is the power to destroy. So sayeth Chief Justice John Marshall in McCulloch v. Maryland in 1819. Likewise, I have always wondered why people moan about minor liberties at the margin–the right to not have to see a biblical statue on the courthouse lawn; the right to be a loser doing drugs–given that all this is trumped by the state’s unchallenged power to literally kill and enslave its citizens. I am talking about the power of conscription, whereby the state kidnaps young men and forces them to be slaves, and often to die, for it. Given that the State has … Continue reading The Power to Tax…