One of the first words in a child’s vocabulary is, “mine!” It is not taught, but instinctive. Sharing needs to be taught. Taking proper care of things needs to be taught. But the possession of private property is indelibly written on the soul. That’s not a bug. It is a feature of our common humanity.
Private property is one of those things that distinguish human beings from animals. While a lion or bear might claim a carcass as its own, that is not at all the same thing as property rights. One reason is that animal claims have no permanency. They hold only until the choicest meat is devoured or too rotten to eat. Then they are abandoned.
The same goes for tools, dens, and nests. Chimpanzees might use a stick for a tool, but you will never see one carrying a toolbelt through the jungle. Only silly, antihuman ideologues theorize that there is no difference between animals and people. Sane people know that no animal could ever comprehend a land deed or certificate of ownership.
Animals might possess to consume, but only humans possess to preserve and improve. A fox left to guard the henhouse will end up with nothing by the end of the year. But a farmer guarding the same henhouse will keep the hens safe and multiply the flock. Robert Zubrin observes this in his excellent book, “Merchants of Despair: Radical Environmentalists, Criminal Pseudo-Scientists, and the Fatal Cult of Antihumanism” (2013).
It is a fact of the human condition that the more we consider something to be “our own,” the better we will take care of it. That’s why government housing programs have a long history of spectacular failure. It’s not that people who live in “the projects” are less human than their counterparts in the suburbs. It is rather that human beings, when denied the right of ownership, are robbed of their humanity.
The story of the Plymouth Colony has embedded the power of personal property in the American consciousness. The colony, founded as a commune in 1620, was an utter disaster. By 1626 the entire enterprise was on the brink of starvation. Then its new governor, William Bradford, divided the public land into individual plots for each family. This new arrangement recognized human nature and unleashed the power of private property rights.
Common sense affirms what children know instinctively. That’s why it is no surprise that, immediately after forbidding murder and adultery, God says, “Thou shalt not steal.” To steal is to take what properly belongs to another. The commandment assumes that some things belong to one, while other things belong to another.
Thus, every denial of property rights not only violates natural law and common sense, it also denies the property rights that God Himself affirms. This is where natural law and God’s law agree. This is also the starting point for even more profound reflections on property rights.
Private property rights—like all rights—are nothing more or less than the freedom to follow human nature. It is the freedom to love God and His creation in and through the concrete things and particular places that He gives into your care. Thomas Jefferson called this “the pursuit of happiness,” in the Declaration of Independence. Before him, John Locke spoke of “life, liberty, and property.”
When God’s gift of private property is seen for what it is, several things become plain. First, human beings should thank God for the things that they have been given. Private property is not child’s play. It is a sacred trust. Thanksgiving Day has been instituted to encourage every American citizen to thank God for the things entrusted to his or her care.
Second, by giving something into your possession, God makes you a steward. A steward is not the ultimate owner, but a temporary manager. Stewards who are accountable to God have a personal responsibility to take care of their property and to use it in a God-pleasing way. He, and he alone, will answer to God for the faithful stewardship of his property.
It is no accident that the atheistic tyrannies of the 20th century attacked property rights just as viciously as they attacked parental rights and religious rights. They are all of one piece. Today’s governmental authorities should keep this truth in mind.
Fellow citizens, operating through government, may disapprove of the way that someone, as a steward, manages his or her property. They may even teach about sharing and about the proper use of property—as parents teach their children. But they dare not use the power of government to usurp the stewardship that God has assigned to each individual citizen.
“Thou shalt not steal” applies as much to governments as to individuals. The near collapse of the Plymouth Colony demonstrated why collectivism will always end in disaster. William Bradford’s property reforms freed its citizens to be stewards of God, and not of government. This became one of the founding pillars of American government.
What a clear, crisp, and easily grasped illumination of how natural law in general, and this aspect of it in particular, is from God our Creator, as spelled out in His Holy Scripture!
The goodness of private property rights backed (not subverted) by rule of law is illustrated by history, (thank you, Jonathan Lange). The objective contemporary observer will also note that the lack of property rights & rule of law fosters corruption & despair. That because natural law reflects God's good commands, including “Thou shalt not steal." That's true whether the thief is a criminal, a predatory business, or the government.
The "Poverty Cure" video documentary notes that in ⅔ of the world, there isn’t rule of law about such things.
I'd say that's the reason so many unauthorized migrants pretend to need political asylum, but whose true desire is to be part of the American workforce, which (generally) enjoys property rights, and Lady Justice is (usually) impartial.
However, it is sad to see unjust seizures by activist lawfare and partisan government officials today.