“The Tesla Model S is a drop-dead gorgeous electric automobile that can go from 0-60 mph in 4.2 seconds and carries a sticker price of $80,000 at the high end,” says Sarah Stanley in this week’s Acton Commentary. “Tesla is also at the center of a debate on cronyism, consumer choice, and innovation” On October 21, Gov. Rick Snyder of Michigan signed Enrolled House Bill 5606 into law. Some have rightly nicknamed this the “anti-Tesla bill.” While direct sales from...

Larry Schweikart This edition of Radio Free Acton features an interview with Larry Schweikart – drummer, history professor, and producer of the documentary “Rockin’ The Wall” – on the power of music and the influence of rock and roll in munism in the Soviet empire.When we think about the fall of the Berlin Wall, it’s only natural that names like Reagan, Thatcher, and Pope John Paul e to mind, but there were otherelements involved in the battle munism that also...

“If we want to be coherent when addressing poverty,” writes Acton Research Director Samuel Gregg at Public Discourse, “our concerns can’t be rooted in emotivist or relativistic accounts of who human beings are. They must be founded on recognition of each person’s freedom, rationality, and dignity.” In social sciences such as economics, positivism’s ongoing influence encourages the tendency to see values as irrelevant, hopelessly subjective, and hard to measure (which, for some people, means they don’t exist). Thus, making the...

In October 3, 1789 in New York City, President George Washington proclaimed Thursday the 26th of November 1789 a day of “public thanksgiving and prayer” devoted to “the service of that great and glorious Being who is the beneficent Author of all the good that was, that is, or that will be.” Here is the full text of his Thanksgiving proclamation: By the President of the United States of America, a Proclamation. Whereas it is the duty of all Nations...

Pope Francis spoke to members of the European Parliament on November 25. The focus of his speech was “dignity:” specifically the transcendent dignity of the human person. He reminded his audience that the protection of dignity was key to rebuilding Europe following World War II, but now, the pope says, ” there are still too many situations in which human beings are treated as objects whose conception, configuration and utility can be programmed, and who can then be discarded when...

Tuesday, December 2 marks the final Acton Lecture Series for 2014. Acton es William Allen, Emeritus Professor of Political Philosophy in the Department of Political Science and Emeritus Dean, James Madison College, at Michigan State University. Allen will be speaking on “American National Character and the Future of Liberty,” beginning at 11:30 at 98 E. Fulton, Grand Rapids, Michigan. You can register here. Allen spoke (along with Samuel Gregg, Acton’s Director of Research) in 2008 on “What Is Freedom?” as...

Tomorrow is the International Day for the Abolition of Slavery, memoration of thedate of the adoption, by the General Assembly, of the United Nations Convention for the Suppression of the Traffic in Persons and of the Exploitation of the Prostitution of Others (resolution 317(IV) of 2 December 1949). As part of the effort to help eradicate modern slavery and human trafficking across the world by 2020,Catholic, Anglican, Muslim, Hindu, Buddhist, Jewish, and Orthodox leaders will gather at the Vaticantomorrow to...

For many, Black Friday epitomizes everything nasty American hyper-consumerism. Stores everywhere are plagued with overly aggressive shoppers, each stuffed to the brim with carb-laden Thanksgiving chow and yet ever-more hungry for the next delicious deal. It’s all rather disgusting, no? Quite the contrary, argues Chris Horst over at OnFaith. “Black Friday may have its warts,but let’s not forget the reason for the Black Friday season,” he writes. “The DNA of Black Friday is generosity.” Wielding a fine mix of basic...

On The Daily Caller, Acton Research Director Samuel Gregg looks at the connection between economic liberty and religious freedom which, he observes, “has not been so obvious; or at least it wasn’t until cases such as Hobby Lobby’s started making their way through the American court system.” Also not so obvious is how the ever expanding welfare state in many countries — and the growing dependence of some religious charities on state funding — have had a negative impact on...

I would like to clarify that inequity and inequality are overlapping (and related) but not identical sets. Here’s a diagram that might be helpful. The way these terms often get used makes it seem like this distinction could provide some clarity. See also “the generally accepted formal equality principle that Aristotle formulated in reference to Plato: ‘treat like cases as like.'” ...