In his latest book, Jedediah Purdy takes up a question of deep and lasting importance: why is property ownership a value to society? His answer returns us to the foundations of American society and enables us to interpret the writings of the patron saint of liberal economics, Adam Smith, in a wholly[...]

In "A Tolerable Anarchy," Jedediah Purdy traces the history of the American understanding of freedom, an ideal that has inspired the country's best--and worst--moments, from independence and emancipation to war and economic uncertainty. Working from portraits of famous American lives, like Frederick[...]