Walter Williams

People in the major news media have come in for considerable and sometimes bitter criticism. They've been charged with anti-Americanism, leftism, bias and just plain lying, as in the cases of former New York Times reporter Jayson Blair, The Associated Press'...

In last week's U.S. Supreme Court's affirmative action decision, Justice Clarence Thomas' dissent included a quotation from an 1865 speech by abolitionist Frederick Douglass. "What I ask for the Negro," Douglass said, "is not benevolence, not pity, not sympathy, but...

Oreo cookies should be banned from sale to children in California. That's according to Stephen Joseph, who filed a lawsuit against Nabisco last month in California's Marin County Superior Court. Oreo cookies contain trans fat, an ingredient that makes the cookies...

Few Americans have heard of the National Slave Memorial Act (HR 196) that proposes to erect a National Slave Memorial on the National Mall in Washington, D.C. Last year, Sen. Trent Lott made this suggestion whilst groveling at the feet of black politicians and civil...

How many times have we applauded those who "made a difference in the lives of others" and been admonished to do the same? On the face of it, that has to be one of the more mindless generalities of our modern era. After all, didn't Hitler, Stalin, Pol Pot and Castro...

Dr. Mike S. Adams, an associate professor of criminal justice at University of North Carolina's Wilmington campus, has given me an excellent idea for grading students, which appeared in his commentary in the web-based Agape Press newswire. For 35 years, I've taught...

Maytag recently announced that it's moving its Galesburg, Ill., production facility to Mexico. A group called Americans Against NAFTA has protested Maytag's decision. Spokesman Russ Anderson said, "We want to spread the word of what we believe Maytag is doing and the...

Imagine that you and I are in a rowboat. I commit the stupid act of shooting a hole in my end of the boat. Would it be intelligent for you to respond by shooting a hole in your end of the boat? Or, imagine I were a politician and told you that the Russian, Chinese,...

Here's part of a letter from a reader: "A hard-working, conscientious person can earn $10,000 a year in a fast-food restaurant. At the same time, movie stars and athletes, who make very little contribution to society, can earn in excess of $10,000,000 a year. A...

There's considerable unnecessary confusion and debate on public policy issues that would be more intelligently discussed and resolved if we'd say what is actually meant rather than using euphemistic disguises. The Grutter and Gratz vs. Bollinger cases before the U.S....

There's a little known law called the Davis-Bacon Act of 1931. It remains on the books today. Before saying what the law is and its effects, let me run by you some of the language used, in the early 1930s, to push the law through Congress. Rep. John Cochran of...

Much of the '60s and '70s civil rights rhetoric was that black political power was necessary for economic power. In 1967, Clevelanders heeded Malcolm X's infamous "The Ballot or the Bullet" speech with the election of Carl B. Stokes, who became the nation's first...

The March 10 issue of Human Events carried a special report on the 10 most outrageous government programs. The Legal Services Corp. headed the list, followed closely by the McCain-Feingold Campaign Finance Reform Act and the Davis-Bacon Act of 1931. Rounding out the...

Early March, Mrs. Williams and I abandoned the snow and the cold to vacation in Panama City, Fla. We savored the hospitality of our many friends, not to mention several fresh fish dinners served at Captain Anderson's restaurant and at the homes of our friends....

You've written a tuition check, carted your son or daughter off to college, given those last minute admonitions and made those tearful good byes. For those thousands of dollars, the anguish of seeing your 17- or 18-year-old pack up and leave home for the first time,...

We hear so much about "rights" -- a right to this and a right to that. People say they have a right to decent housing, a right to adequate health care, food and a decent job, and more recently, senior citizens have a right to prescription drugs. In a free society, do...

My health and other aspects of my well-being are the business of whom? You say, "What's it now, Williams?" I'm simply asking whose business is it if I don't adequately plan for retirement or save money for my child's education? If I don't wear a seatbelt while driving...

Here's what I said in last year's November column: "George Mason University economists are leaders in economic thinking. They include scholars such as Nobel Laureate James Buchanan, who along with his colleague Gordon Tullock, pioneered the field in economics known as...