The perpetual tension: When public duty bows to private interest

“ And though he be careful in his politic person to procure the common interest, yet he is more, or no less, careful to procure the private good of himself, his family, kindred and friends; and for the most part, if the public interest chance to cross the private, he prefers the private: for the passions of men are commonly more potent than their reason. ”

“ And because it may be too great a temptation to human frailty, apt to grasp at power, for the same persons, who have the power of making laws, to have also in their hands the power to execute them, whereby they may exempt themselves from obedience to the laws they make, and suit the law, both in its making, and execution, to their own private advantage, and thereby come to have a distinct interest from the rest of the community, contrary to the end of society and government: ”

“ The persons entrusted with the great interests of the state may, even without any corrupt views, sometimes imagine it necessary to sacrifice to those interests the rights of a private man. But upon the impartial administration of justice depends the liberty of every individual, the sense which he has of his own security. ”

“ The private interest of the individual would not be sufficiently provided for by reasonable and cool self-love alone; therefore the appetites and passions are placed within as a guard and further security, without which it would not be taken due care of. ”

“ If the law contemplated the power of the public prosecutor to deprive the private party of his right to prosecute by arrangements to which the latter is no party, it had better declare at once that the private instance shall be at an end, because it virtually would be so. In every case where the public prosecutor wished to protect a criminal, and shield him from the effects of crime, an arrangement, under the pretence of a precognition and searching for evidence against a third party, might at once be made ”

“ The actions of individuals, groups, or firms, both in the public and private sectors, to influence the formation of laws, regulations, decrees, and other government policies to their own advantage as a result of the illicit and non-transparent provision of private benefits to public officials. ”

“ The distinction of public wrongs from private, of crimes and misdemesnors from civil injuries, seems principally to consist in this : that private wrongs, or civil injuries, are an infringement or privation of the civil rights which belong to individuals, considered merely as individuals ; public wrongs, or crimes and misdemesnors, are a breach and violation of the public rights and duties, due to the whole community, considered as a community, in it's social aggregate capacity. ”

“ They are private when they affect private individuals. They are public when they interfere with a common right, such as the right to use a public street, or when they interfere with a considerable number of persons and thus take on a public character. ”

“ But whenever the law itself is debauched, and enters into a corrupt coalition with violence, robbery, and wrong, then all hope is gone; and then it is not only private persons that suffer, but the law itself, when so corrupted, is often perverted into the worst instrument of fraud and violence; it then becomes most odious to mankind, and an infinite aggravation of every injury they suffer. ”

“ The taking away of a vote is the taking away the shield which the subject has, not only against the oppression of power, but that worst of all oppressions, the persecution of private society and private manners. No candidate for Parliamentary influence is obliged to the least attention towards them, either in cities or counties. On the contrary, if they should become obnoxious to any bigoted or malignant people amongst whom they live, it will become the interest of those who court popular favor to use the numberless means which always reside in magistracy and influence to oppress them. ”

“ The effect of the proprietor lies chiefly in his power of private blackmail (especially, in parliamentary countries, of blackmail exercised against politicians) and in his power (when he acts in combination with his few fellows) to suppress a truth of public interest. ”

“ Public interests are made an affair of trade, and are openly used for private advantage; and no measure, however important and beneficial, can be secured unless it can be made profitable to the ring of practical politicians. ”

“ Thirdly, experience sufficiently proves, that men, in the ordinary conduct of life, look not so far as the public interest, when they pay their creditors, perform their promises, and abstain from theft, and robbery, and injustice of every kind. That is a motive too remote and too sublime to affect the generality of mankind, and operate with any force in actions so contrary to private interest as are frequently those of justice and common honesty. ”

“ The individual good felt in a public benefit is comparatively so small, comes round through such an involved labyrinth of intricate and tedious revolutions, whilst a present personal detriment is so heavy, where it falls, and so instant in its operation, that the cold commendation of a public advantage never was and never will be a match for the quick sensibility of a private loss ”

“ It is difficult to draw a man out of his own circle to interest him in the destiny of the State, because he does not clearly understand what influence the destiny of the State can have upon his own lot. But if it be proposed to make a road cross the end of his estate, he will see at a glance that there is a connection between this small public affair and his greatest private affairs; and he will discover, without its being shown to him, the close tie which unites private to general interest. ”

“ The wise and virtuous man is at all times willing that his own private interest should be sacrificed to the public interest of his own particular order or society. He is at all times willing, too, that the interest of this order or society should be sacrificed to the greater interest of the state or sovereignty, of which it is only a subordinate part. ”

“ And tho' this sense, in the present case, be deriv'd only from contemplating the actions of others, yet we fail not to extend it even to our own actions. The general rule reaches beyond those instances, from which it arose; while at the same time we naturally sympathize with others in the sentiments they entertain of us. Thus self-interest is the original motive to the establishment of justice: but a sympathy with public interest is the source of the moral approbation, which attends that virtue. ”

“ But however single acts of justice may be contrary, either to public or private interest, 'tis certain, that the whole plan or scheme is highly conducive, or indeed absolutely requisite, both to the support of society, and the well-being of every individual. 'Tis impossible to separate the good from the ill. Property must be stable, and must be fix'd by general rules. Tho' in one instance the public be a sufferer, this momentary ill is amply compensated by the steady prosecution of the rule, and by the peace and order, which it establishes in society. ”

“ Nor is every single act of justice, consider'd apart, more conducive to private interest, than to public; and 'tis easily conceiv'd how a man may impoverish himself by a signal instance of integrity, and have reason to wish, that with regard to that single act, the laws of justice were for a moment suspended in the universe. ”

“ Even if the judge chooses to give regardless of the case's outcome it is still considered within his personal interest. Similarly, when a tax is levied on the community as a group no one within the city can act as judge in a case regarding tax payments, as that outcome might affect them or their family members. If the tax is of a specific nature such that part of the community can pay their portion and be done with their responsibility, not being affected by the case's outcome at all, people from that group can act as judge. ”

“ But when the crime is an offence against a fellow-subject, one half of the judges should be peers to the accused, and the other peers to the person offended. So that all private interest, which, in spite of ourselves, modifies the appearance of objects, even in the eyes of the most equitable, is counteracted, and nothing remains to turn aside the direction of truth and the laws. ”

“ If, however, there are others who can also fill the position, he is praiseworthy to refuse to act as judge. In fact, any judge who chooses to pursue compromise between the parties instead of acting as judge will benefit himself, as he prevents others from having enmity against him, as well as avoiding the possibility of false oaths and the misappropriation of funds arising from incorrect rulings. Even if the law in a given case is as clear as the sun, it is always preferable to strive to have all parties reach an out-of-court settlement. ”

“ The public prosecutor, as being the person entrusted with the interest of [Pg 189] the community, and as representing the community, has the primary right to take up the matter; and, having commenced proceedings for behoof of the community, he cannot be stayed or hindered, or impeded in his prosecution for punishment, by any right or any interest which any private party can claim; and he may do, and daily does, many things which exclude the private party from demanding punishment.... ”

“ What excellent words those are to conjure with and wherewith blind our own eyes as well as those of others—Political Party and the Public Weal! We regard ourselves as devoted to the respublica, when, in reality, we care only for our private interests; and our zeal for the public good is hot or cold according as our dividends are affected. ”

“ When private property "is affected with public interest" and is used in a manner to make it of public consequence, the public is in fact granted an interest in that use, and the owner of the property in question "must submit to be controlled by the public for the common good, to the extent of the interest he has thus created." ”

“ That the people have a public interest, a jus publicum, of passage and repassage with their goods by water, and must not be obstructed by nuisances;' 'for the jus privatum of the owner or proprietor is charged with and subject to that jus publicum which belongs to the king's subjects, as the soil of an highway is, which though in point of property it may be a private man's freehold, yet it is charged with a public interest of the people, which may not be prejudiced or damnified.' Id. ”

“ But if the indifference to public affairs, which is now confined only to a class—only to a portion of the people—to too large a portion, indeed, but still only to a portion,—if it were to become general, if things were allowed to go on their way, without any interest taken in them by private persons, by those whose intelligence goes to create a commanding public opinion, then you would soon find your private interests, the comfort and lives of individuals, threatened and assailed. ”

“ But, whatever may be their excuse, there can be no doubt that it is the ignorance, the indifference, the cowardice, the selfishness of the people at large that have caused their public affairs to wade so often towards a settlement, through such frightful streams of [Pg 7] innocent and unoffending blood. Here, in our land, the peace and security of private life are as fully and extensively insured as they are, precisely for this reason, because of the lively and general interest which the people in their private capacity take in things of public concern. ”

“ Who would not rather suffer with the Right than prosper with the Wrong? But if we will not fling our hearts into anything of a general and generous interest, if we insist that we will keep at a distance from all such matters, that we will be ignorant and insensible, we gain no additional security. Still our private lot is inextricably bound up with the public interest; and when those interests suffer, we must suffer with them, but with no sustaining power in our own minds. We may be shot down with the heroes and martyrs of Humanity without the heroes' joy or the martyrs' radiant crown. ”

“ To those who have neither public nor private affections, the excitements of life are much curtailed, and in any case dwindle in value as the time approaches when all selfish interests must be terminated by death: while those who leave after them objects of personal affection, and especially those who have also cultivated a fellow-feeling with the collective interests of mankind, retain as lively an interest in life on the eve of death as in the vigour of youth and health. ”

“ In America's ideal of freedom, the public interest depends on private character - on integrity, and tolerance toward others, and the rule of conscience in our own lives. Self-government relies, in the end, on the governing of the self. ”