Why couldn't an altruist help another? Surely feeding a hungry man is beneficial, as is protecting him from harm. Yet what is fundamental is that which an individual chooses for himself. So when another interferes, he will generally do harm. The altruist can provide worthwhile aid and direction, if another seeks it. Yet that is best done by mutual advantage.

If we view 'law' as the constraints on man's aggression (such as "Thou shalt not...") it has a negative role. Development, on the other hand, is due to free choice. Scientific law indicates the consequences of action, so it lacks any moral direction.

"Can there not be a government in which majorities do not virtually decide right and wrong, but conscience? -- in which majorities decide only those questions to which the rule of expediency is applicable?" Thoreau is right on target. Government should not have a moral mission, but only the technical power to defend the rights of the individual. Absent the presumed right of the government to exercise moral judgment, none of the governmental interventions in our economy and society would occur.

Things operate by inertia; fundamental change is due to the creative acts of individuals, and their moral choice.

"Free trade" means that any individual is free to trade with any other individual (barring of course trade that jeopardizes the nation). Government should be confined to protecting that right. Once the government sets conditions, it is neither free nor fair.

I submit that we endeavor to obey and amend unjust laws, for if each operates solely by his conscience, there cannot be an effective criminal justice system. However, when government is no longer subject to acceptance by the public, it has lost its right to operate. Under this eventuality, people must restore their right to self-defense. One approach is to legalize jury nullification. (An instance was when Bernhard Goetz shot muggers on a NYC subway; the police did not restrain muggers, but went on a rampage to catch and prosecute Goetz.)

Self-government is an ideal, to be sought and improved upon, rather than finalized. It is akin to a navigator who aims at the North Star, to help a ship toward its destination, rather than to reach the star.

George Washington said "Government is not reason or eloquence. It is force. Like fire, it is a dangerous servant and a fearsome master." Let us recognize that culture is based on freedom, while government is based on force. It follows that government should only be used to protect our rights, as a defense against aggression and emergencies.

The question raised is "What is the root?" I submit it is 'sincerity' where one taps into his deepest sense. Do we not know that truth is better than scheming? That justice is better than advantage? Principle is better than selling out? Openness (corrigibility) is better than dogmatism? Systematic better than arbitrary? Character than status? Survival than surrender? Resistance than appeasement? Good than evil? Deep down, each of us know what ought to be for himself. From the root springs the fruit.

"Equal rights for all, special privileges for none." This concept was called 'isonomia' in ancient Greece, and Demosthenes wrote: "it should not be lawful to propose a law affecting any one individual, unless the same applied to all Athenians." Cicero said something similar in ancient Rome. It remains an ideal, although we have gotten ever further from it, with our preference for democracy.

Truth is an ideal, which does not mean that man has achieved it. Rather it is to be furthered. As to the reality, it is covered by "As scarce as is the commodity of truth, the supply has always exceeded the demand."

The ideal of self-government is not operational, but a direction to move in. Similarly, the ideals of truth and justice are not to be fully attained, but to be furthered. As Thoreau wrote "If you have built castles in the air, your work need not be lost; that is where they should be. Now put foundations under them."

My view of Thoreau is that one does good, not by trying to benefit another, but by following his own drummer. He interacts with others by a give-and-take that is mutually beneficial, rather than by altruism.