We contend that he ought not to have distributed such land at all,--that he had no right to do so; and consequently, the gift of a single acre of land, by his own private will, was an act of robbery, either from the public or some individual.
This statement asserts that the individual had no right to distribute land, framing it as an act of theft.
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More from Edmund Burke
I think our happy situation owing to our Constitution,--but owing to the whole of it, and not to any part singly,--owing in a great measure to what we have left standing in our several reviews and reformations, as well as to what we have…
I would not exclude alteration neither; but even when I changed, it should be to preserve.
Whatever they are, I wish my countrymen rather to recommend to our neighbors the example of the British Constitution than to take models from them for the improvement of our own.
They will become flatterers instead of legislators,--the instruments, not the guides of the people.
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