Revisionism, according to Harry Elmer Barnes, is bringing history into accord with the facts. Why would history and factual evidence be at odds? Because governments, per Orwell, falsify the past to keep the population subservient. If people really knew what governments had done they would want less of it than they have.

How much less is the question Lew Rockwell addresses in his book, Against the State: An Anarcho-Capitalist Manifesto, released in May, 2014. As the title makes clear, Rockwell argues for the complete elimination of the State.

Many people otherwise favoring unfettered freedom will qualify their position with an inevitable "but" — "but we need government to provide physical security and dispute resolution, the most critical services of all."

Really?

If the free market is the "arena of voluntary interactions between individuals" that has proven so fruitful over the past 250 years, why does it need a coercive monopoly — the State — providing its most critical services? Monopolies, he reminds us, are characterized by higher prices and poorer service. Furthermore, the State, because it lacks the profit and loss test for allocating resources, "has no idea what to produce, in what quantities, in what location, using what methods." Given the importance of physical security and dispute resolution why do we assign its provision to such a thoroughly flawed institution?