* A society that robs an individual of the product of his effort, or enslaves him, or attempts to limit the freedom of his mind, or compels him to act against his own rational judgment – a society that sets up a conflict between its edicts and the requirements of man’s nature – in not, strictly speaking, a society, but a mob held together by institutionalized gang-rule.
* Life on a desert island is safer than and incomparably preferable to existence in Soviet Russia or Nazi Germany.
* If men are to live together in a peaceful, productive, rational society and deal with one another to mutual benefit, they must accept the basic social principle without which no moral or civilized society is possible: the principle of individual rights.
* Man’s rights can only be violated by the use of physical force. It is only by means of physical force that one man can deprive another of his life, or enslave him, or rob him, or prevent him from pursuing his own goals, or compel him to act against his own rational judgment.
* The precondition of a civilized society is the barring of physical force from social relationships – thus establishing the principle that if men wish to deal with one another, they may do so only be means of reason: by discussion, persuasion, and voluntary, uncoerced agreement.
* In a civilized society, force may only be used in retaliation and only against those who initiate its use. All the reasons which make the initiation of physical force an evil, make the retaliatory use of physical force a moral imperative.* Under a proper social system, a private individual is legally free to take any action he pleases (so long as he does not violate the rights of others), while a government official is bound by law in his every official act. A private individual may do anything except that which is legally forbidden; a government official may do nothing except that which is legally permitted. This is the means of subordinating “might” to “right.” This is the American concept of “a government of laws, and not men.”
* Since the protection of individual rights is the only proper purpose of a government, it is the only proper subject of legislation: all laws must be based on individual rights and aimed at their protection.
* Such, in essence, is the proper purpose of a government: to make social existence possible to men, by protecting the benefits and combatting the evils which men can cause to one another.
* The proper functions of a government fall into three broad categories, all of them involving the issue of physical force and the protection of men’s rights: the police, to protect men from criminals – the armed services, to protect men from foreign invaders – the law courts, to settle disputes among men according to objective laws.
--from Ayn Rand’s essay The Nature of Government (December 1963)
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