The Works of Robert G. Ingersoll, Vol. 04 (of 12): Dresden Edition—LecturesIngersoll, Robert Green
Religion
The Works of Robert G. Ingersoll, Vol. 04 (of 12): Dresden Edition—Lectures
Ingersoll, Robert Green
Free thought
I wish to go a step further. I want, if possible, to get the people
out of the tenements, out of the gutters of degradation, to homes where
there can be privacy, where these people can feel that they are in
partnership with nature; that they have an interest in good government.
With the means we now have of transportation, there is no necessity for
poor people being huddled in festering masses in the vile, filthy and
loathsome parts of cities, where poverty breeds rags, and the rags breed
diseases. I would exempt a homestead of a reasonable value, say of
the value of two or three thousand dollars, not only from sale under
execution, but from sale for taxes of every description. These homes
should be absolutely exempt; they should belong to the family, so that
every mother should feel that the roof above her head was hers; that
her house was her castle, and that in its possession she could not be
disturbed, even by the nation. Under certain conditions I would allow
the sale of this homestead, and exempt the proceeds of the sale for a
certain time, during which they might be invested in another home; and
all this could be done to make a nation of householders, a nation of
land-owners, a nation of home-builders.
I would invoke the same power to preserve these homes, and to acquire
these homes, that I would invoke for acquiring lands for building
railways. Every State should fix the amount of land that could be owned
by an individual, not liable to be taken from him for the purpose of
giving a home to another, and when any man owned more acres than the law
allowed, and another should ask to purchase them, and he should refuse,
I would have the law so that the person wishing to purchase could file
his petition in court. The court would appoint commissioners, or a
jury would be called, to determine the value of the land the petitioner
wished for a home, and, upon the amount being paid, found by such
commission, or jury, the land should vest absolutely in the petitioner.
This right of eminent domain should be used not only for the benefit
of the person wishing a home, but for the benefit of all the people.
Nothing is more important to America than that the babes of America
should be born around the firesides of homes.
There is another question in which I take great interest, and it ought,
in my judgment, to be answered by the intelligence and kindness of our
century.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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