Libertarian Author Richard Cornuelle Dies at 84

The New York Times reports:

Richard Cornuelle, a libertarian writer whose best-known book, “Reclaiming the American Dream, ” championed volunteerism as a means of addressing social problems like poverty, unemployment, delinquency and urban blight, died on April 26 at his home in Manhattan. He was 84.

The cause was cancer, his wife, Elizabeth K. Fonseca, said.

Published in 1965, “Reclaiming the American Dream” was Mr. Cornuelle’s first book. In it, he used the phrase “independent sector” to describe the network of existing voluntary associations — foundations, churches, labor unions, trade groups and fraternal organizations — that, he argued, could marshal their resources to solve a range of contemporary ills more efficiently than government could.

The book received wide attention, as did Mr. Cornuelle (pronounced cornell), whose political ideology — neither undiluted conservatism nor undiluted liberalism — defied easy classification. He was perhaps most accurately described as a classical liberal in the 19th-century sense of the term, advocating the rights of individuals while seeking to limit the reach of government.

Richard Charles Cornuelle was born on April 10, 1927, in Elwood, Ind. He earned a bachelor’s degree from Occidental College in Los Angeles in 1948 and did graduate work at New York University, where he studied with the prominent free-market economist Ludwig von Mises.

In the 1950s, Mr. Cornuelle was vice president and editorial director of the Princeton Panel, a center for the study of American capitalism; he was later executive vice president of the National Association of Manufacturers.

He helped found several nonprofit organizations, including United Student Aid Funds (now USA Funds), which guarantees student loans.