Walter E. Williams - Person Quotes

9 Sourced Quotes

View all Walter E. Williams Quotes
A resource allocation method that requires that I serve my fellow man in order to have a claim on what he produces is far more moral than government resource allocation. The government can offer, justifying it with one reason or another, "Williams, you don't have to serve your fellow man in order to have a claim on what he produces. Through the tax code, we'll take what he produces and give it to you." Of course, if I were to privately take what my fellow man produced, we'd call it theft. The only difference is when the government does it, that theft is legal but nonetheless theft — the taking of one person's rightful property to give to another.

Walter E. Williams
Most people agree that slavery is immoral. But what makes it so? Slavery denies a person the right to use his property (body) and the fruits of his labor the way he sees fit. Slavery forcibly uses one person to serve the purposes of another. Tragically, most Americans, including blacks, whose ancestors have suffered from gross property right violations, think it quite proper that one person be forcibly used to serve the purposes of another.

Walter E. Williams
This is why socialism is evil. It employs evil means, coercion or taking the property of one person, to accomplish good ends, helping one's fellow man. Helping one's fellow man in need, by reaching into one's own pockets, is a laudable and praiseworthy goal. Doing the same through coercion and reaching into another's pockets has no redeeming features and is worthy of condemnation.

Walter E. Williams
Despite the miracles of capitalism, it doesn't do well in popularity polls. One of the reasons is that capitalism is always evaluated against the non-existent, non-realizable utopias of socialism or communism. Any earthly system, when compared to a Utopia will pale in comparison. But for the ordinary person, capitalism, with all of its warts, is superior to any system yet devised to deal with our everyday needs and desires.

Walter E. Williams
Three-fifths to two-thirds of the federal budget consists of taking property from one American and giving it to another. Were a private person to do the same thing, we'd call it theft. When government does it, we euphemistically call it income redistribution, but that's exactly what thieves do — redistribute income. Income redistribution not only betrays the founders' vision, it's a sin in the eyes of God.

Walter E. Williams
If one person has a right to something he did not earn, of necessity it requires that another person not have a right to something that he did earn.

Walter E. Williams
No human should be coerced by the state to bear the medical expense, or any other expense, for his fellow man. In other words, the forcible use of one person to serve the purposes of another is morally offensive.

Walter E. Williams
Once Congress establishes that one person can live at the expense of another, it pays for everyone to try to do so.

Walter E. Williams
True rights, such as those in our Constitution, or those considered to be natural or human rights, exist simultaneously among people. That means exercise of a right by one person does not diminish those held by another.

Walter E. Williams