A man is no less a slave because he is allowed to choose a new master once in a term of years.
Interpretation
True freedom is not just the ability to choose between options, but the absence of coercion.
This quote by Lysander Spooner suggests that the existence of choice does not equate to genuine freedom. A person can be considered a slave if their options are still limited to the authority of a master, regardless of how frequently they are allowed to make that choice. It implies that true autonomy is the absence of oppressive control, rather than simply the act of choosing between different controlling figures.
In practice
In a speech about civil rights, one might cite this quote to illustrate the illusion of freedom in oppressive systems.
The principle that the majority have a right to rule the minority, practically resolves all government into a mere contest between two bodies of men, as to which of them shall be masters, and which of them slaves; a contest, that-however bloody-can, in the nature of things, never be finally closed, so long as man refuses to be a slave.
For a government to declare a vice to be a crime, and to punish it as such, is an attempt to falsify the very nature of things. It is as absurd as it would be to declare truth to be falsehood, or falsehood truth.
And the men who loan money to governments, so called, for the purpose of enabling the latter to rob, enslave, and murder their people, are among the greatest villains that the world has ever seen. And they as much deserve to be hunted and killed (if they cannot otherwise be got rid of) as any slave traders, robbers, or pirates that ever lived.
A married woman has the same natural right to acquire and hold property, and to make all contracts that she is mentally competent to make reasonably, as has a married man, or any other man.
Slavery, if it can be legalized at all, can be legalized only by positive legislation. Natural law gives it no aid. Custom imparts to it no legal sanction.
Those who deny the right of a jury to protect an individual in resisting an unjust law of the government, deny him all defence whatsoever against oppression.
Evolution isn't just a story about where we came from. It's an epic at the center of life itself. Far from robbing our lives of meaning, it instills an appreciation for the beautiful, enduring, and ultimately triumphant fabric of life that covers our planet. Understanding that doesn't demean human life - it enhances it.
If there is a fundamental challenge within these stories, it is simply to change our lurking suspicion that some lives matter less than other lives.
we must not blame our poor symbols if they take forms that seem trivial to us, or absurd, ... however paltry they may be; the nature of our life alone has determined their forms.
Men imagine that they communicate their virtue or vice only by overt actions, and do not see that virtue or vice emit a breath every moment.
Visions of glory, spare my aching sight! Ye unborn ages, crowd not on my soul!
I am free, no matter what rules surround me. If I find them tolerable, I tolerate them; if I find them too obnoxious, I break them.
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