Political ethics

“ But it has failed lamentably to illuminate the ends for which such power should be used. Political ethics is by no means superfluous in lands where a government of law is supposed to be established in lieu of a government of men. ”

“ Relative political ethics, or that which deals with right and wrong in public affairs as partially determined by changing circumstances, cannot progress without taking into account right and wrong considered apart from changing circumstances—cannot do without absolute political ethics; the propositions of which, deduced from the conditions under which life is carried on in an associated state, take no account of the special circumstances of any particular associated state. ”

“ By the side of interest, which is the law of sensibility, reason has made us recognize the law of duty, which a free being can alone fulfil. From these ethics has sprung a generous political doctrine, giving to right a sure foundation in the respect due to the person, establishing true liberty, and true equality, and calling for institutions, protective of both, which do not rest on the mobile and arbitrary will of the legislator, whether people or monarch, but on the nature of things, on truth and justice. ”

“ That reply is, that on a great moral and political, as well as legal question,—a question that connects itself with ethics, as well as with partisan politics, and the success of old parties or the formation of new ones,—integrity is as necessary to the formation of a sound opinion as intelligence. ”

“ Out of all the discoveries of statesmen and sages, out of all the experience of past human life, she compiled a perennial political philosophy, the primordial principles of national ethics—she sought the vital elements of social forms and blended them harmoniously in the free commonwealth which comes nearest to the illustration of the natural equality of all men. ”

“ When we add the indirect effects- the distortion of the public news-service, the protection of vice, the insecurity of justice-the moral evils of political corruption are seen to be of gravest importance.
What is the political duty of the citizen? ”

“ A wholesome disregard of technicalities, and an interpretation of the law in the line of equity, a rigid exclusion of irrelevant evidence and argument, the provision of an adequate number of courts to prevent the piling up of cases, and of a public defender, of skill and training, to look after the interests of the poor, the removal of judgeships from politics by the general improvement of our political system, and the adjudgment of insanity only by impartial, state-hired alienists-these are some of the reforms that ethical considerations suggest. ”

“ They have the right, which all men ought to have, of discussing freely any and every important question in ethics, jurisprudence, and political economy, but not to give their conclusion a direct and offensive application to those portions of their fellow-citizens or fellow-men, to whom they have not yet furnished a clear and satisfactory example, and rule of conduct in the case specially adverted to. ”

“ As a rule, politics we will not deal with. But questions of policy may never be divorced from the demands of morality. We will, therefore, as occasion many arise, discuss important political topics from the stand-point of justice and righteousness. ”

“ He must preach on politics, not as the representative of a party but of mankind, and report not the mean counsels of a political economy, which consults for one party or one nation, for one day alone, but declare the sublime oracles of political morality, which looks to the welfare of all parties, all nations, and throughout all time. He must know no race but the human, no class but men and women, no ultimate lawgiver but God, whose statute book is the world of matter and the world of men—justice the sole finality. ”

“ And let us remember that it is only religion, and morals, and knowledge, that can make men respectable and happy, under any form of government. Let us hold fast the great truth, that communities are responsible, as well as individuals; that no government is respectable, which is not just; that without unspotted purity of public faith, without sacred public principle, fidelity, and honor, no mere forms of government, no machinery of laws, can give dignity to political society. ”

“ By melting down the fetters of moral and republican principles in party confidence, we abolish the only known remedy against the evil qualities of human nature, abandon our experiment of political law founded in these principles, and rest for security on ignorant mobs, guided by a few designing leaders, or on cunning combinations, guided by avarice and ambition. ”

“ But the need of the fictitious explanation arises from a wrong way of putting the question; the power which regulates our conduct in political society is conceived in too abstract a way on the one side, and on the other are set over against it, as the subjects which it controls, individuals invested with all the moral attributes and rights of humanity. ”

“ Shall we not rather take the place to which we are entitled, as the leaders, rather than the followers, in the customs of society, turn back the tide of aristocratic inroads, and carry through the whole, not only of civil and political but of social and domestic life, the true principles of democratic freedom and equality? ”

“ The general acknowledgement of the capacity of good moral principles to correct a bad form of government, is a vast encouragement to expect from them a capacity to correct bad governours; and hence our policy has resorted to the good and virtuous moral principle of responsibility, or a strong code of political law, which can exist and operate upon governours, if the nation understands its interest, at whatever degree of virtue or corruption it may be stationed, in fact or in theory. ”

“ But while we are ready to accept any and every good result of party action, we affirm that the moral reform of our public concerns is infinitely superior in importance to the interests of any political party. ”

“ Supposing then the individual to have decided that some command of a 'political superior' is not for the common good, how ought he to act in regard to it? In a country like ours, with a popular government and settled methods of enacting and repealing laws, the answer of common sense is simple and sufficient. ”

“ Meanwhile, the wise and thinking part of the community, who could trace evils to their source, labored unceasingly to inculcate opinions favorable to the incorporation of some principles into the political system which might correct the obvious vices, without endangering the free spirit of the existing institutions. ”

“ But grave as they are, still, in our present situation, we must, as American citizens, recognize it as our pressing duty to reëstablish the moral character of our Government and to elevate the tone of our political life. Honest government is the first condition of enduring National prosperity, power and freedom. Without the elementary virtues of political as well as social life decay will outstrip our progress. ”

“ The successful cooperation of honest men, without distinction of party, to which it at last succumbed, indicated the commencement of a moral revolution in politics, and nothing could be more desirable than that this revolution should not be confined to the limits of one State or one political organization. An imperative demand for honest government is indeed beginning to be heard all over the land. ”

“ Since virtue and equality are the soul of the republic, and that your aim is to found, to consolidate the republic, it follows, that the first rule of your political conduct should be, to let all your measures tend to maintain equality and encourage virtue, for the first care of the legislator should be to strengthen the principles on which the government rests. ”

“ He viewed this practical political activity of the individual citizen, not only as one of the most effectual means of training the social feelings and practical intelligence of the people, so important in themselves and so indispensable to good government, but also as the specific counteractive to some of the characteristic infirmities of democracy, and a necessary protection against its degenerating into the only despotism of which, in the modern world, there is real danger—the absolute rule of the head of the executive over a congregation of isolated individuals, all equals but all slaves. ”

“ What I fear most is not a civil war,—for I think neither party is prepared for that,—but a condition of things completely upsetting our political morals. The moral sense even of good honest people is apt to become confused and blunted when there is such a complication of right and wrong on each side, that the path of duty is not clear. ”

“ The old king in his passage points to the existence of an important element in government by the people, the moral element; the direct, personal responsibility of the individual for such evils as obtain under government where the people rule. But in order that this element of moral responsibility may be brought into government, it stands to reason that every individual must be free and untrammeled in the exercise of his political duties, in the casting of his vote. Each individual musts have an equal voice in the government. ”

“ After having raised the banner of moral independence to-day, they are certainly not prepared to surrender it again to-morrow. They will follow the lead of political honesty, as long as it is true honesty that leads them. [Cheers.] They have stood up for the defence of the principles of liberty, and they will remain true to that cause, so long as it is genuine and true liberty which claims their support. ”

“ But moral, political, intellectual improvement are duties assigned by the Author of Our Existence to social no less than to individual man.
For the fulfillment of those duties governments are invested with power, and to the attainment of the end--the progressive improvement of the condition of the governed--the exercise of delegated powers is a duty as sacred and indispensable as the usurpation of powers not granted is criminal and odious. ”

“ From these distinctions, applied to each political society and its members, are derived the most certain and universal rules, by which we can judge whether a government is good or bad, and in general of the morality of all human actions. ”

“ It includes those whose suffrages decide the principles of our government; on whose conduct rests the reputation of our country; and whose mere breath is the tenure by which we hold all our dearest political, religious, and social rights. How ineffably important it is, then, that the intelligence of these "lower classes" should be cultivated; that their moral sense should be quickened ”

“ The contending political parties in a republic should be such in point of mental and moral constitution and capability that the government may be intrusted to either without serious apprehension for the safety of the public interest. ”

“ It cannot be repeated too often that your peculiar power consists in your standing with that public opinion and nothing else. When we spoke at the Reform Club banquet about the “moral forces in politics,” we meant just this. You cannot try to carry your points by making concessions to the spoils politicians without being ultimately beaten, for you leave the ground on which you are strong. ”

“ In its less perfect and more usual state the Democratic theory is advanced either as an ethical theory which postulates an absence of formal acquiescence on the part of the governed as injustice, or else as a convenient political compromise ”

“ It becomes a grave question how far we may safely give political power to those who entertain views so erroneous respecting fundamental social relations; and who so pertinaciously struggle to enforce these erroneous views. ”

“ This theory of political morals, though subject to a limitless degradation in practice, underlies the argument of every man who pretends to regard the conduct of the State as a business affecting the conscience of citizens. ”

“ We are not half alive to the glory and grandeur of the experiment of free political institutions, and do not press with the zeal we ought the general education, the political training, the moral discipline, which can alone save the State, when it has no foundation but the good-will, the respect, and the practical valuation of [Pg 26] the people. ”

“ The true ground of objection to 'paternal government' is not that it violates the 'laissez faire' principle and conceives that its office is to make people good, to promote morality, but that it rests on a misconception of morality. The real function of government being to maintain conditions of life in which morality shall be possible, and morality consisting in the disinterested performance of self-imposed duties, 'paternal government' does its best to make it impossible by narrowing the room for the self-imposition of duties and for the play of disinterested motives. ”

“ They demonstrate that there is no dominating moral principle in the creed of any of the great political parties, and that the voters who believe in principles rather than offices or men, hold the balance of power in our civilization. ”

“ But what is meant is something different, viz. that the claim or right of the individual to have certain powers secured to him by society, and the counter-claim of society to exercise certain powers over the individual, alike rest on the fact that these powers are necessary to the fulfilment of man's vocation as a moral being, to an effectual self-devotion to the work of developing the perfect character in himself and others. ”