Top 100 Larken Rose Quotes (2025 Update)
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51. “Targeting “governments,” instead of their loyal enforcers, would serve humanity wonderfully, not only ending most violent conflicts a lot more quickly but creating a huge deterrent to any megalomaniac tempted to start conflicts in the first place. Yet there is an open, mutual, standing agreement between most high-level tyrants that, while it is okay to play games with the lives of their subjects, they will rarely target each other.”

— Larken Rose

52. “Instead of being offended at the insult and injustice of being coercively controlled and exploited – in fact, instead of even recognizing that as injustice – many victims of “government” oppression feel profound loyalty to their controllers.”

— Larken Rose

53. “In the long run, there is no such thing, and can be no such thing, as “limited government,” because once someone is accepted by others as a rightful master, and believes himself to have the moral right to rule, there will be nothing and no one “above” him with the power to restrain him.”

— Larken Rose

54. “There is a certain feeling of comfort and safety that one gets by conforming and obeying. Believing that things are in someone else’s hands, and having trust that someone else will make things right, is a way to avoid responsibility.”

— Larken Rose

55. “Those who fight for any “government,” even if they believe they are “fighting for their country,” can never achieve freedom and justice, because a ruling class, by its very nature, never wants freedom and justice, even for its own subjects, or it would cease to exist. However noble their motives, and however courageous their actions, ultimately the only thing “government” soldiers can ever achieve is subjugation and domination.”

— Larken Rose

56. “Some of us realize the self-evident truth that no election, no constitution, no legislation, and no other pseudo-religious political ritual can bestow upon anyone the right to rule another. Nothing can make a man into a rightful master; nothing can make a man into a rightful slave.”

— Larken Rose

57. “Since these two – consent and governing – are opposites, the concept of “consent of the governed” is a contradiction.”

— Larken Rose

58. “In short, the defining factor which makes something “government” is the perceived legitimacy and righteousness of the power and control it exerts over others – in other words, its “authority.”

— Larken Rose

59. “In short, the works of the “Founding Fathers” consist of a combination of profound wisdom and utter lunacy. In some places, they described quite well the concept of self ownership; in others, they sought to create a ruling class. They did not seem to notice that those two agendas are utterly incompatible with each other.”

— Larken Rose

60. “Today, all statism is based entirely upon the assumption that people can delegate rights they don’t have.”

— Larken Rose

61. “Any “government” that had the consent of its subjects would not need, and would not have, “law” enforcers. Enforcement happens only if someone does not consent to something.”

— Larken Rose

62. “In short, government does not exist.”

— Larken Rose

63. “It’s amazing the amount of anger, hostility and hatred some people show towards those of us who want to leave them in freedom. Hysterically, some statists characterize that as the voluntaryists trying to “force” their views on everyone else. “You’re oppressing me, by leaving me alone, and wanting me to leave you alone!” Meanwhile, they wildly cheer when some politician promises to extort and control them. Go figure.”

— Larken Rose

64. “The sad irony is that the American ruling class, because of the legitimacy its victims imagine it to have, is the only gang actually capable of conquering and subjugating the American people.”

— Larken Rose

65. “In short, if the victims of authoritarian extortion, harassment, surveillance, assault, kidnapping, and murder simply stopped assisting in their own oppression, tyranny would crumble. And if the people went a step further and forcibly resisted, tyranny would collapse even more quickly.”

— Larken Rose

66. “There would be a difference between “rule of law” and “rule of men” only if the so-called “laws” were written by something other than men.”

— Larken Rose

67. “When the people actually want true freedom, they will achieve it without the need for any election or revolution.”

— Larken Rose

68. “Regardless of almost any other factors, the belief in authority turns good people into agents of evil.”

— Larken Rose

69. “The men who wear black dresses and wield wooden hammers and refer to themselves as “the court” are seen as the madmen they are. Those who wear badges and uniforms, and imagine themselves to be something other than mere human beings, are not seen by the deprogrammed as noble warriors for “law and order” but as confused souls suffering from what is little more than a mental disorder.”

— Larken Rose

70. “You indoctrinate your children into a life of unthinking, helpless subservience. You are putting the chains around their little necks and fastening the locks tight. And worst of all, you feel good about it.”

— Larken Rose

71. “But history shows that most human beings would literally rather die than objectively reconsider the belief systems they were brought up in.”

— Larken Rose

72. “Legalizing” wrong does not make it right.”

— Larken Rose

73. “One who begs for lower “taxes” is implicitly agreeing that it is up to the politicians how much a man may keep of what he has earned.”

— Larken Rose

74. “All belief in “government” rests on the idea that the “common good” justifies the “legal” initiation of violence against innocents to one degree or another. And once that premise has been accepted, there is no objective moral standard to limit “government” behavior.”

— Larken Rose

75. “You evade your responsibility as human beings by hallucinating a false god that relieves you of the duty to think for yourselves. You don’t want to be free, because being merely obedient requires so much less thought.”

— Larken Rose

76. “Jesus taught nonviolence, and told you to love your neighbor, but the state encourages you to vote for people who will use the violence of government to butt into every aspect of everyone else’s life. Which do you believe?”

— Larken Rose

77. “In short, despite all of the complex rituals and convoluted rationalizations, all modern belief in “government” rests on the notion that mere mortals can, through certain political procedures, bestow upon some people various rights which none of the people possessed to begin with.”

— Larken Rose

78. “Whether an old lady is robbed by an armed street thug or by a well-dressed, well-educated “tax collector” makes no difference, morally or in practical terms.”

— Larken Rose

79. “Every “government,” including the most oppressive regimes in history, has been funded by the payment of “taxes” by loyal, productive subjects.”

— Larken Rose

80. “The main factor distinguishing the belief in “government” from other religions today is that people actually believe in the god called “government.”

— Larken Rose

81. “I have rights that you don’t. You must do as I say, submit to my commands, and treat me as your superior, because I am not a mere human being. I have risen above that. Through my unquestioning obedience and loyalty to my masters, I have become a piece of the superhuman entity called ‘government’ and act on its ‘authority.’ As a result, the rules of human morality do not apply to me, and my actions should not be judged by the usual standards of human behavior.”

— Larken Rose

82. “If the IRS had to calculate the tax due and then directly take it from each “taxpayer,” there would be no more federal “taxation.”

— Larken Rose

83. “Even when a slave master fights to prevent some other slave master from stealing his slaves, he is still no friend of the slaves themselves.”

— Larken Rose

84. “Kids are taught to praise and adore tyrants, and taught to hate any who resist them. We make fun of it when other countries put their own spin on history. We’re stunned that anyone could still think that Josef Stalin or Chairman Mao was a good guy. But this country does the same thing, teaching our kids to adore tyrants like FDR and Lincoln.”

— Larken Rose

85. “For something to be “government,” it must, by definition, do something that average people do not have the right to do. A “government” with the same rights as everyone else is not a “government” any more than the average man on the street is “government.”

— Larken Rose

86. “When July Fourth rolls around, and you’re all swigging your beer and waving your flags, does the fact that we are infinitely less free than we ever were under British rule ever make its way into what’s left of your brains?”

— Larken Rose

87. “If a hundred people were shipwrecked on an island, what would it even mean to say that everyone there has a “right” to food, or that everyone has a “right” to health care, or the “right” to a job, or the “right” to a “living wage”?”

— Larken Rose

88. “Pride in being a “law-abiding taxpayer” is not the result of having helped people, which the person could have done far more effectively on a voluntary basis; the pride comes from having faithfully obeyed the commands of a perceived “authority.”

— Larken Rose

89. “Irony: Taking a 170-year-old envy-based “philosophy,” which has led to the murder of several hundred million human beings and the oppression of billions more, and calling it “progressive”.”

— Larken Rose

90. “If a hundred people were shipwrecked on an island, who would imagine that forcing most of them to serve and obey a “protector” would be necessary or useful? And who would imagine that letting one or two of them forcibly impose their morals on the rest would make such a group more virtuous?”

— Larken Rose

91. “Perhaps the most valuable thing the “Great American Experiment” accomplished was to demonstrate that “limited government” is impossible. There cannot be a master who answers to his slaves.”

— Larken Rose

92. “The state mercenaries refer to this lack of groveling as someone having an “attitude.” In their eyes, someone treating them as mere mortals, as if they are on the same level as everyone else, amounts to showing disrespect for their alleged “authority.”

— Larken Rose

93. “The truth of the matter, back then and today, is that these parasites who call themselves ‘leaders’ are not superior beings, they are not great men and women, they are not honorable, they’re not even average.”

— Larken Rose

94. “The great Emancipation Proclamation, which I assume you’ve heard of, only declared slaves free in areas not controlled by the Union. It wasn’t a great victory for freedom; it was a military tactic, one used by lots of tyrants before Lincoln, including King George: tell your enemy’s slaves that if you win, they’ll be free. It’s a fine way to cause havoc on the other side, but it has nothing to do with principles.”

— Larken Rose

95. “Throughout history, the perpetual suffering and injustice, occurring on an incomprehensible scale – it was all because of people just like you: the well-trained, thoroughly indoctrinated conformists, the people who do as they’re told, who proudly bow to their masters, who follow the crowd, believing what everyone else believes and thinking whatever authority tells them to think. That is you.”

— Larken Rose

96. “But his nationalism and pack mentality – and most of all, his unshakable faith in authority – rendered him blind to the evil he was committing. It’s the same with every army, and every cop. Above all else, they take pride in their ability to obey without question, as if it’s a virtue instead of the most heinous sin a person can commit.”

— Larken Rose

97. “Trying to clear things up, when people in power are constantly trying to confuse matters, is a tough job. There are so many levels of misunderstanding in most people’s minds, that it’s hard to even know where to begin.”

— Larken Rose

98. “You feel pride at being able to say you once shook a senator’s hand, or saw the President in person. Ah, yes, the grand deity himself, His Royal Highness, the President of the United States of America. You speak the title as if you’re referring to God Almighty.”

— Larken Rose

99. “You proclaim how proud you are to be ‘law-abiding citizens,’ and express utter contempt for anyone who considers himself above your so-called ‘laws,’ laws that are nothing more than the selfish whims of tyrants and thieves.”

— Larken Rose

100. “There are a whole lot of people who have learned the hard way just how little our justice system cares about justice. The system cares about one thing, and one thing only: its own power.”

— Larken Rose