Civil
society, the state, the government, originates in this compact, and the
government, as Mr. Jefferson asserts in the Declaration of American
Independence, "derives its just powers from the consent of the
governed."

This theory, as so set forth, or as modified by asserting that the
individual delegates instead of surrendering his rights to civil
society, was generally adopted by the American people in the last
century, and is still the more prevalent theory with those among them
who happen to have any theory or opinion on the subject. It is the
political tradition of the country. The state, as defined by the elder
Adams, is held to be a voluntary association of individuals.
Individuals create civil society, and may uncreate it whenever they
judge it advisable. Prior to the Southern Rebellion, nearly every
American asserted with Lafayette, "the sacred right of insurrection" or
revolution, and sympathized with insurrectionists, rebels, and
revolutionists, wherever they made their appearance. Loyalty was held
to be the correlative of royalty, treason was regarded as a virtue, and
traitors were honored, feasted, and eulogized as patriots, ardent
lovers of liberty, and champions of the people. The fearful struggle
of the nation against a rebellion which threatened its very existence
may have changed this.

That there is, or ever was, a state of nature such as the theory
assumes, may be questioned. Certainly nothing proves that it is, or
ever was, a real state. That there is a law of nature is undeniable.
All authorities in philosophy, morals, politics, and jurisprudence
assert it; the state assumes it as its own immediate basis, and the
codes of all nations are founded on it; universal jurisprudence, the
jus qentium of the Romans, embodies it, and the courts recognize and
administer it. It is the reason and conscience of civil society, and
every state acknowledges its authority. But the law of nature is as
much in force in civil society as out of it. Civil law does not
abrogate or supersede natural law, but presupposes it, and supports
itself on it as its own ground and reason. As the natural law, which
is only natural justice and equity dictated by the reason common to all
men, persists in the civil law, municipal or international, as its
informing soul, so does the state of nature persist in the civil state,
natural society in civil society, which simply develops, applies, and
protects it. Man in civil