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Portraits of Liberty — History
Portraits of Liberty

Portraits of Liberty investigates the lives and philosophies of thinkers throughout history who argued in favor of a freer world.

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Copyright: © Copyright 2020, Libertarianism.org, All Rights Reserved

Latest Episodes:

The Prosecutor of Kings: John Cooke Aug 11, 2026

Show notes

John Cooke was the English lawyer who dared to prosecute Charles I for tyranny, treason, and bloodshed. In an age when kings claimed to rule by divine right, Cooke argued that even the monarch stood beneath the law. John Cooke, though largely forgotten by history, established one of the most dangerous ideas in political history: rulers can be judged by the people they govern.

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How to Read Like a Founding Father Jul 07, 2026

Show notes

The American Founding Fathers did not stumble into liberty by sheer instinct. To understand their world, we must immerse ourselves in their libraries filled with Roman history, biblical texts, Locke, Cato’s Letters, Montesquieu, and Plutarch. This episode explores the reading habits that shaped the American Revolution and asks what it would mean today to recover that tradition.

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Sociology’s Forgotten Origins: Khaldun, Ferguson, and Spencer Jun 11, 2026

Show notes

Sociology is often treated by libertarians as a hostile discipline: collectivist, ideological, and drawn toward social control. But its origins tell a more complicated story. From Ibn Khaldun to Adam Ferguson and Herbert Spencer, this older tradition reveals a sociology of spontaneous order, civil society, and limits on political power.

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A Martyr for Freedom of Speech: Helmuth Hübener May 12, 2026

Show notes

At just sixteen years old, Helmuth Hübener launched a secret anti-Nazi resistance campaign from inside Hitler’s Germany. He exposed Nazi lies by publishing underground pamphlets, knowing it could cost him his life. In this episode, Paul Meany tells the story of the youngest opponent of the Nazi regime. Hübener’s courageous actions reveal the senselessness of censorship and state propaganda, and the moral responsibility to speak the truth.

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The Making of Modern Japan: Fukuzawa Yukichi Apr 07, 2026

Show notes

Fukuzawa Yukichi rose from a marginal samurai background in a rigid, hierarchical society to become one of the most important minds behind Japan’s transformation in the nineteenth century. Deeply influenced by his encounters with the West, he championed education, skepticism of authority, and personal independence as the foundations of a free society. Yukichi helped translate Enlightenment ideals into a distinctly Japanese context.

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Cato’s Letters: Against Tyranny and Corruption Mar 10, 2026

Show notes

Long before the American Revolution, in the 1720s, a series of newspaper essays known as Cato’s Letters warned readers that power corrupts and liberty survives only through constant vigilance. In this episode of Portraits of Liberty, we explore how John Trenchard and Thomas Gordon’s fiery writings helped shape the American tradition of free speech, self-defense, and resistance to tyranny.

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A Son of the Forest: William Apess Feb 10, 2026

Show notes

Born of Pequot descent, William Apess was the first Native American to publish a full-length autobiography. Apess became a Methodist minister and one of the most piercing moral critics of white Christian America’s hypocrisy.

Drawing on the Bible, the Declaration of Independence, and the language of natural rights, Apess demanded that liberty, equality, and self-government apply to Native peoples as much as they were to anyone else. From his autobiography, A Son of the Forest, and his fiery essay “An Indian’s Looking-Glass for the White Man” to his leadership in the Mashpee Revolt, Apess held the American republic accountable to its professed creed.

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The Forgotten Polish Republican: Wawrzyniec Goślicki and the Rights of a Free Commonwealth Dec 09, 2025

Show notes

In the late sixteenth century, Wawrzyniec Goślicki authored De Optimo Senatore (The Accomplished Senator), a bold argument for a politics grounded in natural law, civic virtue, and the constitutional liberties of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. Joined by Walker Haskins, our editor for intellectual history, Paul Meany, covers Goślicki’s career as a bishop, diplomat, and political theorist. They discuss Goślicki’s vision of checks on executive power and his rejection of arbitrary rule.

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A Quiet Rebel: José Castellanos Nov 11, 2025

Show notes

This episode explores the often overlooked classical liberal tradition of civil disobedience through the remarkable story of José Castellanos Contreras, a Salvadoran diplomat who, during World War II, defied orders and international law to save thousands of Jewish people from Nazi death camps. His story, forgotten for decades, embodies the liberal conviction that moral law supersedes state authority.

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Japan's Ignored Anarchist: Andō Shōeki Oct 14, 2025

Show notes

This episode explores the thought of Andō Shōeki, a Japanese philosopher who denounced feudal hierarchies, Confucian dogma, and the samurai class. Shōeki’s vision of a natural, egalitarian society based on voluntary cooperation challenges the notion that anarchist or libertarian thought is uniquely Western. His work is an early critique of state power, anticipating later theories by figures like Franz Oppenheimer.

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