They are secret, because their reasons for their decrees are to be found only in great volumes of statutes and supreme court reports, which the mass of the people have neither money to buy, nor time to read; and would not understand, if they were to read them.
Spooner points out that legal knowledge is inaccessible to most people, creating a barrier to justice.
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Any restriction upon the exercise of this right is a restriction upon his rightful power of providing for, and accomplishing, his own well-being.
The people considered their jurisprudence as a part of their inheritance.
They cannot claim or expect that the whole people shall practise the folly of taking on trust their pretended superior knowledge, and of committing blindly into their hands all their own interests, liberties, and rights, to be disposed of…
Proud from victory, and with their swords in their hands, would they surrender their liberties to a private man?