1822 Sept. 23 Tripoli Securities against Misrule ?6. V. Secret Banishment

Observations on the subject of preventive measures /measures of prevention/

against injurious and secret banishment

For security against secret and injurious banishment two obvious measures of the

preventive cast /kind/ present themselves. One is - prohibiting egress without a

passport; the other is prohibiting egress without previous entry of the fact in

an official Register book.

It may perhaps be too much to say that in no state of things either of these

means ought to be employed: but what may be said with truth is - that generally

speaking the evil of the remedy will preponderate /be found preponderant/ over

the good. The state of things will be an extraordinary one if for one instance

in which the egress is involuntary on the part of the individual there will not

be hundreds not to say thousands in which it is voluntary Say for argument's

sake, one thousand. Here then in the hope of saving from the greater vexation a

single person, a thousand are subjected to the lesser. But in the case where a

passport is rendered necessary, neither in its length nor therefore in the /its/

aggregate amount has the vexation any certain limit. Power without limitation

over every one who has need of the passport is thus given to the functionary or

functionaries whoever they be whose signature or signatures are necessary to the

giving validity to it: and thus to save /for the hope of saving/ one from

injurious banishment, a thousand are exposed to arbitrary confinement

confinement not the less vexatious for not being injurious. /against law/.

In the case where simple registration is all that is required, the power of

granting or refusing the passport not being given in a direct way, the danger of

abuse may seem as if materially lessened if not removed. It is not by a great

deal however so effectually lessened in reality, as in appearance; for still so

long as the minute in question remains unmade, the confinement is as effectual

as if it had been a passport /the case had been that of a passport/ that had

been delayed.