EQUALITY IN THE UNITED STATES 539 



in life is stronger in the United States than in any of the countries of 

 Europe. Relatively to the desire for equality, however, private prop- 

 erty is held in no higher esteem here than elsewhere. The American 

 people are no more disposed to sacrifice their ideals to the pursuit of 

 money than arc the people of other lands. Among other evidences that 

 this is true are the numerous communistic societies that have sprung up 

 from time to time in the face of repeated failure. 



In the main, the passion for equality and the desire for property 

 have not been incompatible. On occasion, however, the two have con- 

 flicted and an epoch-making event has occurred in our politics. More- 

 over, public opinion has not always held the two in equal esteem, but 

 has at times been more devoted to the one and then again to the other. 

 At the outset the emphasis was upon equality. " We hold these truths 

 to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed 

 by their Creator with certain inalienable rights, that among these are 

 Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness," runs the Declaration of 

 Independence. These words are not to be taken in the sense that every 

 one should wear the same sort of clothes, live in the same kind of a 

 house, eat the same quantity and variety of food, or receive the same 

 economic rewards and social recognition in life. Common sense and the 

 intense individualism of the times are both opposed to any such narrow 

 view as this. The American ideal of equality never has called for a dead 

 level of uniformity. Owing to the strong dislike for anything that 

 savors of titled rank or caste, there was once a popular objection to the 

 wearing of uniforms, even by railroad conductors, but the objection was 

 withdrawn when the practical utility of such uniforms was perceived. 

 The colonists were no less intent upon liberty than upon equality, and 

 their conception of the latter included a generous measure of the former. 

 Equal in some respects, namely, in the right to life, liberty and the pur- 

 suit of happiness, was Lincoln's interpretation.^ 



The Declaration of Independence was occasioned by the commercial 

 restrictions of Great Britain. To secure freedom from these restrictions 

 the right of self-government was asserted. More fundamental, however, 

 than British commercial policy were the spirit of independence, the 

 sense of self-reliance and the craving for freedom which isolation from 

 the mother country and other conditions of frontier life helped to de- 

 velop. 



The colonists were more self-reliant than even the original, self-reliant 

 British stock, since, broadly speaking, only selected men essayed the ocean 

 journey. No aid from a hostile, Stuart-ruled England could reach the colonist, 

 who, separated from his neighbors by miles of treacherous forest, was compelled 

 to rely upon himself. With the aid of his family, he plowed his acres, shot his 



1 Debates of Lincoln and Douglas, published by Follett, Foster and Co., 

 Columbus, Ohio, p. 63. 



