book ''[[The Bell Curve]]''.{{Sfn|Hawley|2016|p=166}}

Rothbard co-founded and became a key figure in the [[John Randolph Club]], which was an alliance between the Mises Institute and the paleoconservative [[Rockford Institute]].{{Sfn|Hawley|2016|p=164}}<ref name=":12" /> He supported the presidential campaign of [[Pat Buchanan]] in 1992, writing that "with Pat Buchanan as our leader, we shall break the clock of [[social democracy]]".<ref>{{cite web |last=Rothbard |first=Murray |title=Strategy for the Right |url=http://archive.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/rothbard219.html |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140313192556/http://archive.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/rothbard219.html |archive-date=March 13, 2014 |access-date=August 14, 2013 |publisher=[[LewRockwell.com]]}} First published in ''The Rothbard-Rockwell Report'', January 1992.</ref> When Buchanan dropped out of the Republican primary race, Rothbard then shifted his interest and support to [[Ross Perot]],<ref>{{cite web |last=Rockwell |first=Llewellyn H. Jr. |author-link=Lew Rockwell |date=April 8, 2005 |title=Still the State's Greatest Living Enemy |url=https://mises.org/daily/1788 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130920065557/http://www.mises.org/daily/1788 |archive-date=September 20, 2013 |access-date=August 13, 2013 |work=Mises Daily |publisher=Ludwig von Mises Institute}}</ref> who Rothbard wrote had "brought an excitement, a verve, a sense of dynamics and of open possibilities to what had threatened to be a dreary race".<ref>Rothbard, Murray (June 1, 1992) [https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1992-06-01-me-286-story.html "Little Texan Connects Big With Masses: Perot is a populist in the content of his views and in the manner of his candidacy"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240417154919/https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1992-06-01-me-286-story.html |date=April 17, 2024 }}, ''[[Los Angeles Times]]''</ref> Rothbard eventually withdrew his support from Perot, and endorsed [[George H. W. Bush]] in the [[1992 United States presidential election|1992 election]].<ref>{{cite news |last=Rothbard |first=Murray |date=July 30, 1992 |title=Hold Back the Hordes for 4 More Years: Any sensible American has one real choice – George Bush |newspaper=Los Angeles Times |url=https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1992-07-30-me-4460-story.html |url-status=live |access-date=February 20, 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171020023729/http://articles.latimes.com/1992-07-30/local/me-4460_1_george-bush |archive-date=October 20, 2017}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |last=Raimondo |first=Justin |author-link=Justin Raimondo |date=October 1, 2012 |title=Race for the White House, 2012: Whom to Root For? |url=http://original.antiwar.com/justin/2012/09/30/race-for-the-white-house-2012-whom-to-root-for/ |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130501141747/http://original.antiwar.com/justin/2012/09/30/race-for-the-white-house-2012-whom-to-root-for/ |archive-date=May 1, 2013 |access-date=August 13, 2013 |publisher=[[Antiwar.com]]}}</ref> Like Buchanan, Rothbard opposed the [[North American Free Trade Agreement]] (NAFTA);<ref>[[Charley Reese|Reese, Charley]] (October 14, 1993) [https://www.orlandosentinel.com/1993/10/14/the-us-standard-of-living-will-decline-if-nafta-is-approved/ "The U.S. Standard Of Living Will Decline If Nafta Is Approved"], ''[[Orlando Sentinel]]''</ref> however, he had become disillusioned with Buchanan by 1995, believing that the latter's "commitment to protectionism was mutating into an all-round faith in economic planning and the nation state".<ref>Lew Rockwell, [http://archive.lewrockwell.com/rockwell/paleoism.html "What I Learned From Paleoism"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200610014040/https://www.lewrockwell.com/2002/05/lew-rockwell/what-i-learned-from-paleoism/|date=June 10, 2020}}, [[LewRockwell.com]], 2002.</ref>

=== Personal life ===
[[File:Murray&Joey.jpg|thumb|left|Rothbard with his wife Joey]]
Joey Rothbard said in a memoriam that her husband had a happy and bright spirit and that Rothbard, a [[Night owl (person)|night owl]], "managed to make a living for 40 years without having to get up before noon. This was important to him." She said Rothbard would begin every day with a phone conversation with his colleague Lew Rockwell: "Gales of laughter would shake the house or apartment, as they checked in with each other. Murray thought it was the best possible way to start a day".<ref>{{cite book |last=Rothbard |first=JoAnn |url=http://library.freecapitalists.org/books/Murray%20N%20Rothbard/memoriam.pdf |title=Murray Rothbard, In Memoriam |publisher=von Mises Institute |location=Auburn, AL |pages=vii–ix |access-date=December 16, 2014 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141220074229/http://library.freecapitalists.org/books/Murray%20N%20Rothbard/memoriam.pdf |archive-date=December 20, 2014 |url-status=dead}}</ref>

Rothbard was irreligious and agnostic about God,<ref>Sciabarra, Chris (2000). ''Total Freedom: Toward a Dialectical Libertarianism'', Penn State Press, 2000. p. 358, {{ISBN|0-27102049-0}}</ref><ref>Vance, Laurence M (March 15, 2011). "Is Libertarianism Compatible with Religion?" Lew Rockwell.</ref> describing himself as a "mixture of an agnostic and a [[Reform Judaism|Reform Jew]]".<ref name="Raimondo2000-67">{{cite book |last=Raimondo |first=Justin |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=YBsyVMg5HToC&pg=PA67 |title=An Enemy of the State: The Life of Murray N. Rothbard |publisher=Prometheus Books |year=2000 |isbn=978-1-61592-239-0 |page=67 |access-date=June 28, 2017 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191016074204/https://books.google.com/books?id=YBsyVMg5HToC&pg=PA67 |archive-date=October 16, 2019 |url-status=live}}</ref> Despite identifying as an agnostic and an [[atheist]], he was critical of the "left-libertarian hostility to religion".<ref>{{cite book |last=Raimondo |first=Justin |title=An Enemy of the State: the Life of Murray N. Rothbard |publisher=Prometheus Books |year=2000 |isbn=978-1-57392809-0 |page=326 |quote=In the same letter, he reiterates his atheism: "On the religion question, we paleolibertarians are not theocrats," he writes. "Obviously, I could not be myself, both as a libertarian and as an atheist." However, he continued, "the left-libertarian hostility to religion, based as it is on ignorance and the bitterness of "aging adolescent rebels against bourgeois America", is "monstrous."}}</ref> In Rothbard's later years, many of his friends anticipated that he would convert to [[Catholicism]], but he never did.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Casey |first1=Gerard |title=Murray Rothbard |publisher=Continuum |year=2010 |isbn=978-1-4411-4209-2 |editor1-last=Meadowcroft |editor1-first=John |series=Major Conservative and Libertarian Thinkers |volume=15 |location=London |page=15 |author-link=Gerard Casey (philosopher)}}</ref>

=== Death ===
Rothbard died of a [[heart attack]] on January 7, 1995, in [[St. Luke's-Roosevelt Hospital Center]] in Manhattan, at the age of 68.<ref name="nytimes"/> ''[[The New York Times]]'' obituary called Rothbard "an economist and social philosopher who fiercely defended individual freedom against government intervention".<ref name="nytimes" /> Lew Rockwell, president of the Mises Institute, told ''The New York Times'' that Rothbard was "the founder of right-wing anarchism".<ref name="nytimes" /> William F. Buckley Jr. wrote a critical obituary in the ''National Review'', criticizing Rothbard's "defective judgment" and views on the [[Cold War]].<ref name="Casey" />{{rp|pages=3–4}} Hoppe, Rockwell, and Rothbard's other colleagues at the Mises Institute took a different view, arguing that he was one of the most important philosophers in history.<ref name="Murray N. Rothbard, In Memoriam">''[http://library.freecapitalists.org/books/Murray%20N%20Rothbard/memoriam.pdf Murray N. Rothbard, In Memoriam] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141220074229/http://library.freecapitalists.org/books/Murray%20N%20Rothbard/memoriam.pdf|date=December 20, 2014}}'', Preface by JoAnn Rothbard, edited by Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr, published by Ludwig von Mises Institute, 1995.</ref>

== Views ==
=== Austrian economics ===
{{Austrian School sidebar|people}}
Rothbard was an advocate and practitioner of the [[Austrian School]] tradition of his teacher [[Ludwig von Mises]]. Like Mises, Rothbard rejected the application of the [[scientific method]] to economics and dismissed [[econometrics]], empirical and statistical analysis, and other tools of mainstream social science as outside the field (economic history might use those tools, but not Economics proper).<ref name="mises.org">Rothbard, Murray (1976). [https://mises.org/rothbard/praxeology.pdf ''Praxeology:  The Methodology of Austrian Economics''] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140731160019/http://mises.org/rothbard/praxeology.pdf |date=July 31, 2014 }}. Mises.org</ref> He instead embraced [[praxeology]], the strictly ''[[A priori and a posteriori|a priori]]'' methodology of Mises. Praxeology conceives of economic laws as akin to geometric or mathematical [[axiom]]s: fixed, unchanging, objective, and discernible through logical reasoning.<ref name="mises.org"/>{{Independent source inline|date=March 2023}}

According to Misesian economist [[Hans-Hermann Hoppe]], eschewing the scientific method and [[empiricism]] distinguishes the Misesian approach "from all other current economic schools", which dismiss the Misesian approach as "dogmatic and unscientific." [[Mark Skousen]] of [[Chapman University]] and the [[Foundation for Economic Education]], a critic of mainstream economics,<ref name="mises">{{cite web|url=https://mises.org/media/2938/Where-Modern-Economics-Went-Wrong|website=mises.org|title=Where Modern Economics Went Wrong|access-date=August 28, 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140916033639/http://mises.org/media/2938/Where-Modern-Economics-Went-Wrong|archive-date=September 16, 2014|url-status=dead}}</ref> praises Rothbard as brilliant, his writing style persuasive, his economic arguments nuanced and logically rigorous and his Misesian methodology sound.<ref name=":3">Mark Skousen. ''[https://books.google.com/books?id=6sisXMv_AecC&pg=PA390 The Making of Modern Economics] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160527151449/https://books.google.com/books?id=6sisXMv_AecC&lpg=PP1&pg=PA390 |date=May 27, 2016 }}'' (M.E. Sharpe, 2009, p. 390). Skousen writes that Rothbard "refused to write for the academic journals."</ref> But Skousen concedes that Rothbard was effectively "outside the discipline" of mainstream economics and that his work "fell on deaf ears" outside his ideological circles. Rothbard wrote extensively on [[Austrian business cycle theory]] and, as part of this approach, strongly opposed [[central banking]], [[fiat money]], and [[fractional-reserve banking]], advocating a [[gold standard]] and a 100% reserve requirement for banks.<ref name="Mystery" />{{rp|pages=89–94, 96–97}}<ref name="Gordon" /><ref name="golddollar">{{cite web |url=https://mises.org/daily/1829 |first=Murray |last=Rothbard |title=The Case for a 100 Percent Gold Dollar |year=1991 |orig-year=1962 |publisher=Ludwig von Mises Institute |access-date=August 13, 2013 |archive-date=August 1, 2013 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130801065845/http://mises.org/daily/1829 |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=http://archive.lewrockwell.com/north/north769.html |title=What Is Money? Part 5: Fractional Reserve Banking |first=Gary |last=North |author-link=Gary North (economist) |publisher=LewRockwell.com |date=October 10, 2009 |access-date=August 13, 2013 |archive-date=March 13, 2014 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140313211006/http://archive.lewrockwell.com/north/north769.html |url-status=live }}</ref>

==== Polemics against mainstream economics ====
Rothbard wrote a series of [[polemic]]s in which he deprecated a number of leading modern economists. He vilified [[Adam Smith]], calling him a "shameless plagiarist"<ref>{{cite book |first=Murray |last=Rothbard |title=An Austrian Perspective on the History of Economic Thought |publisher=Ludwig von Mises Institute |location=Auburn, AL |date=2006 |orig-date=1995 |isbn=0-945466-48-X |volume=1 |page=435}}</ref> who set economics off track, ultimately leading to the rise of [[Marxism]].<ref>{{cite book |first=Murray |last=Rothbard |title=An Austrian Perspective on the History of Economic Thought |publisher=Ludwig von Mises Institute |location=Auburn, AL |date=2006 |orig-date=1995 |isbn=0-945466-48-X |volume=1 |page=453}}</ref> Rothbard praised Smith's contemporaries, including [[Richard Cantillon]], [[Anne Robert Jacques Turgot]] and [[Étienne Bonnot de Condillac]], for developing the [[subjective theory of value]]. In response to Rothbard's charge that Smith's ''[[The Wealth of Nations]]'' was largely plagiarized, [[David D. Friedman]] castigated Rothbard's scholarship and character, saying that he "was [either] deliberately dishonest or never really read the book he was criticizing".<ref>[[Gerard Casey (philosopher)|Casey, Gerard]] (2010). ''Murray Rothbard''. New York: The Continuum International Publishing Group. p. 112. {{ISBN|978-1-4411-4209-2}}.</ref> Tony Endres called Rothbard's treatment of Smith a "travesty".<ref>Tony Endres, review of ''Classical Economics: An Austrian Perspective'', History of Economics Review, http://www.hetsa.org.au/pdf-back/23-RA-7.pdf {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140127064606/http://www.hetsa.org.au/pdf-back/23-RA-7.pdf |date=January 27, 2014 }}</ref>

Rothbard was equally scathing in his criticism of [[John Maynard Keynes]],<ref>[https://mises.org/resources/5223/Keynes-the-Man Keynes the Man] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110902064513/http://mises.org/resources/5223/Keynes-the-Man |date=September 2, 2011 }}, originally published in ''Dissent on Keynes: A Critical Appraisal of Keynesian Economics'', Edited by Mark Skousen. New York: Praeger, 1992, pp. 171–98; Online ed. at The [[Ludwig von Mises Institute]]</ref> calling him weak on economic theory and a shallow political opportunist. Rothbard also wrote more generally that Keynesian-style governmental regulation of money and credit created a "dismal monetary and banking situation". He called [[John Stuart Mill]] a "wooly man of mush" and speculated that Mill's "soft" personality led his economic thought astray.<ref>Gordon, David (1999). [https://mises.org/misesreview_detail.aspx?control=151&sortorder=issue "John Stuart Mill on Liberty and Control."] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140914004452/https://mises.org/misesreview_detail.aspx?control=151&sortorder=issue |date=September 14, 2014 }} The Mises Review</ref> Rothbard was critical of monetarist economist [[Milton Friedman]]. In his polemic "Milton Friedman Unraveled", he called Friedman a "statist", a "favorite of the establishment", a friend of and an "apologist" for [[Richard Nixon]], and a "pernicious influence" on public policy.<ref>Ruger, William (2013). Meadowcroft, John, ed. ''Milton Friedman. Major Conservative and Libertarian Thinkers''. New York: Bloomsbury. p. 174 {{ISBN?}}</ref><ref>Rothbard, Murray (1971). [http://archive.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/rothbard43.html "Milton Friedman Unraveled."] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140313192641/http://archive.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/rothbard43.html |date=March 13, 2014 }} LewRockwell.com</ref> Rothbard said that libertarians should scorn rather than celebrate Friedman's academic prestige and political influence. Noting that Rothbard has "been nasty to me and my work", Friedman responded to Rothbard's criticism by calling him a "cult builder and a dogmatist".<ref>Doherty, Brian (1995). [http://reason.com/archives/1995/06/01/best-of-both-worlds/3 "Best of Both Worlds."] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190405013824/http://reason.com/archives/1995/06/01/best-of-both-worlds/3 |date=April 5, 2019 }} ''Reason''</ref>

In a memorial volume published by the Mises Institute, Rothbard's protégé and libertarian theorist [[Hans-Hermann Hoppe]] wrote that ''[[Man, Economy, and State]]'' "presented a blistering refutation of all variants of mathematical economics" and included it among Rothbard's "almost mind-boggling achievements". Hoppe lamented that, like Mises, Rothbard died without winning the [[Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences|Nobel Prize]] and, while acknowledging that Rothbard and his work were largely ignored by academia, called him an "intellectual giant" comparable to [[Aristotle]], [[John Locke]], and [[Immanuel Kant]].<ref name="Murray Memoriam">{{cite book|last=Rockwell|first=Llewellyn|title=Murray N. Rothbard In Memoriam|year=1995|publisher=Mises Institute|location=Auburn, Alabama|pages=33–37|url=http://library.freecapitalists.org/books/Murray%20N%20Rothbard/memoriam.pdf|access-date=December 16, 2014|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141220074229/http://library.freecapitalists.org/books/Murray%20N%20Rothbard/memoriam.pdf|archive-date=December 20, 2014|url-status=dead}}</ref>

====Disputes with other Austrian economists====
Georgetown Professor [[Randy Barnett]] says, regarding Rothbard's "insistence on complete ideological purity", that "[a]lmost every intellectual who entered his orbit was eventually spun off, or self-emancipated, for some deviation or another. For this reason, the circle around Rothbard was always small."<ref>{{cite book|title=Varieties of Conservatism in America|editor-first=Peter|editor-last=Berkowitz|publisher=Hoover Institution Press|year=2004|last=Barnett|first=Randy E.|chapter=The Moral Foundations of Modern Libertarianism|chapter-url=https://scholarship.law.georgetown.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1860&context=facpub}}</ref> Although he self-identified as an Austrian economist, Rothbard's methodology was at odds with that of many other Austrians. In 1956, Rothbard deprecated the views of Austrian economist [[Fritz Machlup]], stating that Machlup was no praxeologist and calling him instead a "positivist" who failed to represent the views of Ludwig von Mises. Rothbard noted that, in fact, Machlup shared the opposing positivist view associated with economist [[Milton Friedman]].<ref>In "Defense of 'Extreme [[Apriorism]]' Murray N. Rothbard" ''Southern Economic Journal'', January 1957, pp. 314–20</ref> Mises and Machlup had been colleagues in 1920s Vienna before each relocated to the United States, and Mises later urged his American protege [[Israel Kirzner]] to pursue his PhD studies with Machlup at [[Johns Hopkins University]].<ref>{{cite web|last=Kirzner|first=Israel|title=Interview of Israel Kirzner|url=https://www.mises.org/journals/aen/aen17_1_1.asp|publisher=Mises Institute|access-date=June 17, 2013|archive-date=February 10, 2008|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080210215643/http://www.mises.org/journals/aen/aen17_1_1.asp|url-status=live}}</ref>{{Independent source inline|date=April 2023}}

According to libertarian economists [[Tyler Cowen]] and Richard Fink,<ref name=ERE>{{cite journal|last=Tyler Cowen and Richard Fink|title=Inconsistent Equilibrium Constructs: The Evenly Rotating Equilibrium Economy of Mises and Rothbard|journal=American Economic Review|volume=75|issue=4|pages=866–69|year=1985|jstor=1821365}}</ref> Rothbard wrote that the term ''evenly rotating economy'' (ERE) could be used to analyze complexity in a world of change. Mises introduced ERE as an alternative nomenclature for the mainstream economic method of [[static equilibrium]] and [[general equilibrium]] analysis. Cowen and Fink found "serious inconsistencies in both the nature of the ERE and its suggested uses". With the sole exception of Rothbard, no other economist adopted Mises' term, and the concept continued to be called "equilibrium analysis".<ref>{{cite journal|last=Gunning|first=Patrick|title=Mises on the Evenly Rotating Economy|journal=Journal of Austrian Economics|volume=3|issue=3|url=https://mises.org/periodical.aspx?Id=4|date=November 23, 2014|access-date=September 13, 2014|archive-date=September 14, 2014|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140914050526/https://www.mises.org/periodical.aspx?Id=4|url-status=live}}</ref>

In a 2011 article critical of Rothbard's "reflexive opposition" to inflation, ''[[The Economist]]'' noted that his views were increasingly gaining influence among politicians and laypeople on the right. The article contrasted Rothbard's categorical rejection of inflationary policies with the monetary views of "sophisticated Austrian-school monetary economists such as [[George Selgin]] and [[Lawrence H. White]]", [who] follow [[Friedrich Hayek|Hayek]] in treating stability of nominal spending as a monetary ideal—a position "not all that different from [[Scott Sumner|Mr [Scott] Sumner]]'s".<ref>{{Cite news |date=June 22, 2011 |title=Missing Milton Friedman |newspaper=The Economist |url=https://www.economist.com/democracy-in-america/2011/07/22/missing-milton-friedman |access-date=2023-03-12 |issn=0013-0613 |archive-date=March 12, 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230312073452/https://www.economist.com/democracy-in-america/2011/07/22/missing-milton-friedman |url-status=live }}</ref> According to economist [[Peter Boettke]], Rothbard is better described as a [[Property rights (economics)|property rights]] economist than as an Austrian economist. In 1988, Boettke noted that Rothbard "vehemently attacked all of the books of the younger Austrians".<ref name="Boettke Nomos">{{cite journal|last=Boettke|first=Peter|title=Economists and Liberty: Murray N. Rothbard|journal=Nomos|year=1988|pages=29ff|url=https://www.academia.edu/2800511|access-date=November 17, 2013|archive-date=May 3, 2023|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230503213135/https://www.academia.edu/2800511|url-status=live}}</ref>

=== Ethics ===
[[File:Ludwig von Mises.jpg|thumb|upright|[[Ludwig von Mises]]]]
Although Rothbard adopted Ludwig von Mises' [[deductive]] methodology for his social theory and economics,<ref>Grimm, Curtis M.; Hunn, Lee; Smith, Ken G. ''Strategy as Action: Competitive Dynamics and Competitive Advantage''. New York: Oxford University Press. 2006. p. 43 {{ISBN?}}</ref> he parted with Mises on the question of ethics. Specifically, he rejected Mises' conviction that ethical values remain subjective and opposed [[utilitarianism]] in favor of principle-based, [[natural law]] reasoning. In defense of his free-market views, Mises employed utilitarian economic arguments to contend that interventionist policies worsened society. Rothbard countered that interventionist policies do, in fact, benefit some people, including certain government employees and beneficiaries of social programs. Therefore, unlike Mises, Rothbard argued for an objective, natural-law basis for the free market.<ref name="Essential" />{{rp|pages=87–89}} He called this principle "[[self-ownership]]", loosely basing the idea on the writings of [[John Locke]] and also borrowing concepts from [[classical liberalism]] and the anti-imperialism of the [[Old Right (United States)|Old Right]].<ref name="Enemy"/>{{rp|page=134}}

Rothbard accepted the [[labor theory of property]] for [[original appropriation]]<ref>Dominiak, Łukasz. (2017). "Libertarianism and Original Appropriation". Historia i Polityka22: 43‒56.</ref><ref>Dominiak, Łukasz. (2023). Mixing Labor, Taking Possession, and Libertarianism: Response to Walter Block. Studia Z Historii Filozofii, 14(3): 169--195.</ref> but rejected the [[Lockean proviso]], arguing that if an individual mixes his labor with unowned land, then he becomes the proper owner eternally and that after that time, it is private property which may change hands only by trade or gift.<ref>{{cite journal|doi=10.1111/j.1536-7150.2004.00298.x|title=31 Reckoning with Rothbard|year=2004|last1=Kyriazi|first1=Harold|journal=American Journal of Economics and Sociology|volume=63|issue=2|pages=451–84}}</ref> Rothbard was a strong critic of [[egalitarianism]]. The title essay of Rothbard's 1974 book ''[[Egalitarianism as a Revolt Against Nature and Other Essays]]'' held: "Equality is not in the natural order of things, and the crusade to make everyone equal in every respect (except before the law) is certain to have disastrous consequences."<ref>George C. Leef, [http://www.fee.org/the_freeman/detail/egalitarianism-as-a-revolt-against-nature-and-other-essays-by-murray-rothbard-edited-by-david-gordon#axzz2i8c6D5oO "Book Review of ''Egalitarianism as a Revolt Against Nature and Other Essays'' by Murray Rothbard", edited by David Gordon (2000 ed.)] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131019180503/http://www.fee.org/the_freeman/detail/egalitarianism-as-a-revolt-against-nature-and-other-essays-by-murray-rothbard-edited-by-david-gordon#axzz2i8c6D5oO |date=October 19, 2013 }}, ''[[The Freeman]]'', July 2001.</ref> In it, Rothbard wrote: "At the heart of the egalitarian left is the pathological belief that there is no structure of reality; that all the world is a tabula rasa that can be changed at any moment in any desired direction by the mere exercise of human will."<ref>Rothbard, Murray (2003). [http://archive.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/rothbard31.html "Egalitarianism as a Revolt Against Nature and Other Essays"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150618045321/http://archive.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/rothbard31.html |date=June 18, 2015 }}, essay published in full at [[Lewrockwell.com]]. See also Rothbard's essay [https://mises.org/daily/3007 "The Struggle Over Egalitarianism Continues"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140914021835/https://mises.org/daily/3007 |date=September 14, 2014 }}, the 1991 introduction to republication of ''Freedom, Inequality, Primitivism, and the Division of Labor'', [[Ludwig Von Mises Institute]], 2008.</ref> [[Noam Chomsky]] critiqued Rothbard's ideal society as "a world so full of hate that no human being would want to live in it{{nbsp}}... First of all, it couldn't function for a second—and if it could, all you'd want to do is get out, or commit suicide or something."<ref>{{cite book |last1=Schoeffel |first1=John |last2=Chomsky |first2=Noam |title=Understanding Power: The Indispensable Chomsky |date=2011 |publisher=ReadHowYouWant.com |isbn=978-1-4587-8817-7 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=TykKulVqY9UC |language=en |access-date=October 31, 2015 |archive-date=August 6, 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200806062507/https://books.google.com/books?id=TykKulVqY9UC |url-status=live }}</ref> The philosopher James. W. Child has even questioned whether Rothbard and other 
similar libertarians can sustain a standard of fraud.<ref>{{cite journal|last=Child|first=James W|date=July 1994|title=Can libertarianism sustain a fraud standard?|journal=Ethics|volume=104|issue=4|pages=722–738|doi=10.1086/293652 |url=https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/abs/10.1086/293652?journalCode=et|url-access=subscription}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal|last=Ferguson|first=Benjamin|date=July 2018|title=Can Libertarians Get Away with Fraud?|journal=Economics and Philosophy|volume=34|issue=2|pages=165–184|doi=10.1017/S0266267117000311 |doi-access=free}}</ref>

=== Anarcho-capitalism ===
{{anarcho-capitalism sidebar|people}}
According to [[anarcho-capitalist]]s, various theorists have espoused legal philosophies similar to [[anarcho-capitalism]]; however, Rothbard was credited with coining the terms "anarcho-capitalist" and "anarch-capitalism" in 1971 (though "anarchocapitalism [sic]" had been attested earliest in [[Karl Hess]]'s 1969 essay ''The Death of Politics''<ref name = "HessDoP">{{cite web|url= http://fare.tunes.org/books/Hess/dop.html|title= The Death of Politics|last= Hess|first= Karl|orig-date= March 1969|date= 2003|website= Faré's Home Page|publisher= Playboy|access-date= 9 October 2023|quote= Laissez-faire capitalism, or '''anarchocapitalism''' [sic], is simply the economic form of the libertarian ethic. Laissez-faire capitalism encompasses the notion that men should exchange goods and services, without regulation, solely on the basis of value for value. It recognizes charity and communal enterprises as voluntary versions of this same ethic. Such a system would be straight barter, except for the widely felt need for a division of labor in which men, voluntarily, accept value tokens such as cash and credit. Economically, this system is anarchy, and proudly so.|archive-date= August 2, 2019|archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20190802164945/http://fare.tunes.org/books/Hess/dop.html|url-status= live}}</ref><ref name = "Johnson2015">{{cite web|url= https://c4ss.org/content/39997|title= Karl Hess on Anarcho-Capitalism|last= Johnson|first= Charles|date= 28 August 2015|website= Center for a Stateless Society|access-date= 9 October 2023|quote= In fact, the earliest documented, printed use of the word "anarcho-capitalism" that I can find [...] actually comes neither from Wollstein nor from Rothbard, but from Karl Hess's manifesto "The Death of Politics," which was published in ''Playboy'' in March, 1969.]|archive-date= October 4, 2023|archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20231004131548/https://c4ss.org/content/39997|url-status= live}}</ref>{{Self-published inline|date=November 2023}}).<ref name = "Leeson">{{cite book |last=Leeson |first=Robert |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=_pQ4DwAAQBAJ&pg=PA180 |title=Hayek: A Collaborative Biography, Part IX: The Divine Right of the 'Free' Market |publisher=Springer |year=2017 |isbn=978-3-319-60708-5 |page=180 |quote=To the original 'anarchocapitalist' (Rothbard coined the term) [...]. |access-date=November 27, 2023 |archive-date=April 25, 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230425065230/https://books.google.com/books?id=_pQ4DwAAQBAJ&pg=PA180 |url-status=live }}</ref><ref name = "Flood2010">Flood, Anthony (2010). [http://anthonyflood.com/rothbardknowyourrights.htm Untitled preface to Rothbard's "Know Your Rights"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110811135031/http://anthonyflood.com/rothbardknowyourrights.htm |date=August 11, 2011 }}, originally published in ''WIN: Peace and Freedom through Nonviolent Action'', Volume 7, No. 4, 1 March 1971, 6–10. Flood's quote: "Rothbard's neologism, 'anarchocapitalism,' probably makes its first appearance in print here."</ref>{{Self-published inline|date=November 2023}} He synthesized elements from the Austrian School of economics, [[classical liberalism]] and 19th-century American [[individualist anarchist]]s into a right-wing form of anarchism.<ref>''Blackwell Encyclopaedia of Political Thought'', 1987, {{ISBN|978-0-631-17944-3}}, p. 290; quote: "A student and disciple of the Austrian economist Ludwig von Mises, Rothbard combined the laissez-faire economics of his teacher with the absolutist views of human rights and rejection of the state he had absorbed from studying the individualist American anarchists of the 19th century such as Lysander Spooner and Benjamin Tucker."</ref><ref>{{Cite book|last=Robert Leeson|title=Hayek: A Collaborative Biography, Part IX: The Divine Right of the 'Free' Market|publisher=Springer|year=2017|isbn=978-3-319-60708-5|page=180|quote=To the original 'anarchocapitalist' (Rothbard coined the term) [...].}}</ref><ref name=":11" /> According to his protégé [[Hans-Hermann Hoppe]], "[t]here would be no [[anarcho-capitalist]] movement to speak of without Rothbard".<ref name="H-H Hoppe">{{cite web |last=Hoppe |first=Hans-Hermann |author-link=Hans-Hermann Hoppe |date=December 31, 2001 |title=Anarcho-Capitalism: An Annotated Bibliography |url=http://archive.lewrockwell.com/hoppe/hoppe5.html |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140111070712/http://archive.lewrockwell.com/hoppe/hoppe5.html |archive-date=January 11, 2014 |access-date=June 2, 2013}}</ref> [[Lew Rockwell]] in a memoriam called Rothbard the "conscience" of all the various strains of what he described as "libertarian anarchism", and said their advocates had often been personally inspired by his example.<ref>Rockwell, Llewellyn (1995).  [http://library.freecapitalists.org/books/Murray%20N%20Rothbard/memoriam.pdf "Murray N. Rothbard: In Memoriam."] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141220074229/http://library.freecapitalists.org/books/Murray%20N%20Rothbard/memoriam.pdf |date=December 20, 2014 }} p. 117</ref>

During his years at graduate school in the late 1940s, Rothbard considered whether strict adherence to libertarian and ''[[laissez-faire]]'' principles required the abolition of the state altogether. He visited [[Baldy Harper]], a founder of the [[Foundation for Economic Education]],<ref name="The Encyclopedia of Libertarianism by Hamowy">{{cite book|editor=[[Ronald Hamowy]]|title=The Encyclopedia of Libertarianism|date= 2008|publisher=Sage|location=Thousand Oaks, CA|isbn=978-1-4129-6580-4|page=623|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=yxNgXs3TkJYC&q=libertarian+encyclopedia|access-date=November 4, 2020|archive-date=April 15, 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210415022033/https://books.google.com/books?id=yxNgXs3TkJYC&q=libertarian+encyclopedia|url-status=live}}{{Cite news | last = Rothbard | first = Murray N.| title = Floyd Arthur 'Baldy' Harper, RIP | work = Mises Daily | date = August 17, 2007 }}</ref> who doubted the need for any government whatsoever. Rothbard said that during this period, he was influenced by 19th-century [[American individualist anarchists]] like [[Lysander Spooner]] and [[Benjamin Tucker]] and the Belgian economist [[Gustave de Molinari]] who wrote about how such a system could work.<ref name="Essential"/>{{rp|pages=12–13}} Thus, he "combined the ''laissez-faire'' economics of Mises with the absolutist views of human rights and rejection of the state" from individualist anarchists.<ref name="Miller">{{cite book|title=Blackwell Encyclopaedia of Political Thought|publisher=[[Blackwell Publishing]]|year=1991|isbn=978-0-631-17944-3|editor-last=Miller|editor-first=David|editor-link=David Miller (political theorist)|page=290}}</ref> [[Edward Stringham]] opined that: "In the late 1940s, Murray Rothbard decided that that [sic] private-property anarchism was the logical conclusion of free-market thinking [...]."<ref name = "Stringham2007">{{cite book|last= Stringham|first= Edward Peter|year= 2007|title= Anarchy and the Law: The Political Economy of Choice|chapter= Chapter 1: Introduction|chapter-url= https://deliverypdf.ssrn.com/delivery.php?ID=241124005024104084119023003122010066007003009040033092067067101077117023028084030102114017055054029044016124100023087125120022008000007082048031117095082018065072020041095026023125102088018095067108021106075117108123010108108003084003077099006003082&EXT=pdf&INDEX=TRUE|page= 3|location= New Brunswick, NJ|publisher= Transaction Publishers}}{{Dead link|date=September 2025 |bot=InternetArchiveBot }}</ref>

Rothbard began to consider himself a "private property anarchist"{{citation needed|date=November 2023}} and published works about private property anarchism in 1954;<ref name = "Stringham2007"/> later, in 1971, he began to use "[[anarcho-capitalist]]" to describe his political ideology.<ref name = "Flood2010"/><ref name="Crocetta">Roberta Modugno Crocetta, [https://mises.org/journals/scholar/roberta.pdf Murray Rothbard's anarcho-capitalism in the contemporary debate. A critical defense] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121110173459/http://mises.org/journals/scholar/roberta.pdf |date=November 10, 2012 }}, [[Ludwig Von Mises Institute]].</ref><ref name="Exclusive Interview">{{cite journal|last=Oliver|first=Michael|title=Exclusive Interview With Murray Rothbard|journal=The New Banner: A Fortnightly Libertarian Journal|date=February 25, 1972|url=http://archive.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/rothbard103.html|quote=Capitalism is the fullest expression of anarchism, and anarchism is the fullest expression of capitalism.|access-date=February 2, 2016|archive-date=June 18, 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150618045309/http://archive.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/rothbard103.html|url-status=live}}</ref> In his anarcho-capitalist model, the system of private property is upheld by private firms, such as hypothesized protection agencies, which compete in a free market and are voluntarily supported by consumers who choose to use their protective and judicial services. Anarcho-capitalists describe this as "the end of the state [[monopoly on force]]".<ref name="Crocetta"/> In this way, Rothbard differed from Mises, who favored a state to uphold markets.<ref name=":11">{{Cite journal |last=Jensen |first=Jacob |date=April 2022 |title=Repurposing Mises: Murray Rothbard and the Birth of Anarchocapitalism |url=https://muse.jhu.edu/article/855169 |journal=Journal of the History of Ideas |language=en |volume=83 |issue=2 |pages=315–32 |doi=10.1353/jhi.2022.0015 |pmid=35603616 |s2cid=248985277 |issn=1086-3222 |access-date=April 17, 2023 |archive-date=July 12, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220712160927/https://muse.jhu.edu/article/855169 |url-status=live |url-access=subscription }}</ref>

In an unpublished article, Rothbard wrote that economically speaking, [[individualist anarchism]] differs from anarcho-capitalism and jokingly pondered whether libertarians should adopt the term nonarchist. Rothbard concluded the article by affirming that he is neither an anarchist nor an "artist" but a middle-of-the-roader on the archy question.<ref name="Are Libertarians 'Anarchists'">Rothbard, Murray (1950s). [http://archive.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/rothbard167.html "Are Libertarians 'Anarchists'?"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170113130534/http://archive.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/rothbard167.html |date=January 13, 2017 }} Lew Rockwell.com. Retrieved September 4, 2020.</ref>{{Independent source inline|date=March 2023}} In ''Man, Economy, and State'', Rothbard divides the various kinds of state intervention into three categories: "autistic intervention" (interference with private non-economic activities), "binary intervention", (exchange between individuals and the state); and "triangular intervention" (state-mandated exchange between individuals). Sanford Ikeda wrote that Rothbard's typology "eliminates the gaps and inconsistencies that appear in Mises's original formulation".<ref>Ikeda, Sanford, ''Dynamics of the Mixed Economy: Toward a Theory of Interventionism'', Routledge UK, 1997, p. 245.</ref><ref>Rothbard, Murray. [https://mises.org/rothbard/mes/chap14.asp Chapter 2 "Fundamentals of Intervention"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140914010730/https://mises.org/rothbard/mes/chap14.asp |date=September 14, 2014 }} from ''Man, Economy and State'', [[Ludwig von Mises Institute]].</ref> Rothbard writes in ''[[Power and Market]]'' that the role of the economist in a free market is limited, but it is much larger in a government that solicits economic policy recommendations. Rothbard argues that self-interest, therefore, prejudices the views of many economists in favor of increased government intervention.<ref>Peter G. Klein, [https://www.mises.org/story/2318 "Why Intellectuals Still Support Socialism"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090430203330/http://mises.org/story/2318 |date=April 30, 2009 }}, [[Ludwig von Mises Institute]], November 15, 2006</ref><ref>[https://www.mises.org/rothbard/mes/chap19.asp ''Man, Economy, and State'', Chapter 7 – Conclusion: Economics and Public Policy] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140914010150/https://www.mises.org/rothbard/mes/chap19.asp |date=September 14, 2014 }}, [[Ludwig Von Mises Institute]].</ref>

=== Race, gender, and civil rights ===
Michael O'Malley, associate professor of history at [[George Mason University]], describes Rothbard's tone toward the [[civil rights movement]] and the [[women's suffrage]] movement as "contemptuous and hostile".<ref name=":5">O'Malley, Michael (2012). ''Face Value: The Entwined Histories of Money and Race in America.'' Chicago, Illinois: University of Chicago Press. pp. 205–07</ref> Rothbard criticized women's rights activists, attributing the growth of the [[welfare state]] to politically active [[spinster]]s "whose busybody inclinations were not fettered by the responsibilities of home and hearth".<ref>{{cite book |last=Rothbard |first=Murray |year=2017 |title=The Progressive Era |url=https://mises.org/library/book/progressive-era |publisher=[[Ludwig von Mises Institute]] |location=Auburn, AL |pages=332 |isbn=978-1610166744 |access-date=August 19, 2024 |archive-date=October 23, 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201023131723/https://cdn.mises.org/The%20Progressive%20Era_0.pdf |url-status=live }}</ref> Rothbard argued that varieties of [[progressivism]] during the [[Progressive Era]] and after, which he regarded as a noxious influence on the United States, was spearheaded by a coalition of Yankee Protestants (people from the six [[New England]] states and [[upstate New York]] who were [[Protestants]] of [[English-Americans|English descent]]), Jewish women and "lesbian spinsters".<ref>Murray N. Rothbard (August 11, 2006). [https://mises.org/daily/2225 "Origins of the Welfare State in America"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141011063900/http://mises.org/daily/2225 |date=October 11, 2014 }}. ''mises.org''.</ref>

Rothbard, still on the theme of [[feminism]], wrote that "too many American men live in a matriarchy, dominated first by Momism, then by female teachers, and then by their wives", and that women were advantaged because they were supported by their husbands.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Rothbard |first=Murray Newton |date=May 1970 |title=The Great Women's Liberation Issue: Setting It Straight |url=https://www.rothbard.it/articles/women-liberation.pdf |publisher=Individualist}}</ref>  Rothbard's negative view of feminism can also be found in the 1991 article ''The Great Thomas & Hill Show: Stopping The Monstrous Regiment'', where he wrote "At the risk of alienating my atheist libertarian friends, I think it increasingly clear that conservatives are right: that some religion is going to be dominant in every society. And that if Christianity, for example, is scorned and tossed out, some horrendous form of religion is going to take its place: whether it be Communism, New Age occultism, feminism, or Left-Puritanism. There is no getting around this basic truth of human nature."<ref>{{Cite web |last=Rothbard |first=Murray Newton |date=December 1991 |title=THE GREAT THOMAS & HILL SHOW: STOPPING THE MONSTROUS REGIMENT |url=https://archive.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/ir/Ch69.html |website=archive.lewrockwell.com}}</ref>

Rothbard called for the elimination of "the entire 'civil rights' structure," which he said "tramples on the property rights of every American." He consistently favored repeal of the [[1964 Civil Rights Act]], including Title VII regarding employment discrimination,<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://archive.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/ir/Ch69.html|title=The Great Thomas & Hill Show: Stopping the Monstrous Regiment|website=archive.lewrockwell.com|access-date=July 31, 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170418134336/https://archive.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/ir/Ch69.html|archive-date=April 18, 2017|url-status=dead}}</ref> and called for overturning the ''[[Brown v. Board of Education]]'' decision on the grounds that state-mandated integration of schools violated libertarian principles.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.lewrockwell.com/2015/11/lew-rockwell/open-borders-assault-private-property/|title=Open Borders Are an Assault on Private Property – LewRockwell LewRockwell.com|access-date=July 31, 2016|archive-date=June 4, 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160604161028/https://www.lewrockwell.com/2015/11/lew-rockwell/open-borders-assault-private-property/|url-status=live}}</ref> In an essay called "Right-wing Populism", Rothbard proposed a set of measures to "reach out" to the "middle and working classes", which included urging the police to crack down on "street criminals", writing that "cops must be unleashed" and "allowed to administer instant punishment, subject of course to liability when they are in error". He also advocated that the police "clear the streets of bums and vagrants."<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://archive.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/ir/Ch5.html|title=Right-Wing Populism|website=archive.lewrockwell.com|access-date=July 31, 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160524131828/http://archive.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/ir/Ch5.html|archive-date=May 24, 2016|url-status=dead}}</ref><ref name=":15">{{Cite book |last=Massimino |first=Cory |title=Routledge handbook of anarchy and anarchist thought |date=2021 |publisher=Routledge, Taylor & Francis group |isbn=978-1-138-73758-7 |editor-last=Chartier |editor-first=Gary |series=Routledge handbooks |location=London |chapter=Two cheers for Rothbardianism |editor-last2=Van Schoelandt |editor-first2=Chad}}</ref>

Rothbard held strong opinions about many leaders of the civil rights movement. He considered black separatist [[Malcolm X]] to be a "great black leader" and integrationist [[Martin Luther King Jr.]] to be favored by whites because he "was the major restraining force on the developing Negro revolution".<ref name="Enemy" />{{rp|page=167}} Jacob Jensen writes that Rothbard's commentary from the 1960s, approving of both "black power" and "white power" in separated communities, amounted to support for [[racial segregation]].{{Sfn|Jensen|2022|p=325–326}} In 1993, Rothbard rejected the vision of a "separate black nation", asking, "Does anyone really believe that ... New Africa would be content to strike out on its own, with no massive "foreign aid" from the U.S.A.?"<ref>Rothbard, Murray N. (February 1993). [http://archive.lewrockwell.com/1970/01/murray-n-rothbard/their-malcolm-and-mine/ "Their Malcolm ... and Mine."] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220330013408/http://archive.lewrockwell.com/1970/01/murray-n-rothbard/their-malcolm-and-mine/ |date=March 30, 2022 }} LewRockwell.com</ref> Rothbard also suggested that opposition to Martin Luther King Jr., whom he demeaned as a "coercive integrationist", should be a litmus test for members of his "[[paleolibertarian]]" political movement.<ref>Rothbard, Murray (November 1994). [http://archive.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/ir/Ch16.html "Big-Government Libertarians."] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170131223653/http://archive.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/ir/Ch16.html |date=January 31, 2017 }} ''LewRockwell.com''</ref>

Rothbard is described by the historian John P. Jackson Jr. as espousing [[antisemitism]] despite Rothbard's own background as a secular Jew.<ref name=":7" /> One former student described Rothbard as privately using the anti-Jewish slur "[[kike]]s" repeatedly.<ref name=":7" /> Rothbard also befriended the [[Holocaust denial|Holocaust deniers]] [[Willis Carto]] and [[Harry Elmer Barnes]].<ref name=":7">{{cite journal | url=https://muse.jhu.edu/article/804147 | title=The Pre-History of American Holocaust Denial | journal=American Jewish History | year=2021 | volume=105 | issue=1 | pages=25–48 | last1=Jackson | first1=John P. Jr | doi=10.1353/ajh.2021.0002 | s2cid=239763082 | access-date=October 23, 2022 | archive-date=September 4, 2021 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210904004649/https://muse.jhu.edu/article/804147 | url-status=live | url-access=subscription }}</ref>

=== Views on war ===
Like [[Randolph Bourne]], Rothbard believed that "war is the health of the state". According to David Gordon, this was the reason for Rothbard's opposition to aggressive [[foreign policy]].<ref name="Gordon"/> Rothbard believed that stopping new wars was necessary and that knowing how the government had led citizens into earlier wars was important. Two essays expanded on these views: "War, Peace, and the State" and "Anatomy of the State". Rothbard used insights from [[Vilfredo Pareto]], [[Gaetano Mosca]], and [[Robert Michels]] to build a model of state personnel, goals, and ideology.<ref>{{cite web |first=Joseph R. |last=Stromberg |url=http://antiwar.com/stromberg/?articleid=4296 |title=Murray Rothbard on States, War, and Peace: Part I |date=January 10, 2005 |publisher=[[Antiwar.com]] |orig-year=first published June 12, 2000 |access-date=May 1, 2009 |archive-date=August 23, 2011 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110823091728/http://antiwar.com/stromberg/?articleid=4296 |url-status=live }} Also see [http://www.antiwar.com/stromberg/?articleid=4420 Part II] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090417215914/http://antiwar.com/stromberg/?articleid=4420 |date=April 17, 2009 }}, originally published June 20, 2000.</ref><ref>See both essays: Rothbard, Murray. [http://www.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/rothbard26.html "War, Peace, and the State"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130515223625/http://www.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/rothbard26.html |date=May 15, 2013 }}, first published 1963; [http://www.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/rothbard62.html "Anatomy of the State"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120908063653/http://www.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/rothbard62.html |date=September 8, 2012 }}, first published 1974.</ref>{{Independent source inline|date=March 2023}}

Rothbard's colleague Joseph Stromberg notes that Rothbard made two exceptions to his general condemnation of war: "the [[American Revolution]] and the [[Historical negationism#United States history|War for Southern Independence]], as [[Lost Cause of the Confederacy|viewed from the Confederate side]]", referring to the [[American Civil War]].<ref>Stromberg, Joseph (June 12, 2000). [http://antiwar.com/stromberg/?articleid=4296 "Murray N. Rothbard on States, War, and Peace: Part I."] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110823091728/http://antiwar.com/stromberg/?articleid=4296 |date=August 23, 2011 }} Antiwar.com</ref> Rothbard condemned the "[[Names of the American Civil War|Northern war]] against slavery", saying it was inspired by "fanatical" religious faith and characterized by "a cheerful willingness to uproot institutions, to commit mayhem and mass murder, to plunder and loot and destroy, all in the name of high moral principle".<ref>Rothbard, Murray (1991). [http://www.lewrockwell.com/1970/01/murray-n-rothbard/whats-a-just-war/ "Just War."] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130713063612/http://www.lewrockwell.com/1970/01/murray-n-rothbard/whats-a-just-war/ |date=July 13, 2013 }} [[LewRockwell.com]]</ref><ref>Denson, J. (1997). ''[https://books.google.com/books?id=0MJCDZBbxJcC Costs of War: America's Pyrrhic Victories] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160527101804/https://books.google.com/books/about/Costs_of_War.html?id=0MJCDZBbxJcC |date=May 27, 2016 }}''. (pp. 119–33). New Brunswick, New Jersey: Transaction Publishers.</ref><ref>[[Dilorenzo, Thomas]] (January 28, 2006). [http://www.lewrockwell.com/lrc-blog/more-from-rothbard-on-war-religion-and-the-state/ "More from Rothbard on War, Religion, and the State."] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140203050801/http://www.lewrockwell.com/lrc-blog/more-from-rothbard-on-war-religion-and-the-state/ |date=February 3, 2014 }} LewRockwell.com</ref> He celebrated [[Jefferson Davis]], [[Robert E. Lee]], and other prominent Confederates as heroes while denouncing [[Abraham Lincoln]], [[Ulysses S. Grant]], and other Union leaders, who he said had "opened the Pandora's Box of genocide and the extermination of civilians".<ref name="Denson1999">{{cite book|last=Denson|first=John V.|title=The Costs of War: America's Pyrrhic Victories|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=aSOZAwAAQBAJ&pg=PA133|year=1999|publisher=Transaction Publishers|isbn=978-0-7658-0487-7|page=133|access-date=June 28, 2017|archive-date=October 16, 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191016074010/https://books.google.com/books?id=aSOZAwAAQBAJ&pg=PA133|url-status=live}}</ref><ref name="Barr2014">{{cite book|last=Barr|first=John McKee|title=Loathing Lincoln: An American Tradition from the Civil War to the Present|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=gvPpAgAAQBAJ&pg=PA265|date= 2014|publisher=LSU Press|isbn=978-0-8071-5384-0|page=265|access-date=June 28, 2017|archive-date=October 16, 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191016074127/https://books.google.com/books?id=gvPpAgAAQBAJ&pg=PA265|url-status=live}}</ref> Rothbard saw [[secession]] movements as a tool for undermining and disintegrating the state, according to historian [[Quinn Slobodian]], who wrote that "Rothbard's life was marked by a search for signs of potential secession" and that "When he found them, he did his best to deepen them."<ref name=":14" />

=== Historical revisionism ===
Rothbard embraced "[[historical revisionism]]" as an antidote to what he perceived to be the dominant influence exerted by corrupt "court intellectuals" over mainstream historical narratives.<ref name=":7" /><ref name="Enemy" />{{rp|pages=15, 62, 141}}<ref name=":0">Rothbard, Murray (February 1976). [https://mises.org/daily/1541/ "The Case for Revisionism."] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140914001700/https://mises.org/daily/1541/ |date=September 14, 2014 }} Mises.org</ref> His friend [[Harry Elmer Barnes]], the Holocaust-denying historian, used similar language, "court historians".<ref name=":7" /> Rothbard wrote that these mainstream intellectuals distorted the historical record in favor of "the state" in exchange for "wealth, power, and prestige" from the state.<ref name="Enemy" />{{rp|page=15}} Rothbard characterized the revisionist task as "penetrating the fog of lies and deception of the State and its Court Intellectuals, and to present to the public the true history".<ref name=":0" />

Rothbard worked with antisemitic writers in developing an isolationist revisionist history of [[World War II]].<ref name=":7" /> He was influenced by and called a champion of Barnes.<ref name=":0" /><ref name=":16">{{cite encyclopedia |editor1-first=Bertrand |editor1-last=Badie |editor2-first=Dirk |editor2-last=Berg-Schlosser |editor3-first=Leonardo |editor3-last=Morlino |encyclopedia=International Encyclopedia of Political Science |volume=1 |title=Revisionism |publisher=Sage |date=2011 |page=[https://books.google.com/books?id=t0JZp-jrotQC&dq=Murray+rothbard+historical+revisionism&pg=PA2310 2310] |isbn=978-1-4129-5963-6}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last=Raimondo |first=Justin |title=An Enemy of the State: The Life of Murray N. Rothbard |publisher=Prometheus Books |year=2000 |isbn=978-1-61592-239-0 |location=Amherst, NY |pages=15, 62, 141 |oclc=43541222 |author-link=Justin Raimondo}} Raimondo describes Rothbard as a "champion of Henry Elmer Barnes, the dean of world-war revisionism".</ref> Rothbard favorably cited Barnes' view that "the murder of Germans and Japanese was the overriding aim of World War II".{{citation needed|date=December 2023}} In an obituary for Barnes, Rothbard wrote: "Our entry into World War II was the crucial act in foisting a permanent militarization upon the economy and society, in bringing to the country a permanent garrison state, an overweening military–industrial complex, a permanent system of conscription. It was the crucial act in creating a mixed economy run by Big Government, a system of [[state monopoly capitalism]] run by the central government in collaboration with Big Business and Big Unionism."<ref name="Barnes RIP">{{cite web |last=Rothbard |first=Murray N. |year=2007 |title=Harry Elmer Barnes, RIP |url=http://www.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/rothbard165.html |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121017030255/http://www.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/rothbard165.html |archive-date=October 17, 2012 |access-date=April 3, 2009 |publisher=Ludwig von Mises Institute |orig-year=1968}} Article originally appeared in ''[[Left and Right: A Journal of Libertarian Thought]]''.</ref> Besides broadly supporting his historical views, Rothbard promoted Barnes as an influence for future revisionists.<ref name=":1">Rothbard, Murray (1968). 
[https://web.archive.org/web/20180903114940/https://www.lewrockwell.com/1970/01/murray-n-rothbard/cold-war-myths/ "Harry Elmer Barnes as Revisionist of the Cold War."] In: ''Harry Elmer Barnes: Learned Crusader'', edited by A.E. Goddard. Colorado Springs: Ralph Myles. Archived from [https://www.lewrockwell.com/1970/01/murray-n-rothbard/cold-war-myths/ the original.]</ref>

Rothbard's endorsement of World War II revisionism and his association with Barnes and other Holocaust deniers have drawn criticism. [[Kevin D. Williamson]] wrote an opinion piece published by ''[[National Review]]'' which condemned Rothbard for "making common cause with the 'revisionist' historians of the [[Third Reich]]", a term he used to describe American Holocaust deniers associated with Rothbard, such as [[James J. Martin (historian)|James J. Martin]] of the [[Institute for Historical Review]]. The piece also characterized "Rothbard and his faction" as being "culpably indulgent" of [[Holocaust denial]], the view which "specifically denies that the Holocaust actually happened or holds that it was in some way exaggerated".<ref name=":17">[[Kevin D. Williamson|Williamson, Kevin D]]. (January 23, 2012). [http://www.nationalreview.com/nrd/articles/293707/courting-cranks/page/0/3?cb=1 "Courting the Cranks."]''[[National Review]]'', January 2013 ed., p. 4 {{Subscription required}} {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171020023729/http://www.nationalreview.com/nrd/articles/293707/courting-cranks/page/0/3?cb=1 |date=October 20, 2017 }}</ref> In an article for Rothbard's 50th birthday, Rothbard's friend and [[Buffalo State College]] historian [[Ralph Raico]] stated that Rothbard "is the main reason that revisionism has become a crucial part of the whole libertarian position".<ref>{{cite web|last=Raico|first=Ralph|title=Rothbard at his Semi-Centennial|url=https://mises.org/daily/4436/Murray-Rothbard-at-His-Semicentennial|publisher=Mises Institute|access-date=November 15, 2013|date=May 23, 2010|archive-date=November 10, 2013|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131110032255/http://mises.org/daily/4436/Murray-Rothbard-at-His-Semicentennial|url-status=live}}</ref>

=== Middle East conflict ===
Rothbard's ''[[The Libertarian Forum]]'' blamed the Middle East conflict on Israeli aggression "fueled by American arms and money". Rothbard warned that the Middle East conflict would draw the United States into a world war. He was [[anti-Zionist]] and opposed United States involvement in the Middle East. Rothbard said the [[Camp David Accords]] betrayed Palestinian aspirations and opposed [[1982 Lebanon War|Israel's 1982 invasion of Lebanon.]]<ref>{{cite book |last=Perry |first=Marvin |title=The Conservative Press in Twentieth-Century America |publisher=Greenwood Publishing Group |year=1999 |isbn=978-0-313-21390-8 |editor1-last=Lora |editor1-first=Ronald |page=[https://books.google.com/books?id=Ioakmq8yxA4C&pg=PA372 372] |chapter=''Libertarian Forum'' 1969–1986 |editor2-last=Longton |editor2-first=William Henry}}</ref>

In his essay, "War Guilt in the Middle East", Rothbard wrote that Israel refused "to let these refugees return and reclaim the property taken from them," <ref>{{cite journal |last=Rothbard |first=Murray N. |date=Autumn 1967 |title=War Guilt in the Middle East |url=https://mises.org/journals/lar/pdfs/3_3/3_3_4.pdf |url-status=live |journal=Left and Right |volume=3 |issue=3 |pages=20–30 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131012124114/http://www.mises.org/journals/lar/pdfs/3_3/3_3_4.pdf |archive-date=October 12, 2013 |access-date=September 13, 2014}} Reprinted in {{cite book |last=Rothbard |first=Murray N. |title=Left and Right: A Journal of Libertarian Thought (The Complete Edition, 1965–1968) |publisher=Ludwig von Mises Institute |year=2007 |isbn=978-1-61016-040-7 |location=Auburn, AL |oclc=741754456}}</ref> and took negative views of a [[two-state solution]] for the [[Israeli–Palestinian conflict]]. He wrote: "On the one hand there are the Palestinian Arabs, who have tilled the soil or otherwise used the land of Palestine for centuries; and on the other, there are a group of external fanatics, who come from all over the world, and who claim the entire land area as 'given' to them as a collective religion or tribe at some remote or legendary time in the past. There is no way the two claims can be resolved to the satisfaction of both parties. There can be no genuine settlement, no 'peace' in the face of this irrepressible conflict; there can only be either a war to the death, or an uneasy practical compromise which can satisfy no one."<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Rothbard |first1=Murray N. |date=April 1994 |title=The Vital Importance of Separation |journal=The Rothbard-Rockwell Report}}</ref>

=== Children's rights and parental obligations ===
In the ''[[The Ethics of Liberty|Ethics of Liberty]]'', Rothbard explores issues regarding [[children's rights]] regarding self-ownership and contract.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.l4l.org/library/chilroth.html |title=Children's Rights versus Murray Rothbard's ''The Ethics of Liberty'' |first=John |last=Walker |year=1991 |publisher=[[Libertarians for Life]] |access-date=August 13, 2013 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120910134053/http://www.l4l.org/library/chilroth.html |archive-date=September 10, 2012 |url-status=dead }}</ref> These include support for a woman's right to abortion, condemnation of parents showing aggression towards children and opposition to the state forcing parents to care for children. He also holds children have the right to [[Runaway (dependent)|run away]] from parents and seek new guardians as soon as they are able to choose to do so. He argued that parents have the right to put a child out for [[adoption]] or sell the rights to the child in a voluntary contract in what Rothbard suggests will be a "flourishing free market in children". He believes that [[Child-selling|selling children]] as consumer goods in accord with market forces—while "superficially monstrous"—will benefit "everyone" involved in the market: "the natural parents, the children, and the foster parents purchasing".<ref name="Children and Rights">{{cite book|author=Murray N Rothbard|title=The Ethics of Liberty|chapter=14 'Children and Rights'|isbn=978-0814775592|year=1982|publisher=LvMI|chapter-url-access=registration|chapter-url=https://archive.org/details/ethicsofliberty00roth}}</ref><ref>See also: [[Ronald Hamowy|Hamowy, Ronald]] (editor) (2008). [https://books.google.com/books?id=yxNgXs3TkJYC ''The Encyclopedia of Libertarianism''] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230109234738/https://books.google.com/books?id=yxNgXs3TkJYC |date=2023 }}, [[Cato Institute]], Sage, pp. 59–61, {{ISBN|978-1-4129-6580-4}} {{OCLC|233969448}}</ref>

In Rothbard's view of parenthood, "the parent should not have a legal obligation to feed, clothe, or educate his children, since such obligations would entail positive acts coerced upon the parent and depriving the parent of his rights."<ref name="Children and Rights"/> Thus, Rothbard stated that parents should have the legal right to let any infant die by starvation and should be free to engage in other forms of [[child neglect]]. However, according to Rothbard, "the purely free society will have a flourishing free market in children". In a fully libertarian society, he wrote, "the existence of a free baby market will bring such 'neglect' down to a minimum".<ref name="Children and Rights"/> Economist Gene Callahan of [[Cardiff University]], formerly a scholar at the Rothbard-affiliated Mises Institute, wrote that Rothbard allowed "the logical elegance of his legal theory" to "trump any arguments based on the moral reprehensibility of a parent idly watching her six-month-old child slowly starve to death in its crib".<ref name="Callahan">{{cite journal |last=Callahan |first=Gene |date=February 2013 |title=Liberty versus Libertarianism |journal=[[Politics, Philosophy & Economics (journal)|Politics, Philosophy & Economics]] |volume=12 |issue=1 |pages=48–67 |doi=10.1177/1470594X11433739 |s2cid=144062406 |issn=1470-594X |oclc=828009007}}</ref>

=== Retributive theory of criminal justice ===
In ''The Ethics of Liberty'', Rothbard advocates for a "frankly [[Retributive justice|retributive]] theory of punishment" or a system of "a tooth (or two teeth) for a tooth".<ref>{{cite book |chapter-url=https://mises.org/rothbard/ethics/thirteen.asp |chapter=Punishment and Proportionality |pages=85–97 |author=Rothbard, Murray |title=The Ethics of Liberty |publisher=New York University Press |year=1998 |isbn=978-0-8147-7506-6 |access-date=September 13, 2014 |archive-date=November 17, 2014 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141117215622/http://mises.org/rothbard/ethics/thirteen.asp |url-status=live }}</ref> Rothbard emphasizes that all punishment must be proportional, stating that "the criminal, or invader, loses his rights to the extent that he deprived another man of his".<ref name=":6">Morimura, Susumu (1999). "Libertarian theories of punishment." In P. Smith & P. Comanducci (Eds.), ''Legal Philosophy: General Aspects: Theoretical Examinations and Practical Application'' (pp. 135–38). New York: Franz Steiner Verlag.</ref> Applying his retributive theory, Rothbard states that a thief "must pay double the extent of theft". Rothbard gives the example of a thief who stole $15,000 and says he must return the stolen money and provide the victim an additional $15,000, money to which the thief has forfeited his right. The thief would be "put in a [temporary] state of enslavement to his victim"{{citation needed|date=December 2023}} if he is unable to pay him immediately. Rothbard also applies his theory to justify beating and torturing violent criminals, although the beatings are required to be proportional to the crime.

==== Torture of criminal suspects ====
In chapter twelve of ''Ethics'',<ref name=SelfDefense>{{cite book |chapter-url=https://mises.org/rothbard/ethics/twelve.asp |chapter=Self-Defense |pages=77–84 |author=Rothbard, Murray |title=The Ethics of Liberty |publisher=New York University Press |year=1998 |isbn=978-0-8147-7506-6 |access-date=September 13, 2014 |archive-date=September 14, 2014 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140914010256/https://mises.org/rothbard/ethics/twelve.asp |url-status=live }}</ref> Rothbard turns his attention to suspects arrested by the police.<ref name="Callahan" /> He argues that police should be able to torture certain types of criminal suspects, including accused murderers, for information related to their alleged crimes. Writes Rothbard: "Suppose ... police beat and torture a suspected murderer to find information (not to wring a confession, since obviously a coerced confession could never be considered valid). If the suspect turns out to be guilty, then the police should be exonerated, for then they have only ladled out to the murderer a parcel of what he deserves in return; his rights had already been forfeited by more than that extent. But if the suspect is not convicted, then that means that the police have beaten and tortured an innocent man, and that they in turn must be put into the dock for criminal assault".<ref name=SelfDefense/> Gene Callahan examines this position and concludes that Rothbard rejects the widely held belief that torture is inherently wrong, no matter who the victim. Callahan goes on to state that Rothbard's scheme gives the police a strong motive to [[Frameup|frame]] the suspect after having tortured him or her.<ref name="Callahan" />

=== Science and scientism ===
In an essay condemning "[[scientism]] in the study of man", Rothbard rejected the application of [[causal determinism]] to human beings, arguing that the actions of human beings—as opposed to those of everything else in nature—are not determined by prior causes, but by "[[Libertarianism (metaphysics)|free will]]".<ref>Rothbard, Murray (1960). [https://mises.org/rothbard/mantle.asp "The Mantle of Science."] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140914002839/https://mises.org/rothbard/mantle.asp |date=September 14, 2014 }} Reprinted from ''Scientism and Values'', Helmut Schoeck and James W. Wiggins, eds. (Princeton, NJ: D. Van Nostrand), 1960, pp. 159–80, {{ISBN|978-0405004360}}; ''The Logic of Action One: Method, Money, and the Austrian School'' (Cheltenham UK: Edward Elgar, 1997), pp. 3–23. {{ISBN|978-1858980157}}</ref> He argued that "determinism as applied to man, is a self-contradictory thesis, since the man who employs it relies implicitly on the existence of free will"{{citation needed|date=December 2023}}. Rothbard opposed what he considered the overspecialization of the academy and sought to fuse the disciplines of economics, history, ethics and political science to create a "science of liberty". Rothbard described the moral basis for his [[anarcho-capitalist]] position in two of his books: ''[[For a New Liberty]]'', published in 1973; and ''[[The Ethics of Liberty]]'', published in 1982. In his ''[[Power and Market]]'' (1970), Rothbard describes how a stateless economy might function.{{Independent source inline|date=April 2023}}

== Works ==
=== Books ===
* ''[[Man, Economy, and State]]''. [[David Van Nostrand|D. Van Nostrand]] (1962). [https://www.mises.org/rothbard/mes.asp full text.]
:: [https://www.mises.org/rothbard/mes.asp 2nd ed. (Scholar's Ed.)] published in Auburn, AL: [[Ludwig von Mises Institute]] (2004). {{ISBN|0-945466-30-7}}. [https://www.mises.org/rothbard/mes.asp Full text.]
* ''[[The Panic of 1819 (book)|The Panic of 1819: Reactions and Policies]]''. New York: [[Columbia University Press]] (1962). [https://mises.org/resources/695/The-Panic-of-1819-Reactions-and-Policies Full text.]
:: Republished, Auburn, AL: [[Ludwig von Mises Institute]] (2004). {{ISBN|1-933550-08-2}}.
* ''[[America's Great Depression]]''. [[David Van Nostrand|D. Van Nostrand]] (1963). [https://www.mises.org/rothbard/agd/contents.asp Full text.]
:: 5th ed. published in Auburn, AL: [[Ludwig von Mises Institute]] (2005). {{ISBN|0-945466-05-6}}.
* ''[[Power and Market: Government and the Economy]]''. [[Sheed Andrews and McMeel]] (1970). [https://mises.org/resources/196/Power-and-Market-Government-and-the-Economy full text.]
:: Republished, Auburn, AL: [[Ludwig von Mises Institute]] (2004). {{ISBN|0-945466-30-7}}.
* ''[[For a New Liberty: The Libertarian Manifesto]]''. [[Collier Books]] (1973). [https://mises.org/online-book/new-liberty-libertarian-manifesto Full text]; [https://www.mises.org/media.aspx?action=category&ID=87 audiobook.] Auburn, AL: [[Ludwig von Mises Institute]]. {{ISBN|0-945466-47-1}}.
* ''Anatomy of the State''. Auburn, AL: [[Ludwig von Mises Institute]] (1974). [https://mises.org/library/anatomy-state Full text.]; [https://mises.org/library/anatomy-state-audiobook audiobook.] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230925214515/https://mises.org/library/anatomy-state-audiobook |date=September 25, 2023 }} 
:: Republished in Auburn, AL: [[Ludwig von Mises Institute]] (2009). {{ISBN|978-1-933550-48-0}}.
* ''[[Egalitarianism as a Revolt Against Nature and Other Essays]]''. Libertarian Review Press (1974). [https://mises.org/document/3147 Full text.]
:: 2nd ed., Auburn, AL: [[Ludwig von Mises Institute]] (2000). {{ISBN|0-945466-23-4}}.
* ''[[Conceived in Liberty]]'' (4 vol.). New Rochelle, New York: [[Arlington House Publishers|Arlington House]] (1975–1979). [https://mises.org/document/3006/Conceived-in-Liberty Full text.]
:: Republished, Auburn, AL: [[Ludwig von Mises Institute]] (2012). {{ISBN|0-945466-26-9}}.
* ''The Logic of Action'' (2 vol.). Edward Elgar Publications (1997). {{ISBN|1-85898-015-1|1-85898-570-6}}. [https://mises.org/document/6301/Economic-Controversies Full text.]
:: Reprinted as ''Economic Controversies''. Auburn, AL: [[Ludwig von Mises Institute]] (2011).
* ''[[The Ethics of Liberty]]''. [[Humanities Press]] (1982). [[New York University Press]] (1998). [https://www.mises.org/rothbard/ethics/ethics.asp Full text]; [https://www.mises.org/media.aspx?action=category&ID=95 audiobook.] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141019044122/http://mises.org/media.aspx?action=category&ID=95 |date=October 19, 2014 }} Auburn, AL: [[Ludwig von Mises Institute]]. {{ISBN|0-8147-7506-3}}.
* ''[[The Mystery of Banking]]''. Richardson and Snyder, Dutton (1983). [https://mises.org/document/614/Mystery-of-Banking-The Full text.]
:: Republished in Auburn, AL: [[Ludwig von Mises Institute]] (2007). {{ISBN|978-1-105-52878-1}}.
* ''[[The Case Against the Fed]]''. Auburn, AL: [[Ludwig von Mises Institute]] (1994). [https://mises.org/document/3430/ Full text.]
:: Republished in Auburn, AL: [[Ludwig von Mises Institute]] (2007). {{ISBN|0-945466-17-X}}.
* ''America's Great Depression'' [5th ed.]. Auburn, AL: [[Ludwig von Mises Institute]] (2000).
* ''[[An Austrian Perspective on the History of Economic Thought]]'' (2 vol.). Edward Elgar Publishers (1995). {{ISBN|0-945466-48-X}}.
** [https://mises.org/document/3985/Economic-Thought-Before-Adam-Smith-An-Austrian-Perspective-on-the-History-of-Economic-Thought-Volume-I Vol. 1: ''Economic Thought Before Adam Smith''.] Republished in Auburn, AL: [[Ludwig von Mises Institute]] (2009).
** [https://mises.org/document/3986/Classical-Economics-An-Austrian-Perspective-on-the-History-of-Economic-Thought-Volume-II Vol. 2: ''Classical Economics''.] Republished in Auburn, AL: [[Ludwig von Mises Institute]] (2009).
* ''Making Economic Sense''. Auburn, Alab: [[Ludwig von Mises Institute]] (2007). {{ISBN|0-945466-18-8}}. [https://mises.org/document/899/Making-Economic-Sense Full text.]
* ''[[The Betrayal of the American Right]]''. Auburn, Alab: [[Ludwig von Mises Institute]] (2007). {{ISBN|978-1-933550-13-8}}. [https://mises.org/document/3316/ Full text] and [https://mises.org/library/betrayal-american-right-audiobook audiobook] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210902084316/https://mises.org/library/betrayal-american-right-audiobook |date=September 2, 2021 }}, narrated by Ian Temple.
:: Despite posthumous publication in 2007, it appears in print virtually unchanged from the manuscript untouched since the 1970s.
* ''The Progressive Era''. Auburn, AL: [[Ludwig von Mises Institute]] (2017). {{ISBN|978-1-61016-674-4}}. [https://mises.org/library/book/progressive-era Full text].

=== Book contributions ===
* Introduction to ''Capital, Interest, and Rent: Essays in the Theory of Distribution'', by Frank A. Fetter. Kansas City: [[Sheed Andrews and McMeel]] (1977).
* [https://www.lewrockwell.com/1970/01/murray-n-rothbard/money-and-the-individual/ Foreword] to ''[[The Theory of Money and Credit]]'', by [[Ludwig von Mises]]. [[Liberty Fund]] (1981). [https://web.archive.org/web/20141216191645/http://library.freecapitalists.org/books/Ludwig%20von%20Mises/The%20Theory%20of%20Money%20and%20Credit.pdf Full text .]
* "Bramble Minibook" (1973). In: ''The Essential von Mises''. Auburn, AL: [[Ludwig von Mises Institute]] (1988). [https://mises.org/document/3081 Full text.] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140915095149/http://mises.org/document/3081/ |date=September 15, 2014 }}

=== Monographs ===
* [https://mises-media.s3.amazonaws.com/Wall%20Street%2C%20Banks%2C%20and%20American%20Foreign%20Policy_2.pdf ''Wall Street, Banks, and American Foreign Policy''.] World Market Perspective (1984); [[Center for Libertarian Studies]] (1995); [[Ludwig von Mises Institute]] (2005). [https://mises-media.s3.amazonaws.com/Wall%20Street%20los%20Bancos%20y%20la%20Pol%C3%ADtica%20Exterior%20Norteamericana.pdf Spanish translation.]

=== Selected articles ===
* Primary anthology of [selected] essays by Murray N. Rothbard: "THE IRREPRESSIBLE ROTHBARD; Essays of Murray N. Rothbard / Edited with an introduction by Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr. / Preface by JoAnn Rothbard"<ref name="IRRE">{{cite web 
| last1        = Rothbard 
| first1       = Murray N. 
| last2        = Rockwell Jr.
| first2       = Llewellyn H. 
| last3        = Rothbard 
| first3       = JoAnn 
| title        = THE IRREPRESSIBLE ROTHBARD; Essays of Murray N. Rothbard / Edited with an introduction by Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr. / Preface by JoAnn Rothbard 
| url          = https://cdn.mises.org/The%20Irrepressible%20Rothbard.pdf 
| publisher    = [Burt Blumert, for] The [[Center for Libertarian Studies]], Inc. Burlingame, California (dba 'The Rothbard-Rockwell Report')  
| url-status   = live 
| archive-date = April 26, 2025 
| archive-url  = https://web.archive.org/web/20250426090951/https://cdn.mises.org/The%20Irrepressible%20Rothbard.pdf 
| quote        = <br/><br/>(from the PREFACE, page xi) : And so the Triple R became the newsletter it is-of trenchant opinions on politics and politicians, on economics and history, on foreign policy and government, and on religion and culture. With two such superb and prolific writers as Lew and Murray, and with BurtBlumert, as Publisher, keeping his eye on finances and advertising, the Triple R could not fail.<br/><br/>Writing for the Triple R was an important and pleasurable part of Murray's life for the last four years. Although he also enjoyed the scholarly work that he did, writing for the Triple R was the most fun he could think of. For he had firm opinions on almost every topic and wrote with ease.<br/><br/>Lew writes of the joy of coming to the office and finding Murray's output of the night on his fax machine. The same went for Murray, who was going to bed about the time that Lew reached the office, and could expect many goodies to be faxed to him by the time he awoke.<br/><br/>Occasionally, Lew, who did the really hard work of putting the newsletter together, would call and say he needed one more short article to finish an issue, and Murray would happily sit down at his typewriter and skewer another politician.
}}</ref>
{{Cleanup list|section|date=January 2025}}
* ''The Individualist'' (Apr., Jul.–Aug. 1971); Revised and republished by the Center for Independent Education (1979). {{OCLC|3710568}}.
* "Soviet Foreign Policy: A Revisionist Perspective." ''[[Libertarian Review]]'' (Apr. 1978), pp.&nbsp;23–27.
* [https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1992-03-03-me-2952-story.html "His Only Crime Was Against the Old Guard: Milken."] ''[[Los Angeles Times]]'' (Mar. 3, 1992).
* "Anti-Buchanania: A Mini-Encyclopedia." ''Rothbard-[[Lew Rockwell|Rockwell]] Report'' (May 1992), pp.&nbsp;1–13.
* [https://www.lewrockwell.com/2016/07/murray-n-rothbard/hillary-witch/ "Saint Hillary and the Religious Left."] (Dec. 1994).
* [https://mises-media.s3.amazonaws.com/aen10_2_1_0.pdf "The Other Side of the Coin: Free Banking in Chile."] ''[[Austrian Economics Newsletter]]'', vol. 10, no. 2.

== Interviews ==
* [https://archive.today/20210901063004/https://mises.org/library/interview-murray-rothbard-man-economy-and-state-mises-and-future-austrian-school "Interview with Murray Rothbard on Man, Economy, and State, Mises, and the Future of the Austrian School"] (Summer 1990). ''[[Austrian Economics Newsletter]]''.

== See also ==
* [[American philosophy]]
* [[Alt-right#Influences]]
* [[Anarcho-capitalism]]
* [[Criticism of the Federal Reserve]]
* [[Libertarianism in the United States]]
* [[List of American philosophers]]
* [[List of peace activists]]

== References ==
{{reflist}}

== Further reading ==
* {{cite journal |last1=Block |first1=Walter E. |title=Toward a Libertarian Theory of Inalienability: A Critique of Rothbard, Barnett, Gordon, Smith, Kinsella and Epstein |date=Spring 2003 |journal=Journal of Libertarian Studies |volume=17 |issue=2 |ssrn=1889456 |url=https://mises.org/journals/jls/17_2/17_2_3.pdf |access-date=September 13, 2014 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140702052835/http://mises.org/journals/jls/17_2/17_2_3.pdf |archive-date=July 2, 2014 |url-status=dead }}
* {{cite journal |last=Boettke |first=Peter |author-link=Peter Boettke |title=Economists and Liberty: Murray N. Rothbard |journal=Nomos |date=Fall–Winter 1988 |pages=29–34, 49–50 |url=http://www.rothbard.it/su%20rothbard/boettke-economists-and-liberty-r.pdf |issn=0078-0979 |oclc=1760419 |access-date=September 21, 2013 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130925180608/http://www.rothbard.it/su%20rothbard/boettke-economists-and-liberty-r.pdf |archive-date=September 25, 2013 |url-status=dead}}
* [[Brian Doherty (journalist)|Doherty, Brian]] (2007). ''[[Radicals for Capitalism|Radicals for Capitalism: A Freewheeling History of the Modern American Libertarian Movement]]''. [[PublicAffairs]]. {{ISBN|1-58648-350-1}}
* {{cite journal |doi=10.1007/BF01718450 |title=The public choice theory of Murray N. Rothbard, a modern anarchist |year=1973 |last1=Frech |first1=H.E. |journal=Public Choice |volume=14 |pages=143–53 |jstor=30022711|s2cid=154133800 }}
* {{cite journal |first1=Marek |last1=Hudík |year=2011 |title=Rothbardian demand: A critique |journal=The Review of Austrian Economics |volume=24 |issue=3 |pages=311–18 |doi=10.1007/s11138-011-0147-3|s2cid=153559003 }}
* {{cite journal |ssrn=473601 |title=Mere Libertarianism: Blending Hayek and Rothbard |last1=Klein |first1=Daniel B. |journal=Reason Papers |volume=27  |date=Fall 2004 |pages=7–43 |url=http://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:hhs:ratioi:0029}}
* {{cite journal |doi=10.1007/s12113-998-1004-5 |url=https://mises.org/journals/qjae/pdf/Q11_5.PDF |title=Murray Rothbard's Adam Smith |year=1998 |last1=Pack |first1=Spencer J. |journal=The Quarterly Journal of Austrian Economics |volume=1 |issue=1 |pages=73–79 |s2cid=153815373 |access-date=September 13, 2014 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130402040030/http://mises.org/journals/qjae/pdf/Q11_5.pdf |archive-date=April 2, 2013 |url-status=dead }}
* {{cite journal |last=Touchstone |first=Kathleen |title=Rand, Rothbard, and Rights Reconsidered |journal=Libertarian Papers |year=2010 |volume=2 |issue=18 |page=28 |url=http://libertarianpapers.org/articles/2010/lp-2-18.pdf |oclc=820597333 |access-date=August 16, 2013 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171020023733/http://libertarianpapers.org/articles/2010/lp-2-18.pdf |archive-date=October 20, 2017 |url-status=dead }}

== External links ==
{{sister project links|d=Q297079|wikt=no|c=Category:Murray Rothbard|n=no|b=no|v=no|voy=no|species=no|s=Author:Murray_Newton_Rothbard}}
* [https://mises.org/rothbard/Bibliography1.PDF Murray Rothbard full bibliography] at Mises.org
* {{Google Scholar ID|_7kriXsAAAAJ}}

{{Murray Rothbard}}
{{navboxes
|list=
{{anarcho-capitalism}}
{{Austrian School economics}}
{{libertarianism}}
{{Political philosophy}}
}}
{{Portal bar|Anarchism|Capitalism|Economics|Libertarianism|Philosophy|Politics}}
{{authority control}}
{{good article}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Rothbard, Murray}}
[[Category:Murray Rothbard| ]]
[[Category:1926 births]]
[[Category:1995 deaths]]
[[Category:20th-century American economists]]
[[Category:20th-century American essayists]]
[[Category:20th-century American historians]]
[[Category:20th-century American Jews]]
[[Category:20th-century American journalists]]
[[Category:20th-century American male journalists]]
[[Category:20th-century American male writers]]
[[Category:20th-century American non-fiction writers]]
[[Category:20th-century American philosophers]]
[[Category:20th-century atheists]]
[[Category:Academics from New York City]]
[[Category:Activists from New York City]]
[[Category:American agnostics]]
[[Category:American anarcho-capitalists]]
[[Category:American anti–Vietnam War activists]]
[[Category:American book editors]]
[[Category:American economics writers]]
[[Category:American foreign policy writers]]
[[Category:American founders]]
[[Category:American historical negationists]]
[[Category:American male essayists]]
[[Category:American male non-fiction writers]]
[[Category:American opinion journalists]]
[[Category:American people of Polish-Jewish descent]]
[[Category:American people of Russian-Jewish descent]]
[[Category:American philosophy writers]]
[[Category:American political journalists]]
[[Category:American political philosophers]]
[[Category:American political writers]]
[[Category:American segregationists]]
[[Category:Austrian School economists]]
[[Category:Birch Wathen Lenox School alumni]]
[[Category:Cato Institute people]]
[[Category:Columbia College, Columbia University alumni]]
[[Category:Critics of Marxism]]
[[Category:Critics of socialism]]
[[Category:Economists from New York (state)]]
[[Category:Historians from New York (state)]]
[[Category:Historians of economic thought]]
[[Category:Historians of the United States]]
[[Category:History of racism in Nevada]]
[[Category:History of racism in New York (state)]]
[[Category:Jewish agnostics]]
[[Category:Jewish American activists for Palestinian solidarity]]
[[Category:Jewish American anti-Zionists]]
[[Category:Jewish American atheists]]
[[Category:Jewish American historians]]
[[Category:Jewish American journalists]]
[[Category:Jewish American non-fiction writers]]
[[Category:Jewish American social scientists]]
[[Category:Jewish anti-communists]]
[[Category:Jewish American philosophers]]
[[Category:Journalists from New York (state)]]
[[Category:Libertarian economists]]
[[Category:Libertarian historians]]
[[Category:Libertarian theorists]]
[[Category:Mises Institute people]]
[[Category:Natural law ethicists]]
[[Category:New York (state) Libertarians]]
[[Category:New York (state) Republicans]]
[[Category:Old Right (United States)]]
[[Category:Paleolibertarianism]]
[[Category:Philosophers from Nevada]]
[[Category:Philosophers from New York (state)]]
[[Category:Polytechnic Institute of New York University faculty]]
[[Category:University of Nevada, Las Vegas faculty]]
[[Category:Writers from New York City]]