As a writer and scholar, he labored for decades to move libertarianism from the margins to the mainstream of American politics.
David Boaz, a writer and scholar who for nearly half a century was a leading voice of libertarianism, a political philosophy that he labored to move from the margins to the mainstream of American politics, died June 7 at his home in Arlington, Va. He was 70., the libertarian think tank in Washington where Mr. Boaz served at the time of his death as a senior fellow and executive vice president. The cause was cancer, said his partner of 30 years, Steve Miller.
Mr. Boaz said he was drawn to libertarianism during his adolescence in western Kentucky, where he acquired a twang that never fully left him. His mother had studied economics and kept on her bookshelf a copy of “Economics in One Lesson” by Henry Hazlitt, a best-selling 1946 volume that articulated in layman’s terms the case for an unfettered free market.The young Mr.
Mr. Boaz contributed prolifically to newspapers including The Post, the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times. He drew wide notice with a 1988 commentary published in the Times in which he argued against the criminal laws, immigration regulations and other policies enforced under the umbrella of what was often described as the “war on drugs.”
For libertarians, the growing contemporary movement toward the legalization of marijuana represented a significant victory; the drug is now legal for medicinal purposes in 38 states and the District and for recreational purposes in 24 states and the District.Mr. Boaz counted another victory in the expansion of rights for same-sex couples — most notably the U.S. Supreme Courtfinding a constitutional right for gay couples to marry, a cause that he had worked toward for decades.
He conceded that the Libertarian Party was “not a very successful” political party but posited that most Americans support at least some libertarian ideals. He found stark flaws in the Democratic Party platform and during the 2016 presidential campaign, in which Democrat Hillary Clinton lost to Republican Donald Trump, remarked that among libertarians, the view was that “if someone puts a gun to your head and says you have to choose between Clinton and Trump, the correct answer is, take the bullet.
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