Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 25.djvu/307

Rh these powers and obligations of majority and minority; and, in the absence of any agreement to co-operate, such powers and obligations are also absent.

Here the argument apparently ends in a dead-lock. Under the existing condition of things no moral origin seems assignable either for the sovereignty of the majority or for the limitation of its sovereignty. But further consideration reveals a solution of the difficulty. For if, dismissing all thought of any hypothetical agreement to co-operate heretofore made, we ask, what would be the agreement into which citizens would now enter with practical unanimity, we get a sufficiently clear answer; and with it a sufficiently clear justification for the rule of the majority inside a certain sphere, but not outside that sphere. Let us first observe a few of the limitations which at once become apparent.

Were all Englishmen now asked if they would agree to co-operate for the teaching of religion, and would give the majority power to fix the creed and the forms of worship, there would come a very emphatic "No" from a large part of them. If, in pursuance of a proposal to revive sumptuary laws, the inquiry were made whether they would bind themselves to abide by the will of the majority in respect of the fashions and qualities of their clothes, nearly all of them would refuse. In like manner, if (to take an actual question of the day) people were polled to ascertain whether, in respect of the beverages they drank, they would accept the decision of the greater number, half, and probably more than half, would very decidedly decline. Similarly with respect to many other actions which most men now-a-days regard as of purely private concern. Whatever desire there might be to co-operate for carrying on, or regulating, such actions, would be far from a unanimous desire. Manifestly, then, had social co-operation to be commenced by ourselves, and had its purposes to be specified before consent to co-operate could be obtained, there would be large parts of human conduct in respect of which co-operation would be declined; and in respect of which, consequently, no authority by the majority over the minority could be rightfully exercised.

Turn now to the converse question. For what ends would all men agree to co-operate? None will deny that for resisting invasion the agreement would be practically unanimous. Excepting only the Quakers, who, having done highly useful work in their time, are now dying out, all would unite for defensive war (not, however, for offensive war); and they would, by so doing, tacitly bind themselves to conform to the will of the majority in respect of measures directed to that end. There would be practical unanimity, also, in the agreement to co-operate for defense against internal enemies as against external enemies. Omitting criminals, all must wish to have person and property adequately protected. In short, each citizen desires to preserve his life, to preserve those material things which conduce to