628 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



Yet no citizen will be allowed to give evidence in a court of jus- 

 tice who does not profess belief in a God and a future state. The 

 result of this is that infidels may be looked upon as outlaws, and, 

 if the conviction of a robber depends on their testimony, he may 

 go free. This rule admits the evidence of those atheists who deny 

 their faith, and excludes those who are brave enough to openly 

 affirm it. A citizen's safety, rights, and property may thus be 

 made to depend upon his belief. What rational man would not 

 willingly believe the testimony of Huxley, Spencer, or Ingersoll 

 on questions involving rights between themselves and other men ? 

 Yet these, under our free government, might be challenged as 

 witnesses on religious ground, and thus deprived of the protection 

 of the state. 



By the Constitution of the United States all citizens are to be 

 protected against all unlawful searches and seizures; but these 

 rights are continually violated, without redress, by the action of 

 brutal and ignorant officers who, without authority, make police 

 raids and do irreparable injury to innocent men. 



Space will not permit of the further recital of offenses, but 

 what has been said will show clearly that the state has done acts 

 that are as deserving of the name of crime as anything committed 

 by the citizen ; and, further, that we have drifted into a passive 

 condition of assent to the doctrine that " we, the people/' can do 

 no wrong. The effect on the community of the ills that have been 

 set forth is demoralizing, and weakens the stability of the state 

 as a body. 



The principal question of human affairs must ever be the 

 proper adjustment of the rights of the individual as against 

 society. The value of existence to the citizen depends upon the 

 restraints placed on the actions of other people. Yet looking at 

 the subject in its widest sense, how little has been done ! The influ- 

 ence of custom is so great that the rules laid down by the superior 

 power appear self -justifying. The struggle between liberty and 

 authority the man and the tyrant has given place to a more 

 representative government ; but success in politics, as in persons, 

 sometimes brings with it infirmities, and popular control may 

 perpetuate in other forms the wrongs of despots long gone. 



The question is not new. In some form or other it has been 

 before mankind from the remotest ages. The law that the king 

 could do no wrong has been declared inapplicable to our repub- 

 lican government. But in the monarch's place appears the hydra- 

 headed tyrant the state. The authority of this body, more dan- 

 gerous than the power of the king, presents itself under new 

 conditions that require deep consideration and fundamental 

 treatment. 



The remedy for many of the troubles is extremely simple. Let 



