INTRODUCTORY.

OF GOVERNMENT.

The American Theory.

SECTION 1. When the people of the American colonies had determined to sever the political ties that bound them to the British government, and to establish for themselves an independent political existence, they asserted certain fundamental principles as the basis of their right to do so; and they specified certain violations of those principles by the British crown as a justification of their conduct in throwing off their allegiance to that government.

$ 2. In their Declaration of Independence, the representatives of the colonies, in Congress assembled, in the name and by the authority of the good people of the colonies, put forth, among others, the following principles, as fundamental to the establishment and maintenance of just governments:

"We hold these truths to be self-evident: That all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness; that to secure these rights governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed; that whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or abolish it, and to institute a new gov

ernment, laying its foundations on such principles, and organizing its powers in such forms, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness; that when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object, evinces a design to reduce them under an absolute despotism, it is their right and their duty to throw off such government, and to provide new guards for their future security." (See Dec. Am. Ind.)

S3. The principles thus promulgated by that Declaration were accepted by the American people, after mature deliberation and full discussion; and to maintain them they pledged life, fortune and sacred honor, and fought the battles of the revolution.

S 4. The grounds upon which they based their right to dissolve the political bands that bound them to Great Britain were embraced in the following affirmations of principles and rights:

1. The civil equality of all men.

2. Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness are gifts from God to man, and, therefore, the natural and unalienable right of all.

3. Governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed, and are established for the protection of these rights.

4. When these governments become destructive of the ends for which they are established, they act without authority, and the people may resist and overthrow them.

5. When a government evinces a design to disregard the ends of justice, and seeks to reduce its subjects under an absolute despotism, it is the duty of the people to overthrow it, and establish new guards for their future security.

CHAPTER I.

THE CIVIL EQUALITY OF ALL MEN.

"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal."

S5. This proposition separates man from acquirements, and considers him as possessed only of natural endowments; deriving them, with his existence, from God; as having God's warrant for that which he gave to him, and made indispensable to the accomplishment of a perfect destiny. It affirms in simple language, man's natural right to the natural means of supplying his natural necessities. That in these respects, all men are created equal.

$ 6. Man's creation under the divine government as a physical, social, moral, intellectual and religious being, is to be deemed conclusive evidence of his right to exist; and, hence, of his right to all those beneficent provisions which have been made indispensably necessary to the maintenance of such existence, as a physical, social, moral, intellectual and religious being. $ 7. Man's natural rights are indicated by his natural necessities. As a physical being he is so constituted that he must have the power of locomotion, to maintain himself properly and perfect his physical and other faculties. He is so constituted, naturally, that he must walk because he cannot fly; and he must walk upon the earth because, naturally, he cannot tread the air or walk upon the water. Therefore, these natural necessities become indications of his natural rights. If his nature and constitution compel him to walk upon the earth, he has an indisputable right to walk upon it; and no one is authorized to question that right.1

1 Necessity, when imposed upon us by the very constitution of our being, is above all conventional law. If the Author of our being has given us an existence upon the earth, and has made us constitutionally subject to certain necessities looking to the development, continuation and perfection of our existence, and has provided for us the means of supplying those necessities, he has, thereby, given us a perfect right to the use of those means; a right as

S 8. Again, man is so constituted that he must breathe the pure air which God has provided, to maintain a healthy existence. It is a necessity which God has imposed upon him, and He has provided the appropriate supply free of expense. Therefore, man has an unalienable right to breathe the pure atmosphere of heaven, and he has God's warrant of authority for the same. Thus it is in respect to the sunlight, the rains and the dews, etc.

S9. Man must draw his physical supplies from the earth, gathering them from the gardens of nature as supplied without the labor of man, or produced through cultivation by his labor. In either case the supply must come from the earth. Hence, man has a natural right to have access to the bosom of the earth, that he may draw his necessary supplies therefrom.

$10. To maintain his existence and accomplish his destiny, man must exercise in a proper manner, the faculties and powers with which he is naturally endowed. If he must draw his supplies from the earth, he must be permitted to exercise those faculties and powers by which they are to be produced or obtained; and he must be permitted to possess and appropriate the supplies, thus obtained by his own labor or creation, to his own use to supply his needs.

S 11. By thus making the necessities which God has imposed upon man, a clear indication of his right to use the natural means provided for their supply, we arrive without difficulty at the basis of man's natural rights, and, hence, at a just perception of their natural equality in all men.1

absolute as existence itself. The Almighty has not created man upon the earth, and by the very constitution of his existence compelled him to derive his physical subsistence therefrom, without, thereby, giving him an unalienable right to have access to the earth that he may draw his supplies thence. Hence, man's natural right to the use of the earth as a means of supplying his natural necessities, may be claimed as appurtenant to his existence.

1 To make an inherent necessity an indication, or basis even, of a right, either in the individual or in the state, is no new doctrine. If an individual or state has a right to exist, he or it has, as a necessary incident to such right, the

$12. The affirmation that all men are created equal and are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, is an assertion that all men having the same origin, the same ultimate destiny to seek, and the. same means by which to attain that destiny under the divine government, have the same natural necessities; and, hence, the same natural right to supply them. And, therefore, the power which cannot dispense with these necessities, has no authority to deny or question these natural rights.

S 13. These natural rights are not only equal in all, but they are unalienable. Until man can become superior to his necessities, and can dispense with the means of supplying them, there is no consideration by which he, while he continues to exist, can separate himself from his right to seek their supply. Therefore, his natural rights are as unalienable as his natural necessities are constant. How far these rights may become forfeited will be considered when man is introduced into society and comes under the higher law of social necessity.

$14. The doctrine of the natural equality of all men, as indicated by their natural constitutions, implies: 1. That all men have a common origin, and a common destiny; and possess in common the natural means by

authority of the Author of that existence to use all necessary and just means to maintain and defend that existence. When President JEFFERSON assumed that France must not possess the territory of Louisiana, and occupy New Orleans, and that to do so would necessarily involve the two countries in war, he based the morality of his position upon the necessity of the case: to wit, the right on the part of the United States to do that which was indispensable to self-preservation. (See Life of Jefferson, 30, pp. 7, 8 and 9; see also his messages on the purchase of the Louisiana territory; see also post, —.) '

Says PUFFENDORF: "Since human nature agrees equally to all persons, and since no one can live a sociable life with another who does not own and respect him as a man, it follows as a command of the law of nature, that every man should esteem and treat another as one who is naturally his equal, or one who is a man as well as he." (Book iii, ch. 2, 1.) Says Mr. BARBEYRAC, in his note to the same: "For every one having a perfect right to expect that he be regarded and treated as a man, he that doeth otherwise with him does him a real damage. This duty being founded on an immovable condition, namely, that men should be used precisely as men, is not only of general, but of perpetual obligation; insomuch, that notwithstanding all the inequality by the changes and diversity of addition, titles and degrees, the rights of natural equality always remain immovable, and agree to every one in relation to another, whatever condition he is in."