Our Enemy, the State
New York: William Morrow & Company, 1935.
First edition. Copy of Wayne State University sociologist Frank E. Hartung with his gift inscription to another person on front free endpaper and stamp on title page, a single marginal notation in easily-erasable pencil (presumably his). An annual award at Wayne State has been named in his honor as "a great proponent of the notion that crime was a freely chosen behavioral pattern and was not the result of psychological abnormalities." [viii], 209 pp. Publisher's black cloth with gilt lettering. Tiny portrait of Nock mounted to verso of dedication page. A Near Fine copy in the rare original dust jacket, About Very Good, tear in top of front panel mended with archival tissue on verso, small crease and snag along bottom outer corner of front panel, spine dulled, head and tail chipped.
The best-known work by libertarian philosopher and writer Albert Jay Nock, a challenge to state authority which was first published during the acme of Rooosevelt's New Deal. Among the book's many fans have been Ayn Rand and Barry Goldwater. Nock's aphoristic style has gained him critical praise through the years as well; this book has a number of gems such as "Bureaucracy is ineradicable as a cancer, when once it gets well-rooted," and "The State is no proper agency for human welfare."
Price: $1,600.00