Excerpt from Lawlessness an Address Delivered Before the Civic Forum Two months ago I wrote an inscription to be placed on the court house at Duluth as follows: The people's laws define usages, ordain rights and duties, secure public safety, defend liberty, teach reverence and obedience, and establish justice. This is a great function for the law; and, if it be correctly described, the law embodies the most valuable parts of the experience of any people in its onward march towards liberty and righteousness. If this be a just descrip tion of law, what a mischief and calamity it must be for any individual man, group of men, or community to be lawless! The law does not attain its greatest dignity until it records the progress, embodies the sentiments, and ex presses the resolves of a free people; and yet it is freedom which gives the opportunity of lawlessness. We are to consider how American freedom has made possible lawlessness in many forms. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.