The exercise of one coercion always makes another inevitable.

Coercion is the tool of the desperate.

The desire to force others to bend or break to her will was always there, usually hidden deeply enough that she could forget she had that wish within her, but occasionally surfacing to dangle the ripe fruit of power just out of her reach. She knew, as few others did, that the power to coerce depended entirely on the fear or weakness of other human beings. It was possible to use coercion, yes, but in the end you found yourself surrounded only by the weak and fearful, with all those of courage and strength arrayed against you.

There may be occasions when "to do unto others as you would have them do unto you" requires coercion.

What we call Man's power over Nature turns out to be a power exercised by some men over other men with Nature as its instrument.

The nature of power is such that even those who have not sought it, but have had it forced upon them, tend to acquire a taste for more.

Governmental regulations all carry coercion to some degree, and even where they don't, they habituate man to expect teaching, guidance and help outside himself, instead of formulating his own.

The man who uses coercion is guilty of deliberate violence. Coercion is inhuman.

An autocratic system of coercion, in my opinion soon degenerates. For force always attract men of low morality.

Legal coercion is a course which the law allows.

That all legislation is based on the natural law, and that all coercion must be brought about by the choice and consent of the subjects, since we are equally free by nature, and that jurisdictions that are created have no power from themselves, but only according to the laws and canons. This is a fine argument.

The human beings who possess the dominion of land and machinery and compel others, in order to obtain the essentials of existence, to serve them, are as truly masters of slaves as they who exact blood from the dorsals of their fellows with literal slave whips.

All governments - left, right or other - are by their very nature coercive. They have to be. A rule not ultimately backed by the threat of violence is merely a suggestion.

An example of indirect coercion: There is no law that says we have to go to work every day and follow our employer’s orders. Legally there is nothing to prevent us from going to live in the wild like primitive people or from going into business for ourselves. But in practice there is very little wild country left, and there is room in the economy for only a limited number of small business owners. Hence most of us can survive only as someone else’s employee.