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Vanhorne’s Lessee v.
Dorrance
U.S.
Supreme Court
1795
[This early Supreme Court case shows the importance of the right to
property in the minds of the Founders. — TGW]
Opinion
of the Court by Justice William Paterson.
[After
quoting the 1st, 8th, and 11th articles of the Pennsylvania Declaration of
Rights, and the 9th and 46th section of the Pennsylvania Constitution,
Paterson writes:]
From
these passages it is evident; that the right of acquiring…property, and
having it protected, is one of the natural, inherent, and unalienable
rights of man. Men have a sense of property: Property is necessary to their
subsistence, and correspondent to their natural wants and desires; its
security was one of the objects, that induced them to unite in society. No
man would become a member of a community, in which he could not enjoy the
fruits of his honest labor and industry. The preservation of property then
is a primary object of the social compact, and, by the late constitution of
Pennsylvania, was made a fundamental law.
[From
Philip B. Kurland and Ralph Lerner, ed., The Founders’ Constitution
(Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1987), 1:599-600.]
***
Property
James Madison
March 29, 1792
[Madison wrote this newspaper article to explain the relationship
between property rights and other natural rights. — TGW]
This
term in its particular application means "that dominion which one man
claims and exercises over the external things of the world, in exclusion of
every other individual."
In its
larger and juster meaning, it embraces every thing to which a man may
attach a value and have a right; and which leaves to every one else the
like advantage.
In the
former sense, a man’s land, or merchandize, or money is called his
property.
In the
latter sense, a man has a property in his opinions and the free
communication of them.
He has
a property of peculiar value in his religious opinions, and in the
profession and practice dictated by them.
He has
a property very dear to him in the safety and liberty of his person.
He has
an equal property in the free use of his faculties and free choice of the
objects on which to employ them.
In a
word, as a man is said to have a right to his property, he may be equally
said to have a property in his rights.
Where
an excess of power prevails, property of no sort is duly respected. No man
is safe in his opinions, his person, his faculties, or his possessions.
Where
there is an excess of liberty, the effect is the same, tho’ from an
opposite cause.
Government
is instituted to protect property of every sort; as well that which lies in
the various rights of individuals, as that which the term particularly
expresses. This being the end of government, that alone is a just
government, which impartially secures to every man, whatever is his own.
According
to this standard of merit, the praise of affording a just securing to
property, should be sparingly bestowed on a government which, however
scrupulously guarding the possessions of individuals, does not protect them
in the enjoyment and communication of their opinions, in which they have an
equal, and in the estimation of some, a more valuable property.
More
sparingly should this praise be allowed to a government, where a man’s
religious rights are violated by penalties, or fettered by tests, or taxed
by a hierarchy. Conscience is the most sacred of all property; other
property depending in part on positive law, the exercise of that, being a
natural and unalienable right. To guard a man’s house as his castle, to pay
public and enforce private debts with the most exact faith, can give no
title to invade a man’s conscience which is more sacred than his castle, or
to withhold from it that debt of protection, for which the public faith is
pledged, by the very nature and original conditions of the social pact.
That
is not a just government, nor is property secure under it, where the
property which a man has in his personal safety and personal liberty, is
violated by arbitrary seizures of one class of citizens for the service of
the rest. A magistrate issuing his warrants to a press gang, would be in
his proper functions in Turkey or Indostan, under appellations proverbial
of the most compleat despotism.
That
is not a just government, nor is property secure under it, where arbitrary
restrictions, exemptions, and monopolies deny to part of its citizens that
free use of their faculties, and free choice of their occupations, which
not only constitute their property in the general sense of the word; but
are the means of acquiring property strictly so called. What must be the
spirit of legislation where a manufacturer of linen cloth is forbidden to
bury his own child in a linen shroud, in order to favour his neighbour who
manufactures woolen cloth; where the manufacturer and wearer of woolen
cloth are again forbidden the oeconomical use of buttons of that material,
in favor of the manufacturer of buttons of other materials!
A just
security to property is not afforded by that government, under which
unequal taxes oppress one species of property and reward another species:
where arbitrary taxes invade the domestic sanctuaries of the rich, and
excessive taxes grind the faces of the poor; where the keenness and
competitions of want are deemed an insufficient spur to labor, and taxes
are again applied, by an unfeeling policy, as another spur; in violation of
that sacred property, which Heaven, in decreeing man to earn his bread by
the sweat of his brow, kindly reserved to him, in the small repose that
could be spared from the supply of his necessities.
If
there be a government then which prides itself in maintaining the
inviolability of property; which provides that none shall be taken directly
even for public use without indemnification to the owner, and yet directly
violates the property which individuals have in their opinions, their
religion, their persons, and their faculties; nay more, which indirectly
violates their property, in their actual possessions, in the labor that
acquires their daily subsistence, and in the hallowed remnant of time which
ought to relieve their fatigues and soothe their cares, the influence
[inference?] will have been anticipated, that such a government is not a
pattern for the United States.
If the
United States mean to obtain or deserve the full praise due to wise and
just governments, they will equally respect the rights of property, and the
property in rights: they will rival the government that most sacredly
guards the former; and by repelling its example in violating the latter,
will make themselves a pattern to that and all other governments.
[From
Philip B. Kurland and Ralph Lerner, ed., The Founders’ Constitution
(Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1987), 1:598-99.]
***
Speech in New Haven,
Connecticut
Abraham Lincoln
March 6, 1860
[Slavery is a denial of the right to property, because the slave is not
permitted to keep the fruits of his own labor, and he is not allowed to
strike or quit his job. — TGW]
…Let
us talk about the shoe strike…. I am glad to see that a system of labor
prevails in New England under which laborers CAN strike when they want
to, where they are not obliged to work under all circumstances, and are not
tied down and obliged to labor whether you pay them or not! I like
the system which lets a man quit when he wants to, and wish it might
prevail everywhere.
One of
the reasons why I am opposed to Slavery is just here. What is the true
condition of the laborer? I take it that it is best for all to leave each
man free to acquire property as fast as he can. Some will get wealthy. I
don’t believe in a law to prevent a man from getting rich; it would do more
harm than good. So while we do not propose any war upon capital, we do wish
to allow the humblest man an equal chance to get rich with everybody else.
When
one starts poor, as most do in the race of life, free society is such that
he knows he can better his condition; he knows that there is no fixed
condition of labor, for his whole life. I am not ashamed to confess that
twenty five years ago I was a hired laborer, mauling rails, at work on a
flat-boat—just what might happen to any poor man’s son! I want every man to
have the chance—and I believe a black man is entitled to it—in which he can
better his condition—when he may look forward and hope to be a hired
laborer this year and the next, work for himself afterward, and finally to
hire men to work for him! That is the true system….
[From
Speech in New Haven, in Lincoln, The Collected Works of Abraham
Lincoln, Vol. IV, ed. Roy P. Basler (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers
University Press, 1953), 24.]
***
TODAY
“AGENDA 21”
***
"WASHINGTON (AP) - The Supreme Court on Thursday
[June 23, 2005] ruled that local governments may seize people's homes and
businesses - even against their will - for private economic development.
At issue was the scope of the Fifth Amendment, which allows governments to
take private property through eminent domain if the land is for
"public use."
The 5-4 ruling represented a defeat for some Connecticut residents whose
homes are slated for destruction to make room for an office complex. They
argued that cities have no right to take their land except for projects
with a clear public use, such as roads or schools, or to revitalize
blighted areas.
· The very worst thing about “Agenda 21”
is, they are implementing it in an un-American way because it is anti-
American. They know if we the people
were asked to vote on it and ratify it by each state, it would never pass.
· They are all guilty. This is not about being a Democrat or a
Republican it’s about being an American.
Every elected official who is sneaking this past the citizens of
this country is not worthy of calling themselves an American.
· There is no middle road here. You either support implementing Agenda 21
or you oppose implementing Agenda 21.
Which flag is your flag?
AGENDA
21
FREEDOM 21
 
· Make “Agenda 21” an election issue for
your Congressman.
· “Agenda 21” should be a public debate
issue. Let’s bring “Agenda 21” out
of the closet and shine the bright light of scrutiny on the subject so all
Americans know what’s happening.
· Become an anti-soviet, become a Freedom
21 Fighter.
· To be a Freedom 21 Fighter you don’t have
to join anything. You don’t have to
pay any dues. You don’t have to
attend any meetings. You just have
to learn about Agenda 21 because you can’t fight something you know nothing
about. Then you must share your
knowledge with your friends and neighbors.
And the next time you meet someone who is running for elected
office, any office, ask them where they stand on Agenda 21 “sustainable
development”. Be a Freedom 21
Fighter!
· May GOD Bless the United States of
America.
LINKS:
· Maurice
Strong Architect of Agenda 21
· Local
Agenda 21 – The U.N. Plan for your community
· ICLEI Members
· Henry Lamb @ World Net Daily
· Freedom 21 – Advancing the Principals of Freedom in the 21st
Century
· U. N.
Watch
· The Earth Charter and the Ark of the Gaia Covenant
· Sirolli Institute and Lake County, CA ‘Lake County’s Spirit of
Entrepreneurs’
· HOME
© copyright Bill Wink July 1, 2005
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