The Essential Rothbard - Ludwig von Mises Institute

The Essential Rothbard 59
Rothbard agreed with Étienne de la Boétie and David Hume
that government depends on popular support: “no state—no
minority—can continue long in power unless supported, even if
passively, by the majority.” 148 Hence the imperative need for intellectuals
to guide the public.
The case is far different for revolutionary intellectuals.
It is usually directly in the economic interests of the radical
intellectuals to allow themselves to “sell out,” to be coopted
by the ruling state apparatus. The intellectuals who do
choose the radical opposition path . . . can scarcely be dominated
by economic motives; on the contrary, only a fiercely
held ideology, centering on a passion for justice, can keep the
intellectuals to the rigorous path of truth. . . .Thus, statists
tend to be governed by economic motivation, with ideology
serving as a smokescreen for such motives, while libertarians
or antistatists are ruled principally and centrally by ideology,
with economic defense playing a subordinate role. 149
When he turns to the American Revolution itself, Rothbard, as
usual, challenges mainstream opinion. The virtues and military
leadership of George Washington did not impress him.
Washington set out to transform a people’s army, uniquely
suited for a libertarian revolution, into another orthodox and
despotically ruled statist force after the familiar European
model. His primary aim was to crush the individualistic and
democratic spirit of the American forces. 150
For Rothbard, the Articles of Confederation were not, contrary
to most historians, an overly weak arrangement that needed to be
replaced by the more centrally focused Constitution. Quite the
contrary, the Articles themselves allowed too much central control.
148 Ibid.
149 Ibid., pp. 353–54.
150 Ibid., vol. IV, p. 43.