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Dictionary of the History of Ideas

Studies of Selected Pivotal Ideas
  
  

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Other Countries. What the United States is doing
through its various powers and organs, and what its
people do voluntarily, meet with varying degrees of
opposition; such opposition is also found elsewhere in
the world, sometimes in a repressive fashion. Rhodesia
is only one example. Nevertheless, the idea of equal
protection and treatment has spread during the last
two centuries to the point where the United Nations'
purposes include the development of “friendly rela-
tions among nations based on respect for the principle
of equal rights,” etc. (Charter, Art. 1, par. 2). So, too,
does India's Constitution provide for equality (Arts.
14-18) and other rights, as does that of the Philippines,
which contains a Bill of Rights. In 1968 the new
Canadian Prime Minister reportedly promised “to
strive for a just society with all possible freedom for
individuals and equal sharing of the country's wealth.”

The desire for equal protection and treatment polit-
ically, economically, educationally, and in all other
aspects of human behavior and conduct has spread with
the “revolt of the masses” envisaged since Christ. This
current desire and need for such negative and positive
equal protection is aggressive, that is, the people press
for it, but is also defensive, that is, persons and nations
which can aid do so not only for humanitarian reasons
but also for self-interest. Some feel that this glacial
movement toward equality will result in a complete
levelling of differences and the elimination of all clas-
sifications, but this is impossible. What appears more
likely to happen is a general raising of the economic
standards of living, equal participation in government
and culture, and otherwise the enjoying of more of the
good life by those once classed as inferiors.