All these things prove that the government does not exist at all for the protection of men's rights; but that it absolutely denies to the people any rights, or any liberty, whatever, except such as it shall see fit to permit them to have for the time being.
Spooner contends that the government exists not to protect rights but to deny them, except when convenient.
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It was a principle of the Common Law, as it is of the law of nature, and of common sense, that no man can be taxed without his personal consent.
Since Magna Carta, we have evidence showing quite conclusively that all freemen, above the age of twenty-one years, were eligible as jurors.
It would also be making them consent to what they regard as the destruction of their own rights.
One answer is, that this power, which juries have of judging of the law, is not a power of absolute decision in all cases.