Statelessness

“ Of all systems and institutions, the most vigorous in battling Liberty,—the most noxious in adulterating Right,—the most corrosive in eating out Nationality, has been an Aristocracy based upon habits or traditions of oppression. ”

“ Is our grand Republic, its destiny, its administration, its policy, to be forever floating hither and thither upon the uncertain billows of this beautiful but dangerous sea of political metaphysics? Are these gentlemen prepared to say that every institution of society must stand or fall, according as it conforms, or fails to conform, to some principle of natural right, deduced by each generation from natural reason? Where, sir, would such a principle stop? ”

“ Why not make it the nation’s creed? Why not emblazon it on the wall of every city on earth?––one for all; all for one; Love, Service, Freedom!
Before such a faith, autocracy and tyranny die. 141 Under such a law every evil withers, every question is unravelled. There are no more problems of poverty and riches, none of greed and oppression.
The tyranny of convention, of observance, of taboo, of folkways, ends. And into the brain of all living beings will be born the perfect comprehension of their own indestructible divinity. ”

“ But in a state habituated to a despotism, all is still and torpid. A dark and savage tyranny stifles every effort of genius; and the mind loses all its spirit and dignity.
Before I proceed to what I have farther in view, I will observe, that the account now given of the principles of public Liberty, and the nature of an equal and free government, shews what judgment we should form of that OMNIPOTENCE, which, it has been said, must belong to every government as such. ”

“ It was once fashionable--and that not a very long time ago--to speak of political society with a certain distaste, as a necessary evil, an irritating but inevitable restriction upon the "natural" sovereignty and entire self-government of the individual. ”

“ Under the severe pressure of despotism the people rise in their fury, and snap their chains asunder. A republic follows; degenerating first into a rude and wild democracy; and thence into a cruel and more turbulent anarchy. ”

“ Do you not see already that the régime of authority, of inequality, of predestination, of eternal salvation, and of reasons of State, is daily becoming still more intolerable for the well-to-do classes, whose conscience and reason it tortures, than for the mass, whose stomach cries out against it? ”

“ Does it conduce to the welfare of those whom it pretends to bind or to rule? Is it in consonance with right reason that men should impose upon themselves the despotism of those laws and of the beliefs sanctioning them? ”

“ Independence, defiance-they don't see it as a principle, only as an expedient. They may make it a cry, they may feel it as their right; but when to insist on it looks like losing a point in the game—then they give up the principle, to become parasites! ”

“ But half a century elapses and this free government is ruled by a despotic interest; the Republic sinks into the mire of slavery and corruption, sinks deeper and deeper, and the hope of humanity sinks with it. ”

“ We have not the notion, so familiar on the Continent and to antiquity, of the State,—the nation in its collective and corporate character, entrusted with stringent powers for the general advantage, and controlling individual wills in the name of an interest wider than that of individuals. We say, what is very true, that this notion is often made instrumental to tyranny; we say that a State is in reality made up of the individuals who compose it, and that every individual is the best judge of his own interests. ”

“ If the principle were predicated of one individual alone, the assertion of his sovereignty, or, in other words, of his absolute right to do as he pleases, or to pursue his own happiness in his own way, would be, confessedly, to invest him with the attributes of despotism over others. ”

“ Without the aggrandizement of self and the abasement of others, without hypocrisies and deceptions, without prisons, fortresses, executions, and murders, no power can come into existence or be maintained.
"If the power of government is suppressed the more wicked will oppress the less wicked," say the champions of state authority. ”

“ Every day dissatisfied with ourselves, we come to the debate with the intention of doing something, and every day we return without having done any thing. The people expect from us wise laws, and not storms and tumults. How are we to make these wise laws, and keep twenty-five millions of people quiet, when we, who are only seven hundred and fifty individuals, give an example of perpetual riot and disorder? What signifies our preaching the unity and indivisibility of the republic, when we cannot maintain peace and union amongst ourselves? ”

“ Submission, whether to a government, to the dogmas of ecclesiastics, or to that code of behaviour which society at large has set up, is essentially of the same nature; and the sentiment which induces resistance to the despotism of rulers, civil or spiritual, likewise induces resistance to the despotism of the world's opinion. Look at them fundamentally, and all enactments, alike of the legislature, the consistory, and the saloon—all regulations, formal or virtual, have a common character: they are all limitations of men's freedom. ”

“ To me the chief peril of our time is the growing power of the State, its growing interference in personal opinion and personal life, the intrusion of an inhuman being called an expert or official into the most intimate, inexplicable, and changing affairs of our lives and souls, and the arrogant social legislation of a secret and self-appointed Cabal or Cabinet, which refuses even to consult the wishes of that half of the population which social restrictions touch most nearly. ”

“ To people disposed to put restraints on power and to abolish privileges, what guide is more sympathetic than the writer of genius, the powerful logician, the impassioned orator, who establishes natural law, who repudiates historic law, who proclaims the equality of men, who contends for the sovereignty of the people, who denounces on every page the usurpation, the vices, the worthlessness, the malefactions of the great and of kings! ”

“ They reject not only religion, but also government, or the entire political and civil order. They will have no God, no king, no aristocracy, no democracy, no law, no court, no judges, but simply—we can hardly say what. Practically, they will fall under the authority of irresponsible and despotic leaders, governing in the name of nobody, and by their own passions or interests alone. ”

“ Governments again are disobeyed, political factions plot against the state, dignities are evil spoken of; and, strong in their own conceit, heady and high-minded men regard their own intellect as their only guide, and their own will as their only law. ”

“ If state necessity demanded this perpetual violation of the laws of God and the rights of man, this continual solecism in a government of freedom, why is it not met as a necessity, incurable and inevitable, and formally and distinctly recognized as a settled part of our social system? State necessity, that imperial tyrant, seeks no disguise. ”

“ Against all practical rules of limitation—all rules limiting official conduct, there is a constant pressure from one side or the other. Honest differences of opinion as to the extent of power, arising from different points of view make this inevitable, to say nothing of those weaknesses and faults of human nature which lead men to press the exercise of power to the utmost under the influence of ambition, of impatience with opposition to their designs, of selfish interest and the arrogance of office. ”

“ The slow and whispered admonitions of publick opinion to tyranny, are struggles of nature for her rights, excited by acquisitions of knowledge; like the efforts and uneasiness of a strong man, long confined in darkness, excited by a ray of light. Upon every appearance of these struggles, orders and exclusive privileges cry out, that kings, aristoorats, priests and privileges ought to unite, and confine her in stronger bonds. ”

“ So insecure was the state of society, that, when he whose iron hand had preserved order among his feudal nobles had expired, those about him fled to their strongholds in expectation of a general anarchy. Government was still only personal: law had not yet been enthroned in the minds of men. ”

“ Behold a Republic, one is hereby at once impelled to continue, where suspected evildoers are soaked in oil and roasted, where the rulings of judges override the law, a Republic where the shadow of morality is preferred to the substance, and a great man is driven out of the land because he has failed to conform to that order of things, a Republic where those who sit in darkness are permitted to finance crime. ”

“ I have shown how, in time past, the history of states has been a history of selfishness, cupidity, and robbery, and I have affirmed that now and always the problems of government are how to deal with these same vices of human nature. ”

“ And no doubt both forms of despotism have been necessary in the appropriate stages of human development. But, at the time our republic was born, it had become apparent to the dullest, as it had long been to prophetic minds, that the hour had arrived when political control must concern itself not only with its first great task, viz., the development of social order, but must set itself at work also on its second great effort, viz., the definition and defense of personal rights inside of this social order. ”

“ That government ought to be instituted for the common benefit, protection, and security, of the people; and that the doctrine of non-resistance against arbitrary power and oppression is absurd, slavish, and destructive to the good and happiness of mankind. ”

“ It is their pleasing duty to free us of the delusion, which we have fondly cherished, that we are the subjects of a mild, free, & limited Government, & to demonstrate by a regular chain of premises & conclusions, that Government possesses over us a power more tyrannical, more arbitrary, more dangerous, more allied to blood & murder, more full of every form of mischief, more productive of every sort & degree of misery, than has been exercised by any civilized Government, with a single exception, in modern times. ”

“ But how irrevocable and tremendous! what a triumph for our enemies to verify their predictions! what a triumph for the advocates of despotism, to find that we are incapable of governing ourselves, and that systems founded on the basis of equal liberty are merely ideal and fallacious! ”

“ They are dissolved in what may be called a state of moral nature, in which public authority is only one function more, hated and deceived by those who think it necessary, respected only by those who can do without it. ”

“ You yourself are not convinced of the truth of your objection, you yourself know that it is a tyrannical and despotic government which, in order to make a display of force and independence, denies everything through fear or distrust, and that the tyrannized and enslaved peoples are the only ones whose duty it is never to ask for anything. ”

“ Public opinion without the guidance of the state was unorganized and dangerous. “The many as individuals, whom we are prone to call the people, are indeed a collective whole, but merely as a multitude or formless mass, whose movement and action would be elemental, void of reason, violent, and terrible.” ”

“ The favourite Subject of its Clamours will be the Misconduct of Those who govern. And in a Country where Liberty is justly ranked among the greatest national Blessings, the most plausible Pretence of Faction will be, "to load the executive Power with the Charge of Despotism." ”

“ Society is produced by our wants, and government by our wickedness. Society is in every state a blessing; government even in its best state but a necessary evil." [60]
But what is to hold men together in "society without government"? ”

“ The power existing in every body politic, is an absolute despotism; in constituting a government, the body politic distributes that power as it pleases, and in the quantity it pleases, and imposes what checks it pleases upon its public functionaries. ”

“ And if these offenses against high morality and true citizenship have been frequently observable, are we to say that the blame for the present discontent and turbulence is wholly on the side of those who are in revolt against them? ”

“ It has well been observed that many men complain of the tyranny of the State, and yet say not a word against the far more powerful tyranny of society. Social dogmas, precisely because they are not fixed in laws and regulations, are more oppressive and more irresistible than the principles of State control. ”

“ A demoralization of public sentiment more than ever fatal to public justice and eventually to public order and peace; unscrupulous struggles for the possession of power to be used in the exploitation of opportunities without regard to the rights of the defeated—that is, alternating despotisms. ”

“ With the rise of democracy, the identification of the State with society has been redoubled, until it is common to hear sentiments expressed which violate virtually every tenet of reason and common sense such as, "we are the government." ”

“ One would not think it necessary to belabor this point, and yet the overwhelming bulk of the people hold this fallacy to a greater or lesser degree.
We must, therefore, emphasize that "we" are not the government; the government is not "us." ”

“ I cannot perceive that a negative, able to prevent such aggressions, which may alter the theory of our government, is less necessary for the preservation of liberty, if the integrity of the State rights is necessary for that purpose, than the tribunitial, regal, executive, senatorial, representative, and judicial negatives. ”

“ The people, on the other hand, after bearing, with the most abject patience, the capricious cruelty of their tyrants, rising at once, and murdering them, or driving them, with ignominy, out of their dominions. Unable to bear either limited or absolute government, the impatient and capricious multitude wish for things which have always been found incompatible: the secrecy, promptitude, and efficacy, of a despotic government, with all the freedom and mildness of a legal and limited constitution. ”