If any man's money can be taken by a so-called government

When Lysander Spooner wrote, “If any man's money can be taken by a so-called government, without his own personal consent, all his other rights are taken with it; for with his money the government can, and will, hire soldiers to stand over him, compel him to submit to its arbitrary will, and kill him if he resists,” he was striking at the very heart of freedom. He was not merely speaking of taxes or currency; he was speaking of consent, the sacred foundation of liberty. To Spooner, a 19th-century abolitionist, lawyer, and radical philosopher, freedom was not a gift of the state but a divine inheritance of the individual. His words thunder against the false notion that authority can claim moral legitimacy simply by its existence. For if a man’s property can be seized without his agreement, then he is not a free citizen, but a subject — ruled not by justice, but by force.

The origin of this quote lies in Spooner’s lifelong war against what he saw as government coercion masquerading as law. Living in the turbulent years after the American Revolution, he watched as the ideals of liberty were slowly replaced by bureaucracy and taxation. He believed that the U.S. Constitution, though noble in design, had failed to secure true freedom because it allowed men in power to rule without genuine consent from those they governed. His writings — especially No Treason: The Constitution of No Authority — argued that any government that extracts wealth from its people by compulsion rather than voluntary agreement is indistinguishable from a band of robbers. The robber, at least, admits his crime; the state cloaks it in the robes of legality.

Spooner’s insight is both economic and moral. He saw that money, more than words, is the lifeblood of power. To control a man’s labor — the fruit of his time and effort — is to control his very being. And when government claims the right to take that labor by decree, it gains the means to enforce every other tyranny. With taxes, it funds its armies; with armies, it enforces its will; with power, it silences dissent. Thus, Spooner warns that the loss of economic freedom is the beginning of all oppression. A man who cannot say “no” to the taking of his property cannot say “no” to anything else.

Consider the lesson of the American Revolution, which Spooner himself often invoked. The colonists did not rise merely over tariffs or taxes, but over the deeper principle that taxation without consent is tyranny. When King George III imposed levies upon the colonies without their representation, he was, in their eyes, not a lawful monarch but a thief. It was not the weight of the tax but the denial of consent that provoked rebellion. The cry of “no taxation without representation” was more than a political slogan — it was the moral proclamation that no man or government has the right to take what is not freely given. Spooner extended this principle even further: if consent must be given collectively, it is not true consent at all. Only the individual can rightfully own his life, his labor, and the fruits thereof.

There is also a haunting prophetic tone in Spooner’s warning. He foresaw what later centuries would confirm: that governments, once granted the power to tax and conscript, will use those powers to wage wars, silence opponents, and grow endlessly at the expense of their citizens. The 20th century proved him right — as nations consumed the wealth of their people to fund global conflicts, surveillance states, and endless bureaucracies, all justified by necessity or fear. Each generation surrendered a little more of its autonomy, believing that safety required obedience. But Spooner reminds us: a government that can take without asking will one day rule without limit.

Yet his message is not one of despair but of awakening. He calls upon every soul to reclaim the sacred principle of voluntary association — to remember that no man owes allegiance to authority he did not choose. True law arises not from the commands of rulers, but from the conscience of free individuals living in mutual respect. Spooner’s ideal society is not one without order, but one where order springs from justice freely agreed upon, not imposed by fear. His vision is bold and moral: that human beings, guided by reason and virtue, could live without coercion, bound only by the natural law of liberty.

The lesson is eternal: freedom begins where consent is honored, and dies where it is ignored. Guard, therefore, the sanctity of your labor, for it is the vessel of your independence. Question every hand that reaches for your earnings in the name of the “greater good,” for tyranny often hides behind noble words. Remember that every coin taken without your assent strengthens the chain that binds you. A just society must rest not upon forced contributions, but upon willing cooperation — upon the dignity of choice.

So let the words of Lysander Spooner echo through the ages: the power to tax without consent is the power to enslave. Do not yield your liberty to convenience, nor your conscience to authority. Stand as he did — unbowed before governments and empires — and declare that no man, no institution, no nation has the right to command what belongs to your soul. For only in that courage lies the true meaning of freedom — the freedom not to be ruled by force, but to live by the covenant of your own consent.