The mirror. (Stillwater, Minn.) 1894-1925, 1895-09-12
THE PRICE OF LIBERTY.

more in need of definition and defense
than that of natural rights" 1t is
made to do great deal of service on
the stump in congress and in the press,
by persons who have never asked them
selves what are the rights that nature
has conferred upon man. TO answer
this question it is necessary to observe
what rights men in the state of nature
enjoy and what they have enjoyed in
the past. Inquiry here shows that they
are not the rights which we mean when
we use the phrase natural rights"
Among Australian savages, these be-
ing by common consent the nearest to |
state of nature Of all existing tribes, |
the right of young woman is to be
Drained with club if she does not fol
low the first man who takes fancy to
her. Among Terra del Fuegians the
right of an aged person is to be eaten,
instead Of the more useful dogs of the
family. In general, the right of the
strong man in the state of nature is to
wife, his life. or his liberty. The right
of the weaker man is to submit.
The state of nature is the last place
to look for natural rights Least Of
all is it the place to look for the right
to liberty, right which was denied
even in our own ''land of the free, down
| 70
thing in the worlds history that denies
and stultifies the right to liberty as be-
ing natural" it is the almost universal
prevalence of slavery. and its persist
ence down to our own time, even among
the most civilized races. The republics
of Greece in their paImy days enslaved
each others free citizens with no more
cOmpunction than Mahommedan
Kurd feels in the persecution Of Arme-
nian Christians. Our ancestors in
Massachusetts thought it not wrong to
sell the children of the Quakers into
slavery, and they made no distinction
between Indians and Africans in that
regard, as, indeed, there was no reason
: why they should. The right to life and
the right to liberty, as they now exist
are artificial and conventional rights
, evolved from the painful experience OF
l ages Such they are historically, anc
5 no man can affirm that they are differ
/ ent in any other sense, except by taking
5 refuge in theological dogmas which
| have no more foundation in the bible
: than they have in the natural state O.
e man.
t What are commonly called ''natura
e rights are ideal rights, the product o
L ideas gradually accepted by mankint
and moulded into the form of law
!. ''The most important fact in regard t.
t the history of the dogma of natura
g liberty" says Prof. Sumner, lis tha
that dogma never had any historica
y foundation, but is the purest eXampl
n that could be brought forward of a
vt out-and out a-priori dogma; that thi
II dogma, among the most favored nations
l. helped and sustained the masses: an
u that by contagion it has, in the nine
,r teenth century, spread liberty to tn
ae uttermost parts of the earth. By dir
ID of calling these natural rights, whe
" they are in the strictest sense artificia
,e having been forged by the sweat {
ages, minds have been opened to belie1
that lot of other things follow as co
ollaries, such as the right to livin
-. the right to labor (that is, the right
be provided with suitable employmen
and the right to marry (that is, the rigl
w to have ones offspring taken care OF
Of These things are inseparable from Il
Id right to pursue happiness, and if tn
n be natural right, the others cannot
er denied. If it is only an artificial rigl
,is hammered out by painful effort, t.
is others are in like manner to be won
of toll and patient mastery of the conc
" tions, in which mans lot has been ca
,e- on earth.
pg The right to liberty having be
CHI gained by slow effort, protracted CT
tainly through the whole historic peri