Sir, your idea of the true character of our government is plainly this:
you assume that all the natural, inherent, inalienable, individual,
_human_ rights of fifty millions of people--all their individual rights
to preserve their own lives, and promote their own happiness--have been
thrown into one common heap,--into hotchpotch, as the lawyers say: and
that this hotchpotch has been given into the hands of some four hundred
champion robbers, each of whom has pledged himself to carry off as large
a portion of it as possible, to be divided among those men--well known
to himself, but who--to save themselves from all responsibility for his
acts--have secretly (by secret ballot) appointed him to be their
champion.
Sir, if you had assumed that all the people of this country had thrown
all their wealth, all their rights, all their means of living, into
hotchpotch; and that this hotchpotch had been given over to four hundred
ferocious hounds; and that each of these hounds had been selected and
trained to bring to his masters so much of this common plunder as he, in
the general fight, or scramble, could get off with, you would scarcely
have drawn a more vivid picture of the true character of the government
of the United States, than you have done in your inaugural address.
No wonder that you are obliged to confess that such a government can be
carried on only "amid the din of party strife"; that it will be
influenced--you should have said _directed_--by "purely partisan zeal";
and that it will be attended by "the animosities of political strife,
the bitterness of partisan defeat, and the exultation of partisan
triumph."
What gang of robbers, quarrelling over the division of their plunder,
could exhibit a more shameful picture than you thus acknowledge to be
shown by the government of the United States?
Sir, nothing of all this "din," and "strife," and "animosity," and
"bitterness," is caused by any attempt, on the part of the government,
to simply "do equal and exact justice to all men,"--to simply protect
every man impartially in all his natural rights to life, liberty, and
property. It is all caused simply and solely by the government's
violation of some men's "_rights_," to promote other men's "interests."
If you do not know this, you are mentally an object of pity.
Sir, men's "_rights_" are always harmonious. That is to say, each man's
"rights" are always consistent and harmonious with each and every other
man's "rights." But their "_interests_" as you estimate them, constantly
clash; especially such "interests" as depend on government grants of
monopolies, privileges, loans, and bounties. And these "interests," like
the interests of other gamblers, clash with a fury proportioned to the
amounts at stake. It is these clashing "_interests_" and not any
clashing "_rights_" that give rise to all the strife you have here
depicted, and to all this necessity for "that spirit of amity and mutual
concession," which you hold to be indispensable to the accomplishment of
such legislation as you say is necessary to the welfare of the country.
Each and every man's "_rights_" being consistent and harmonious with
each and every other man's "_rights_"; and all men's rights being
immutably fixed, and easily ascertained, by a science that is open to be
learned and known by all; a government that does nothing but "equal and
exact justice to all men"--that simply gives to every man his own, and
nothing more to any--has no cause and no occasion for any "political
_parties_." What are these "political parties" but standing armies of
robbers, each trying to rob the other, and to prevent being itself
robbed by the other? A government that seeks only to "do equal and exact
justice to all men," has no cause and no occasion to enlist all the
fighting men in the nation in two hostile ranks; to keep them always in
battle array, and burning with hatred towards each other. It has no
cause and no occasion for any "political _warfare_" any "political
_hostility_" any "political _campaigns_" any "political _contests_" any
"political _fights_" any "political _defeats_" or any "political
_triumphs_." It has no cause and no occasion for any of those "political
_leaders_" so called, whose whole business is to invent new schemes of
robbery, and organize the people into opposing bands of robbers; all for
their own aggrandizement alone. It has no cause and no occasion for the
toleration, or the existence, of that vile horde of political bullies,
and swindlers, and blackguards, who enlist on one side or the other, and
fight for pay; who, year in and year out, employ their lungs and their
ink in spreading lies among ignorant people, to excite their hopes of
gain, or their fears of loss, and thus obtain their votes. In short, it
has no cause and no occasion for all this "din of party strife," for all
this "purely partisan zeal," for all "the bitterness of partisan
defeat," for all "the exultation of partisan triumph," nor, worst of
all, for any of "that spirit of amity and mutual concession [by which
you evidently mean that readiness, "in the halls of national
legislation," to sacrifice some men's "rights" to promote other men's
"interests"] in which [you say] the constitution had its birth."
If the constitution does really, or naturally, give rise to all this
"strife," and require all this "spirit of amity and mutual
concession,"--and I do not care now to deny that it does,--so much the
worse for the constitution. And so much the worse for all those men
who, like yourself, swear to "preserve, protect, and defend it."
And yet you have the face to make no end of professions, or pretences,
that the impelling power, the real motive, in all this robbery and
strife, is nothing else than "the service of the people," "their
interests," "the promotion of their welfare," "good government,"
"government by the people," "the popular will," "the general weal," "the
achievements of our national destiny," "the benefits which our happy
form of government can bestow," "the lasting welfare of the country,"
"the priceless benefits of the constitution," "the greatest good to the
greatest number," "the common interest," "the general welfare," "the
people's will," "the mission of the American people," "our civil
policy," "the genius of our institutions," "the needs of our people in
their home life," "the settlement and development of the resources of
our vast territory," "the prosperity of our republic," "the interests
and prosperity of all the people," "the safety and confidence of
business interests," "making the wage of labor sure and steady," "a
due regard to the interests of capital invested and workingmen
employed in American industries," "reform in the administration of the
government," "the application of business principles to public
affairs," "the constant and ever varying wants of an active and
enterprising population," "a firm determination to secure to all the
people of the land the full benefits of the best form of government
ever vouchsafed to man," "the blessings of our national life," etc.,
etc.
Sir, what is the use of such a deluge of unmeaning words, unless it be
to gloss over, and, if possible, hide, the true character of the acts of
the government?
Such "generalities" as these do not even "glitter." They are only the
stale phrases of the demagogue, who wishes to appear to promise
everything, but commits himself to nothing. Or else they are the
senseless talk of a mere political parrot, who repeats words he has been
taught to utter, without knowing their meaning. At best, they are the
mere gibberish of a man destitute of all political ideas, but who
imagines that "good government," "the general welfare," "the common
interest," "the best form of government ever vouchsafed to man," etc.,
etc., must be very good things, if anybody can ever find out what they
are. There is nothing definite, nothing real, nothing tangible, nothing
honest, about them. Yet they constitute your entire stock in trade. In
resorting to them--in holding them up to public gaze as comprising your
political creed--you assume that they have a meaning; that they are
matters of overruling importance; that they require the action of an
omnipotent, irresponsible, lawmaking government; that all these
"interests" must be represented, and can be secured, only "in the halls
of national legislation"; and by such political hounds as have been
selected and trained, and sent there, solely that they may bring off, to
their respective masters, as much as possible of the public plunder they
hold in their hands; that is, as much as possible of the earnings of all
the honest wealth-producers of the country.
And when these masters count up the spoils that their hounds have thus
brought home to them, they set up a corresponding shout that "the public
prosperity," "the common interest," and "the general welfare" have been
"advanced." And the scoundrels by whom the work has been accomplished,
"in the halls of national legislation," are trumpeted to the world as
"great statesmen." And you are just stupid enough to be deceived into
the belief, or just knave enough to pretend to be deceived into the
belief, that all this is really the truth.
One would infer from your address that you think the people of this
country incapable of doing anything for themselves, _individually_; that
they would all perish, but for the employment given them by that "large
variety of diverse and competing interests"--that is, such purely
selfish schemes--as may be "persistently seeking recognition of their
claims ... in the halls of national legislation," and secure for
themselves such monopolies and advantages as congress may see fit to
grant them.
Instead of your recognizing the right of each and every individual to
judge of, and provide for, his own well-being, according to the dictates
of his own judgment, and by the free exercise of his own powers of body
and mind,--so long as he infringes the equal rights of no other
person,--you assume that fifty millions of people, who never saw you,
and never will see you, who know almost nothing about you, and care very
little about you, are all so weak, ignorant, and degraded as to be
humbly and beseechingly looking to you--and to a few more lawmakers (so
called) whom they never saw, and never will see, and of whom they know
almost nothing--to enlighten, direct, and "_control_" them in their
daily labors to supply their own wants, and promote their own happiness!
You thus assume that these fifty millions of people are so debased,
mentally and morally, that they look upon you and your associate
lawmakers as their earthly gods, holding their destinies in your hands,
and anxiously studying their welfare; instead of looking upon you--as
most of you certainly ought to be looked upon--as a mere cabal of
ignorant, selfish, ambitious, rapacious, and unprincipled men, who know
very little, and care to know very little, except how you can get fame,
and power, and money, by trampling upon other men's rights, and robbing
them of the fruits of their labor.
Assuming yourself to be the greatest of these gods, charged with the
"welfare" of fifty millions of people, you enter upon the mighty task
with all the mock solemnity, and ridiculous grandiloquence, of a man
ignorant enough to imagine that he is really performing a solemn duty,
and doing an immense public service, instead of simply making a fool of
himself. Thus you say:
Fellow citizens: In the presence of this vast assemblage of my
countrymen, I am about to supplement and seal, by the oath
which I shall take, the manifestation of the will of a great
and free people. In the exercise of their power and right of
self-government, they have committed to one of their fellow
citizens a supreme and sacred trust, and he here consecrates
himself to their service. This impressive ceremony adds little
to the solemn sense of responsibility with which I contemplate
the duty I owe to all the people of the land. Nothing can
relieve me from anxiety lest by any act of mine their
_interests_ [not their _rights_] may suffer, and nothing is
needed to strengthen my resolution to engage every faculty and
effort in the promotion of their _welfare_. [Not in "doing
equal and exact justice to all men." After having once
described the government as one "pledged to do equal and exact
justice to all men," you drop that subject entirely, and wander
off into "interests," and "welfare," and an astonishing number
of other equally unmeaning things.]
Sir, you would have no occasion to take all this tremendous labor and
responsibility upon yourself, if you and your lawmakers would but keep
your hands off the "_rights_" of your "countrymen." Your "countrymen"
would be perfectly competent to take care of their own "_interests_,"
and provide for their own "_welfare_," if their hands were not tied, and
their powers crippled, by such fetters as men like you and your
lawmakers have fastened upon them.
Do you know so little of your "countrymen," that you need to be told
that their own strength and skill must be their sole reliance for their
own well-being? Or that they are abundantly able, and willing, and
anxious above all other things, to supply their own "needs in their home
life," and secure their own "welfare"? Or that they would do it, not
only without jar or friction, but as their highest duty and pleasure, if
their powers were not manacled by the absurd and villainous laws you
propose to execute upon them? Are you so stupid as to imagine that
putting chains on men's hands, and fetters on their feet, and
insurmountable obstacles in their paths, is the way to supply their
"needs," and promote their "welfare"? Do you think your "countrymen"
need to be told, either by yourself, or by any such gang of ignorant or
unprincipled men as all lawmakers are, what to do, and what not to do,
to supply their own "needs in their home life"? Do they not know how to
grow their own food, make their own clothing, build their own houses,
print their own books, acquire all the knowledge, and create all the
wealth, they desire, without being domineered over, and thwarted in all
their efforts, by any set of either fools or villains, who may call
themselves their lawmakers? And do you think they will never get their
eyes open to see what blockheads, or impostors, you and your lawmakers
are? Do they not now--at least so far as you will permit them to do
it--grow their own food, build their own houses, make their own
clothing, print their own books? Do they not make all the scientific
discoveries and mechanical inventions, by which all wealth is created?
_Or are all these things done by "the government"?_ Are you an idiot,
that you can talk as you do, about what you and your lawmakers are doing
to provide for the real wants, and promote the real "welfare," of fifty
millions of people?