PATERNAL GOVERNMENT. 13 



All trespassing is a matter of private grievance. But grant a mo- 

 nopoly of land, and all the other laws follow. Poor men's ex- 

 emption laws have never helped a poor man, except to curtail 

 his credit, and make him dishonest. But having instituted the 

 devouring shark of usury, the paternal State likes to protect the 

 poor ! The unjustifiable usury laws, can only be rationally inter- 

 preted, by acknowledging the right of free banking. Compulsory 

 education, excusing itself under "universal suffrage," becomes 

 needless, after the abrogation of majority rule. 



The doctrine of equal liberty, on the other hand, covers all that 

 is so bunglingly attempted by paternalism, without its expense or 

 injustice. For instance, a person has a right, on the ground of 

 equal liberty to make his own kind of street and side- walk, but if it 

 should be such as to impede travel, he could be complained of. But 

 on the ground of paternalism, one could not regulate the architec- 

 ture of his ovm house ; and if it was a Quaker who was in office, it 

 might have to be painted drab. 



Pternalism itself, at last, comes to reciprocity for judgment. 

 The mooted questions of governn- ental jurisdiction can be settled 

 in no other way. Take, for instance, the dispute over the Bible 

 in the public schools, where the religious conscience of the Catholic 

 is diametrically in conflict with that of the Protestant. What is 

 to unlock this difficulty, and insure peace, except the doctrine of 

 eipial liberty ? There is compulsory vaccination, what can pater- 

 nalism do to adjust the relations of the rival claimants ? Take the 

 case of free speech for Dynamiters and the parades of the Salvation 

 army, what is to decide the limits of governmental jiu'is diet ion ? 

 Take the problem of land tenure, how can paternalism settle it ? 

 But, upon the basis of equal liberty, it settles itself. 



In our hue and cry iov political liberty, as interpreted by ma- 

 jority rule, the counterfeit is often taken for the real. The advo- 

 cates of paternalism, then, cry '■'laissez faire,'''' and "do as you 

 please." We answer that these are none of the characteristics of 

 equal liberty. License is always a result of an irresponsible pater- 

 nalism, an undefined reaction from it, or a relic of i)atornaIism, in 

 tlie name of liberty. Equal liberty is the very soul of order con- 

 servatism and progress. 



Let us not, then, confound the application of paternalism witli 

 Die doctrine of equal liberty. The exact principle that separates 

 tliom is that governmental interterence is never justifiable on the 

 ground of the nature of the act itself, but on the ground of its uu re- 

 ciprocal relationship. An act, good by itself, may be very meddle- 

 some, while a bad act, which injux-es only the party concerned, is 

 not to be suppressed. And if there is ever any doubt as to how far 



