Untitled article

Pacific Press Publishing Company · New York · March 17, 1892

FromThe American Sentinel, Vol. 7, No. 11

AT first thought it seems strange that people reared in a land of comparative freedom should have no just appreciation of individual liberty; and yet such is certainly the case. The principle is illustrated by the fact, that generally speaking, only those who labor properly appreciate the fruits of toil. The fortune carefully hoarded by the father, by whose industry and self-denial it was accumulated, is frequently squandered by the son, reared in ease and luxury. It is indeed true, as Wendell Phillips has said, “The manna of popular liberty must be gathered each day or it is rotten.”

THE utter lack of any proper sense of the meaning or value of the sacred rights of the individual, is well illustrated by a recent article in the Boston Traveler, by one Charles Eaton, of Memphis, Tennessee. In the outset of his article Mr. Eaton says:—

The supreme law of the land (Article 6, paragraph 2, United States Constitution) is that made by the people, whether in their Federal or State organizations; or, the supreme law may be that which is expressed by the people through the press, the platform, and the pulpit—called public sentiment. This fact is stated in a variety of forms in the several State Constitutions. In Pennsylvania’s Constitution of 1838 this language is used: “That the general, great, and essential principles of liberty and free government may be recognized and unalterably established, we declare: . . . That all power is inherent in the people, and all free governments are founded on their authority, and instituted for their peace, safety, and happiness.”

THIS paragraph contains a great truth, and a fatal error. The truth is that “the Constitution is the supreme law of the land;” the fallacy, that the will of the people, aside from the Constitution, is supreme; or that it ought to be supreme. That which should be supreme in civil government, and that which political Constitutions should guarantee, is inalienable human rights. But that Mr. Eaton does not at all appreciate these facts is evident from these propositions which he lays down in the course of his article:—

The people, the State, are sovereign in all things whatsoever, as between man and man.

The people and the people alone decide where my rights end and yours begin.

BUT the people have of right no such powers as those claimed for them by Mr. Eaton. Nothing whatever can justify the majority in meddling with the inalienable rights of the individual. John Stuart Mill never wrote a truer thing than when he said that such—

power itself is illegitimate. The best government has no more title to it than the worst. It is as noxious, or more noxious, when exerted in accordance with public opinion, than when in opposition to it.

The idea that whatever the majority decrees is right is no more true now than it was when the majority demanded the crucifixion of Christ, or when the majority demanded the hanging of witches in Massachusetts, or when, as in our own day, the commune of a Russian village decrees the exiling of innocent men and women to Siberia. It is possible for majority rule to be just as tyrannical and just as wicked as the rule of a single man.

THE Declaration of Independence sets forth this: “That all men are created equal, that they are by their Creator endowed 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.” The difference between this declaration and the propositions laid down by Mr. Eaton, is as great as the difference between night and day.

GOVERNMENTS are not instituted to define rights, “to decide where my rights end and yours begin.” My rights begin where yours begin, and end only where yours end; and no majority, however large, can of right make it otherwise. Governments are instituted, not to create, but to defend rights; to guarantee to the individual the untrammeled exercise of his rights; and when “public sentiment” forbids this, the will of the people becomes as tyrannical as the will of a single man. And it is for this very reason that Constitutions are made—to restrict or hold in check the majority from trampling upon the rights of the minority, no less than to protect the majority against the usurpations of the few, or of one.

CONSTITUTIONS are usually the fruit of agitation, and are framed by men jealous for their rights. They are designed to be the conservators of the inalienable rights of the individual citizen; the citadel of defense alike against the usurpations of one, of the few, or of the many. Constitutions are supposed to be, and should be stable; the will of the majority is fickle, and liable to sudden and unreasonable changes; hence, Constitutions are just as essential in popular governments like our own as in any other.

AND not only are Constitutions necessary, but the people must be constantly reminded of their rights as individuals. As Wendell Phillips has so aptly said: “Some men suppose that in order to the people’s governing themselves, it is only necessary that the rights of men be printed, and that every citizen have a copy; as the Epicureans two thousand years ago imagined God a being who arranged this marvelous machinery, set it going, and then sunk to sleep. Republics exist only by being constantly agitated. . . . Never to our latest posterity, can we do without prophets . . . to trouble the waters, that there may be health in their flow.” Mr. Eaton’s article proves the truth of these words, for it demonstrates the present need of such prophets.