North Dakota Law Review/Volume 1/Number 3/The Just System

THE JUST SYSTEM

The lips of many speak the name of Abraham Lincoln these days with reverential pride and mingled feelings of civic kinship and national possession. There are some, however, who paint glowing word-pictures of the Great Emancipator upon every conceivable occasion, and generally for the purpose of justifying their own positions on some particular subject. A comparison of the picture with the original it is supposed to represent frequently finds one in the position where he is constrained to say that the two have very little in common. The following, for instance, from the pen of Abraham Lincoln, certainly does not appeal to us as being in accord with the views of some of those who today claim to be the direct heirs of the Lincoln economic and political philosophy:

“The prudent, penniless beginner in the world labors for wages for awhile, saves a surplus with which to buy tools or land for himself, then labors for himself another while, and at length hires another new beginner to help him. This is the just, and generous, and prosperous system, which opens the way to all, gives hope to all, and consequent energy and progress and improvement of condition to all.”