Col. William B(atchelder). Greene was one of the most important figures of the American libertarian movement of the 1800's. Greene was, along with
Lysander Spooner,
Josiah Warren and
Stephen P. Andrews, one of the leading activists of the civil war and post-civil war periods. I want to recommend the great effort that
Shawn P. Wilbur is doing to put Greene's
writingsonline. Wilbur is in the process of completing a biography, provisionally entitled
A Special Answer to a Special Prayer: William B. Greene, An American Mutualist. Greene was insightful, and helped to focus the direction of
American libertarianism from the mid to late 1800's on such matters as mutualism, transcendentalism, cooperative banking theory, equality and socialism and was instrumental in forging individualist-anarchism into a coherent system.
When I began studying 19th century American libertarianism years ago, Greene was one of the first that I researched and read. His life and writings are classically American in his viewpoint and writings. There are many of his writings are at the
Labadie Collection of the Rare Books Room in the Special Collections Library of the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor, Michigan and the
Working Men's Institute in New Harmony, Indiana, both of which I heartily recommend.
Just a thought.
Just KenCLASSical Liberalism
