FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   131   132   133   134   135   136   137   138   139   140   141   142   143   144   145   146   147   148   149   150   151   152   153   154   155  
156   157   158   159   160   161   162   163   164   165   166   167   168   169   170   171   172   173   174   175   176   177   178   179   180   >>   >|  
g idea grew many of the interpretations and partial enforcements. A legislator, magistrate or judge might be the very opposite of venal, and yet be irresistibly impelled by the force of training and association to take the current view of the unassailable rights and superiority of property. It would be biassed, in fact, ridiculous to say that the privileges and exemptions enjoyed by the rich were altogether the outcome of corruption by bribes. There is a much more subtle and far more effective and dangerous form of corruption. This is corruption of the mind. For innumerable centuries all government had proceeded, perhaps not avowedly, but in reality, upon the settled and consistent principle that the sanctity of property was superior to considerations of human life, and that a man of property could not very well be a criminal and a peril to the community. Under various disguises church, college, newspaper, politician, judge, all were expositors of this principle. The people were drugged with laudations of property. But these teachings were supplemented by other methods which added to their effectiveness. We have seen how after the Revolution the propertied classes withheld suffrage from those who lacked property. They feared that property would no longer be able to dominate Government. Gradually they were forced to yield to the popular demand and allow manhood suffrage. This seemed to them a new and affrighting force; if votes were to determine the personnel and policy of Government, then the propertyless, being in the majority, would overwhelm them eventually and pass an entirely new code of laws. In one State after another, the propertied class were driven, after a prolonged struggle, to grant citizens a vote, whether they had property or not. In New York State unqualified manhood suffrage was adopted in 1822, but in other States it was more difficult to bring about this revolutionary change. The fundamental suffrage law of New Jersey, for instance, remained, for more than sixty years after the adoption of the Declaration of Independence, in accordance with an act passed by the Provincial Congress of New Jersey on July 2, 1776, two days before the adoption of the Declaration of Independence, or according to some authorities, on the very day of its adoption. Among other requirements this act (1 Laws, N. J. p. 4.) decreed that the voter must be "worth L50 proclamation money, clear estate within the colony." The fourt
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   131   132   133   134   135   136   137   138   139   140   141   142   143   144   145   146   147   148   149   150   151   152   153   154   155  
156   157   158   159   160   161   162   163   164   165   166   167   168   169   170   171   172   173   174   175   176   177   178   179   180   >>   >|  



Top keywords:
property
 

suffrage

 

corruption

 

adoption

 

Independence

 
Government
 
propertied
 

manhood

 
principle
 

Declaration


Jersey

 

eventually

 
majority
 

overwhelm

 
driven
 

prolonged

 
decreed
 
propertyless
 

demand

 

estate


popular

 

Gradually

 

colony

 

forced

 

determine

 

personnel

 

policy

 

affrighting

 

proclamation

 

struggle


authorities

 
remained
 

dominate

 

instance

 

passed

 
Provincial
 

accordance

 
unqualified
 

adopted

 
citizens

States
 

change

 
fundamental
 
requirements
 

revolutionary

 

difficult

 
Congress
 

altogether

 
outcome
 

bribes