The True Function of Government
Henry Ware Allen
[Reprinted from the
Single Tax Review, September-October 1921]
It is just as true now as it ever was that eternal vigilance is the
price of liberty. As a people we are apt to be superficial, not going
deep enough into the problems before us. It is very easy to make heavy
the yoke of government and very, very difficult to throw it off
afterward. History records a strange tendency in man to enslave
himself, to lose his natural rights. Benevolent despotism has always
been attractive to a certain class of minds, but, after all, has it
any place in a free country? And does not history prove that
benevolent despotism leads invariably to despotism that is anything
but benevolent? We need to commune more often with that spirit of
liberty which has animated the struggle upward throughout all time,
the spirit of '76; for its neglect invites a despotism imposed upon us
by our own office-holders quite as unbearable as that of a foreign
tyrant.
Many economists have defined the proper limitations of the functions
of government, but none better than this by Henry George:
"It is not the province of government to make men
virtuous or religious, or to preserve the fool from the consequence
of his own folly. Government should be repressive no further than is
necessary to secure liberty by protecting the equal rights of each
from aggression on the part of others, and the moment governmental
prohibitions extend beyond this line, they are in danger of
defeating the very ends they are intended to serve."
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