The Philosophy of Ownership
Chapter XI. Authority and Responsibility
Rightful authority is that which a person exercises over himself and what he owns. There is no other rightful authority. All authority which exceeds this limit is a usurpation. Thus, authority by one man over another, unless it arises through a voluntarily assumed contractual arrangement, is an imposition of force that runs counter to the will of the person so placed under authority. A rightful authority falls within the boundaries of property. Each man is the authority, the full sovereign, over himself and whatever he owns. The full meaning of authority, seen in this light, helps to reveal the problem that arises when ownership of property is presumed to be collectivized or shared in some public manner.
Life being what it is, ultimate decision-making must occur in a single mind. Although discussions and debate may ensue endlessly among those interested in a property, sometime, somewhere, someone must make the final decision as to the use or disposition of a property. If the owner and the decision-maker are one and the same, there is no problem. But if the owner (the man who has paid for the property) and the decision-maker (a political steward of any sort) are two different people, a problem immediately arises which is bound to create dissatisfaction, annoyance, and often many results far more serious. This is especially true when we have a condition in which it is presumed that several thousand or even millions of taxpayers are the “owners” of a property and are compelled to pay for that property and its upkeep. Meanwhile, however, a man known to only a bare handful of those who are said to be the “owners” is appointed to manage the property and to set up policies for its operation.
Since ownership is dispersed, but management is centralized, the manager will have things his own way contrary to the wishes of all but a very few owners. It is immoral and a violation of rightful authority to force people to pay for something on the assumption that they are “owners” when in fact they cannot control what is owned, they cannot exercise authority over it, and they cannot make use of what they have helped to provide if political policy and their own personal wishes are in opposition at any given moment. This is an instance of property that is incorrectly or improperly owned. It is owned, in the sense that it is beyond the area wherein an original claim could be established. But it is out of the control of those who have purchased it, and under the control of a man who is not directly responsible to those who have paid for it.
The idea of “representative” management should be explored more fully. There is obviously no problem if the concept of agency is employed. If a man is an owner and employs an agent to manage his property for him, the relationship between owner and property is not disturbed. Similarly, if a group of stockholders or joint owners of any property decide mutually to select a manager who will represent their interests, which interests they have in common, again there is no problem. The real problem of representative management arises when concepts of agency are violated. This occurs when the political method is introduced. The taxpayers are compelled to pay for a property. The “representative” chosen is selected by a majority process wherein the wishes of some of the taxpayers are bound to be betrayed in favor of the interests of other taxpayers. The kind of management to ensue from representation rather than from agency will always result in betrayal of some kind. Nor does it matter whether the “representative” is appointed or merely hired by some agency of government. Government itself cannot possibly “represent” all the taxpayers and support all of their individual and conflicting interests. Thus, government, and any management obtained through government, will invariably betray the interests of some in favor of the interests of others.
Many suppose that so long as the vote remains in the hands of the people at large, they are “represented” in the management of the property the government acquires. But control is invariably less than desirable or more than desirable in any case where governmental management is imposed.
When authority over any property, personal, real, or otherwise, is divided, specific notation of the boundary of that division may prevent problems. A father with two sons gives one pony to the two boys jointly. Unless he makes further provision by allocating the use of the pony to each boy at different hours or days and, similarly, makes specific provision for the care of the pony divided in like manner, he is merely asking for domestic civil war. Both “owners” cannot use the pony at the same time in the same way. The boundary between the authority to be exercised and the property over which it is to be exercised must be precisely set forth and maintained if difficulties are to be avoided or overcome.
Two separate human beings cannot both exercise total control over anything at the same moment. This is an ever-present problem in marriage relationships where it is often presumed that such joint control will automatically proceed from identical interests, values, and desires. Even two people who are devoted to each other will not have identical values and interests simultaneously. And since property must always be under the control of an ultimate sovereign, confusions and difficulties abound until ultimate authority in a given area is firmly placed.
This fact, in itself, may ultimately result in an erosion of the family system as we know it, in favor of larger individualism. From the dawn of history (exclusive of pre-history), the family unit, as such, comprised the major units of any tribal or urban group. In modern communities, we see an insensible drift toward more and more individualism, even when political reaction has set in toward larger collectivization. It is possible that the family unit of the future will operate under a different type of understanding or contract, with less and less joint ownership of property and more and more individual sovereignty over property expressed. Many marriages are made today with the property of each spouse reserved individually and exclusively at the time of the marriage. Properties acquired after marriage are sometimes viewed as joint property, in such contracts, with property held prior to marriage retained by each partner. The day may come when property acquired during marriage will be similarly retained by individuals and thus greater individual control over property will be maintained and expressed.
A great deal could be said about the property relationships which arise within the marriage contract. In earlier times, men practiced plural marriages as a matter of course, but as property ideas became more distinct and more meaningful, exclusive pairing became the prescribed although not necessarily the practiced rule.
Currently, there are a number of influences at work which are having an effect upon the family as it has progressed from the time of the gens and phratries. The partial emancipation of women has played a great part in setting these influences at work, as have improved technology, urban living, various economic migrations, mass schooling, and the like. Communist and socialist theorizers, anxious to root out all tendencies toward private property, have seen in the family a veritable matrix leading toward private capitalism. In both Russia and China major steps were taken to destroy familial ties, but to no avail. It is entirely likely that any direct attack against the marriage contract and the tie between parents and children will come to naught. What is evident is that the lasting marriage contract and the raising of children within the private home have become sanctified along with a recognition of the sanctity of private property and the rights of man as a property owner and manager.
Beneath the surface, however, can be detected certain unconventional forces at work which, if they are not in process of eroding the familial conventions, are at least initiating free and open discussion in this area. It is doubtful if there is more promiscuity than heretofore. But it is certain that marriage, the rearing of children, sexual practices, and the intimacies implicit in the current marriage custom are now talked of with greater latitude than was true even half a century ago. The trend, as with property, is toward more and more privacy, more and more private ownership, more and more exclusive contractual relationships. It is economically sound to favor monogamous marriage relationships in preference to pluralistic marriages. It is also economically sound for parents to limit their offspring to numbers which are economically feasible.
A few generations ago it was taken for granted that women had little if any voice in the matter of selecting a life-time partner. Today, many people of both sexes deliberately experiment sexually before they select the person to whom they expect to be married. The double standard whereby it was assumed that a young man would perhaps have premarital experiences but a “nice” girl would remain virginal until after the wedding ceremony is being challenged on virtually every front.
Forty years ago and more, “trial marriages” (short-term marriage contracts) were being advocated. Today, in many cases, the marriage ceremony is being bypassed entirely, and with the new-found freedom of choice women are experiencing, it is hardly to be wondered at when young ladies of exemplary background and training embark on a sea of adventure sans marriage vows. A portion of this so-called “sexual revolution” doubtless stems from rebellion against both church and state. Young people point out that a sexual union is a personal affair that is either right or wrong intrinsically. If sexual behavior is wrong, they tell us, then it cannot be made right by a church ceremony or the issuance of a license after payment of a small tax. Further, if sexual behavior is right, we are advised, it is right implicitly and not because of any ceremony, theological or otherwise.
What is lacking so frequently, although by no means universally, is the seriousness with which any contractual relationship should be viewed. The marriage relationship has served for millennia as one of the vital forces leading toward self-discipline, character development, productive effort, and sound economic behavior. The raising of children is an enormous responsibility and cannot be entered into successfully in an offhand manner.
But many of our moderns tell us that they do not wish to have children and are well enough informed to prevent child birth. Nor is this observation mere braggadocio and overconfidence. The improvement in knowledge and in various regulatory devices can remove the matter of pregnancy from the arena of chance to the realm of deliberate and careful planning. It would appear that young people are as eager as they ever were to accept the responsibility for their actions, while they have become far more able to predict the results of their actions. And if concern is real in seeking to establish a more moral and responsible world, then, however shocking they may appear to be at first, when responsible choices are made, compulsory intervention cannot rightfully be invoked.
If we are to support the idea of absolute sovereignty of the individual over his person and effects, we can hardly oppose his private contracting, exclusive of fraud, deceit, and double dealing, even though that private contracting is unconventional.
Economic history sustains the view that lasting contracts in marriage, whether monogamous or polygamous, are more conducive to a high order of economic progress than either haphazard or irresponsible mating. In this respect, the monogamous union has the advantage over the polygamous, just as the family of two or three children has an economic advantage over the family of twelve to fifteen children.
When all else has been said, the fact remains that human beings will continue to have children. And human offspring require an extensive period of time in which they remain under constant care and surveillance, during which parental responsiblity cannot be shrugged off. How the parents meet this responsibility is a matter of personal choice but the responsibility remains fixed until such time as the child assumes his own responsibility and economic independence.
Responsible parenthood requires freedom of choice on the part of parents. At the moment, the world is experiencing a population explosion, which has occasioned many expressions of concern. The real concern is not in the numbers of children born but in the irresponsible attitude taken by many parents who simply shrug off their involvement and leave their offspring to the haphazard and impersonal interventions of the state.
It would be better, now that advanced means of birth control have been devised, if parents planned their own families with economic forethought. With full parental responsibility restored, it is possible the population explosion would be halted. If freedom of choice is sustained, then parents should have the latitude of raising the children themselves or providing for professional help as they can afford it. It is obviously a gross injustice for some persons to procreate indiscriminately and to pass the product of their behavior off on the taxpaying ability of the productive, while others, who assume responsibility, are financially impaired and unable to plan intelligently for their own offspring.
Knowledge concerning birth control should be as readily available as knowledge relating to the prevention or control of disease. If full responsibility is vouchsafed, the joys of parenthood will be more broadly recognized The fundamental rules relating to property and property ownership are indispensable here if the parent-child relationship is to be redeemed and elevated to the position it correctly holds.
Just as property is an extension of the person of the owner, and hence subject to his authority in much the same way that each is the authority over his person, similarly, responsibility for property owned resides with the owner. Authority and responsibility go hand in hand. Correct use of property, including its retention by the owner, its maintenance, preservation, and protection, rightfully descends along the same line that authority arises. Choice of the use to be put to property is the choice of the owner. And each owner must, of necessity, be responsible for his own choices and actions in relation to the property he owns. I have used the term, sovereignty, in relation to ownership to convey the idea that the owner of a property can do no wrong in respect to what he totally owns. He is sovereign of his property, and his decisions, whether wise or foolish, are not subject to the review of a non-owner.
Today, there is a broad tendency to suppose that somehow society in a collective sense retains some responsibility over privately owned property. Hence, laws have proliferated to “protect” the societal interest presumed to exist and thus to curtail the actual responsibility of each owner. This is nowhere more noticeable than in areas where theft occurs, or arson and vandalism arise. It is presumed in such cases that the responsibility exercised by the owner is somehow shared by “society” and hence “society” can employ policemen and judicial systems, hiring these collectively and using them to preserve, in some small measure, the individual ownership of property. But primarily these collectivized agencies of defense and protection must be seen in a collective light and arise from the presumed societal interest, authority, and responsibility retained by the group at large.
If private ownership of property is ever to develop in full, the total responsibility for the property owned must accompany the total authority over the property owned. Each owner must be at liberty to provide whatever protection he deems advisable and for which he is willing to pay in order to make certain that his property is not taken from him by stealth or force. If his protection is inadequate for any reason, there is still no justification for imposing some penalty upon the members of society at large. Yet this is the current practice.
A man who fails to provide adequate insurance for his home and loses it through fire or some other hazard, is viewed correctly as having personally made an erroneous assessment of the risks he ran. We may permit him to carry the cost of the damage himself. If the same general practice applied in respect to other hazards faced by any property owner, we would advance materially toward a full recognition of just what private ownership entails. In such a case, each owner would purchase for himself such protection or defense he thought economically feasible and practical. If it proved for any reason to be inadequate, we would hold that his own judgment was at fault, and losses thus experienced would fall to him.
This procedure is fair and reasonable because the person having the largest amount of property to protect would in all likelihood be in a favorable position to provide it, while the man with little or no property, running little risk of loss through theft or fraud, would have little reason to pay enormous fees for the protection of what he owned.
In such a move toward private responsibility we would have to discard almost entirely the ancient concept of justice which still rests upon the idea that retributive justice is desirable and feasible. While there would be nothing immoral about a man seeking return of property stolen from him, it would have to be specified that in seeking such restitution, only moral means could be employed. This would eliminate compulsory collective action.
The thief, while obviously in violation of the rights of the property owner at the time he stole, would nonetheless retain all his own rights to his own person and his own property. A quid pro quo violation of the rights of the thief cannot be viewed as desirable.
What is desirable is a condition of non-theft. If private persons protect their own property and are viewed as being responsible in the matter of providing their own protection, then the victim of an act of theft is no more victimized than he would be if a fire destroyed his property. A person can indemnify himself by having obtained a fire insurance policy in the latter case. With equal clarity it can be seen that a person can indemnify himself by having obtained protection in advance, or by having an insurance policy which reimburses him in the event of theft.
Too often, in our present state of moral understanding, punishment of the thief or the transgressor is deemed the highest of motivational forces at work. And this presumes a collective responsibility in place of personal responsibility of the property owner over what he owns. Yet this entire idea of retaliation or retribution has, in the centuries it has been tried, led us into every war, and nearly every act of torture and murder that has been performed by the state. The concept of retributive justice, so strong in Roman, British, and American law, is still the concept of an eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth. If this concept is to endure, with it will endure the ancient family feud along with national and even international hostilities. The solution to these enormous problems will only be found by accepting the idea of private ownership of property along with the idea of total acceptance of responsibility for his property by each owner.
If it is wrong for a thief to steal, it is wrong for his victim to steal from him in return. The act of theft is either wrong in principle or it is wrong only under certain conditions. Stolen property, like all property acquired by government, is merely property which is, at the moment, incorrectly owned. The government (or the thief) owns it in violation of the rights of the person who has honestly acquired it. Our task is to realize that theft in any form, and by any person or group, including government, is not a satisfactory method whereby to build a stable and workable social structure. Nor can we carry forward this argument by claiming that theft by all individuals or groups occurring on a Thursday, warrants a retaliatory act of theft on Friday. If theft is intrinsically wrong, we can only avoid theft when we stop practicing it for any reason whatever. And this we can do, when we recognize the full meaning of individual responsibility and individual authority over property privately owned.
Many properties owned by individuals are potentially or actually dangerous, and the owner is responsible for the use of such property. Should injury to another’s person or property ensue from the use or ownership of any property privately owned, responsibility rests with the owner. The individual exercising control and authority over property is clearly the responsible party. I am not supposing the requirement of any agency of violence to compel a responsible party to make restitution in the event property for which he is responsible contributes to the injury of another person. Rather, when full responsibility is recognized, a social order in which such responsibility is practiced will tend to reward and trust those who assume their full responsibility. Those who are careless or neglectful of their responsibility will generally be distrusted and hence will be avoided or even ostracized, since it will be risky to have dealings with them. The market will find ways of identifying persons who can be trusted. The trend will be toward full responsibility and full trust since nothing less is desirable.
This matter of responsibility has still another dimension. To discover it, let us suppose the following situation:
A owns a horse. A mare rightfully acquired has foaled this particular horse. It is his. Since it is a horse, it is individually marked (by nature, not by brand). Further, the owner, who has lavished affection upon the animal, has it trained to respond to his whistle or command and to perform the various orders he imparts to it. In consequence, the owner can readily recognize his horse, and the horse is trained to recognize its owner.
One night, B enters the corral where the horse is kept and steals the horse. B is a thief. He rides away with the horse, taking it to another part of the country where the horse would not be recognized. Here, B forges a bill of sale, indicating that he had purchased the horse honestly from its rightful owner, in this case an entirely fictitious person. He now offers the horse for sale, and C appears and purchases the horse for $250.
C keeps the horse for a period of time and offers it for sale.
D appears and buys the horse for $500. Now D offers it for sale and E arrives, buying it from D for $750. In each of these transactions, a bill of sale is exchanged. C, D, and E have all behaved honestly and, on the basis of bills of sale furnished them, believe the horse to be honestly acquired.
E now takes the horse back to the vicinity of A’s ranch, where A discovers E in possession of the horse. A whistles to the horse, and the horse responds as it was trained to respond, thus establishing that a former connection must have existed between A and the animal.
At this point A demands that E surrender the horse to him and accuses E of being a thief.
We can fittingly inquire, who really owns the horse?
The system of retributive justice under which most of us labor would at this junction require that E surrender the horse to A or suffer the consequences. But the injustice of such a procedure insofar as E is concerned is quickly evident. E has done nothing wrong. He purchased the animal in good faith and paid a good price for it. Additionally, he is quite attached to the animal and does not want to give it up. To accuse him of being a thief is obviously a wrong in itself. And although some will say that he was a receiver of stolen goods, the fact is that the horse was not passed to him by a thief but by a proper owner who himself had honestly acquired the horse in a forthright and open manner.
Customarily, it would now be presumed that the state would have to intervene and E would be forced to return the horse to D, and try to get his money back from D. Then D would have to seek out C and try to obtain his money from C, leaving the latter to try to find B so he could retrieve his money.
But B, as we have already learned, is a thief. Hence, he cannot be found. C cannot produce the evidence that B is a real person and it is presumed at this point that C is the thief. Unless C can provide an absolute alibi for himself on the occasion when the horse was stolen from A, it is entirely possible and even likely that he will go to jail for a crime committed by B, yet C has committed no crime at all.
Thus, our modern system, based upon retributive justice, in this case accomplishes the following wrongs:
1. It wrongs E, an innocent man, by compelling him to part with a property he desires to own and to accept his funds in return.
2. It wrongs D, another innocent man, who has spent the $750 he obtained when he sold the horse. Since he spent the money in paying for an operation for his daughter, and has no money with which to redeem the animal, he is forced into bankruptcy.
3. It wrongs C, another innocent man, not only by forcing him to redeem the animal, but by putting him in jail to serve a term for theft of which he is innocent.
4. B, the only wrongdoer, escapes the punishment called for by retributive justice.
5. A, the original owner, is rewarded.
6. The taxpayers of the entire area are punished by having their funds confiscated in taxation so that this series of injustices can be perpetrated.
When we recognize that ownership entails both authority and responsibility, we will see that retributive justice, while it may obtain retribution, is not just. The obvious fact is that A took less care of his horse than he could have done. Had he properly safeguarded his corral in the first place, it is unlikely that B would have succeeded in stealing the horse. Thus, A was careless and irresponsible with his own property. Yet, as a result of our system, all the taxpayers were punished, B escaped punishment, and C, D, and E are all punished. And the man who was careless is rewarded. Could anyone devise a system which is more unjust and less practical?
Assuming that a system of private ownership were to be recognized and upheld as the social system in vogue, then A, when he discovers E riding the horse that was at one time his, would recognize that he is NOT the owner in fact, even though the horse was taken from him by an act of theft. Ownership, as such, had ceased when he was victimized. Granted that B improperly acquired the horse, this does not mean that the horse is still owned by A. It means, rather, that following the theft, the horse was owned by B, although his ownership was immoral and improper. But C, D, and E are all innocent parties and may not morally be punished. C was the victim of deceit in our illustration, but C is punished, not for being deceived, but for being judged to be a thief.
Let us suppose that A does recognize his horse and it is now in possession of E, an innocent man. What may A do morally to get the horse back? He may proceed on any moral course of action open to him, Certainly, he has no call to accuse E of being a thief. He has only two modes of moral procedure open to him. He can recognize that he was careless and hence failed in his responsibility as a property owner. Thus, he can tell E what the circumstances were and ask E to give him back the horse. E is at liberty to surrender the animal or to retain it. A can also offer to buy the horse at any price he wishes to offer. In this case, E is at liberty to accept the offered price, bargain for a higher price, or refuse to sell. A’s dilemma is caused, not by immoral behavior on his part, nor by immoral behavior on E’s part, but by his own careless and irresponsible behavior.
Let us assume that the system of responsible individual ownership is recognized. What are the benefits?
1. A, who was at least irresponsible, is not rewarded. He may or he may not obtain the horse through gift or bargaining. But at least no one other than himself is punished for his carelessness.
2. B still escapes any punishment.
3. C escapes punishment.
4. D escapes punishment.
5. E escapes punishment.
6. All the taxpayers escape punishment.
The question to be asked is this: Are we so conditioned to insist on a societal and socialized responsibility that in order to punish B we will insist on punishing C, D, and E, and all the taxpayers? Note that in our example, B escapes punishment anyway. Yet a great number of innocent and helpless persons are victimized by the system we have in vogue.
If B is to be punished for his act of theft, he will at least have to be identified. There is no reason why A, in pursuit of his horse, could not hire a private detective agency to try to discover the identity of the thief. But lacking an agency of coercion, what could A do? There is one very potent weapon he has at his disposal, if upon confronting B with the knowledge of his crime he can obtain no satisfaction within a moral framework. He can at this point publicize the facts concerning B. Further, he can let B know that this is what he intends to do.
Many people will rightfully contend that the plight of a given person does not create a societal responsibility wherein the individual in difficulties must be assisted. If a poor man appears on the scene, those who believe in individualism will argue that his condition of poverty does not entail an automatic obligation that “society” end his poverty. But isn’t this to also argue that A, a poor man in that he lost a property which was rightfully his, has no claim upon any societal obligation or service to make restitution? If A may rightfully demand recompense, then a poor man may also rightfully demand an end to his poverty.
When we recognize the full meaning of responsibility over property, as well as authority over property, we will see the significance of individual ownership. The owner of property may rightfully take whatever steps he deems feasible and economically warranted to PROTECT his property. That is, he may fence his property, hire watchmen, put in alarms, or make whatever preparations he wishes with his own money and in respect to his own property. He may take out an insurance policy to indemnify himself in the event of loss.
However, he may not seek to involve all of society with his losses, any more than he can rightfully be made to share his gains with all of society.
Our present system presumes to move in two directions at once. It presumes that the individual may gain privately, but must share his losses with society. Indeed, persons in society are forced to contribute from their gains in order to overcome the losses others experience.
The illustration used here relates to a horse. Expand the illustration to include land, and we at once see the invalidity of attempting to rectify improper ownership on a retroactive basis.
Much of the land in this country which is held in title by private persons, who themselves are innocent of wrongdoing, was originally wrested from the Indians by the American government, or in some instances by private parties. If retributive justice has validity, then all the present “owners” must be dispossessed and the land handed back to the Indians. Many socialists including anarchists favor this procedure. Agrarian reform, the name given to such a procedure, is often at the core of socialist endeavors. But agrarian reform, like a legal action against E to recover the horse, will injure many innocent persons.
This argument is not for the purpose of justifying theft nor of creating a situation in which thieves may operate with impunity. On the contrary, once individual ownership with its concomitant of responsibility and authority is fully understood, PROTECTION rather than REVENGE will dominate our thinking in this area. In such cases, individuals will grasp their full authority over property and their full responsibility. And, because they will not wish their properties to be stolen, they will expand their efforts at private and personal protection of what they own. They will see that the best protection they can acquire will result from prior steps toward protection, consisting primarily of their own unwillingness to trespass others for any reason whatever.
Property which is presently “owned” by the government is, in final analysis, improperly owned property. That it is “owned” cannot be questioned. That it was acquired improperly is clear. To bring an end (or at least a reduction) to stolen property, theft must be abandoned as a practice. We ourselves must not only cease to steal, we must cease calling upon the government to steal for us in favor of some benefit or retribution we hope to acquire. If we expect to gain privately, we must also expect to experience our losses privately.
In considering the nature of trespass, the damage wrought by a given act of molestation cannot and should not be ignored. Nonetheless, all trespass is predicated, not upon molestation per se, but upon a psychic violation of the will of the owner.
Each person is the owner of himself, and all additional property beyond his person is merely an extension of his person. A trespass is a violation of the will of the owner respecting that which he owns. When a person enters upon my property, uses my possessions, or even destroys something that I own, but does so in harmony with my will, no trespass ensues. But a person who enters upon my property against my will, even though he does not injure anything, is a trespasser.
Because of the difficulty of knowing the will of another unless communication has ensued, most persons tend to act in anticipation of the expected willing of the other. This is where the Golden Rule is generally applied. Another person’s property catches fire. I have no rights over the other person’s property. It is not up to me to put out the fire or to concern myself with the fire. But I place myself in the position of the person whose property is burning. If our conditions were reversed, if it were my property burning and if the other person were available to help put out the fire, where would my will stand? Would I prefer to have the other person attempt to put out the fire? Or would I prefer to have my property burn with a man standing by who could put it out but who, because he has not ascertained my will in the matter, and because he knows he has no rights over my property, prefers to stand by, letting my property be consumed?
By this conceptual reversal I detect where I think my neighbor’s will would be in respect to his property. So, I put out the fire. If I have accurately interpreted my neighbor’s will in the matter, then moving onto his property to perform a service for him was not a trespass. However, since I had no rights to his property, I must be prepared to face the consequences. If my neighbor was not desirous of having his property saved from the fire, and I have saved it because I falsely concluded the position of his will, then I would have committed a trespass and would be placed under the moral compunction of having to rectify the matter as best I could.
None of us is able in advance to ascertain the will of another in respect to his property, prior to the communication of that decision on the part of the owner. But the human propensity to seek to maximize gain and to minimize losses is so common that we can usually act in anticipation of the decisions of others. But such conduct is always fraught with moral risk since we have no rights whatever over the person or property of another. We act in response to our best judgment in the matter, respecting the rights of the other, anticipating the probable position of the owner’s will, and preparing to take the consequences of our actions if our evaluation of the other’s will was in error.
Thus, in a very real sense, trespass is invariably a psychic phenomenon, whether damage of a physical nature ensues or not. The owner of a property is the victim of trespass when his will is violated in respect to something he owns.
