Laissez Faire Books
| Company type | Private |
|---|---|
| Industry | Bookselling, Publishing |
| Founded | 1972 in New York City, United States |
| Founder | John Muller, Sharon Presley |
| Fate | Ownership transferred to International Society for Individual Liberty in 2007; acquired by Agora Financial in 2011; ceased bookselling by 2017 |
| Headquarters | New York City , United States |
| Products | Libertarian books and literature |
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Laissez Faire Books (abbreviated as LFB) was a libertarian bookseller and publishing company established in 1972 by John Muller and Sharon Presley, initially located in New York City. Between 1982 and 2007, Laissez Faire Books functioned as a division under the nonprofit organizations Center for Independent Thought and Center for Libertarian Thought, both directed by Andrea Millen Rich. The imprint Fox & Wilkes Books was used to release both classic and modern libertarian literature.
In November 2007, ownership transferred to the International Society for Individual Liberty. Records from before ISIL's stewardship are preserved at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University. Later, in March 2011, Agora Financial took over Laissez Faire Books but repurposed the brand for different uses.
History
The inception of Laissez Faire Books took place in New York City in 1972, founded by John Muller alongside Sharon Presley. Muller, a civil engineer by profession, conceived the idea of the bookstore. In late 1971, he secured a location on Mercer Street within Greenwich Village, New York City, for what would become the Laissez Faire Bookstore and Art Gallery. Together with Presley, then a psychology graduate student at CUNY Graduate Center, they distributed their initial flyer to roughly one thousand individuals whose contact information they had gathered nationwide. The official launch occurred on March 4, 1972, drawing prominent libertarian authors and intellectuals such as Murray Rothbard, Roy A. Childs Jr., and Jerome Tuccille.
From 1982 through 2005, leadership of LFB was under Andrea Millen Rich, who, along with her husband Howard Rich, expanded its mail-order operations.
In his book Radicals for Capitalism, chronicling the libertarian movement’s history, Brian Doherty describes the bookstore as "an essential social hub for the movement in America's largest city, serving as a gathering place for traveling libertarians seeking fellowship and support..."
On March 17, 2011, Agora Financial, LLC—a publisher specializing in economic and investment books and newsletters—announced its acquisition of Laissez Faire Books from the International Society for Individual Liberty (ISIL). However, by 2017, the LFB.org website had ceased offering books for purchase.
The archival materials of Laissez Faire Books—including correspondence, memoranda, financial documents, catalogs, printed materials, and photographs related to libertarianism and publishing in the United States from 1959 to 2008—are housed at the Hoover Institution Library at Stanford University.
Fox & Wilkes Books
Laissez Faire Books once operated a distinct publishing division known as Fox & Wilkes Books, named in honor of the eighteenth-century British classical liberal figures Charles James Fox and John Wilkes. This imprint focused on releasing works by modern libertarian writers and brought back into circulation classic libertarian titles that had gone out of print.
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