Graham R (Ed.) - Anarchism - A Documentary History of Libertarian Ideas Volume One - From Anarchy to Anarchism (300 CE to 1939)

18/ ANARCHISM
...[RJeprese ntative government is necessarily imperfect. It is ... a point to be regretted,
in the abstract notion of civil society, that a majority should overbear a minority,
and that the minority, after having opposed and remonstrated, should be
obliged practically to submit to that which was the subject of their remonstrance.
But this evil, inseparable from political government, is aggravated by representation,
which removes the power of making regulations one step further from the people
whose lot it is to obey them ...
Whatever evils are included in the abstract idea of government, they are all of
them extremely aggravated by the extensiveness of its jurisdiction, and softened under
circumstances of an opposite nature . Ambition, which may be no less fo rmidable
than a pestilence in the former, has no room to unfold itself in the latter. Popular
commotion is like the waters of the earth, capable where the surface is large, of producing
the most tragi cal effects, but mild and innocuous when confined within the
circuit of a hUIllble lake. Sobriety and equity are the obvious characte ristics of a limited
circle . ..
Ambition and tUIllUIt are evils that arise out ofgovefl1ment, in an indirect manner,
in consequence of the habits, which government introduces, of conce rt and combination
extending themselves over multitudes of men. There are other evils
inseparable from its existence . The object of government is the suppression of such
violence , as well external as internal, as might destroy, or bring into jeopardy. the
well being of the community or its members: and the means it employs are constraint
and violence of a more regulated kind. For this purpose the concentration of individlIal
fo rces beconles necessary, and the nlethod in \vhich this concentration is usuCliiy
obtained is also constraint ... Constraint employed against delinquents, or persons to
whom delinquency is imputed, is by no means without its mischiefs. Constraint employed
by the majority of a society against the minority, who may differ from them
upon some question of public good, is calculated, at first sight at least, to excite a
still greater disapprobation .
...[Tlhe existence of a national assembly introduces the evils of a fictitious unanimity.
The public, guided by such an assembly, must act with concert, or the assembly
is a nugatory excrescence. But it is impossible that this unanimity can really exist.
The individuals who constitute a nation cannot take into consideration a variety of
important questions without fo rming different sentiments respecting them. In reality,
all questions that are brought before such an assembly are decided by a majority
of votes, and the minority, afler having exposed, with all the power of eloquence , and
force of reasoning, of which they are capable, the injustice and folly ofthe measures