Lysander Spooner

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Lore & Background

Spooner was born on a farm in Athol, Massachusetts, on January 19, 1808, the second of nine children. His father was a deist. He studied law under prominent lawyers and abolitionists John Davis and Charles Allen, but never attended college. Defying Massachusetts law, which required non-college graduates to study for five years, he set up his practice in Worcester after only three years, arguing the requirement discriminated against the poor. The legislature abolished the restriction in 1836. After a disappointing legal career and failed real estate speculation in Ohio, he returned to his father's farm in 1840. In 1844, Spooner started the American Letter Mail Company, which competed with the United States Post Office, whose rates were very high. He published a pamphlet titled 'The Unconstitutionality of the Laws of Congress Prohibiting Private Mails.' Although the company found commercial success, legal challenges by the government exhausted his financial resources, and a law enacted in 1851 strengthening the federal monopoly put him out of business. His competition led to a reduction in letter postage from 5¢ to 3¢. Spooner attained his highest profile as an abolitionist. His 1845 book The Unconstitutionality of Slavery argued that the Constitution did not permit slavery, challenging the disunionist faction led by William Lloyd Garrison. He actively campaigned against slavery until the Civil War. Later in life, he defended the Millerites, who were arrested for vagrancy after stopping work because they believed the world would soon end. He died unmarried at age 79 on May 14, 1887, at his residence at 109 Myrtle Street, Boston.

Reader's Guide

Spooner's significance lies in his multifaceted challenge to state authority across legal, economic, and political domains. As a lawyer, he successfully opposed discriminatory licensing requirements for the bar. As an entrepreneur, his American Letter Mail Company directly challenged the U.S. Postal Service's monopoly, leading to reduced postage rates. As a political theorist, his individualist anarchism rejected institution of legislature and compulsive government, proposing instead voluntary mutual insurance companies owned by all members, which he called political corporation, with disputes judged in jury trials where jurors would use their intuition to seek the most just verdict. He argued for the inalienability of liberty, making any contract giving dominion over anyone criminal. He believed every person has absolute dominion over the products of their labor, and opposed wage labor on grounds of the right of every laborer to own the fruits of their labor, seeing wage laborers as servants coerced by the alternative of starvation. His writings, including The Unconstitutionality of Slavery and No Treason: The Constitution of No Authority, influenced both left-libertarian and right-libertarian thought. Spooner also advocated for free banking, opposed licensing for lawyers, and distinguished vices (acts by which a man harms himself or his property) from crimes (acts by which one man harms the person or property of another), arguing against punishing vices. Unlike fellow individualist anarchist Benjamin Tucker, Spooner was not opposed to violent uprisings against unjust systems, and in 1880 advocated for the Irish to rise up and kill their British landlords.

Did You Know?

• Spooner's father was a deist and may have named his older sons Leander and Lysander after Greek mythological and Spartan heroes.
• Spooner studied law under John Davis, later Governor of Massachusetts and Senator, and Charles Allen, a state senator and Representative from the Free Soil Party.
• His American Letter Mail Company reduced letter postage from 5¢ to 3¢ through competition.
• Spooner defended the Millerites, who were arrested for vagrancy after stopping work because they believed the world would soon end.
• In 1880, Spooner advocated for the Irish to rise up and kill their British landlords, believing the landlords were denying them their natural rights.