[Dean's World] Dave Price: Thursday Quote

[notify at powerblogs.com]

Posted by Dave Price:
Thursday Quote
http://www.deanesmay.com/posts/1184255956.shtml


   "It has been thought a considerable advance towards establishing the
   principles of Freedom to say that Government is a pact between those
   who govern and those who are governed; but this cannot be true,
   because it is putting the effect before the cause; for as man must
   have existed before Governments existed, there necessarily was a time
   when Governments did not exist, and consequently there could exist no
   governors to form such a pact with. The fact therefore must be that
   the individuals themselves, each in his own personal and sovereign
   right, entered into a compact with each other to produce a Government;
   and this is the only mode in which Governments have a right to arise,
   and the only principle on which they have a right to exist."
   --Thomas Paine, Rights of Man (emphases in original)