Plainly, unless _all_ a man's natural rights are inviolable by lawmakers, _none_ of them are. It is an absurdity to say that a man has any rights _of his own_, if other men, whether calling themselves a government, or by any other name, have the right to take them from him, without his consent. Therefore the very idea of a lawmaking government necessarily implies a denial of all such things as individual liberty, or individual rights. From this statement it does not follow that every lawmaking government will, in practice, take from every man _all_ his natural rights. It will do as it pleases about it. It will take some, leaving him to enjoy others, just as its own pleasure or discretion shall dictate at the time. It would defeat its own ends, if it were wantonly to take away _all_ his natural rights,--as, for example, his right to live, and to breathe,--for then he would be dead, and the government could then get nothing more out of him. The most tyrannical government will, therefore, if it have any sense, leave its victims enough liberty to enable them to provide for their own subsistence, to pay their taxes, and to render such military or other service as the government may have need of. _But it will do this for its own good, and not for theirs._ In allowing them this liberty, it does not at all recognize their right to it, but only consults its own interests. Now, sir, this is the real character of the government of the United States, as it is of all other _lawmaking_ governments. There is not a single human right, which the government of the United States recognises as inviolable. It tramples upon any and every individual right, whenever its own will, pleasure, or discretion shall so dictate. It takes men's property, liberty, and lives whenever it can serve its own purposes by doing so. 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. It virtually declares that it does not itself exist at all for the good of the people, but that the people exist solely for the use of the government. All these things prove that the government is not one voluntarily established and sustained by the people, for the protection of their natural, inherent, individual rights, but that it is merely a government of usurpers, robbers, and tyrants, who claim to own the people as their slaves, and claim the right to dispose of them, and their property, at their (the usurpers') pleasure or discretion. Now, sir, since you may be disposed to deny that such is the real character of the government, I propose to prove it, by evidences so numerous and conclusive that you cannot dispute them.