XIX     HUMAN GOVERNMENT – Part 2

A     The particular form of state government that is best for the people in a given area, region, or country depends on the virtue and intelligence of the people. 
     When virtue and intelligence are nearly universal, democratic forms of government are best suited to promote the public good.  In this type of society, democracy is greatly conducive to the general diffusion of knowledge from the government to its subjects.  In a suitable state of society, a democracy is in many respects the most desirable form of government. 
     God has always providentially given to mankind those forms of government that were suited to the degree of virtue and intelligence among them.  If they have been extremely ignorant and sinful, He has restrained them by the iron rod of human despotism.  If they were more intelligent and virtuous, He has given them the milder form of limited monarchies.  If still more intelligent and virtuous, He has given them still more liberty, and providentially established republics for their government.  Whenever the general state of intelligence has permitted it, He has put them to the test of self‑government and self‑restraint, by establishing democracies. 
     If the world ever becomes perfectly virtuous, governments will be proportionally modified, and used in broadcasting and applying the great principles of moral law.

B     The form of government that is best suited to meet the needs of the people is the one that we need. 
     This follows from considering that need is a condition of the right to have human government.  To meet this need is the object of any government; and the best government is the one that the circumstances, intelligence, and morals of the people demand. 
     As a result, in some cultures, it would be a Christian’s duty to pray for and perpetuate even a military despotism.  In another culture, it would be a Christian’s duty to pray for and perpetuate a monarchy.  In some cultures, we should pray for and perpetuate a republic; and in a still more advanced stage of virtue and intelligence, we should to pray for and perpetuate a democracy; if indeed, a democracy is the most appropriate form of self-government under the circumstances.  It is ridiculous to set up the claim that any particular form of government is the one that God favors.  Only that form of government that the state of society, and the virtue and intelligence of the people demands, has the Divine right and sanction.

C    Revolutions become necessary when the virtue and intelligence, or the vice and ignorance of the people, demand them. 
     When one form of government no longer meets the needs of the people, it is the duty of the people to revolutionize.  In such situations, it is worthless to oppose revolution; for in some way the love of God will bring about revolution.  It is on this principle alone that we can justify the American Revolution.  The intelligence and virtue of our Puritan ancestors made a monarchy an unnecessary burden, and a republican form of government both appropriate and necessary; and God always allows His children as much liberty as they are prepared to enjoy. 
     The stability of our republican institutions must depend on the progress of general intelligence and virtue.  If, in these respects, the nation fails, if our general intelligence, our public and private virtue, sink to that point below which self‑control becomes practically impossible, we must fall back into monarchy, limited or absolute; or into civil or military despotism; according to the overall standard of intelligence and virtue of the nation.  This is just as certain as the fact that God governs the world, or that causes produce their effects. 
     Therefore, it is the maddest conceivable policy, for Christians to try to overthrow human governments, when they should be engaged in supporting them based on the great principles of moral law.  It is certainly foolish to overlook, in either theory or practice, these universal truths.

D    When should we obey human governments? 

1     We must obey, when the government requires something that does not involve a violation of our moral obligation.  

2     We must obey when the government requires something that has no moral character all by itself, on the principle that obedience in this situation is a lesser evil than resistance and revolution.  But: 

3     We must disobey, when human legislation opposes moral law, or invades the rights of our con­science. 

E     I will now apply the above principles to the rights and duties of governments and their subjects concerning executing of the necessary penalties of law: suppressing mobs, insurrections and rebellions; and also concerning war, slavery, Sabbath desecration, etc.

1     It is clear that the right and duty to govern for the security and promotion of public interests, implies the right and duty to use whatever necessary means are available to achieve this result.  It is absurd to say that a ruler has the right to govern, but cannot use the necessary means to govern.  Some people insist that to take a person’s life is wrong, and that we should uphold governments without the death penalty.  Others have gone as far as claiming that governments have no right to resort to physical force to uphold the authority of the law.  But this absurd philosophy amounts just to this: “The ruler has a right to govern as long as the subject obeys; but if the subject refuses to obey then the right to govern ceases”.  The right to govern cannot exist when the right to enforce obedience does not exist.  This philosophy denies the right to use whatever means are necessary to promote the great end that all moral agents should live for.  And yet, this strange philosophy denies the right to use force and to take a life in support of a government by claiming that benevo­lence forbids it.  What is this but claiming that the law of love demands that we should love others too much to use the indispensable means to secure their good?  Or that we should love everybody too much to execute the law upon those who would destroy all good?  Shame on such philosophy!  It overlooks the foundation of our moral obligation.  It overlooks all morality and religion, as if some kind of enlightened love can forbid the due, wholesome, and necessary execution of law. 
     This philosophy emphasizes the commandment, “You shall not kill” (Deut. 5:17), as prohibiting the taking of human life.  But we may ask, “why just human life”?  The commandment, as far as the words are concerned, just as fully prohibits killing animals and vegetables as it does men.  The question is, what kind of killing does this commandment prohibit?  Certainly not all killing of human beings, for in the next chapter the Jews were commanded to kill human beings for certain crimes.  The Ten Commandments are precepts, and the Lawgiver, after laying down the precepts, goes on to specify the penalties that the government should inflict for violating these precepts.  Some of these penalties are death, and the penalty for the violation of the precept that says “You shall not kill” is death.  We know that this precept doesn’t prohibit taking someone’s life for murder. 
     Considering the law in its spirit makes it clear that this commandment prohibits murder, and the lawgiver, when someone violates this precept, adds the penalty of death.  Now it is absurd to quote this precept and say that it prohibits taking a life under any circumstances!  Governments have a right to do whatever is clearly indispens­able to the highest good of man; and, therefore, nothing should prohibit the taking of human life when it becomes indispensable to the great end of government.  Everywhere in the Bible, this right is recognized, and even if it were not, the right would still exist.  The philosophy that I am opposing, assumes that God’s will  creates law, and that we have no right to take any life without a clear command from God.  However, God did give the Jews a clear command to take life for certain crimes; and, if He had not, it would have been man’s duty to do so whenever the public good required it.  Remember, that the moral law is the law of nature, and that everything is lawful and right that the highest good of others demands. 
     The philosophy that I am talking about lays a lot of stress on what it calls inalienable rights.  It assumes that man has a right to life, in such a sense that he cannot forfeit it by crime.  But the fact is, there are no rights inalienable in this sense.  There can be no such rights.  Whenever any individual, by committing a crime, comes into such a relationship to the public interest that his death is a necessary means of securing the highest public good, his life should be forfeited, and that is the duty of government.  

2     The same principles also apply to insurrections, rebellions, etc.  Because right and duty are necessary as a means to the great end which love terminates on, it must be both the right and the duty of government, and of all its subjects, to use any means possible to suppres­s insurrections, rebellions, etc., as well as using any means possible also for the due administration of justice in executing law.

3     These principles will guide us in determining the right and the duty of governments in relationship to war. 
     In order for war to be virtue, or to be less than a crime of infinite magnitude, those who engage in it must not only believe that the law of love demands it, but they must also engaged in it with an eye that is focused on the glory of God and the highest good of others.  There has been times when the spirit of the moral law required war, since God sometimes commanded it.  Now, God wouldn’t have done that if the highest good of the universe did not demand it.  In these situations, if those God commanded to engage in war had the same unselfish intentions in fighting it as God had in commanding it; it is absurd to say that they sinned.  God calls on rulers to represent Him as ministers to execute wrath on the guilty.  If, in God’s providence , He should find it necessary to destroy or to rebuke a nation for His own glory, He may command that the hand of man should chastise them.  Remember, war is a most horrible crime, unless the existence of war is God’s will, and unless we engage in that war in obedience to His will.  This is true of all who engage in war.  Selfish war is wholesale murder.  For a nation to declare war, or for people to enlist, or in any way to aid in the declaration or prosecu­tion of war under any other conditions than those I just mentioned, involves the guilt of murder. 
     One can hardly conceive of a more abominable maxim than “our country right or wrong”.  This maxim was adopted and used in the war of the United States with Mexico in the early 1800’s.  Some think that it is the duty of good citizens to sympathize with and support the government in the prosecution of a war in which they have unjustly engaged in, and committed themselves to, on the ground that since it began we must fight to the finish.  These people also had the same philosophy concerning slavery.  They acknowledged that the slavery that existed in this country was indefensible on the ground of right.  It was a great evil and a great sin, but we must leave it alone because it is the lesser of two evils.  “It exists,” they said, “and it cannot be abolished without disturbing the friendly relationships and the federal union of the States, therefore we must allow slavery”.  Their philosophy is this: war and slavery as they exist in this nation are unjust, but they exist, and so to perpetuate them is our duty, because their existence, under the circum­stances, is the lesser of two evils. 
     The only thing that can sanctify any crime is something that makes it a virtue.  But these philoso­phers, whose views I am examining, must take the ground that since war and slavery exist, although their beginning was unjust and sinful, yet because they exist it is no longer a crime but a virtue to support them as the lesser of two natural evils.  But I would ask, to whom are they the lesser of two evils?  To ourselves or to others in general?  The lesser of two present, or of two ultimate evils?  Our duty is not to calculate the evils in respect merely to ourselves, or to this nation and those immediately oppressed and injured, but to look abroad upon the world and the universe, and ask, “what are the results of these evils to the world, to the church, and to the universe.”  From declaring and prosecuting such a war, and from supporting slavery by a nation who claims that we are a free nation, and who has drawn the sword and bathed it in blood defending that principle, that all men have an inalienable right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness; that they are born free and equal.  Such a nation proclaiming such a principle, and fighting in defense of it, standing with its proud foot on the neck of three million crushed and prostrate slaves!  O horrible!  How can this be a less evil to the world than emancipation, or even than the dismemberment of our hypocritical union!  “O shame, where is your blush!”  The prosecution of a war, unjustly engaged in, a less evil than repentance and restitution!  It is impossible.  Honesty is always the best policy.  The same law binds Nations as individuals.  If they have done wrong, it is always their duty to repent, confess, and make restitution.  To adopt the maxim, “Our country right or wrong”, and to sympathize with the government in the prosecution of a war which was unrighteously waged, must involve the guilt of murder.  To adopt the maxim, “Our union, even with perpetual slavery”, is an abomination so disgusting that a just mind cannot discuss it without indignation.

4     The same principles apply to governmental Sabbath desecration.  The Sabbath is clearly a Divine institution, based on the needs of human beings.  The letter of the law of the Sabbath forbids all labor of every kind, and under all circumstances on that day.  But, the spirit of the law of the Sabbath, being identical with the law of love, sometimes requires violating the letter of the law.  Both governments and individuals may do on the Sabbath, whatever the great law of love requires.  But nothing more, absolutely!  No human legislature can nullify moral law.  No human legislation can make it right or lawful to violate any command of God.  All human laws, requiring or sanctioning the violation of any command of God, are not only invalid, but they are also a blasphemous invasion and stealing of God’s rights. 

5     The same principles apply to slavery.  No human constitution or man made laws can possibly be law that recognizes the right of one human being to enslave another in a sense that implies selfishness on the part of the slaveholder.  Selfishness is wrong.  It is always and unalterably wrong.  No laws passed by the Senate or Congressional bill, human or divine, can legalize selfishness and make it right under any conceivable circumstances.  In order for slavery, or any other evil to be a crime, it must imply selfishness.  It must imply a violation of the command, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself” (Matt. 19:19)  If it implies a breach of this law, it is wrong, and no legislation can make it right.  God cannot authorize it.  The Bible cannot sanction it.  And if both God and the Bible were to sanction it, it could not be lawful.  God’s arbitrary will is not law.  The moral law is as independent of His will as His own existence is.  He cannot alter or repeal it.  He cannot sanctify selfishness and make it right.  Nor could we receive any book that claims Divine authority while it sanctions selfishness.  Imagine, that people quote God and the Bible to perpetuate and sanctify slave holding in a sense implying selfishness!  That’s blasphemous!  That slave holding, as it exists in this country, implies selfishness, at least in almost every situation, is too obvious to need proof.  The sinfulness of slave holding and war, in almost every situation, and in every situation where the terms slave holding and war are popularly used, will be obvious when we consider that sin is selfishness, and that all selfishness is sinful.  To deprive a human being of his freedom who has not been guilty of a crime; rob him of himself, his body, his soul, his time, and his earnings, to promote the interests of his master and attempt to justify this on the principles of moral law!  It is the greatest absurdity, and the most revolting wickedness.