Fresh out of college and full of ideals, young Americans are finding that, in this economy, the American es at a steep cost. Just ask Michelle Holshue: At 30 years old, Holshue exemplifies a key tenet of the American dream: exceeding one’s parents’ education and e. “My dad never finished high school,” she says. “So in that sense, I am doing better than my parents did.” Holshue’s father is a school bus driver, and her mother, a teacher. At this...

Online today at The American Spectator is an article from Acton Research Director Samuel Gregg. The article highlights the forethought of German economist Wilhelm Röpke, who predicted Europe’s present economic downturn in the middle of the twentieth century. Röpke, Gregg says, was a “euroskeptic” before the term existed. Excerpt here: Where Röpke proved correct was in envisaging that efforts to impose European political integration from the top-down would go hand-in-hand with attempts to replicate large welfare systems and extensive regulation...

This Saturday, June 30, is the 211th birthday of Frédéric Bastiat, one of the greatest political philosophers of the modern era. Considered among the founding fathers of classical liberalism, Bastiat is known for his simple and direct explanations of political and economic realities, his arguments against oppressive economic regulations and his clear and concise vision of a government of limited, enumerated powers, operating under the rule of law and unencumbered by favoritism or distributionist policies. Bastiat drew on his Catholic...

Florida Governor Rick Scott recently declared that his state would ply with President Obama’s Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. In blatant defiance of the federal government, Florida will not expand its Medicare program or implement any of the other changes that “Obamacare” requires. While a flat-out refusal ply with federal law on the part of a lower authority is relatively mon, it is by no means unprecedented. The history of the United States is filled with individuals and groups...

Most Rev. Joseph F. Naumann, D.D., Archbishop of Kansas City, Kansas On Catholic World Report, Carl E. Olson interviews Rev. Joseph F. Naumann, the Archbishop of Kansas City, Kansas, about the HHS mandate, the Ryan budget, and what the Supreme Court ruling means for the religious freedom fight. “There are always some people who feel that the Church is ing partisan and political in this,” Archbishop Naumann said, referring to a collective response to the HHS mandate covering provision of...

Uncontrolled public debt threatens to rupture society, says Niall Ferguson, as the older generation thrives at the expense of the young. In his Reflections on the Revolution in France (1790), Edmund Burke wrote that the real social contract is not Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s contract between the sovereign and the people or “general will”, but the “partnership” between the generations. He writes: “SOCIETY is indeed a contract… The state … is … a partnership not only between those who are living, but...

Ismael Hernandez, founder and executive director of the Freedom & Virtue Institute and Acton University lecturer, has written a piece in Crisis Magazine detailing why the Church should cut purse strings with the federal government. Noting that we cannot be both religious ministers to the poor and government-paid social workers, Hernandez bolsters his view by looking to the very foundation of America: James Madison, known as the father of our Constitution, supported religious liberty.[16] He is most surely quoted because...

“Modern Americans read the Declaration of Independence too individualistically,” says James R. Rogers. “We think of it as a revolt against high taxes and big government.” Take the Declaration’s plaint against the King, “for imposing taxes on us without our consent.” This is not about high taxes. Any tax, no matter how mild, that is imposed without a people’s “consent” would violate this principle. On the other hand, a very high tax, imposed with the consent of the people, would...

From es this tragic headline: As India’s kids starve, $1.5 billion worth of grain rots How does a country have starving people while it is producing so much food that it is literally rotting from being left outside in the open? The depressing answer is that it’s the result of government intervention in the agricultural market. The article from MSNBC goes on to detail how government policies produce too much grain relative to other agricultural products such as fresh fruits...

Galatians 6:9 (NKJV) And let us not grow weary while doing good, for in due season we shall reap if we do not lose heart. Is it possible to sow, toil and work only to lose heart and not reap any reward? Can all of our effort be lost simply by getting tired and giving up? If this is true, then it is imperative that we figure out how to not grow weary or lose heart while we are On...