We have constitutions in civilized communities to prevent robbery and
the injustice of majorities upon minorities. We have sheriffs, police,
and military power to enforce the edict of right, when once the highest
tribunal has made the nearest possible human approach to justice.

A distinguished lawyer once said to me that, to him, the most wonderful
thing in the world was an edict of the Supreme Court of the United
States; "A few words scrawled upon a scrap of paper and approved by
some aged individuals of no great physical vigor; and, behold, it is
instantly the law of a hundred million people!"

And, for the benefit of future human progress, the argument supporting
that edict is later printed with it; and that in future any errors
therein may be corrected, the wisdom of the minority or dissenting
judges is as carefully preserved and bound up with the major opinion
and edict, that all public sources for correction of error may be
preserved in the clear amber of legal justice in truth as betwixt man
and man.

"For what avail the plow or sail,
Or land or life, if freedom fail?"


And freedom fails when justice falls and right of might succeeds.

The breaking up of the world's physical body, or of the material
dwellings and possessions of humanity, may be necessary for "a new
birth of freedom"; for the incoming of the larger light; for a broader,
more universal brotherhood.