Harry Browne, R.I.P.

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Harry Browne, R.I.P.

D o w n s i z e r - D i s p a t c h

The world has lost a wonderful human being. Harry Browne passed away
last night after a long illness. Harry was a joy and inspiration to all
who knew him. We offer our condolences to his family, and especially to
his wife Pamela.

Words cannot express what Harry meant to us. But words are all we have.
And so we will muster what meager inadequate words we can find to
remember Harry Browne over the days ahead. You are invited to
participate.
This message will be posted at the top of the DownsizeDC.org blog. You
can leave your thoughts and comments there.
The blog can be reached by clicking here.
http://www.downsizedc.org/blog/

Rather than cards or flowers, Pamela Browne requests that donations be
made in Harry's memory to this organization, or to a family foundation.
Pamela Browne will be informed of all donations made in Harry's name.
The details are below. But for now we merely want to remember and
celebrate the life of a great man.
Harry Browne was a co-founder of this organization. But he was so much
more. So very much more.

Jim Babka & Perry Willis
DownsizeDC.org, Inc.

Contrbutions to DownsizeDC.org in Harry's memory can be made by clicking
here.
https://www.fbs.net/ddc-org/web-contribute.cfm

Contributions can also be made in Harry's memory to Korner's Folly
Foundation,
413 South Main Street, Kernersville, NC 27284.

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Libertarian Party:
 http://www.lp.org/
To learn more about the Advocates
and our work for liberty:
  http://www.theadvocates.org
To learn more about libertarianism:
http://www.Libertarianism.com
________________________________
THE PLEDGE OF A GRIEVANCE
I pledge a grievance against politicians Of the Imperial State of
America.
I support The Republic,
against which they stand,
Two Parties imitating gods, indistinguishable, Against liberty, for
injustice to all.
=================================
No human being has the right
 under any circumstances
  to initiate force against another human being, nor to threaten
or delegate its initiation.
http://www.0ap.org/
---------------------------------------------------
Freiheit stirbt in kleinen Teilen.
Freedom dies in little pieces.
-- German proverb.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++
"'Necessity' is the plea for every infringement of human freedom. It is
the argument of tyrants;
it is the creed of slaves."
William Pitt, 1783
==============================

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Harry Browne, RIP

Posted by Lew Rockwell

How sad to hear the news that
Harry Browne (born June 17, 1933), author and long-time spokesman for
libertarian causes,
died yesterday, March 1, 2006.

He was a man of great principle who courageously and consistently stood
up for liberty even when his position clashed with mainstream political
culture and public opinion. He was a great writer who worked hard to
turn a phrase in a way that would serve to educate people about free
markets and the free society. He was a supremely thoughtful man, who
read voraciously to educate himself, was not adverse to admitting error,
and constantly struggled to say what was true as he understood it.

Harry goes way back in the history of modern libertarianism. His book
How You Can Profit From the Coming Devaluation, which came out in 1970,
was a blockbuster in its day. He foresaw what would result from Nixon's
abandonment of the gold standard. In contrast to legions of mainstream
economists, he knew from his reading of the Austrian economists such as
Murray Rothbard that an inflationary period was on the horizon and that
gold prices would not go down but up. Those who followed his advice did
well indeed.

But the book also had pedagogical merit.
It introduced the community of readers that buy how-to books on
investments to the Austrian School of economic thought.
He explained the origin and nature of money, and how the gold standard
had been destroyed by governments, not for good reasons, but to provide
fuel for the growth of power. He explained how the business cycle
results from monetary manipulation by the central bank, a theory that
had been originated by Mises. He applied the theory to contemporary
events.

Harry was a founder of what was called the "hard-money movement"
—that group of writers and consultants who rallied around gold and
silver as inflation hedges in hard times. But he differed from many
people in this crowd because he was willing to change his advice
depending on circumstances of time and place. In the 1980s, for example,
he came to advocate a balanced portfolio of mutual funds alongside
precious metals. His "permanent portfolio" made money during one of the
great stock run-ups of American history.

During the 1990s, he worked tirelessly for libertarian causes. He had
never been a big enthusiast for the Libertarian Party but in 1996, he
graciously threw his hat into the ring as an aspirant to its
presidential nomination.

He won the bid, and proceeded to dedicate himself to educating the
American people about government and libertarian principles. His book
Why Government Doesn't Work is as good a campaign book as has appeared
in the history of American elections. In 2000, he was an effective and
dedicated candidate again. He didn't need to make these runs, and he
probably regretted it later at some level, but, at the time, he saw this
as an opportunity for public service, a chance to do more good and reach
more people.

How did his presidential bids do at the polls? About as well as most
third-party candidates do in a two-party system.
Many people who might have voted for him either stayed home or worried
at the last minute that they would be throwing away their votes or
helping a candidate whom they feared, by failing to vote for the lesser
of two evils.

It is extremely difficult for any third-party candidate to overcome this
problem.
However: it was also during this period that many people in the two
parties began to fear the Libertarian vote on grounds that, as small as
it might be, it was enough to make a margin of difference in any race.
The LP went from being dismissed to being feared, and this was Harry's
doing.

He was exceptional as a public speaker during the campaigns. No matter
whether the topic was taxes, education, states rights, war and foreign
policy, or the drug war, he took the right position and explained it in
a way that allowed anyone to see his point of view. He changed minds,
and stuck to principle the whole time. Harry was not tempted to sell out
his message for the sake of more votes.
He didn't trim or compromise. His energies were spent trying to think of
ways to make the core message more marketable and understandable.

Harry went through two ideological permutations that we can look back on
with some degree of regret. His second book called How I Found Freedom
in an Unfree World conflated libertine choices in personal lifestyle
with ideologically driven libertarian political philosophy. This was
regrettable insofar as it contributed to the public perception of
libertarians as nothing more than people who want bourgeois income
without bourgeois institutions and values.

In the early 1980s, he went in the opposite direction, sympathizing far
too much with the Republican agenda and even temporarily showing
sympathies for Reaganite foreign policy. In this he foreshadowed the sad
descent of many current-day libertarians into the miasma of DC policy
wonkery and political gamesmanship.

To his credit, however, these were temporary diversions from a lifetime
of solid writing and thinking. In his last years, few writers have been
as good as Harry on all aspects of the Bush administration. After 9-11,
when others fell silent or acquiesced to regime priorities, he stuck his
neck out and defended personal liberty against the surveillance state,
less government against the homeland-security state, and peace against
the war on terror. He never hesitated. He wrote the truth with grace and
good humor, and clicked "Send."

As we look back on the history of the libertarian movement, and we think
of those who have contributed mightily to making the idea of radical
liberty more mainstream and popular, Harry Browne emerges as a giant. He
was talented, dignified, sincere, and dedicated, and he showed genuine
courage in the face of fantastic pressure to get him to cave in.
All lovers of liberty should be grateful for him, his life, his
writings, and his legacy.
We will all miss you terribly,
Harry.
May you find the freedom in the next life for which you fought so hard
in this.

http://blog.lewrockwell.com/lewrw/archives/010081.html