PDF, Epperson, The-Unseen-Hand - 9 11 truth Switzerland

CHAPTER 2 FREEDOM
to those born of "common" stock. It is quite apparent that the founding
fathers were attempting to limit this concept of the European nobility.
Another "self-evident truth" in that paragraph was the recognition that
man's rights were inalienable, which meant that other men, or other
governments, could not tamper with them.
The founding fathers attempted to define what these human rights
were: the right to "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness." (They
recognized that these were not the only rights of man, but that these were
"amongst others.")
And lastly, that man creates governments to protect these inalienable
rights.
James Madison has been quoted as saying that: "Government is
instituted to protect property of every sort. This being the end of government,
that alone is a just government which impartially secures to every man,
whatever is his own.... That is not a just government where... proper-
ty... is violated by... seizures .. is violated by... seizures of one class of
citizens for the service of the rest."
Two other examples of the concern about the rights of man can be
found in the Virginia Bill of Rights, adopted on June 12, 1776, and the
Alabama Constitution.
Article I of the Virginia Bill of Rights states:
That all men are by nature equally free and independent, and
have certain inherent rights, of which, when they enter into a state
of society, they cannot, by any compact, deprive or divest their
posterity;
Namely the enjoyment of life and liberty, with the means of
acquiring and possessing property, and pursuing and obtaining
happiness and safety.
Article 1 of the Alabama Constitution reads, in part:
That the sole object and only legitimate end of government is
to protect the citizen in the enjoyment of life, liberty and property,
and when the government assumes other functions it is usurpation
and oppression.
Since government is the accumulation of individual rights to use force
in the protection of individual or collective rights to life, liberty and
property, great care should be exercized in the granting of power to the
government. The question is always just how much power can be granted to
government before it, in itself, becomes an enemy of human rights.
George Washington addressed this problem when he stated: "Govern-
ment is not reason, it is not eloquence. It is force, and like fire, it is a
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