The Profit Of The One Is The

Here I Encounter The Most Popular Fallacy Of Our Times. It Is Not Considered Sufficient That The Law Should Guarantee To Every Citizen The Free And Inoffensive Use Of His Faculties For Physical, Intellectual And Moral Self-improvement. Instead, It Is Demanded That The Law Should Directly Extend Welfare, Education, And Morality Throughout The Nation. This Is The Seductive Lure Of Socialism. And I Repeat: These Two Uses Of The Law Are In Direct Contradiction To Each Other.

Who Then Would Not Like To See These Benefits Flow Upon The World From The Law, As From An Inexhaustible Source? But Is It Possible? Whence Does The State Draw Those Resources That It Is Urged To Dispense By Way Of Benefits To Individuals? Is It Not From The Individuals Themselves? How, Then, Can These Resources Be Increased By Passing Through The Hands Of A Parasitic And Voracious Intermediary?

In Fact, If Law Were Restricted To Protecting All Persons, All Liberties, And All Properties; If Law Were Nothing More Than The Organized Combination Of The Individual's Right To Self-defense; If Law Were The Obstacle, The Check, The Punisher Of All Oppression And Plunder - Is It Likely That We Citizens Would Then Argue Much About The Extent Of The Franchise?

The Mission Of The Law Is Not To Oppress Persons And Plunder Them Of Their Property, Even Though The Law May Be Acting In A Philanthropic Spirit. Its Purpose Is To Protect Persons And Property.... If You Exceed This Proper Limit -- If You Attempt To Make The Law Religious, Fraternal, Equalizing, Philanthropic, Industrial, Or Artistic -- You Will Then Be Lost In Uncharted Territory, In Vagueness And Uncertainty, In A Forced Utopia Or, Even Worse, In A Multitude Of Utopias, Each Striving To Seize The Law And Impose It On You.

The State Tends To Expand In Proportion To Its Means Of Existence And To Live Beyond Its Means, And These Are, In The Last Analysis, Nothing But The Substance Of The People. Woe To The People That Cannot Limit The Sphere Of Action Of The State! Freedom, Private Enterprise, Wealth, Happiness, Independence, Personal Dignity, All Vanish.