Lysander Spooner: “But this pretence, it will be seen, utterly discards the idea that contracts have any natural obligation.”

They do not tell us of the almshouses, hospitals, schools, churches, etc., which, out of the purest charity and benevolence, they maintain for our benefit, out of the money they take from us.

They do not attempt to deceive us, or mislead us, or reconcile us to their doings, by any such pretences, impostures, or insults as these.

They neither ask, nor expect, any mercy, if they should ever fall into the hands of honest men.

They acknowledge it to be our unquestioned right and duty to kill them, if we can; that they expect nothing else, than that we will kill them, if we can; and that we are only fools and cowards, if we do not kill them, by any and every…