cases in which government is false to the fundamental principles on
which free government is based. What is the object of government, but to
protect men's rights? On what principle does a man pay his taxes to the
government, except on that of contributing his proportion towards the
necessary cost of protecting the rights of all? Yet, when his own rights
are actually invaded, the government, which he contributes to support,
instead of fulfilling its implied contract, becomes his enemy, and not
only refuses to protect his rights, (except at his own cost,) but even
forbids him to do it himself.

All free government is founded on the theory of voluntary association;
and on the theory that all the parties to it _voluntarily_ pay their
taxes for its support, on the condition of receiving protection in
return. But the idea that any _poor_ man would voluntarily pay taxes to
build up a government, which will neither protect his rights, (except at
a cost which he cannot meet,) nor suffer himself to protect them by such
means as may be in his power, is absurd.

Under the prevailing system, a large portion of the lawsuits determined
in courts, are mere contests of purses rather than of rights. And a
jury, sworn to decide causes "according to the evidence" produced, are
quite likely, _for aught they themselves can know_, to be deciding
merely the comparative length of the parties' purses, rather than the
intrinsic strength of their respective rights. Jurors ought to refuse to
decide a cause at all, except upon the assurance that all the evidence,
necessary to a full knowledge of the cause, is produced. This assurance
they can seldom have, unless the government itself produces all the
witnesses the parties desire.

In criminal cases, the atrocity of accusing a man of crime, and then
condemning him unless he prove his innocence at his own charges, is so
evident that a jury could rarely, if ever, be justified in convicting a
man under such circumstances.

But the free administration of justice is not only indispensable to the
maintenance of right between man and man; it would also promote
simplicity and stability in the laws. The mania for legislation would
be, in an important degree, restrained, if the government were compelled
to pay the expenses of all the suits that grew out of it.

The free administration of justice would diminish and nearly extinguish
another great evil,--that of malicious _civil_ suits. It is an old
saying