Salt Lake evening Democrat. [volume] (Salt Lake City, Utah) 1885-1887, 1885-04-06
MAN AND THE STATE.

ton are the regulation of the dealings, OF
all kinds whatsoever, of man with man
to claim for them any other object and to
give them any other justification, is to
claim for them that which belongs not to
them. and to give to them that to which
they are not entitled Various forms of
government are but various expressions
of different ideas; and nations like men
have their ideal standards, and the nearest
approach to arealization of theiridealis is but
an approximation. Many centuries are
required for nations to reach high ideal
standard in art and in literature, and for
nations to attain high standards in
theories of government and the political
rights of man has taken still greater time.
In art and literature individual men rise
to heights of whose immensity the masses
never dream politics can approach, and
Homer and the Iliad are known and read
where Plato and The Republic are never
heard of. The reason is that in art and
literature man acts independently of
his fellowman and in a domain
where the State. which is the
masses organized on whatever plan
they adopt or suffer to be imposed, does
not come, and is not bound by any 9TH
er power than his own will and the limits
of his own genius. Not so in government,
for there man is limited by the will of the
whole and can only act in politics in ac-
cordance with the constitution of his gov
eminent, and whatever that constitution
may be, written or unwrttten, there he
finds his rights and duties defined, there
he finds them protected. In America
we have adopted a written con-
stitution, based on the theory, the
only true theory to secure freedom.
that the powers of the government are
derived from the consent of the governed.
With us government is a means to an
end, that end the liberty of the citizen.
and the right to act for himself in all
things in whatever manner he NAV
choose, but so that he shall not infringe
on the rights of other citizens. For the
government to withhold from any citizen
who is obedient to and in no way contra
venes the law any political rights, is for
the government to commit a wrong
against those from whom it derives
its existence. True it is that the
charter of our political rights in
this Territory is the Organic Act
and aside from that we have no political
rights. But the Organic Act is a recog-
milton of the American idea of govern
ment, which is before all things the
right of the people of locality to govern
and control the affairs of the locality:
but it is expected that the ideas of the
people of the locality will in essentials
be in harmony with the underlying theory
OF the whole country as to the founda-
tion of our institutions, which founda-
tion is that government is created for
man and not man for government.
In Utah there are two parties.
the Peoples Party and the Liberal party.
neither of which believes that govern
ment was created for man, the one hold
ing that man was created for a church.
and the other that man was created TO
destroy this church, while each maintains
that the other is trampling the Constitu-
ton under foot. The Peoples Party holds
that the Government has no rights, while
the Liberal Party holds that the people
have no rights. The Peoples Party saw
that the Liberal Party wish to enchain
them and hence call for a commission.
while the Liberal Party say that
the people are already enchained, and
will be until a commission is appointed, |
forgetting that the enchainment of the
mind may be broken by the mind itself,
while to break the enchainment of the
law is to come in conflict with a recog-
nizcd, material and tangible authority.
an authotity which asserts its rights over
the body, the medium of the soul and
mind. The enchainment of the mind
by spiritual authority is subjective with
the individual, and being subjective NAV
be thrown off when the enchainment be-
comes irksome, and the individual de-
sires to reassert his independence and
right of intellectual self control.
The contentment of the soul with
-he conditions by which it is
whether created from
within or accepted from without, is a
natter with which the State can have no s
concern so long as those conditions are {
not inhaImonious in action and not in t
hought merely. For the State to coerce 5
'hought is for the State to kill thought
md destroy freedom. All the State can {
lsk is obedience to the law, the law being {
he expression of the viii of the people. |
Md will a commission tend to make t
PEOPLE think for themselves and become {
Americans in thought, SO far as govern It
nent is concerned? VIII the tendency I
lot rather be to stife all thought 1T
nd postpone indefinitely the day when +
ii citizens will recognize that their c
emporal allegiance is due to the a
overnment which protects them in their 9
emporal affairs, their property and their b
ights as citizens? The religious rights Ii
-hich are vouchsafed to them by the il
constitution itself are protected by the c
emporal power of the government and il
OF by the spiritual power of any church. W
he recognition of this great fact in our ii
Oyemment will be the cure of all our l.
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