The Law Has Been Perverted

It Is Indeed A Singular Thing That People Wish To Pass Laws To Nullify The Disagreeable Consequences That The Law Of Responsibility Entails. Will They Never Realize That They Do Not Eliminate These Consequences But Merely Pass Them Along To Other People? The Result Is One Injustice The More And One Moral The Less.

The Law Can Be An Instrument Of Equalization Only As It Takes From Some Persons And Gives To Other Persons. When The Law Does This, It Is An Instrument Of Plunder.

[socialists Claim] That We Reject Fraternity, Solidarity, Organization, And Association; And They Brand Us With The Name Of Individualists. We Can Assure Them That What We Repudiate Is Not Natural Organization, But Forced Organization. It Is Not Free Association, But The Forms Of Association That They Would Impose Upon Us. It Is Not Spontaneous Fraternity, But Legal Fraternity. It Is Not Providential Solidarity, But Artificial Solidarity, Which Is Only An Unjust Displacement Of Responsibility. Socialism . . . Confounds Government And Society.

The Law Has Been Perverted, And The Powers Of The State Have Become Perverted Along With It. The Law Has Not Only Been Turned From Its Proper Function, But Made To Follow An Entirely Contrary Purpose. The Law Has Become A Tool For Every Kind Of Greed. Instead Of Preventing Crime, The Law Itself Is Guilty Of The Abuses It Is Supposed To Punish. If This Is True, It Is A Serious Matter, And Moral Duty Requires Me To Call The Attention Of My Fellow-citizens To It.

Nothing Is More Senseless Than To Base So Many Expectations On The State, That Is, To Assume The Existence Of Collective Wisdom And Foresight After Taking For Granted The Existence Of Individual Imbecility And Improvidence.