The Freeman 1972 - The Ludwig von Mises Institute

300 THE FREEMAN Mayfor so long had classified and categorizedall people began to crumble.With the breakdown of thefeudal rigidities, men and womenwere free to move about the countryand to choose occupations thattheretofore had been barred tothem. Literature and the arts entereda new era; with the end offeudalism came the awakening ofthe human spirit. Let loose werethe latent energies of those paintersand sculptors, poets and playwrights,composers and musicians,whose legacy reminds us that theRenaissance was an age not onlyin which the old rigidities ofstatus disappeared, but one inwhich the flowering of man's spiritproduced a great cultural treasurehouse after its long feudal hibernation.What was the one overridingchange that took place when feudalsociety crumbled and gave way toa new approach to life? The greatlegal historian, Sir Henry Maine,in his work, Ancient La,w, statedthat "the movement of progressivesocieties has hitherto been amovement from status to contract."It was the substitution offlexibility for fixed and unyieldinghuman relationships. Primitive societiesimpose on individuals andon classes of people a system oflaw designed to perpetuate thevalues which those having powerto impose it themselves embraceor consider necessary. Such lawsmay not be of general application;as a rule they enunciate no abstractprinciples by which the individualmay be guided in respectto his future conduct. More oftenthe law consists of rules devisedto deal with individuals or groupsof individuals in respect of specificacts or relationships.Three Principles for LawsThere appear to be at least threeessential principles that ought togovern substantive laws in a societyin which freedom of contractand not status governs the relationshipamong men.The first principle: laws should,as far as possible, be general andof general application. They oughtr..ot to be designed for the purposeof regulating the special relationshipsbetween A and B as distinguishedfrom relationships betweenall other persons. Neithershould they attempt to apply oneset of principles to class A personsand a different set of principles toclass B persons. All persons, ofwhatever class or "status," shouldbe treated alike,not only by procedurallaws but by substantivelaw as well. It is in this contextthat the principle of egalitarianismtakes on its most significantmeaning. Laws ought not to makefish of one group and fowl of another.When laws are made es-