I Chose Liberty - Ludwig von Mises Institute

402 I Chose Liberty: Autobiographies of Contemporary Libertarians
In addition to those enjoyable evenings with Murray and Joey, I have of course spent
countless hours immersed in his books and articles. The first book of his that I read was
probably Man, Economy and State; I have read it 2 ½ times altogether.
While often provocative, Murray’s opinions were indeed apodictic. This is most obvious,
of course, in his theoretical tomes. In some cases, such as The Ethics of Liberty, I find
him frequently unpersuasive. Even in such cases, however, he rarely fails to provoke intellectually;
consider, for example, his distinction between copyright and patent (with which
Mises disagreed) and his thoughts on what he called “Kid Lib.” And of course he could be
delightfully un-politically correct, such as when speaking of certain feminists.
Clearly, a lot of research went into his not-so-theoretical works, such as America’s Great
Depression and his delightful two-volume history of economic thought. Someone wrote
somewhere that Murray seemed to have read EVERYTHING ever published about
EVERYTHING; as one picks through his extensive footnotes, one can believe it.
Both in person and in his writings, Murray was one of the most exciting and inspiring
people I ever met in my life. I’m glad I had the chance to know him.
David Grant runs his own public relations firm, the LVM Group.