LETTERS TO THE EDITOR.
THE STATE AND THE EIGHTH COMMANDMENT.
[To TEE EDITOR OF TEE " SPECTATOR."1
Siu,—Allow me to explain that, in the letter on which you have commented, I had no thought of divesting the State of moral responsibility, or of denying that it could act unjustly in the financial treatment of its subjects. My view is this,—that in- justice on the part of the State does not consist (as you bold) in the invasion of proprietary rights inherent in the possessor, but in the violation of the principles of equity. This may perhaps appear at first sight to be a distinction without a difference ; but I believe that, both for ethics and for politics, the distinction may be shewn to be real and of practical importance.
To my mind, equity or justice owes its high authority over the human conscience to the belief in an order—a living, pro- gressive, social order—made and developed by the Creator of men. One chief way of getting to know this order is by con- sidering what is for the well-being of human society. In ethics or theology, no place can be found for natural rights inhering in the individual. When we speak of a man's rights, we mean the powers and the protection which the social order —practically equivalent to the general well-being of society— assigns to him. We get rid of a troublesome cause of con- fusion when we reject the idea of natural personal rights* as a needless figment.
Amongst these rights, the supposed rights of individual ownership or possession, barring any claims of the community, will disappear. Such rights have been hopelessly difficult to formulate. You speak of what a man " creates " as his by right; and you give as an instance the cultivation of a plot of ground on a desert island by a Robinson Crusoe. Perhaps it is hardly worth while to pick to pieces the right won by "creation." A more practical question would be, whether inheritance gives a man a right of possession which it is criminal in the State to invade. As a matter of fact, no State has ever recognised a proprietary right over which it had not itself a superior right. A well-governing State respects its own laws of property, till they are changed ; and it respects the social order, Bo far as the principles of that order have revealed themselves through the development of the well- being of society. But States have never scrupled to subordi- nate all proprietary rights to the safety or the well-being of the community. And every owner has been made to feel that his rights of property as against private persons are essentially different from any that he has against the State. What people resent in exactions of the State is not the demand itself, but any violation of equity in it,--chiefly in the rough intelligible form of inequality. If they complain that the State is robbing them, it is not because it takes what is theirs, but because it is taking, unreasonably, more from them than from others.
It is recognised that the State may take anything from its subjects—property, liberty, life—so long as it acts fairly, on principles or by rules which commend themselves as fair to the instructed intelligence. You affirm that the inheritor of Holland House holds it as his own against the State no less than against individuals. But when you say that if the State wants Holland House it must pay for it, you mean, no doubt, to imply that the State has the right to take it for some price which persons nominated by the State may think reasonable.. But the owner may not wish to sell it at any price, very probably not for its estimated pecuniary value. To a private person proposing to buy Holland House the owner is at liberty to .answer,—" Thy money perish with thee !" But owners have been taught that when the State wants a piece of land or a house, they are not free to refuse to sell it, nor allowed to put their own price upon it.
Mr. Gladstone holds, with most people, that the appropria- tion of all the land of the country by the State without com- pensation would be robbery; that with compensation it would not be robbery, but would be unwise. If an individual should seize a piece of land, and offer due compensation, his act would still be robbery, unless the owner should freely consent to the exchange. An owner can say to an individual,--' This is mine ; you will commit a crime if you lay hands on it.' To the State he cannot say this ; he can only protest against an exaction because it is arbitrary and exceptional, because it would be held by reasonable persons to be unfair. The owner of land will say,--' I do not see why my rent should be taken from me, any more than my neighbour's dividend from him.' According to the view I am defending, special +ovation of the rich cannot be condemned on the ground that it takes from the rich what belongs to them ;. but it may be condemned in so far as it is unfair or un- wise. And if we are perplexed to discover any standard of fairness which will guide us as to the burdens to be laid on the rich and the poor respectively, we may often be more able to perceive what is unwise. It is easier to prove that much of proposed Socialistic legislation is impolitic, and would in the long-run injure the classes it seeks to benefit, than that it is unjust. But any light on the comparative equity of methods and rates of taxation is sure to be welcomed.—I am, Sir, &c., Kirkby Lonsdale, October 8th. J. LLEWELYN DAVIES.
[* Has, then, a man no " right " to religious liberty? Mr.. Davies's theory makes all rights dependent on human law, and consequently confers on the lawmaker entire freedom.. We say he is bound by God's law.—En. spectator.]
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