Property and its Importance

John Adams

What is the importance of property anyway? Founding Father and former President John Adams had a sense of its importance:

The moment the idea is admitted into society that property is not as sacred as the laws of God, and that there is no force of law and public justice to protect it, anarchy and tyranny commence. Property must be secured or liberty cannot exist (John Adams, “Defense of the Constitutions of Government of the United States of America,” The Works of John Adams, 6:9, p. 280.)

Property and its importance in western culture as a positive force is also reflected in our language, expressions, and in words and their meaning. For instance, compare the following words pairs and their meaning

• proper to property
• good to goods
• weal to wealth
• matter (as in important, ie., “it matters.”) to immaterial (as in unimportant, ie., “it is immaterial to the subject,” or “it doesn’t matter)

There are probably other examples of word pairs I haven’t thought about yet. Then there are phrases, such as this English play on words, “he is a good man who is a man of goods?” Or the saying that to be born “of goodly parents” meant that the family was wealthy enough to hire tutors for “learning?”

With this understanding of property and its importance, it should come as no surprise that the founding fathers sought to protect property through the governments (state and federal) they established. The state of Alabama for instance has this great saying enshrined in her constitution:

“The sole object and only legitimate end of government is to protect the citizen in the enjoyment of life, liberty and property, and when government assumes other functions it is usurpation and oppression.” (Alabama State Constitution, Article 1 Section 35)

Let us do all we can to ensure that government, at all levels, will remember their proper role.