Sorry for the 19th century text wall, but this is so pertinent that it hurts. "Next in importance to personal freedom is immunity from suspicions, and jealous

Sorry for the 19th century text wall, but this is so pertinent that it hurts. "Next in importance to personal freedom is immunity from suspicions, and jealous observation. Men may be without restraints upon their liberty: they may pass to and fro at pleasure: but if their steps are tracked by spies and informers, their words noted down for crimination, their associates watched as conspirators, who shall say that they are free? Nothing is more revolting to Englishmen than the espionage which forms part of the administrative system of continental despotisms. It haunts men like an evil genius, chills their gaiety, restrains their wit, casts a shadow over their friendships, and blights their domestic hearth. The freedom of a country may be measured by its immunity from this baleful agency. Rulers who distrust their own people, must govern in a spirit of absolutism; and suspected subjects will be ever sensible of their bondage." The Constitutional History Of England Vol II (1863), pg. 288 by T. E. May http://archive.org/stream/constitutionalhi029622mbp#page/n313/mode/2up http://archive.org/stream/constitutionalhi029622mbp#page/n31...