Today, I decided to let James Madison do my thinking for me.   What follows is an excerpt of an article written in the National Gazette, March 29, 1792. It is Madison considers property rights and especially the definition of property. I will follow his comments with a few of my own.

Madison:

This term (Property) in its particular application means “that domination which one man claims and exercises over the external things of the world, in exclusion of every other individual.”

In its larger and juster meaning, it embraces every thing to which a man may attach a value and have a right; and which leaves to every one else the like advantage.

In the former sense, a man’s land, or merchandize, or money is called his property.

In the latter sense, a man has property in his opinions and the free communication of them.

He has a property of peculiar value in his religious opinions, and in the profession and practice dictated by them.

He has property very dear to him in the safety and liberty of his person.

He has an equal property in the free use of his faculties and free choice of the objects on which to employ them.

In a word, as a man is said to have a right to his property, he may be equally said to have a property in his rights.

Where and excess of power prevails, property of no sort is duly respected. No man is safe in his opinions, his person, his faculties or his possessions.

Where there is an excess of liberty, the effect is the same, tho’ from an opposite cause.

Government is instituted to protect property of every sort; as well that which lies in the various rights of individuals, as that which the term particularly expresses. This being the end of government, that alone is a just government, which impartially secures to every man, whatever is his own….

Conscience is the most sacred of all property; other property depending in part on positive law, the exercise of that, being a natural and inalienable right. To guard a man’s house as his castle, to pay public and enforce private debts with the most exact faith, can give no title to invade a man’s conscience which is more sacred than his castle….

If there be a government then which prides itself on maintaining the inviolability of property; which provides that none shall be taken directly even for public use without indemnification of the owner, and yet directly violates the property which individuals have in their opinions, their religion, their persons, and their faculties; nay more, which indirectly violates their property, in their actual possessions, in the labor that acquires their daily subsistence, and in the hallowed remnant of time which ought to relieve their fatigues and soothe their cares, the inference will have been anticipated, that such a government is not a pattern for the United States.

If the United States mean to obtain or deserve the full praise due to wise and just governments, they will equally respect the rights of property, and the property of rights.

Sumruld:

One must wonder what Madison would make of the modern United States. We have already had a Supreme Court ruling which justified local municipalities taking property, in the form of land and dwelling, from individuals to give it to others simply because the city or county would reap more in taxes from the new owner. Here we see a violation of property rights. We also are seeing a growing “excess of power” on the part of our government which is threatening our opinions (new hate speech laws), our persons (government health regulations), and our possessions.

Though our government was instituted to “protect property of every sort” including those which lie “in the rights of individuals,” it has ceased to be a just government by Madison’s definition. Remember Madison would know perhaps better than anyone else what our founders had meant our government under the Constitution to be. After all, he got the moniker “Father of the Constitution” the old fashioned way, he earned it. He envisioned the new document, wrote its first draft and fought for it in the convention and in the ratification fight. A truly just government, according to Madison, “impartially secures to every man, whatever is his own.” It does not use empathy as an excuse to pass out rewards to its favorites at the expense of others. For Madison, as for the other founders, charity was a voluntary act by the individual. He would have viewed our approach to government welfare as a form of state sanctioned theft.

Note also how much Madison would have objected to the idea that our consciences can be judged by the law, which is a basic assumption of the new hate crimes law making its way through the Congress. He even said a government that perfectly respected the sacredness of private property (our government has ceased to do this) would have no right to “invade a man’s conscience which is more sacred.” 

According to Madison, no government which violates our rights to our opinions, religion, persons, or our actual possessions can be a pattern for the United States. This, however, has become the pattern. We must turn back the tides of tyranny for the day has come when the United States does not “equally respect the rights of property, and the property in rights.” Our government has become an elitist tyranny which respects neither the rights of property nor the property of rights. It is time to change that.