...which rights do pertain to them and their posterity, as the basis and foundation of Government. Section 1. That all men are by nature equally free and independent...property, and pursuing and obtaining happiness and safety. Section 2. That all power is vested in, and consequently derived from, the People; that magistrates...

...Rights is derived knew and declared the importance of property rights when he wrote ". . . all men are by nature equally free and independent, and have...property, and pursuing and obtaining happiness and safety." How do we justify the trampling of the property rights of those persons who own land in the...

...drafting the more famous Declaration of Independence, adopted three weeks later. Mason wrote: All men are by nature equally free and independent and have...property, and pursuing and obtaining happiness and safety. (<www.nara.gov/exhall/charters/billrights/virginia> (Section 1); my emphasis) Mason's text...

...1776, drafted by George Mason and adopted just prior to the Declaration of Independence, provided: That all men are by nature equally free and independent,...their posterity; namely, the enjoyment of life and Other states drafted and ratified very similar constitutional provisions. The states clearly embraced...

...of Debates in the Federal Convention, reported by James Madison, 630. 1 24. Its first sentence reads "That all men are by nature equally free and independent...any compact, deprive or divest their posterity!.]" Robert A. Rutland, George Mason: Reluctant Statesman, 54. Rutland's discussion of the Declaration's...

..."forerunner of ... civil convulsion." More moderate men struck a compromise. The final version read that "all men are by nature equally free and independent,...when they enter into a state of society," they cannot be deprived. By making these subtle changes, the members of the convention could sidestep the issue...

...Enlightenment views, in part. The Virginia Declaration of Rights (1776), for example, provided in Article 1: "That all men are by nature equally free and independent,...property, and pursuing and obtaining happiness and safety." The Declaration went on to specify the rights of the people to vote and to run for office,...

...Freiheit des Einzelnen prinzipiell unbegrenzt, die BefugSiehe Art. l Virginia Bill of Rights v. 12.6.1776: That all men are by nature equally free and independent,...property, and pursuing and obtaining happiness and safety. Unabhängigkeitserklärung der USA v. 4.7.1776: We hold these truths to be self-evident, that...

...Bill of Rights. The first provision of the 1776 constitution's bill of rights therefore stipulates "that all men are by nature equally free and independent...property, and pursuing and obtaining happiness and safety" (Article I, Section i). Subsequent provisions of the Virginia Bill of Rights go on to declare...

...Government is the genius of universal emancipation."75 He derived this from that fact that "individuals have 'certain inherent rights of which when they enter...the means of acquiring and possessing property.'" 6 This is precisely what concerned the slave-owner: if all men possessed rights inalienably, then the...