The New Orleans bulletin. [volume] (New Orleans [La.]) 1874-1876, 1876-01-25
ECONOMY IN GOVERNMENT THE
HIGHEST DUTY OF LEGIS-
LATORS.

1t has long been said that the government
is best which governs least. The saying ID
worthy of acceptation if government is always
at its best condition a subtraction from the
liberties of the individual subject for the ben.
eft of the commonwealth. In this sense il
could be put into another form, in which
what is lost in epigramatic antithesis would
be made up in accuracy: that government Is
best which leaves to the citizen or subject the
maximum residue Of natural liberty consistent
with the maintenance Of order, the protec-
ton of interests, property, person and lie,
and the preservation OF its own existence
That ia not good government which leaves
so much to personal liberty that citizen
may wrong, cheat, rob, SANDER, assault,
main or kill his neighbor with impunity; nor
is that a good government which, under any
pretense, takes away from the citizen or SUBJ
ject the right to control his own action or his
own property in any way that may to him
seem fit provided only that in this exercise
Of liberty he iDjure no one.
Such have been the extravaganza and pro-
governments of modern days that We are al
most tempted to supersede the old maxim by
another and to declare that "the best govern
ment is that which governs most cheaply.''
BY this we mean, that among the govern
ments that are self sufficient for stability and
uniformity, capable of self-mantenance and
adequate to the protection of the rights of cit
,zens without danger to their liberty, that
government is best which least taxes the
labor of the governed 1t should therefore
be the aim of legislators and magistrates
to do all that is strictly necessary to be done
and no more, and to do that at the least cost,
distinguishing always between q mean and
damaging parsimony and judicious econ
omy.
Forty-ive years ago the twenty-seven States
then composing our Federal Republic were
governed Individually at q cost not one-fourth
part of what it now requires to govern an
equal number, and the government Of the
Union with its thirteen million inhabitants
did not require one-tenth Of the amount now
annually expended by Federal authority. Yet
no reader of the history of this country be-
fore 1880 will observe any notable defect or
INSULT cheney of the Federal or State govern
ments of that era. The people insisted on
low taxes, and they had their will They had
their own local rules and rulers, and their
local governme n. in towns, cities or counties
was carried on at their own expense. Offices
were few, salaries we're low, the disposition to
swindle was rare, the opportunities and
to defraud the government were
and honest legislators, judges
and magistrates we're so largely in majority
that official rogues had small
chance for successful peculation. 1t was es-
sentially the era of cheap government. 1t
was an era of prosperity, of happiness, Of Off
cial integrity and Of universal honesty. Men
in exalted stations set no examples of the
vicious ostentation of extravaganza, and public
offices were looked on with view to their
honors rather than their gains. 1t was an era
of noble and wholesome ambition, before
offices were sought or used as q means of
making money, and when men were valued
chiefly for their characters and talents.
Is it impossible to retun to the simple and
practices and the honorable spirit
Of the era when high taxes were held in equal |
odium by the people and by their agents
Will the time ever again come when people
md legislators will look upon needless pub
ic expense as q crime, and needless public
lebt as a curse? Will popular sentiment
,ver again become SO corrected and so en-
ightened, that the transmission ola burden
,ome debt to their successors will be held as
40 less vilainous than the transmission Of
ZONE incurable and loathsome constitutional
nalady? Unless that time returns and the
ines Of political ethics are once more strictly
lrawn, there will be but slender hopes Of
happy future for our country.