CHAPTER XXIII

WALKING DECLARATIONS OF INDEPENDENCE

Philadelphia,

IT is a commonplace that if all the members of a
self-governing or democratic community had
their private conduct under rational control that
community would need but little in the way of
bfficial government. And these conditions would
be greatly fortified if the country inhabited by
these rationally selfrgoverning individuals were
self-contained in respect of its material resources,
isolated from other countries, immune from
attack and free from entangling alliances with
foreign powers* Interference with the private
liberty of the citizen for the purposes of war
and national defence, whether in the indirect
(but potent) form of heavy taxation, or the direct
form of compulsory military service, and the
many disciplines and restraints incidental to
maintaining the efficiency of the nation as ,a
fighting unit, would then be uncalled for. ,

Such a country America traditionally aspires
to be and actually is in the popular imagination,
The American believes in his individual capacity

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