



Produced by David Widger






LIBERTY IN THE NINETEENTH CENTURY

By Frederic May Holland

1899

BY

PREFACE

THIS book is a result of having studied the development of political
and religious liberty for forty years. How well I have selected
my authorities the reader can judge. I will merely say that I have
mentioned no writer whom I have not studied carefully. The sun-dial has
been so far my model that victories in the cause of freedom are more
prominent than defeats in the pages that follow. It did not seem
necessary to give much space to familiar authors, though I should have
liked to do justice to Buckle, George Eliot, and Swinburne.

I regret that I have been unable to tell at any adequate length how the
Republic which was proclaimed at Paris in 1870 has survived longer than
any other government set up in France during the century. Its enemies
have been voted down repeatedly everywhere; the schools have been made
free from ecclesiastical control; and the hostility of the clergy has
been suppressed by the Pope. The French are still too fond of military
glory, and too ignorant of the value of personal liberty and local
self-government; but rapid advance in freedom is already possible under
the Constitution of 1884. Not only France, but also Great Britain,
Canada, and Australia, give proof that the time has gone by when
Americans had any right to claim, as they did in my boyhood, to be the
only people able to govern themselves.

If any nation can maintain a free press, just laws, and elections of
local magistrates, it ought to enjoy these rights, however slight may
be its fitness for becoming a real republic; and the suppression of such
rights by Cromwell and Napoleon cannot be pardoned consistently by any
friend to liberty. Napoleon's chief guilt, as I must here mention,
was in ordering the expulsion from office by soldiers, in 1797, of
representatives of the people who were striving to maintain liberty at
home and establish peace abroad. If there were any necessity for his
usurpation two years later, it was largely of his own making. Despotism
had already been made tolerable, however, even during the first
Republic, by the national fondness for war. This is according to a
principle which is taught by Herbert Spencer, and which is illustrated
in the following pages by many instances from the history of France
and other nations. The horrors of the Reign of Terror may be explained,
though not excused, by the greatness of the danger from invaders as well
as rebels. And there were very few cases of punishing differences merely
about religion by the guillotine.

I have also tried to show how the centralising tendencies of a
government are strengthened by the wish of its citizens to gain private
advantages by state aid. John Stuart Mill and Herbert Spencer have
published timely warnings against the danger of checking the development
of individual energy and ability by meddlesome laws. Whether the power
of the government ought to be reduced to the narrow limits proposed by
these great thinkers, is a question which has been discussed at some
length in my last chapter. It is there suggested that such a reduction
would be much more practicable in the case of national than of local
governments. It is not likely to be made anywhere at present; but
it might be well for reformers to try to restrict the operations of
governments according to the following rule: nothing to be undertaken by
a national government which can be done as well by municipalities; and
nothing to be attempted by either a local or central government which
can be done as well by private citizens, acting singly or in voluntary
associations. This rule would justify towns and cities in taking such
care of roads, streets, and schools as is not sanctioned by Spencer; but
it would leave municipalities free to decide the question whether
they ought to carry on gas- and water-works, electric roads, and other
enterprises according to the merits of each special case. Here in
America internal improvements seem to be the proper charge of the State,
rather than of the nation; but whether the former has any right to
enforce Sunday laws, and the latter to impose protective tariffs, are
questions which I have taken the liberty of discussing thoroughly.
Herbert Spencer should not be held responsible for any opinions not
printed plainly as his. Most of the instances of the working of Sunday
statutes were taken from a religious newspaper entitled The American
Sentinel. Among very recent cases are these. A