A small victory for freedom: Las Vegas tables food truck restrictions
The Las Vegas Review-Journal has the full story here, but I'm assuming you know the background, so here's reaction from food truck owners gathered by Kyle Gillis with Nevada Journal. As a bonus, this video includes a great story in defense of free enterprise from Councilman Steve Ross.
Unfortunately, this victory for freedom is likely short lived. I have no doubt some brick-and-mortar restaurant owners will again appeal to government to use its coercive power to limit the freedom of their competitors. As French economist and political philosopher Frederic Bastiat writes in The Law, far too often government's authority is unjustly used to pick winners and losers in the economy.
The Complete Perversion of the LawIf you have never read The Law, a short, brilliant book on just government, it is available for free online here. Read it to find out why one perversion of the law - if not stopped immediately - inevitably leads to many.
But, unfortunately, law by no means confines itself to its proper functions. And when it has exceeded its proper functions, it has not done so merely in some inconsequential and debatable matters. The law has gone further than this; it has acted in direct opposition to its own purpose. The law has been used to destroy its own objective: It has been applied to annihilating the justice that it was supposed to maintain; to limiting and destroying rights which its real purpose was to respect. The law has placed the collective force at the disposal of the unscrupulous who wish, without risk, to exploit the person, liberty, and property of others. It has converted plunder into a right, in order to protect plunder. And it has converted lawful defense into a crime, in order to punish lawful defense.
How has this perversion of the law been accomplished? And what have been the results?
The law has been perverted by the influence of two entirely different causes: stupid greed and false philanthropy.
