George H. Smith

{{about|the American libertarian and atheist writer|the American science fiction author of the same name|George H. Smith (fiction author)}}

{{Infobox writer

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| name = George Hamilton Smith

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| birth_date = {{birth date|1949|02|10}}

| birth_place = Japan

| death_date = {{death date and age|2022|04|08|1949|02|10}}

| death_place = Bloomington, Illinois, U.S.

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| nationality = American

| education = University of Arizona

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| genre = Critical view

| subject = Atheism, classical liberalism (liberalism in the United States)

| movement = Libertarianism (later), Objectivism (early), anarcho-capitalism, philosophical anarchism

| notable_works = Atheism: The Case Against God (1974); Atheism, Ayn Rand and Other Heresies (1991); Why Atheism? (2000); The System of Liberty (2013)

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George Hamilton Smith (February 10, 1949 – April 8, 2022) was an American author, editor, educator, and speaker known for his writings on atheism and libertarianism in the United States.

Early life and activism

Born in Japan in 1949 to Frank and Juanita Smith,{{cite web |last=Boaz |first=David |date=May 15, 2022 |title=George H. Smith, RIP |url=https://www.cato.org/blog/george-h-smith-rip |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220515170644/https://www.cato.org/blog/george-h-smith-rip |archive-date=May 15, 2022 |access-date=December 18, 2024 |publisher=Cato Institute}} the young Smith grew up mostly in Tucson, Arizona, and attended the University of Arizona for several years, where he organized an Objectivist club named Students of Objectivism before leaving without a degree; he relocated to Los Angeles in 1971. With the help of American libertarian editor Roy Childs, he secured a contract from Nash Publishing (then located in Los Angeles) to produce a book on atheism. The finished product was his first book, Atheism: The Case Against God (1974),{{cite journal |last=Martin |first=Michael |date=April 1982 |title=Atheism: The Case Against God [review] |url=https://infidels.org/library/modern/michael-martin-review-smith/ |url-status=live |journal=Teaching Philosophy |volume=5 |issue=2 |pages=152–155 |doi=10.5840/teachphil19825236 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210917062117/https://infidels.org/library/modern/michael-martin-review-smith/ |archive-date=September 17, 2021 |access-date=December 18, 2024 |via=Internet Infidels|url-access=subscription }}{{cite journal |last=Placentra Johnston |first=Margaret |date=2016 |title=Atheism: The Case Against God [review] |url=https://www.nyjournalofbooks.com/book-review/atheism-case-against-god |url-status=live |journal=New York Journal of Books |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170812210608/https://www.nyjournalofbooks.com/book-review/atheism-case-against-god |archive-date=August 12, 2017 |access-date=December 18, 2024}} which continued to be reprinted many years after. It was in Atheism: The Case Against God that Smith stated he became an atheist by the time he was 16. Around this period, he saw Ayn Rand on The Tonight Show saying that she was an atheist; impressed, Smith sought out her books.

Career

Smith began teaching in the 1970s, first under the auspices of his own Forum for Philosophical Studies (with offices on Sunset Boulevard in Los Angeles), later under the auspices of American libertartian think tanks like the Cato Institute and the Institute for Humane Studies (IHS). During the 1980s, Smith worked for more than six years as the general editor of Knowledge Products, a Nashville-based company that produced educational audio recordings in philosophy, history, economics, and current affairs; these came as a result of Nashville entrepreneur Crom Carmichael, who had attended Smith's seminars in those years and told the Cato Institute: "These lectures are great, but you're only reaching 75 people. You need to scale up."

In addition to his duties as editor, Smith was the primary scriptwriter for Knowledge Products' Great Political Thinkers series, and these recordings were used widely in college classrooms. For nearly twenty years, from the mid-1970s to the mid-1990s, Smith spent his summers teaching political philosophy and American political and intellectual history to university students at seminars sponsored by Cato Institute, IHS, and at other American libertarian conferences. After hearing his lectures, the American politician and Cato Institute co-founder Ed Crane said: "Why don't we just have George do all the lectures?"

Since 1971, more than one hundred of Smith's articles and book reviews appeared in a wide range of publications, most of them American libertarian magazines, including the Academic Associates Book News, Arizona Daily Star, Cato Policy Report, Free Inquiry, Humane Studies Review, The Humanist, Inquiry, Journal of Libertarian Studies, Liberty, The New York Times, Reason, and The Voluntaryist. In March 1990, he wrote for Liberty a denunciation of American libertarian academics at state universities as "libertarians on welfare". In 1991, Smith wrote Atheism, Ayn Rand and Other Heresies, which was published by Prometheus Books.{{cite journal |last=Gordon |first=David |date=Fall 1992 |title=Review of Atheism, Ayn Rand, and Other Heresies By George H. Smith |url=https://cdn.mises.org/10_2_6_0.pdf |url-status=live |journal=The Journal of Libertarian Studies |volume=10 |issue=2 |pages=191–199 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220313084901/https://cdn.mises.org/10_2_6_0.pdf |archive-date=March 13, 2022 |access-date=December 18, 2024 |via=Mises Institute}} In an op-ed for The New York Times in 1992, he defended the right of the Boy Scouts of America to refuse membership to atheists.{{refn|For his op-ed, see {{cite news |last=Smith |first=George H. |date=January 9, 1992 |title=God and Boy In the Scouts |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1992/01/09/opinion/god-and-boy-in-the-scouts.html |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220515170717/https://www.nytimes.com/1992/01/09/opinion/god-and-boy-in-the-scouts.html |archive-date=May 15, 2022 |access-date=December 18, 2024 |work=The New York Times |page=23 |issn=0362-4331}}|group=nb}}

Smith wrote a weekly column on American libertarian and classical liberal thought for Libertarianism.org, a website operated by the Cato Institute. Smith presented his arguments in favor of non-political participation in his party dialogue "Neither Bullets Nor Ballots", considering it a practice of power through rhetoric; even though its activity is carried out by parties in favor of freedom and justice, since in his views every party exercises the coercive power of the state, whether it uses it or not, and always under political commitments. Mistrusting all political activity, he separated American libertarianism from partisanship.{{cite journal |last1=McElroy |first1=Wendy |last2=Smith |first2=George H. |last3=Watner |first3=Carl |year=1981 |title=Neither Bullets Nor Ballots: Essays On Voluntaryism |url=https://www.scribd.com/document/665405688/Neither-Bullets-Nor-Ballots-Essays-on-Voluntaryism-Carl-Watner-George-H-Smith-Wendy-McElroy |url-status=dead |journal=New Libertarian |volume=IV |issue=8 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20241214164652/https://www.scribd.com/document/665405688/Neither-Bullets-Nor-Ballots-Essays-on-Voluntaryism-Carl-Watner-George-H-Smith-Wendy-McElroy |archive-date=December 14, 2024 |access-date=December 18, 2024 |via=Scribd}}{{cite web |last=Smith |first=George H. |date=January 7, 2017 |title=Party Dialogue by George H. Smith |url=http://voluntaryist.com/non-voting/party-dialogue-george-h-smith/ |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170706173055/https://voluntaryist.com/non-voting/party-dialogue-george-h-smith/ |archive-date=July 6, 2017 |access-date=December 18, 2024 |website=The Voluntaryist}}

In November 1999, Smith wrote "In Defense of Rational Anarchism", where he argued that demarcations between the justice-enforcing government and the justice-violating gang was nowhere to be found in any existing organization claiming to be a government.{{cite web |last=Flood |first=Anthony |date=March 1, 2008 |title=George Smith, 'In Defense of Rational Anarchism' |url=http://www.anthonyflood.com/smithrationalanarchism.htm |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080305190921/http://www.anthonyflood.com/smithrationalanarchism.htm |archive-date=March 5, 2008 |access-date=December 18, 2024 |website=AnthonyFlood.com}} He wrote: "Those familiar with its [i.e., 'consent' theory's] long history will understand that it has everywhere and always been used to defend and expand the absolute power of govern-ment." Ultimately, Smith argued that the "basic premise of anarchism" is that "true sovereignty resides in each individual, who has the right to assess the justice of a particular law, procedure or government". In 2000, Smith wrote Why Atheism?, which was published by Prometheus Books.{{cite journal |last=McClung |first=Britt |date=October 1, 2001 |title=Why Atheism? [review] |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/23919816 |url-status=live |journal=Journal of Church and State |volume=43 |issue=4 |pages=808–809 |doi=10.1093/jcs/43.4.808 |issn=0021-969X |jstor=23919816 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20241214190937/https://www.jstor.org/stable/23919816 |archive-date=December 14, 2024 |access-date=December 18, 2024 |via=Oxford Academic|url-access=subscription }}

His published works often dealt with such issues as capital punishment (which he opposed),{{cite journal |last=Kinsella |first=Stephan |author-link=Stephan Kinsella |year=1999 |title=Inalienability and Punishment: A Reply to George Smith |url=https://cdn.mises.org/14_1_4_0.pdf |url-status=live |journal=Journal of Libertarian Studies |volume=14 |issue=1 |pages=79–93 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191212172447/https://cdn.mises.org/14_1_4_0.pdf |archive-date=December 12, 2019 |access-date=December 18, 2024 |via=Mises Institute}} anarcho-capitalism and philosophical anarchism, American libertarianism,{{cite journal |last=Strasnick |first=Steven |year=1979 |title='Justice Entrepreneurship in A Free Market': Comment |url=https://cdn.mises.org/3_4_6_0.pdf |url-status=live |journal=Journal of Libertarian Studies |volume=3 |issue=4 |pages=433–437 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220126014813/https://cdn.mises.org/3_4_6_0.pdf |archive-date=January 26, 2022 |access-date=December 18, 2024 |via=Mises Institute}} religious toleration, and atheism.{{cite book |url=https://philpapers.org/rec/PALWLY |title=Why Liberty: Your Life, Your Choices, Your Future |publisher=Jameson Books |year=2013 |isbn=978-0-89803-172-0 |editor-last=Palmer |editor-first=Tom G. |location=Ottawa, Illinois |page=119 |access-date=December 18, 2024 |via=PhilPapers}}{{cite book |last=Flood |first=Anthony |title= Atheism Analyzed: The Implosion of George Smith's "Case against God" |year=2019 |edition=Kindle E-book}}{{cite web |last=Flood |first=Anthony |date=April 6, 2020 |title=A Debate on the Existence of God: Greg Bahnsen vs. George Smith (1991) |url=https://anthonygflood.com/2020/06/a-debate-on-the-existence-of-god-greg-bahnsen-vs-george-smith-1991/ |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201213223638/https://anthonygflood.com/2020/06/a-debate-on-the-existence-of-god-greg-bahnsen-vs-george-smith-1991/ |archive-date=December 13, 2020 |access-date=December 18, 2024 |website=AnthonyFlood.com}} Among many figures, he wrote about Thomas Hobbes, John Locke, Ayn Rand, Herbert Spencer, and William Wollaston; he also wrote an introduction, fourteen pages long,{{cite book |last=Shone |first=Steve J. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=9MM_cpF9IM8C |title=Lysander Spooner: American Anarchist |publisher=Lexington Books |year=2010 |isbn=978-0-7391-4452-7 |location=Lanham, Mayland |access-date=December 18, 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20241218222354/https://www.google.com/books/edition/Lysander_Spooner_American_Anarchist/9MM_cpF9IM8C |archive-date=December 18, 2024 |url-status=live |via=Google Books}} to a collection of work by Lysander Spooner.{{refn|For his introduction, see {{cite book |last=Smith |first=George H. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=HoRsqI4Kj34C |title=The Lysander Spooner Reader |publisher=Laissez Faire Books |year=1992 |isbn=978-1-62129-007-0 |editor-last=Tucker |editor-first=Jeffrey |editor-link=Jeffrey Tucker |location=New York City, New York |pages=12–26 |chapter=Introduction by George H. Smith |access-date=December 18, 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20241218223218/https://books.google.com/books?id=HoRsqI4Kj34C |archive-date=December 18, 2024 |url-status=live |via=Google Books}}|group=nb}} From 2010 to 2020, he wrote around 300 essays on liberalism for Libertarianism.org, ranging from Aristotle and Thomas Aquinas to Adam Smith and the American Revolution to abolitionism.

On December 31, 2007, Smith provided a humorous qualified endorsement of Republican Party candidate Ron Paul for American libertarian voters but also one that was consistent with his published writings on electoral politics.{{cite AV media |url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h81tGuWCdmY |title=George H. Smith Gives Qualified Endorsement of Ron Paul 2008 |date=December 31, 2007 |last=Smith |first=George H. |access-date=December 18, 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230104122411/https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h81tGuWCdmY&feature=youtu.be |archive-date=January 4, 2023 |url-status=live |via=YouTube}} In 2013, Cambridge University Press published his book The System of Liberty: Themes in the History of Classical Liberalism, which was praised by The Structure of Liberty: Justice and the Rule of Law author Randy E. Barnett, Libertarianism: What Everyone Needs to Know author Jason Brennan, and Radicals for Capitalism author Brian Doherty.{{cite web |date=April 22, 2013 |title=The System of Liberty {{!}} Political theory |url=https://www.cambridge.org/us/universitypress/subjects/politics-international-relations/political-theory/system-liberty-themes-history-classical-liberalism |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240928052313/https://www.cambridge.org/us/universitypress/subjects/politics-international-relations/political-theory/system-liberty-themes-history-classical-liberalism |archive-date=September 28, 2024 |access-date=December 18, 2024 |publisher=Cambridge University Press}}

Death

Smith died on April 8, 2022, in Bloomington, Illinois.{{cite news |date=April 14, 2022 |title=George Smith Obituary |url=https://www.sj-r.com/obituaries/i0042055 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220626151735/https://www.sj-r.com/obituaries/i0042055 |archive-date=June 26, 2022 |access-date=December 18, 2024 |work=The State Journal-Register}} He was 73.

Selected publications

{{cite book |last=Smith |first=George H. |url=https://www.google.com/books/edition/Atheism/FI7ZAAAAMAAJ |title=Atheism: The Case Against God |location=Los Angeles, California |author-mask=— |access-date=December 18, 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20241218224934/https://www.google.com/books/edition/Atheism/FI7ZAAAAMAAJ |archive-date=December 18, 2024 |url-status=live |via=Google Books |publisher=Nash |year=1974 |isbn=978-0-87975-124-1}}
{{cite journal |url=https://www.libertarianism.org/publications/essays/literature-free-thought |url-status=live |journal=Libertarian Review |volume=VI |issue=1 |last=Smith |first=George H. |author-mask=— |date=January–February 1977 |title=The Literature of Freethought |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170115044239/https://www.libertarianism.org/publications/essays/literature-free-thought |archive-date=January 15, 2017 |access-date=December 18, 2024 |via=Libertarianism.org}}
{{cite journal |url=https://cdn.mises.org/2_3_2_0.pdf |url-status=live |title=William Wollaston on Property Rights |journal=Journal of Libertarian Studies |volume=2 |issue=3 |last=Smith |first=George H. |author-mask=— |year=1978 |pages=217–225 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210613112012/https://cdn.mises.org/2_3_2_0.pdf |archive-date=June 13, 2021 |access-date=December 18, 2024 |via=Mises Institute}}
{{cite journal |url=https://cdn.mises.org/3_4_4_0.pdf |url-status=live |title=Justice Entrepreneurship in a Free Market |journal=Journal of Libertarian Studies |volume=3 |issue=4 |last=Smith |first=George H. |author-mask=— |date=Winter 1979 |pages=405–426 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191211202218/https://cdn.mises.org/3_4_4_0.pdf |archive-date=December 11, 2019 |access-date=December 18, 2024 |via=Mises Institute}}
{{cite journal |url=https://cdn.mises.org/3_4_8_0.pdf |url-status=live |title=Justice Entrepreneurship Revisited |journal=Journal of Libertarian Studies |volume=3 |issue=4 |last=Smith |first=George H. |author-mask=— |date=Winter 1979 |pages=453–469 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211118075918/https://cdn.mises.org/3_4_8_0.pdf |archive-date=November 18, 2021 |access-date=December 18, 2024 |via=Mises Institute}}
{{cite journal |url=https://cdn.mises.org/5_2_1_0.pdf |url-status=live |title=Herbert Spencer's Theory of Causation |journal=Journal of Libertarian Studies |volume=5 |last=Smith |first=George H. |author-mask=— |date=Spring 1981 |issue=2 |pages=113–152 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211118124222/https://cdn.mises.org/5_2_1_0.pdf |archive-date=November 18, 2021 |access-date=December 18, 2024 |via=Mises Institute}}
{{cite book |last=Smith |first=George H. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=I6bXAAAAMAAJ |title=Atheism, Ayn Rand and Other Heresies |location=Buffalo, New York |publisher=Prometheus Books |year=1991 |isbn=0-87975-577-6 |author-mask=— |access-date=December 18, 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20241218224342/https://books.google.com/books?id=I6bXAAAAMAAJ |archive-date=December 18, 2024 |url-status=live |via=Google Books}}
{{cite magazine |url=http://www.libertyunbound.com/sites/files/printarchive/Liberty_Magazine_November_1996.pdf |url-status=dead |title=A Killer's Right to Life |magazine=Liberty |volume=10 |issue=2 |last=Smith |first=George H. |author-mask=— |date=November 1996 |page=[http://www.libertyunbound.com/sites/files/printarchive/Liberty_Magazine_November_1996.pdf#page=46 46] |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210109192838/https://www.libertyunbound.com/sites/files/printarchive/Liberty_Magazine_November_1996.pdf |archive-date=January 9, 2021 |access-date=December 18, 2024}}
{{cite magazine |url=http://www.libertyunbound.com/sites/files/printarchive/Liberty_Magazine_July_1997.pdf |url-status=dead |title=Inalienable Rights? |magazine=Liberty |volume=10 |issue=6 |last=Smith |first=George H. |author-mask=— |date=July 1997 |page=[http://www.libertyunbound.com/sites/files/printarchive/Liberty_Magazine_July_1997.pdf#page=51 51] |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210110021504/http://www.libertyunbound.com/sites/files/printarchive/Liberty_Magazine_July_1997.pdf |archive-date=January 10, 2021 |access-date=December 18, 2024}}
{{cite book |last=Smith |first=George H. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=qpzXAAAAMAAJ |title=Why Atheism? |location=Amherst, New York |author-mask=— |publisher=Prometheus Books |year=2000 |isbn=978-1-57392-268-5 |access-date=December 18, 2024 |archive-url=http://web.archive.org/web/20241218225159/https://books.google.com/books?id=qpzXAAAAMAAJ |archive-date=December 18, 2024 |url-status=live |via=Google Books}}
{{cite encyclopedia |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=yxNgXs3TkJYC |title=Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen |encyclopedia=The Encyclopedia of Libertarianism |year=2008 |publisher=SAGE; Cato Institute |location=Thousand Oaks, California |last=Smith |first=George H. |isbn=978-1-4129-6580-4 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20241218224932/https://www.google.com/books/edition/The_Encyclopedia_of_Libertarianism/yxNgXs3TkJYC |archive-date=December 18, 2024 |author-mask=— |editor-last=Hamowy |editor-first=Ronald |editor-link=Ronald Hamowy |pages=115–117 |doi=10.4135/9781412965811.n73 |access-date=December 18, 2024 |via=Google Books|url-access=subscription }}
{{cite book |last=Smith |first=George H. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=WxAVSJlyIu4C |title=The System of Liberty: Themes in the History of Classical Liberalism |location=New York City, New York |publisher=Cambridge University Press |year=2013 |isbn=978-1-107-00507-5 |author-mask=— |access-date=December 18, 2024 |via=Google Books |url-status=live |archive-date=December 18, 2024 |archive-url=http://web.archive.org/web/20241218224511/https://books.google.com/books?id=WxAVSJlyIu4C}}

Notes

References

External links

[https://www.libertarianism.org/people/george-h-smith George H. Smith] at Libertarianism.org
[https://ghsbibliography.blogspot.com/p/essays.html Essays by George H. Smith] at George H. Smith Bibliography

Category:1949 births

Category:2022 deaths

Category:20th-century American philosophers

Category:American atheists

Category:American libertarians

Category:American philosophers

Category:Atheist philosophers

Category:Freethought writers

Category:Libertarian theorists

Category:People from Tucson, Arizona

Category:Rationalists

Category:University of Arizona alumni