law

Pandemics and Patents by Adam Mossoff

Biopharmaceutical innovators responded heroically to the COVID-19 pandemic. In unprecedented time and with cutting-edge technologies, they created vaccines and other medical treatments that saved millions of lives around the world. For this extraordinary achievement, leftists and libertarians have vilified them, and politicians are actively seeking to confiscate their patents. This talk explains how patents made possible the unprecedented response to the pandemic and why these vital property rights have been wrongly attacked.

Recorded live on July 7, 2022 as part of the Objectivist Summer Conference.

Criminalizing Economic Inequality through the Prohibition on Insider Trading by Kevin Douglas

Mr. Douglas will describe how insider trading laws criminalize several forms of economic inequality. Property law generally protects a business owner’s freedom to profit from trade secrets and business opportunities, and by setting prices. By contrast, the prohibition on insider trading undermines the usefulness of information for its owners and treats less informed investors as victims of investors with information advantages. The result is a system of regulation that actively redistributes and even nullifies investors’ wealth—all in the name of protecting property rights in information.

Recorded live on July 5, 2022 as part of the Objectivist Summer Conference.

All Regulation is Over-Regulation by Harry Binswanger

Conservatives complain about “over-regulation,” but all governmental regulation—regulation as such—is destructive and evil. Ayn Rand wrote that the premise of regulation is “the concept that a man is guilty until he is proved innocent by the permissive rubber stamp of a commissar or a Gauleiter.” Dr. Binswanger will argue that government must have “probable cause” before it can use force against someone—and he will discuss how this applies not only to business activity, but also to immigration, “public health” and gun ownership. Recorded live as part of The Objectivist Conference on August 31, 2021.

Life, Liberty, and Intellectual Property with Adam Mossoff

In this talk, Mossoff addresses the nature of patent rights, emphasizing the Founding Fathers’ moral achievement in securing patents and other intellectual property rights in U.S. law. Known for leading the charge on intellectual property rights, Mossoff has testified before the Senate and the House on patent legislation, and speaks and writes extensively on the issue.

This talk was recorded as part of OCON 2017 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

How Did Freedom Fare in the Supreme Court This Year? (2018) with Amy Peikoff, Larry Salman, Steve Simpson

Gay wedding cakes. Compulsory union dues. Mandatory disclosures for pregnancy centers. Police searches of cell phone records. These are just a few of the subjects the Supreme Court has taken up this term. The Court’s major cases impact freedom in America and involve fascinating political and philosophical questions. Our panel of experts: Amy Peikoff, Larry Salzman and Steve Simpson, analyze some of the Court’s most momentous decisions from this term and explain their implications.

Recorded live at OCON 2018 on July 3, 2018.

Free Speech, Free Minds, Free Markets by Tara Smith

Many people believe that while freedom of speech is a vital human liberty, economic freedom is entirely separate, merely a distant and inferior relation. This lecture exposes their error by examining the underappreciated implications of free speech on free markets. After isolating the First Amendment’s core concern as intellectual freedom, Smith demonstrates how the mind is the bridge between speech and property—between intellectual activity, on the other hand, and its manifold material rewards, on the other.

Recorded Live in Cleveland on Thursday June 27th, 2019.

Free Speech and the Threat of Tech Regulation by Yaron Brook, Dave Rubin, Brian Amerige and Greg Salmieri

Dave Rubin of the Rubin Report is joined by Yaron Brook, Brian Amerige, and Greg Salmieri LIVE from OCON to talk about big tech censorship, the Google leak, Project Veritas, free speech, YouTube demonetization, fake news, and more.

Tribalism in Law by Tara Smith

Unfortunately, all three branches of our government are contributing to the tribalization of our legal system. As a result, the substance of our laws along with the laws’ administration authority are increasingly determined by power shifts among rival groups rather than by the sovereignty of individual rights.

This audio was recorded at AynRandCon in Atlanta, Georgia, on November 3, 2018.

Free Speech Panel at the University of Southern California with Dave Rubin, Colin Moriarty and Steve Simpson

College used to be grounded in the inviolate principle that each of us should confront new ideas, speak our minds, and learn. Has that time passed? This year (2017) alone we have seen a riot at U.C. Berkeley and violence at Middlebury College over controversial speakers. Instead of “express yourself,” a new view seems to be taking hold: “Suppress yourself—or I’ll do it for you.” What is happening to free speech on campus?

In this panel discussion (sponsored by the Ayn Rand Institute and the University of Southern California Political Student Assembly and Young Americans for Liberty), three leading voices in this field address current threats to freedom of speech on college campuses: Dave Rubin, Creator and Host of “The Rubin Report”; Colin Moriarty, Creator and Host of “Colin’s Last Stand,” and Steve Simpson, Director of Legal Studies, Ayn Rand Institute, and editor of “Defending Free Speech.”

This panel was recorded live at the Seeley G. Mudd Building, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, California, on Thursday, April 13, 2017.

The Berkeley “Free Speech Movement” and the Erosion of Free Speech by Steve Simpson

In the 1960s, protests erupted at U.C. Berkeley over a ban on political activity on campus. Students marched and occupied school property, all in the name of “free speech.” Today, the Free Speech Movement launched at Berkeley in the 1960s is widely held as a model for advocates of the right to free speech. Is that true? This talk analyzes the Berkeley Free Speech Movement and its implications for free speech today.