THE LAW
By Fredric Bastiat
(1801 to 1850)
Table of Contents
The law perverted! And the police powers of the state perverted
along with it! The law, I say, not only turned from its proper purpose
but made to follow an entirely contrary purpose! The law become the
weapon of every kind of greed! Instead of checking crime, the law itself
guilty of the evils it is supposed to punish!
If this is true, it is a serious fact, and moral duty requires me to
call the attention of my fellow-citizens to it.
{TLP note: All the italicized words and parenthetical expressions were supplied by the Author; all the subheadings and bracketed material were supplied by the Translator.}
We hold from God the gift which includes all others. This gift is life
- physical, intellectual, and moral life.
But life cannot maintain itself alone. The Creator of life has
entrusted us with the responsibility of preserving, developing, and
perfecting it. In order that we may accomplish this, He has provided us
with a collection of marvelous faculties. And He has put us in the
midst of a variety of natural resources. By the application of our
faculties to these natural resources we convert them into products, and
use them. This process is necessary in order that life may run its
appointed course.
Life, faculties, production - in other words, individuality, liberty,
property - this is man. And in spite of the cunning of artful political
leaders, these three gifts from God precede all human legislation, and
are superior to it.
Life, liberty, and property do not exist because men have made laws. On
the contrary, it was the fact that life, liberty, and property existed
beforehand that caused men to make laws in the first place.
What, then, is law? It is the collective organization of the individual
right to lawful defense.
Each of us has a natural right - from God - to defend his person, his
liberty, and his property. These are the three basic requirements of
life, and the preservation of any one of them is completely dependent
upon the preservation of the other two. For what are our faculties but
the extension of our individuality? And what is property but an
extension of our faculties?
If every person has the right to defend - even by force - his person,
his liberty, and his property, then it follows that a group of men have
the right to organize and support a common force to protect these rights
constantly. Thus the principle of collective right - its reason for
existing, its lawfulness - is based on individual right. And the common
force that protects this collective right cannot logically have any
other purpose or any other mission than that for which it acts as a
substitute. Thus, since an individual cannot lawfully use force against
the person, liberty, or property of another individual, then the common
force - for the same reason - cannot lawfully be used to destroy the
person, liberty, or property of individuals or groups.
Such a perversion of force would be, in both cases, contrary to our
premise. Force has been given to us to defend our own individual
rights. Who will dare to say that force has been given to us to destroy
the equal rights of our brothers? Since no individual acting separately
can lawfully use force to destroy the rights of others, does it not
logically follow that the same principle also applies to the common
force that is nothing more than the organized combination of the
individual forces?
If this is true, then nothing can be more evident than this: The law is
the organization of the natural right of lawful defense. It is the
substitution of a common force for individual forces. And this common
force is to do only what the individual forces have a natural and lawful
right to do: to protect persons, liberties, and properties; to maintain
the right of each, and to cause justice to reign over us all.
If a nation were founded on this basis, it seems to me that order would
prevail among the people, in thought as well as in deed. It seems to me
that such a nation would have the most simple, easy to accept,
economical, limited, non-oppressive, just, and enduring government
imaginable - whatever its political form might be.
Under such an administration, everyone would understand that he
possessed all the privileges as well as all the responsibilities of his
existence. No one would have any argument with government, provided
that his person was respected, his labor was free, and the fruits of his
labor were protected against all unjust attack. When successful, we
would not have to thank the state for our success. And, conversely,
when unsuccessful, we would no more think of blaming the state for our
misfortune than would the farmers blame the state because of hail or
frost. The state would be felt only by the invaluable blessings of
safety provided by this concept of government.
It can be further stated that, thanks to the non-intervention of the
state in private affairs, our wants and their satisfactions would
develop themselves in a logical manner. We would not see poor families
seeking literary instruction before they have bread. We would not see
the great displacements of capital, labor, and population that are
caused by legislative decisions.
The sources of our existence are made uncertain and precarious by these
state-created displacements. And, furthermore, these acts burden the
government with increased responsibilities.
The Complete Perversion of the Law
But, unfortunately, law by no means confines itself to its proper
functions. And when it has exceeded its proper functions, it has not
done so merely in some inconsequential and debatable matters. The law
has gone further than this; it has acted in direct opposition to its own
purpose. The law has been used to destroy its own objective: It has
been applied to annihilating the justice that it was supposed to
maintain; to limiting and destroying rights which its real purpose was
to respect. The law has placed the collective force at the disposal of
the unscrupulous who wish, without risk, to exploit the person, liberty,
and property of others. It has converted plunder into a right, defense
into a crime, in order to punish lawful defense.
How has this perversion of the law been accomplished? And what have been
the results?
The law has been perverted by the influence of two entirely different
causes: stupid greed and false philanthropy. Let us speak of the
first.
A Fatal Tendency of Mankind
Self-preservation and self-development are common aspirations among all
people. And if everyone enjoyed the unrestricted use of his faculties
and the free disposition of the fruits of his labor, social progress
would by ceaseless, uninterrupted, and unfailing.
But there is also another tendency that is common among people. When
they can, they wish to live and prosper at the expense of others. This
is no rash accusation. Nor does it come from a gloomy and uncharitable
spirit. The annals of history bear witness to the truth of it: the
incessant wars, mass migrations, religious persecutions, universal
slavery, dishonesty in commerce, and monopolies. This fatal desire has
its origin in the very nature of man - in that primitive, universal, and
insuppressible instinct that impels him to satisfy his desires with the
least possible pain.
Property and Plunder
Man can live and satisfy his wants only by ceaseless labor, by the
ceaseless application of his faculties to natural resources. This
process is the origin of property.
But it is also true that a man may live and satisfy his wants by seizing
and consuming the products of the labor of others. This process is the
origin of plunder.
Now since man is naturally inclined to avoid pain - and since labor is
pain in itself - it follows that men will resort to plunder whenever
plunder is easier than work. History shows this quite clearly. And
under these conditions, neither religion nor morality can stop it.
When, then, does plunder stop? It stops when it becomes more painful and
more dangerous than labor.
It is evident, then, that the proper purpose of law is to use the power
of its collective force to stop this fatal tendency to plunder instead
of to work. All the measures of the law should protect property and
punish plunder.
But, generally, the law is made by one man or one class of men. And
since law cannot operate without the sanction and support of a
dominating force, this force must be entrusted to those who make the
laws.
This fact, combined with the fatal tendency that exists in the heart of
man to satisfy his wants with the least possible effort, explains the
almost universal perversion of the law. Thus it is easy to understand
how law, instead of checking injustice, becomes the invincible weapon of
injustice. It is easy to understand why the law is used by the
legislator to destroy in varying degrees among the rest of the people,
their personal independence by slavery, their liberty by oppression, and
their property by plunder. This is done for the benefit of the person
who makes the law, and in proportion to the power that he holds.
Victims of Lawful Plunder
Men naturally rebel against the injustice of which they are victims.
Thus, when plunder is organized by law for the profit of those who make
the law, all the plundered classes try somehow to enter - by peaceful or
revolutionary means - into the making of the laws. According to their
degree of enlightenment, these plundered classes may propose one of the
two entirely different purposes when they attempt to attain political
power: Either they may wish to stop lawful plunder, or they may wish to
share in it.
Woe to the nation when this latter purpose prevails among the mass
victims of lawful plunder when they, in turn, seize the power to make
laws!
Until that happens, the few practice lawful plunder upon the many, a
common practice where the right to participate in the making of law is
limited to a few persons. But then, participation in the making of law
becomes universal. And then, men seek to balance their conflicting
interests by universal plunder. Instead of rooting out the injustices
found in society, they make these injustices general. As soon as the
plundered classes gain political power, they establish a system of
reprisals against other classes. They do not abolish legal plunder.
(This objective would demand more enlightenment than they possess.)
Instead, they emulate their evil predecessors by participating in this
legal plunder, even though it is against their own interests.
It is as if it were necessary, before a reign of justice appears, for
everyone to suffer a cruel retribution - some for their evilness, and
some for their lack of understanding.
The Results of Legal Plunder
It is impossible to introduce into society a greater change and a
greater evil than this: the conversion of the law into an instrument of
plunder.
What are the consequences of such a perversion? It would require volumes
to describe them all. Thus we must content ourselves with pointing out
the most striking.
In the first place, it erases from everyone's conscience the distinction
between justice and injustice.
No society can exist unless the laws are respected to a certain degree.
The safest way to make laws respected is to make them respectable. When
law and morality contradict each other, the citizen has the cruel
alternative of either losing his moral sense or losing his respect for
the law. These two evils are of equal consequence, and it would be
difficult for a person to choose between them.
The nature of law is to maintain justice. This is so much the case
that, in the minds of the people, law and justice are one and the same
thing. There is in all of us a strong disposition to believe that
anything lawful is also legitimate. This belief is so widespread that
many persons have erroneously held that things are "just" because law
makes them so. Thus, in order to make plunder appear just and sacred to
many consciences, it is only necessary for the law to decree and
sanction it. Slavery, restrictions, and monopoly find defenders not
only among those who profit from them but also among those who suffer
from them.
The Fate of Non-Conformists
If you suggest a doubt as to the morality of these institutions, it is
boldly said that "You are a dangerous innovator, a utopian, a theorist,
a subversive; you would shatter the foundation upon which society
rests."
If you lecture upon morality or upon political science, there will be
found official organizations petitioning the government in this vein of
thought: "That science no longer be taught exclusively from the point
of view of free trade (of liberty, of property, and of justice) as has
been the case until now, but also, in the future, science is to be
especially taught from the viewpoint of the facts and laws that regulate
French industry (facts and laws which are contrary to liberty, to
property, and to justice). That in government-endowed teaching
positions, the professor rigorously refrain from endangering in the
slightest degree the respect due to the laws now in force." (Author's note: General Council of Manufacturers, Agriculture and Commerce, May 6, 1850.)
Thus, if there exists a law which sanctions slavery or monopoly,
oppression or robbery, in any form whatever, it must not even be
mentioned. For how can it be mentioned without damaging the respect
which it inspires? Still further, morality and political economy must be
taught from the point of view of this law; from the supposition that it
must be a just law merely because it is a law.
Another effect of this tragic perversion of the law is that it gives an
exaggerated importance to political passions and conflicts, and to
politics in general.
I could prove this assertion in a thousand ways. But, by way of
illustration, I shall limit myself to a subject that has lately occupied
the minds of everyone: universal suffrage.
Who Shall Judge?
The followers of Rousseau's school of thought - who consider themselves
far advanced, but whom I consider twenty centuries behind the times -
will not agree with me on this. But universal suffrage - using the word
in its strictest sense - is not one of those sacred dogmas which it is a
crime to examine or doubt. In fact, serious objections may be made to
universal suffrage.
In the first place, the word universal conceals a gross fallacy.
For example, there are 36 million people in France. Thus, to make the
right of suffrage universal there should be 36 million voters. But the
most extended system permits only 9 million people to vote. Three
persons out of four are excluded. And more than this, they are excluded
by the fourth. This fourth person advances the principle
of incapacity as his reason for excluding the others.
Universal suffrage means, then, universal suffrage for those who are
capable. But there remains this question of fact: Who is capable? Are
minors, females, insane persons, and persons who have committed certain
major crimes the only ones to be determined incapable?
The Reason Why Voting Is Restricted
A closer examination of the subject shows us the motive which causes the
right of suffrage to be based upon the supposition of incapacity. The
motive is that the elector or voter does not exercise this right for
himself alone, but for everybody.
The most extended elective system and the most restricted elective
system are alike in this respect. They differ only in respect to what
constitutes incapacity. It is not a difference of principle, but merely
a difference of degree.
If, as the republicans of our present-day Greek and Roman schools of
thought pretend, the right of suffrage arrives with one's birth, it
would be an injustice to prevent women and children from voting. Why
are they prevented? Because they are presumed to be incapable. And why
is incapacity a motive for exclusion? Because it is not the voter alone
who suffers the consequences of his vote; because each vote touches and
affects everyone in the entire community; because the people in the
community have a right to demand some safeguards concerning the acts
upon their welfare and existence depend.
The Answer Is to Restrict the Law
I know what might be said in answer to this; what the objections might
be. But this is not the place to exhaust a controversy of this nature.
I wish merely to observe here that this controversy over universal
suffrage (as well as most other political questions) which agitates,
excites, and overthrows nations, would lose nearly all of its importance
if the law had always been what it ought to be.
In fact, if law were restricted to protecting all persons, all
liberties, and all properties; if law were nothing more than the
organized combination of the individual's right to self defense; if law
were the obstacle, the check, the punisher of all oppression and plunder
- is it likely that we citizens would then argue much about the extent
of the franchise?
Under these circumstances, is it likely that the extent of the right to
vote would endanger that supreme good, the public peace? Is it likely
that the excluded classes would refuse to peaceably await the coming of
their right to vote? Is it likely that those who had the right to vote
would jealously defend their privilege?
If the law were confined to its proper functions, everyone's interest in
the law would be the same. Is it not clear that, under these
circumstances, those who voted could not inconvenience those who did not
vote?
The Fatal Idea of Legal Plunder
But on the other hand, imagine that this fatal principle has been
introduced: Under the pretense of organization, regulation,
protection, or encouragement, the law takes property from one person and
gives it to another; the law takes the wealth of all and gives it to a
few - whether farmers, manufacturers, shipowners, artists, or comedians.
Under these circumstances, then certainly every class will aspire to
grasp the law, and logically so.
The excluded classes will furiously demand their right to vote - and
will overthrow society rather than not to obtain it. Even beggars and
vagabonds will then prove to you that the also have an incontestable
title to vote. They will say to you:
"We cannot buy wine, tobacco, or salt without paying the tax. And a
part of the tax that we pay is given by law - in privileges and
subsidies - to men who are richer than we are. Others use the law to
raise the prices of bread, meat, iron, or cloth. Thus, since everyone
else uses the law for his own profit, we also would like to use the law
for our own profit. We demand from the law the right to relief,
which is the poor man's plunder. To obtain this right, we also should
be voters and legislators in order that we may organize Beggary on a
grand scale for our own class, as you have organized Protection on a
grand scale for your class. Now don't tell us beggars that you will act
for us, and then toss us, as Mr. Mimerel proposes, 600,000 francs to
keep us quiet, like throwing us a bone to gnaw. We have other claims.
And anyway, we wish to bargain for ourselves as other classes have
bargained for themselves!"
And what can you say to answer that argument!
Perverted Law Causes Conflict
As long as it is admitted that the law may be diverted from its true
purpose - that it may violate property instead of protecting it - then
everyone will want to participate in making the law, either to protect
himself against plunder or to use it for plunder. Political questions
will always be prejudicial, dominant, and all-absorbing. There will be
fighting at the door of the Legislative Palace, and the struggle within
will be no less furious. To know this, it is hardly necessary to
examine what transpires in the French and English legislatures; merely
to understand the issue is to know the answer.
Is there any need to offer proof that this odious perversion of the law
is a perpetual source of hatred and discord; that it tends to destroy
society itself? If such a proof is needed, look at the United States [in
1850]. There is no country in the world where the law is kept more
within its proper domain: the protection of every person's liberty and
property. As a consequence or this, there appears to be no country in
the world where the social order rests on a firmer foundation. But even
in the United States, there are two issues - and only two - that have
always endangered the public peace.
Slavery and Tariffs Are Plunder
What are these two issues? They are slavery and tariffs. These are the
only two issues where, contrary to the general spirit of the republic of
the United States, law has assumed the character of a plunderer.
Slavery is a violation, by law, of liberty. The protective tariff is a
violation, by law, of property.
It is a most remarkable fact that this double legal crime - a
sorrowful inheritance from the Old World - should be the only issue
which can, and perhaps will, lead to the ruin of the Union. It is
indeed impossible to imagine, at the very heart of a society, a more
astounding fact than this: The law has come to be an instrument of
injustice. And if this fact brings terrible consequence in Europe,
where the perversion of the law is a principle; a system?
Two Kinds of Plunder
Mr. de Montalembert [politician and writer] adopting the thought
contained in a famous proclamation by Mr. Carlier, has said: "We must
make war against socialism." According to the definition of socialism
advanced by Mr. Charles Dupin, he meant: "We must make war against
plunder."
But of what plunder was he speaking? For there are two kinds of plunder:
legal and illegal.
I do not think that illegal plunder, such as theft or swindling - which
the penal code defines, anticipates, and punishes - can be called
socialism. It is not this kind of plunder that systematically threatens
the foundations of society. Anyway, the war against this kind of
plunder has not waited for the command of these gentlemen. The war
against illegal plunder has been fought since the beginning of the
world. Long before the Revolution of February 1848 - long before the
appearance even of socialism itself - France had provided police,
judges, gendarmes, prisons, dungeons, and scaffolds for the purpose of
fighting illegal plunder. The law itself conducts this war, and it is
my wish and opinion that the law should always maintain this attitude
toward plunder.
The Law Defends Plunder
But it does not always do this. Sometimes the law defends plunder and
participates in it. Thus the beneficiaries are spared the shame,
danger, and scruple which their acts would otherwise involve. Sometimes
the law places the whole apparatus of judges, police, prisons, and
gendarmes at the service of the plunderers, and treats the victim - when
he defends himself - as a criminal. In short, there is a legal
plunder, and it is of this, no doubt, that Mr. de Montalembert
speaks.
This legal plunder may be only an isolated stain among the legislative
measures of the people. If so, it is best to wipe it out with a minimum
of speeches and denunciations - and in spite of the uproar of the vested
interests.
How to Identify Legal Plunder
But how is this legal plunder to be identified? Quite simply. See if
the law takes from some persons what belongs to them, and gives it to
other persons to whom it does not belong. See if the law benefits one
citizen at the expense of another by doing what the citizen himself
cannot do without committing a crime.
Then abolish this law without delay, for it is not only an evil itself,
but also it is a fertile source for further evils because it invites
reprisals. If such a law - which may be an isolated case - is not
abolished immediately, it will spread, multiply, and develop into a
system.
The person who profits from this law will complain bitterly, defending
his acquired rights. He will claim that the state is obligated
to protect and encourage his particular industry; that this procedure
enriches the state because the protected industry is thus able to spend
more and to pay higher wages to the poor workingmen.
Do not listen to this sophistry by vested interests. The acceptance of
these arguments will build legal plunder into a whole system. In fact,
this has already occurred. The present-day delusion is an attempt to
enrich everyone at the expense of everyone else; to make plunder
universal under the pretense of organizing it.
Legal Plunder Has Many Names
Now, legal plunder can be committed in an infinite number of ways. Thus
we have an infinite number of plans for organizing it: tariffs,
protection, benefits, subsidies, encouragements, progressive taxation,
public schools, guaranteed jobs, guaranteed profits, minimum wages, a
right to relief, a right to the tools of labor, free credit, and so on,
and so on. All these plans as a whole - with their common aim of legal
plunder - constitute socialism.
Now, since under this definition socialism is a body of doctrine what
attack can be made against it other than a war of doctrine? If you find
this socialistic doctrine to be false, absurd, and evil, then refute it.
And the more false, the more absurd, and the more evil it is, the easier
it will be to refute. Above all, if you wish to be strong, begin by
rooting out every particle of socialism that may have crept into your
legislation. This will be no light task.
Socialism Is Legal Plunder
Mr. de Montalembert has been accused of desiring to fight socialism by
the use of brute force. He ought to be exonerated from this accusation,
for he has plainly said: "The war that we must fight against socialism
must be in harmony with law, honor, and justice."
But why does not Mr. de Montalembert see that he has placed himself in
a vicious circle? You would use the law to oppose socialism? But it is
upon the law that socialism itself relies. Socialists desire to
practice legal plunder, not illegal plunder.
Socialists, like all other monopolists, desire to make the law their own
weapon. And when once the law is on the side of socialism, how can it
be used against socialism? For when plunder is abetted by the law, it
does not fear your courts, your gendarmes, and your prisons. Rather, it
may call upon them for help.
To prevent this, you would exclude socialism from entering into the
making of laws? You would prevent socialists from entering the
Legislative Palace? You shall not succeed, I predict, so long as legal
plunder continues to be the main business of the legislature. It is
illogical - in fact, absurd - to assume otherwise.
The Choice Before Us
This question of legal plunder must be settled once and for all, and
there are only three ways to settle it:
- The few plunder the many.
- Everybody plunders everybody.
- Nobody plunders anybody.
We must make our choice among limited plunder, universal plunder, and no
plunder. The law can follow only one of these three.
Limited legal plunder: This system prevailed when the right to
vote was restricted. One would turn back to this system to prevent the
invasion of socialism.
Universal legal plunder: We have been threatened with this
system since the franchise was made universal. The newly enfranchised
majority has decided to formulate law on the same principle of legal
plunder that was used by their predecessors when the vote was
limited.
No legal plunder: This is the principle of justice, peace
order, stability, harmony, and logic. Until the day of my death, I
shall proclaim this principle with all the force of my lungs (which,
alas! is all too inadequate). [Translator's note: At the time this was
written, Mr. Bastiat knew that he was dying of tuberculosis. Within a
year, he was dead]
The Proper Function of the Law
And, in all sincerity, can anything more than the absence of plunder be
required of the law? Can the law - which necessarily requires the use of
force - rationally be used for anything except protecting the rights of
everyone? I defy anyone to extend it beyond this purpose without
perverting it and, consequently, turning might against right. This is
the most fatal and most illogical social perversion that can possibly be
imagined. It must be admitted that the true solution - so long searched
for in the area of social relationships - is contained in these simple
words: Law is organized justice.
Now this must be said: When justice is organized by law - that is, by
force - this excludes the idea of using law (force) to organize any
human activity whatever, whether it be labor, charity, agriculture,
commerce, industry, education, art, religion. The organizing by law of
any one of these would inevitably destroy the essential force being used
against the liberty of citizens without it also being used against
justice, and thus acting against its proper purpose?
The Seductive Lure of Socialism
Here I encounter the most popular fallacy of our times. It is not
considered sufficient that the law should be just; it must be
philanthropic. Nor is it sufficient that the law should guarantee to
every citizen the free and inoffensive use of his faculties for
physical, intellectual, and moral self-improvement. Instead, it is
demanded that the law should directly extend welfare, education, and
morality throughout the nation.
This is the seductive lure of socialism. And I repeat again: These two
uses of the law are in direct contradiction to each other. We must
choose between them. A citizen cannot at the same time be free and not
free.
Enforced Fraternity Destroys Liberty
Mr. de Lamartine once wrote to me thusly: "Your doctrine is only the
half of my program. You have stopped at liberty; I go on to
fraternity." I answered him: "The second half of your program will
destroy the first."
In fact, it is impossible for me to separate the word fraternity
from the word voluntary. I cannot possibly understand how
fraternity can be legally enforced without liberty
being legally destroyed, and thus justice being legally trampled
underfoot.
Legal plunder has two roots: One of them, as I have said before, is in
human greed; the other is in false philanthropy.
At this point, I think that I should explain exactly what I mean by the
word plunder. [Translator's note: The French word used by Mr.
Bastiat is spoliation.]
Plunder Violates Ownership
I do not, as is often done, use the word in any vague, uncertain,
approximate, or metaphorical sense. I use it in its scientific
acceptance - as expressing the idea opposite to that of property [wages,
land, money, or whatever]. When a portion of wealth is transferred from
the person who owns it - without his consent and without compensation,
and whether by force or by fraud - to anyone who does not own it, then I
say that property is violated; that an act of plunder is committed.
I say that this act is exactly what the law is supposed to suppress,
always and everywhere. When the law itself commits this act that it is
supposed to suppress, I say that plunder is still committed, and I add
that from the point of view of society and welfare, this aggression
against rights is even worse. In this case of legal plunder, however,
the person who receives the benefits is not responsible for the act of
plundering. The responsibility for this legal plunder rests with the law, the legislator, and society itself. Therein lies the political
danger.
It is to be regretted that the word plunder is offensive. I
have tried in vain to find an inoffensive word, for it would not at any
time - especially now - wish to add an irritating word to our
dissentions. Thus, whether I am believed or not, I declare that I do
not mean to attack the intentions or the morality of anyone. Rather, I
am attacking an idea which I believe to be false;
a system which appears to me to be unjust; an injustice so
independent of personal intentions that each of us profits from it
without wishing to do so, and suffers from it without knowing the cause
of the suffering.
Three Systems of Plunder
The sincerity of those who advocate protectionism, socialism, and
communism is not here questioned. Any writer who would do that must be
influenced by a political spirit or a political fear. It is to be
pointed out, however, that protectionism, socialism, and communism are
basically the same plant in three different stages of its growth. All
that can be said is that legal plunder is more visible in communism
because it is complete plunder; and in protectionism because the plunder
is limited to specific groups and industries. Thus it follows that, of
the three systems, socialism is the vaguest, the most indecisive, and,
consequently the most sincere stage of development. (Author's note: If the
special privilege of government protection against competition -- a
monopoly -- were granted to only one group in France, the iron workers,
for example, this act would be so obviously legal plunder that it could
not last for long. It is for this reason that we see all the protected
trades combined into a common cause. They even organize themselves in
such a manner as to appear to represent all persons who labor.
Instinctively, they sense that legal plunder is best concealed by
generalizing it.)
But sincere or insincere, the intentions of persons are not here under
question. In fact, I have already said that legal plunder is based
partially on philanthropy, even though it is a false philanthropy.
With this explanation, let us examine the value - the origin and the
tendency - of this popular aspiration which claims to accomplish the
general welfare by general plunder.
Law Is Force
Since the law organizes justice, the socialists ask why the law should
not also organize labor, education, and religion.
Why should not law be used for these purposes? Because it could not
organize labor, education, and religion without destroying justice. We
must remember that law is force, and that, consequently, the proper
functions of the law cannot lawfully extend beyond the proper functions
of force.
When law and force keep a person within the bounds of justice, they
impose nothing but a mere negation. they oblige him only to abstain
from harming others. They violate neither his personality, his liberty
nor his property. They safeguard all of these. They
are defensive; they defend equally the rights of all.
Law Is a Negative Concept
The harmlessness of the mission performed by law and lawful defense is
self-evident; the usefulness is obvious; and the legitimacy cannot be
disputed.
As a friend of mine once remarked, this negative concept of law is so
true that the statement, the purpose of the law is to cause justice
to reign, is not a rigorously accurate statement. It ought to be
stated that the purpose of the law is to prevent injustice from
reigning. In fact, it is injustice, instead of justice,
that has an existence of its own. Justice is achieved only when
injustice is absent.
But when the law, by means of its necessary agent, force, imposes upon
men a regulation of labor, a method or a subject of education, a
religious faith or creed - then the law is no longer negative; it acts
positively upon people. It substitutes the will of the legislator for
their own initiatives. When this happens, the people no longer need to
discuss, to compare, to plan ahead; the law does all this for them.
Intelligence becomes a useless prop for the people; they cease to be
men; they lose their personality, their liberty, their property.
Try to imagine a regulation of labor imposed by force that is not a
violation of liberty; a transfer of wealth imposed by force that is not
a violation of property. If you cannot reconcile these contradictions,
then you must conclude that the law cannot organize labor and industry
without organizing injustice.
The Political Approach
When a politician views society from the seclusion of his office, he is
struck by the spectacle of the inequality that he sees. He deplores the
deprivations which are the lot of so many of our brothers, deprivations
which appear to be even sadder when contrasted with luxury and
wealth.
Perhaps the politician should ask himself whether this state of affairs
has not been caused by old conquests and lootings, and by more recent
legal plunder. Perhaps he should consider this proposition: Since all
persons seek well-being and perfection, would not a condition of justice
be sufficient to cause the greatest efforts towards progress, and the
greatest possible equality that is compatible with individual
responsibility? Would not this be in accord with the concept of
individual responsibility which God has willed in order that mankind may
have the choice between vice and virtue, and the resulting punishment
and reward?
But the politician never gives this a thought. His mind turns to
organizations, combinations, and arrangements - legal or apparently
legal. He attempts to remedy the evil by increasing and perpetuating
the very thing that caused the evil in the first place: legal plunder.
We have seen that justice is a negative concept. Is there even one of
these positive legal actions that does not contain the principle of
plunder?
The Law and Charity
You say: "There are persons who have no money," and you turn to the
law. but the law is not a breast that fills itself with milk. Nor are
the lacteal veins of the law supplied with milk from a source outside
the society. Nothing can enter the public treasury for the benefit of
one citizen or one class unless other citizens and other classes have
been forced to send it in. If every person draws from the
treasury the amount that he has put in it, it is true that the law then
plunders nobody. But this procedure does nothing for the persons who
have no money. It does not promote equality of income. The law can be
an instrument of equalization only as it takes from some persons and
gives to other persons. When the law does this, it is an instrument of
plunder.
With this in mind, examine the protective tariffs, subsidies, guaranteed
profits, guaranteed jobs, relief and welfare schemes, public education,
progressive taxation, free credit, and public works. You will find that
they are always based on legal plunder, organized injustice.
The Law and Education
You say: "There are persons who lack education," and you turn to the
law. But the law is not, in itself, a torch of learning which shines
its light abroad. The law extends over a society where some persons
have knowledge and others do not; where some citizens need to learn, and
others can teach. In this matter of education, the law has only two
alternatives: It can permit this transaction of teaching-and-learning
to operate freely and without the use of force, or it can force human
wills in this matter by taking from some of them enough to pay the
teachers who are appointed by government to instruct others, without charge. But in this second case, the law commits legal plunder by
violating liberty and property.
The Law and Morals
You say: "Here are persons who are lacking in morality or religion,"
and you turn to the law. But law is force. And need I point out what a
violent and futile effort it is to use force in the matters of morality
and religion?
It would seem that socialists, however self-complacent, could not avoid
seeing this monstrous legal plunder that results from such systems and
such efforts. But what do the socialists do? They cleverly disguise
this legal plunder from others - and even from themselves - under the
seductive names of fraternity, unity, organization, and association.
Because we ask so little from the law - only justice - the socialists
thereby assume that we reject fraternity, unity, organization, and
association. The socialists brand us with the
name individualist.
But we assure the socialists that we repudiate only forced
organization, not natural organization. We repudiate the forms of
association that are forced upon us, not free association. We
repudiate forced fraternity, not true fraternity. We repudiate
the artificial unity that does nothing more than deprive persons
of individual responsibility. We do not repudiate the natural unity of
mankind under Providence.
A Confusion of Terms
Socialism, like the ancient ideas from which it springs, confuses the
distinction between government and society. As a result of this, every
time we object to a thing being done by government, the socialists
conclude that we object to its being done at all.
We disapprove of state education. Then the socialists say that we are
opposed to any education. We object to a state religion. Then the
socialists say that we want no religion at all. We object to a state-
enforced equality. Then they say that we are against equality. And so
on, and so on. It is as if the socialists were to accuse us of not
wanting persons to eat because we do not want the state to raise
grain.
The Influence of Socialist Writers
How did politicians ever come to believe this weird idea that the law
could be made to produce what it does not contain - the wealth, science,
and religion that, in a positive sense, constitute prosperity? Is it due
to the influence of our modern writers on public affairs?
Present-day writers - especially those of the socialist school of
thought - base their various theories upon one common hypothesis: They
divide mankind into two parts. People in general - with the exception
of the writer himself - form the first group. The writer, all alone,
forms the second and most important group. Surely this is the weirdest
and most conceited notion that ever entered a human brain!
In fact, these writers on public affairs begin by supposing that people
have within themselves no means of discernment; no motivation to action.
The writers assume that people are inert matter, passive particles,
motionless atoms, at best a kind of vegetation indifferent to its own
manner of existence. They assume that people are susceptible to being
shaped - by the will and hand of another person - into an infinite
variety of forms, more or less symmetrical, artistic, and perfected.
Moreover, not one of these writers on governmental affairs hesitates to
imagine that he himself - under the title of organizer, discoverer,
legislator, or founder - is this will and hand, this universal
motivating force, this creative power whose sublime mission is to mold
these scattered materials - persons - into a society.
These socialist writers look upon people in the same manner that the
gardener views his trees. Just as the gardener capriciously shapes the
trees into pyramids, parasols, cubes, vases, fans, and other forms, just
so does the socialist writer whimsically shape human beings into groups,
series, centers, sub-centers, honeycombs, laborcorps, and other
variations. And just as the gardener needs axes, pruning hooks, saws,
and shears to shape his trees, just so does the socialist writer need
the force that he can find only in law to shape human beings. For this
purpose, he devises tariff laws, tax laws, relief laws, and school
laws.
The Socialists Wish to Play God
Socialists look upon people as raw material to be formed into social
combinations. This is so true that, if by chance, the socialists have
any doubts about the success of these combinations, they will demand
that a small portion of mankind be set aside to experiment upon.
The popular idea of trying all systems is well known. And one
socialist leader has been known seriously to demand that the Constituent
Assembly give him a small district with all its inhabitants, to try his
experiments upon.
In the same manner, an inventor makes a model before he constructs the
full-sized machine; the chemist wastes some chemicals - the farmer
wastes some seeds and land - to try out an idea.
But what a difference there is between the gardener and his trees,
between the inventor and his machine, between the chemist and his
elements, between the farmer and his seeds! And in all sincerity, the
socialist thinks that there is the same difference between him and
mankind!
It is no wonder that the writers of the nineteenth century look upon
society as an artificial creation of the legislator's genius. This idea
- the fruit of classical education - has taken possession of all the
intellectuals and famous writers of our country. To these intellectuals
and writers, the relationship between persons and the legislator appears
to be the same as the relationship between the clay and the potter.
Moreover, even where they have consented to recognize a principle of
action in the heart of man - and a principle of discernment in man's
intellect - they have considered these gifts from God to be fatal gifts.
They have thought that persons, under the impulse of these two gifts,
would fatally tend to ruin themselves. They assume that if the
legislators left persons free to follow their own inclinations, they
would arrive at atheism instead of religion, ignorance instead of
knowledge, poverty instead of production and exchange.
The Socialists Despise Mankind
According to these writers, it is indeed fortunate that Heaven has
bestowed upon certain men - governors and legislators - the exact
opposite inclinations, not only for their own sake but also for the sake
of the rest of the world! While mankind tends towad evil, the
legislators yearn for good; while mankind advances toward darkness, the
legislators aspire for enlightenment; while mankind is drawn toward
vice, the legislators are attracted towards virtue. Since they have
decided that this is the true state of affairs, they then demand the use
of force in order to substitute their own inclinations for those of the
human race.
Open at random any book on philosophy, politics, or history, and you
will probably see how deeply rooted in our country is this idea - the
child of classical studies, the mother of socialism. In all of them,
you will probably find this idea that mankind is merely inert matter,
receiving life, organization, morality, and prosperity from the power of
the state. And even worse, it will be stated that mankind tends toward
degeneration, and is stopped from this downward course only by the
mysterious hand of the legislator. Conventional classical thought
everywhere says that behind passive society there is a concealed power
called law or legislator (or called by some other
terminology that designates some unnamed person or persons of undisputed
influence and authority) which moves, controls, benefits, and improves
mankind.
A Defense of Compulsory Labor
Let us first consider a quotation from Bossuet [tutor to the Dauphin in
the Court of Louis XIV]:
One of the things most strongly impressed (by whom?) upon the minds of
the Egyptians was patriotism....No one was permitted to be
useless to the state. The law assigned to each one his work, which was
handed down from father to son. No one was permitted to have two
professions. Nor could a person change from one job to another....But
there was one task to which all were forced to conform: the
study of the laws and of wisdom. Ignorance of religion and of the
political regulations of the country was not excused under any
circumstances. Moreover, each occupation was assigned (by
whom?) to a certain district . . . . Among the good laws, one of the
best was that everyone was trained (by whom?) to obey them. As
a result of this, Egypt was filled with wonderful inventions, and
nothing was neglected that could make life easy and quiet.
Thus, according to Bossuet, persons derive nothing from themselves.
Patriotism, prosperity, inventions, husbandry, science - all of these
are given to the people by the operation of the laws, the rulers. All
that the people have to do is to bow to leadership.
A Defense of Paternal Government
Bossuet carries this idea of the state as the source of all progress
even so far as to defend the Egyptians against the charge that they
rejected wrestling and music. He said:
How is that possible? these arts were invented by Trismegistus [who was alleged to have been Chancellor to the Egyptian god Osiris].
And again among the Persians, Bossuet claims that all comes from
above:
One of the responsibilities of the prince was to encourage
agriculture....Just as there were offices established for the regulation
of armies, just so were there office for the bdirection of farm work .
. . . The Persion people were inspired with an overwhelming
respect for royal authority.
And according to Bossuet, the Greek people, although exceedingly
intelligent, had no sense of personal responsibility; like dogs and
horses, they themselves could not have invented the most simple
games:
The Greeks, naturally intelligent and courageous, had been early
cultivated by the kings and settlers who had come from Egypt. From
these Egyptian rulers, the Greek people had learned bodily
exercises, foot races, and horse and chariot races...But the
best thing that the Egyptians had taught the Greeks was to become
docile, and to permit themselves to be formed by the law for the public
good.
The Idea of Passive Mankind
It cannot be disputed that these classical theories [advanced by these
latter-day teachers, writers, legislators, economists, and philosophers]
held that everything came to the people from a source outside
themselves. As another example, take Fenelon [archbishop, author, and
instructor to the Duke of Burgundy].
He was a witness to the power of Louis XIV. This plus the fact that he
was nurtured in the classical studies and the admiration of antiquity,
naturally caused Fenelon to accept the idea that mankind should be
passive; that the misfortunes and the prosperity - vices and virtues -
of people are caused by the external influence exercised upon them by
the law and the legislators. Thus, in his Utopia of Salentum,
he puts men - with all their interests, faculties, desires, and
possessions - under the absolute discretion of the legislator. Whatever
the issue may be, persons do not decide it for themselves; the prince
decides for them. The prince is depicted as the soul of this
shapeless mass of people who form the nation. In the prince resides the
thought, the foresight, all progress, and the principle of all
organization. Thus all responsibility rests with him.
The whole of the tenth book of Fenelon's Telemachus proves this.
I refer the reader to it, and content myself with quoting at random from
this celebrated work to which, in every other respect, I am the first to
pay homage.
Socialists Ignore Reason and Facts
With the amazing credulity which is typical of the classicists, Fenelon
ignores the authority of reason and facts when he attributes the general
happiness of the Egyptians, not to their own wisdom but to the wisdom of
their kings:
We could not turn our eyes to either shore without seeing rich towns and
country estates most agreeably located; fields, never fallowed, covered
with golden crops every year; meadows which the earth lavished upon its
cultivators; shepherds who made the echoes resound with the soft notes
from their pipes and flutes. "Happy," said Mentor, "is the people
governed by a wise king."...
Later Mentor desired that I observe the contentment and abundance which
covered all Egypt, where twenty-two thousand cities could be counted.
He admired the good police regulations in the cities; the justice
rendered in favor of the poor against the rich; the sound
education of the children in obedience, labor, sobriety, and the love of
the artls and letters; the exactness with which all religious ceremonies
were performed; the unselfishness, the high regard for honor, the
faithfulness to men, and the fear of the gods which every father taught
his children. He never stopped admiring the prosperity of the country.
"Happy," said he, "is the people ruled by a wise king in such a
manner."
Socialists Want to Regiment People
Fenelon's idyl on Crete is even more alluring. Mentor is made to
say:
All that you see in this wonderful island results from the laws of
Minos. The education which he ordained for the children makes their
bodies strong and robust. From the very beginning, one accustoms the
children to a life of frugality and labor, because one assumes that all
the pleasures of the senses weaken both body and mind. Thus one allows
them no pleasure except that of becoming invincible by virtue, and of
acquiring glory. . . . Here one punishes three vices that go
unpunished among other people: ingratitude, hypocrisy, and greed.
There is no need to punish persons for pomp and dissipation, for they
are unknown in Crete...No costly furniture, no magnificent clothing, no
delicious feasts, no gilded palaces are permitted.
Thus does Mentor prepare his student to mold and to manipulate -
doubtless with the best of intentions - the people of Ithaca. And to
convince the student of the wisdom of these ideas, Mentor recites to him
the example of Salentum.
It is from this sort of philosophy that we receive our first political
ideas! We are taught to treat persons much as an instructor in
agriculture teaches farmers to prepare and tend the soil.
A Famous Name and an Evil Idea
Now listen to the great Montesquieu on this same subject:
To maintain the spirit of commerce, it is necessary that all the laws
must favor it. These laws, by proportionately dividing up the fortunes
as they are made in commerce, should provide every poor citizen with
sufficiently easy circumstances to enable him to work like the others.
These same laws should put every rich citizen in such lowered
circumstances as to force him to work in order to keep or to gain.
Thus the laws are to dispose of all fortunes!
Although real equality is the soul of the state in a democracy, yet this
is so difficult to establish that an extreme precision in this matter
would not always be desirable. It is sufficient that there be
established a census to reduce or fix these differences in wealth within
a certain limit. After this is done, it remains for specific laws to
equalize inequality by imposing burdens upon the rich and granting
relief to the poor.
Here again we find the idea of equalizing fortunes by law, by force.
In Greece, there were two kinds of republics, One, Sparta, was military;
the other, Athens, was commercial. In the former it was desired
that the citizens be idle; in the latter, love of labor was
encouraged.
Note the marvelous genius of these legislators: By debasing all
established customs - by mixing the usual concepts of all virtues - they
knew in advance that the world would admire their wisdom.
Lycurgus gave stability to his city of Sparta by combining petty
thievery with the soul of justice; by combining the most complete
bondage with the most extreme liberty; by combining the most atrocious
beliefs with the greatest moderation. He appeared to deprive his city
of all its resources, arts, commerce, money, and defenses. In Sparta,
ambition went without hope of material reward. Natural affection found
no outlet because a man was neither son, husband, nor father. Even
chastity was no longer considered becoming. By this road, Lycurgus
led Sparta on to greatness and glory.
This boldness which was to be found in the institutions of Greece has
been repeated in the midst of the degeneracy and corruption of our
modern times. An occasional honest legislator has molded a people
in whom integrity appears as natural as courage in the Spartans.
Mr. William Penn, for example, is a true Lycurgus. Even though Mr.
Penn had peace as his objective - while Lycurgas had war as his
objective - they resemble each other in that their moral prestige over
free men allowed them to overcome prejudices, to subdue passions, and to
lead their respective peoples into new paths.
The country of Paraguay furnishes us with another example [of a people
who, for their own good, are molded by their legislators]. [Translator's note: What was then known as Paraguay was a much larger area than it is today. It was colonized by the Jesuits who settled the Indians into villages, and generally saved them from further brutalities by the avid conquerors.]
Now it is true that if one considers the sheer pleasure of commanding to
be the greatest joy in life, he contemplates a crime against society; it
will, however, always be a noble ideal to govern men in a manner that
will make them happier.
Those who desire to establish similar institutions must do as
follows: Establish common ownership of property as in the republic
of Plato; revere the gods as Plato commanded; prevent foreigners from
mingling with the people, in order to preserve the customs; let the
state, instead of the citizens, establish commerce. The legislators
should supply arts instead of luxuries; they should satisfy needs
instead of desires.
A Frightful Idea
Those who are subject to vulgar infatuation may exclaim: "Montesquieu
has said this! So it's magnificent! It's sublime!" As for me, I have the
courage of my own opinion. I say: What! You have the nerve to call
that fine? It is frightful! It is abominable! These random selections
from the writings of Montesquieu show that he considers persons,
liberties, property - mankind itself - to be nothing but materials for
legislators to exercise their wisdom upon.
The Leader of the Democrats
Now let us examine Rousseau on this subject. This writer on public
affairs is the supreme authority of the democrats. And although he
bases the social structure upon the will of the people, he has,
to a greater extent than anyone else, completely accepted the theory of
the total inertness of mankind in the presence of the legislators:
If it is true that a great prince is rare, then is it not true that a
great legislator is even more rare? The prince has only to follow the
pattern that the legislator creates. The legislator is the mechanic
who invents the machine; the prince is merely the workman who sets
it in motion.
And what part do persons play in all this? They are merely the machine
that is set in motion. In fact, are they not merely considered to be
the raw material of which the machine is made?
Thus the same relationship exists between the legislator and the prince
as exists between the agricultural expert and the farmer; and the
relationship between the prince and his subjects is the same ad that
between the farmer and his land. How high above mankind, then, has this
writer on public affairs been placed? Rousseau rules over legislators
themselves, and teaches them their trade in these imperious terms:
Would you give stability to the state? Then bring the extremes as
closely together as possible. Tolerate neither wealthy persons nor
beggars.
If the soil is poor or barren, or the country too small for its
inhabitants, then turn to industry and the arts, and trade these
products for the foods that you need... On a fertile soil - if you
are short of inhabitants - devote all your attention to
agriculture, because this multiplies people; banish the arts,
because they only serve to depopulate the nation...
If you have extensive and accessible coast lines, then cover the
sea with merchant ships; you will have a brilliant but short
existence. If your seas wash only inaccessible cliffs, let the
people be barbarous and eat fish; they will live more quietly -
perhaps better - and, most certainly, they will live more happily.
In short, and in addition to the maxims that are common to all, every
people has its own particular circumstances. And this fact in itself
will cause legislation appropriate to the circumstances.
This is the reason why the Hebrews formerly - and more recently, the
Arabs - had religion as their principle objective. The objective of the
Athenians was literature; of Carthage and Tyre, commerce; of Rhodes,
naval affairs; of Sparta, war; and of Rome, virtue. The author
of The Spirit of Laws has shown by what art the legislator
should direct his institutions toward each of these
objectives....But suppose that the legislator mistakes his proper
objective, and acts on a principle different from that indicated by the
nature of things? Suppose that the selected principle sometimes creates
slavery, and sometimes liberty; sometimes wealth, and sometimes
population; sometimes peace, and sometimes conquest? This confusion of
objective will slowly enfeeble the law and impair the constitution. The
state will be subjected to ceaseless agitations until it is destroyed or
changed, and invincible nature regains her empire.
But if nature is sufficiently invincible to regain its empire,
why does not Rousseau admit that it did not need the legislator
to gain it in the first place? Why does he not see that men, by
obeying their own instincts, would turn to farming on fertile soil, and
to commerce on an extensive and easily accessible coast, without the
interference of a Lycurgus or a Solon or a Rousseau who might easily
be mistaken.
Socialists Want Forced Conformity
Be that as it may, Rousseau invests the creators, organizers, directors,
legislators, and controllers of society with a terrible responsibility.
He is, therefore, most exacting with them:
He who would dare to undertake the political creation of a people ought
to believe that he can, in a manner of speaking, transform human nature;
transform each individual - who, by himself, is a solitary and perfect
whole - into a mere part of a greater whole from which the individual
will henceforth receive his life and being. Thus the person who would
undertake the political creation of a people should believe in his
ability to alter man's constitution; to strengthen it; to substitute for
the physical and indipendent existence received from nature, an
existence which is partial and moral. In short, the would-be creator of
political man must remove man's own forces and endow him with others
that are naturally alien to him. [Translator's note: According to Rousseau, the existence of social man is partial in the sense that he is henceforthe merely a part of society. Knowing himself as such -- and thinking and feeling from the point of view of the whole -- he thereby becomes moral.]
Poor human nature! What would become of a person's dignity if it were
entrusted to the followers of Rousseau?
Legislators Desire to Mold Mankind
Now let us examine Raynal on this subject of mankind being molded by the
legislator:
The legislator must first consider the climate, the air, and the soil.
The resources at his disposal determine his duties. He must
first consider his locality. A population living on maritime
shores must have laws designed for navigation. . . . If it is an
inland settlement, the legislator must make his plans according to the
nature and fertility of the soil...
It is especially in the distribution of property that the genius of the
legislator will be found. As a general rule, when a new colony is
established in any country, sufficient land should be given to each man
to support his family.
On an uncultivated island that you are populating with children,
you need do nothing but let the seeds of truth germinate along with the
development of reason. But when you resettle a nation with a
past into a new country, the skill of the legislator rests in the policy
of permitting the people to retain no injurious opinions and
customs which can possibly be cured and corrected. If you
desire to prevent these opinions and customs from becoming permanent,
you will secure the second generation by a general system of public
education for the children. A prince or a legislator should never
establish a colony without first arranging to send wise men along to
instruct the youth.
In a new colony, ample opportunity is open to the careful legislator who
desires to purify the customs and manners of the people. If he
has virtue and genius, the land and the people at his disposal
will inspire his soul with a plan for society. A writer can only
vaguely trace the plan in advance because it is necessarily subject to
the instability of all hypotheses; the problem has many forms,
complications, and circumstances that are difficult to foresee and
settle in detail.
Legislators Told How to Manage Men
Raynal's instructions to the legislators on how to manage people may be
compared to a professor of agriculture lecturing his students: "The
climate is the first rule for the farmer. His resources
determine his procedure. He must first consider his locality. If his
soil is clay, he must do so and so. If his soil is sand, he must act in
another manner. Every facility is open to the farmer who wishes to
clear and improve his soil. If he is skillful enough, the manure at
his disposal will suggest to him a plan of operation. A professor
can only vaguely trace this plan in advance because it is necessarily
subject to the instability of all hypotheses; the problem has many
forms, complications, and circumstances that are difficult to foresee
and settle in detail."
Oh, sublime writers! Please remember sometimes that this clay, this
sand, and this manure which you so arbitrarily dispose of, are men! They
are your equals! They are intelligent and free human beings like
yourselves! As you have, they too have received from God the faculty to
observe, to plan ahead, to think, and to judge for themselves!
A Temporary Dictatorship
Here is Mably on this subject of the law and the legislator. In the
passages preceding the one here quoted, Mably has supposed the laws, due
to a neglect of security, to be worn out. He continues to adress the
reader thusly:
Under these circumstances, it is obvious that the springs of government
are slack. Give them a new tension, and the evil will be cured.
Think less of punishing faults, and more of rewarding that which you
need. In this manner you will restore to your republic the
vigour of youth. Because free people have been ignorant of this
procedure, they have lost their liberty! But if the evil has made such
headway that ordinary governmental procedures are unable to cure it,
then resort to an extraordinary tribunal with considerable
powers for a short time. The imagination of the citizens needs to be
struck a hard blow.
In this manner, Mably continues through twenty volumes.
Under the influence of teaching like this - which stems from classical
education - there came a time when everyone wished to place himself
above mankind in order to arrange, organize, and regulate it in his own
way.
Socialists Want Equality of Wealth
Next let us examine Condillac on this subject of the legislators and
mankind:
My Lord, assume the character of Lycurgus or of Solon. And before you
finish reading this essay, amuse yourself by giving laws to some savages
in America or Africa. Confine these nomads to fixed dwellings; teach
them to tend flocks. Attempt to develop the social consciousness that
nature has planted in them. Force them to begin to practice the duties
of humanity. Use punishment to cause sensual pleasures to become
distasteful to them. Then you will see that every point of your
legislation will cause these savages to lose a vice and gain a
virtue.
All people have had laws. But few people have been happy. Why is this
so? Because the legislators themselves have almost always been ignorant
of the purpose of society, which is the uniting of families by a common
interest.
Impartiality in law consists of two things: the establishing of
equality in wealth and equality in dignity among the citizens. As the
laws establish greater equality, they become proportionately more
precious to every citizenI When all men are equal in wealth and dignity
- and when the laws leave no hope of disturbing this equality - how can
men then be agitated by greed, ambition, dissipation, idleness, sloth,
envy, hatred, or jealousy?
What you have learned about the republic of Sparta should enlighten you
on this question. No other state has ever had laws more in accord with
the order of nature; of equality.
The Error of the Socialist Writers
Actually, it is not strange that during the seventeenth and
eighteenth centuries the human race was regarded as inert matter, ready
to receive everything - form, face, energy, movement, life - from a
great prince or a great legislator or a great genius. These centuries
were nourished on the study of antiquity. And antiquity presents
everywhere - in Egypt, Persia, Greece, Rome - the spectacle of a few men
molding mankind according to their whims, thanks to the prestige of
force and of fraud. But this does not prove that this situation is
desirable. It proves only that since men and society are capable of
improvement, it is naturally to be expected that error, ignorance,
despotism, slavery, and superstition should be greatest towards the
origins of history. The writers quoted above were not in error when
they found ancient institutions to be such, but they were in error when
they offered them for the admiration and imitation of future
generations. Uncritical and childish conformists, they took for granted
the grandeur, dignity, morality, and happiness of the artificial
societies of the ancient world. They did not understand that knowledge
appears and grows with the passage of time; and that in proportion to
this growth of knowledge, might takes the side of right,
and society regains possession of itself.
What Is Liberty?
Actually, what is the political struggle that we witness? It is the
instinctive struggle of all people toward liberty. And what is this
liberty, whose very name makes the heart beat faster and shakes the
world? Is it not the union of all liberties - liberty of conscience, of
education, of association, of the press, of travel, of labor, of trade?
In short, is not liberty the freedom of every person to make full use of
his faculties, so long as he does not harm other persons while doing so?
Is not liberty the destruction of all despotism - including, of course,
legal despotism? Finally, is not liberty the restricting of the law only
to its rational sphere of organizing the right of the individual to
lawful self-defense; of punishing injustice?
It must be admitted that the tendency of the human race toward liberty
is largely thwarted, especially in France. This is greatly due to a
fatal desire - learned from the teachings of antiquity - that our
writers on public affairs have in common: They desire to set themselves
above mankind in order to arrange, organize, and regulate it according
to their fancy.
Philanthropic Tyranny
While society is struggling toward liberty, these famous men who put
themselves at its head are filled with the spirit of the seventeenth and
eighteenth centuries. They think only of subjecting mankind to the
philanthropic tyranny of their own social inventions. Like Rousseau,
they desire to force mankind docilely to bear this yoke of the public
welfare that they have dreamed up in their own imaginations.
This was especially true in 1789. No sooner was the old regime
destroyed than society was subjected to still other artificial
arrangements, always starting from the same point: the omnipotence of
the law.
Listen to the ideas of just a few of the writers and politicians during
that period:
SAINT-JUST: The legislator commands the future. It is for him
to will the good of mankind. It is for him to make men
what he wills them to be.
ROBESPIERRE: The function of government is to direct the physical and
moral powers of the nation toward the end for which the commonwealth has
come into being.
BILLAUD-VARENNES: A people who are to be returned to liberty must be
formed anew. A strong force and vigorous action are necessary to
destroy old prejudices, to change old customs, to correct depraved
affections, to restrict superfluous wants, and to destroy ingrained
vices. Citizens, the inflexible austerity of Lycurgus created the firm
foundation of the Spartan republic. The weak and trusting character of
Solon plunged Athens into slavery. This parallel embraces the whole
science of government.
LE PELLETIER: Considering the extent of human degradation, I am
convinced that it is necessary to effect a total regeneration and, if I
may so express myself, of creating a new people.
The Socialists Want Dictatorship
Again, it is claimed that persons are nothing but raw material. It is
not for them to will their own improvement; the are incapable of
it. According to Saint-Just, only the legislator is capable of doing
this. Persons are merely to be what the legislator wills them
to be. According to Robespierre, who copies Rousseau literally, the
legislator begins by decreeing the end for which the commonwealth has
come into being. Once this is determined, the government has only
to direct the physical and moral forces of the nation toward
that end. Meanwhile, the inhabitants of the nation are to remain
completely passive. And according to the teachings of Billaud-Varennes,
the people should have no prejudices, no affections, and no desires
exept those authorized by the legislator. He even goes so far as to say
that the inflexible austerity of one man is the foundation of a
republic.
In cases where the alleged evil is so great that ordinary governmental
procedures cannot cure it, Mably recommends a dictatorship to promote
virtue: "Resort," he says, "to an extraordinary tribunal with
considerable powers for a short time. The imagination of the citizens
needs to be struck a hard blow." This doctrine has not been forgotten.
Listen to Robespierre:
The principle of the republican government is virtue, and the means
required to establish virtue is terror. In our country we desire to
substitute morality for selfishness, honesty for honor, principles for
customs, duties for manners, the empire of reason for the tyranny of
fashion, contempt of vice for contempt of poverty, pride for insolence,
greatness of soul for vanity, love of glory for love of money, good
people for good companions, merit for intrigue, genius for wit, truth
for glitter, the charm of happiness for the boredom of pleasure, the
greatness of man for the littleness of the great, a generous, stong
happy people for a good-natured, frivolous, degraded people; in short,
we desire to substitute all the virtues and miracles of a republic for
all the vices and absurdities of a monarchy.
Dictatorial Arrogance
At what a tremendous height above the rest of mankind does Robespierre
here place himself! And note the arrogance with which he speaks. He is
not content to pray for a great reawakening of the human spirit. Nor
does he expect such a result from a well-ordered government. No, he
himself will remake mankind, and by means of terror.
This mass of rotten and contradictory statements is extracted from a
discourse by Robespierre in which he aims to explain the principles
of morality which ought to guide a revolutionary government. Note
that Robespierre's request is not made merely for the purpose of
repelling a foreign invasion or putting down the opposing groups.
Rather he wants a dictatorship in order that he may use terror to force
upon the country his own principles of morality. He says that this act
is only to be a temporary measure preceding a new constitution. But in
reality, he desires nothing short of using terror to extinguish from
France selfishness, honor, customs, manners, fashion, vanity, love of
money, good companionship, intrigue, wit, sensuousness, and
poverty. Not until he, Robespierre, shall have accomplished
these miracles, as he so rightly calls them, will he permit the
law to reign again.
[Translator's note: At this point in the original French text, Mr. Bastiat pauses and speaks thusly to all the do-gooders and would-be rulers of mankind.] "Ah, you miserable creatures! You who think you are so great! You who
judge humanity to be so small! You who wish to reform everything! Why
don't you reform yourselves? The task would be sufficient enough."
The Indirect Approach to Despotism
Usually, however, these gentlemen- the reformers, the legislators, and
the writers on public affairs - do not desire to impose direct despotism
upon mankind. Oh no, they are too moderate and philanthropic for such
direct action. Instead, they turn to the law for this despotism, this
absolutism, this omnipotence. They desire only to make the laws.
To show the prevalence of this queer idea in France, I would need to
copy not only the entire works of Mably, Raynal, Rousseau, and Fenelon -
plus long extracts from Bossuet and Montesquieu - but also the entire
proceedings of the Convention. I shall do no such thing; I merely refer
the reader to them.
Napoleon Wanted Passive Mankind
It is, of course, not at all surprising that this same idea should have
greatly appealed to Napoleon. He embraced it ardently and used it with
vigor. Like a chemist, Napoleon considered all Europe to be material
for his experiments. But, in due course, this material reacted against
him.
At St. Helena, Napoleon - greatly disillusioned - seemed to recognize
some initiative in mankind. Recognizing this, he became less hostile to
liberty. Nevertheless, this did not prevent him from leaving this
lesson to his son in his will: "To govern is to increase and spread
morality, education, and happiness."
After all this, it is hardly necessary to quote the same opinions from
Morelly, Babeuf, Owen, Saint-Simon, and Fourier. Here are, however, a
few extracts from Louis Blanc's book on the organization of labor: "In
our plan, society receives its momentum from power."
Now consider this: The impulse behind this momentum is to be supplied
by the plan of Louis Blanc; his plan is to be forced upon
society; the society referred to is the human race. Thus the human race
is to receive its momentum from Louis Blanc.
Now it will be said that the people are free to accept or to reject this
plan. Admittedly, people are free to accept or to reject advice
from whomever they wish. But this is not the way in which Mr. Louis
Blanc understands the matter. He expects that his plan will be
legalized, and thus forcibly imposed upon the people by the power of the
law:
In our plan, the state has only to pass labor laws (Nothing else?) by
means of which industrial progress can and must proceed in complete
liberty. The state merely places society on an incline (Is that
all?). Then society will slide down this incline by the mere force of
things, and by the natural workings of the established
mechanism.
But what is this incline that is indicated by Mr. Louis Blanc? Does it
not lead to an abyss? (No, it leads to happiness.) If this is true, then
why does not society go there of its own choice? (Because society does
not know what it wants; it must be propelled.) What is to propel it?
(Power.) And who is to supply thi impulse for this power? (Why, the
inventor of the machine - in this instance, Mr. Louis Blanc.)
The Vicious Circle of Socialism
We shall never escape from this circle: the idea of passive mankind,
and the power of the law being used by a great man to proppel the
people.
Once on this incline, will society enjoy some liberty? (Certainly.) And
what is liberty, Mr. Louis Blanc?
Once and for all, liberty is not only a mere granted right; it is also
the power granted to a person to use and to develop his faculties under
a reign of justice and under the protection of the law.
And this is no pointless distinction; its meaning is deep and its
consequences are difficult to estimate. For once it is agreed that a
person, to be truly free, must have the power to use and develop his
faculties, then it follows that every person has a claim on society for
such education as will permit him to develop himself. It also
follows that every person has a claim on society for tools of
production, without which human activity cannot be fully effective. Now
by what action can society give to every person the necessary education
and the necessary tools of production, if not by the action of the
state?
Thus, again, liberty is power. Of what does this power consist? (Of
being educated and of being given the tools of production.) Who is to
give the education and the tools of production? (Society, which owes
them to everyone.) By what action is society to give tools of
production to those who do not own them? (Why, by the action of the
state.) And from whom will the state take them?
Let the reader answer that question. Let him also notice the direction
in which this is taking us.
The Doctrine of the Democrats
The strange phenomenon of our times - one which will probably astound
our descendants - is the doctrine based on this triple hypothesis: the
total inertness of mankind the omnipotence of the law, and the
infallibility of the legislator. These three ideas form the sacred
symbol of those who proclaim themselves totally democratic.
The advocates of this doctrine also profess to be social. So
far as they are democratic, they place unlimited faith in mankind. But
so far as they are social, they regard mankind as little better than
mud. Let us examine this contrast in greater detail.
What is the attitude of the democrat when political rights are under
discussion? How does he regard the people when a legislator is to be
chosen? Ah, then it is claimed that the people have an instinctive
wisdom; they are gifted with the finest perception; their will is
always right; the general will cannot err; voting cannot be
too universal.
When it is time to vote, apparently the voter is not to be asked for any
guarantee of his wisdom. His will and capacity to choose wisely are
taken for granted. Can the people be mistaken? Are we not living in an
age of enlightenment? What! are the people always to be kept on leashes?
Have they not won their rights by great effort and sacrifice? Have they
not won their rights by great effort and sacrifice? Have they not given
ample proof of their intelligence and wisdom? Are they not adults? Are
they not capable of judging for themselves? Do they not know what is
best for themselves? Is there a class or a man and judge and act for
them? No, no, the people are and should be free. They desire to
manage their own affairs, and they shall do so.
But when the legislator is finally elected - ah! then indeed does the
tone of his speech undergo a radical change. The people are returned to
passiveness, inertness, and unconsciousness; the legislator enters into
omnipotence. Now it is for him to initiate, to direct, to propel, and
to organize. Mankind has only to submit; the hour of despotism has
struck. We now observe this fatal idea: The people who, during the
election, were so wise, so moral, and so perfect, now have no tendencies
whatever, or if they have any, they are tendencies that lead downward
into degradation.
The Socialist Concept of Liberty
But ought not this people be given a little liberty?
But Mr. Considerant has assured us that liberty leads inevitably to
monopoly!
We understand that liberty means competition. But according to Mr.
Louis Blanc, competition is a system that ruins the businessmen and
exterminates the people. It is for this reason that free people
are ruined and exterminated in proportion to their degree of freedom.
(Possibly Mr. Louis Blanc should observe the results of competition in,
for example, Switzerland, Holland, England, and the United States.)
Mr Louis Blanc also tells us that competition leads to monopoly.
And by the same reasoning, he thus informs us that low prices lead to
high prices; that competition drives production to destructive
activity; that competition drains away the sources of purchasing
power; that competition forces an increase in production while,
at the same time, it forces a decrease in consumption. From this
it follows that free people produce for the sake of not consuming; that
liberty means oppression and madness among the people; and that
Mr. Louis Blanc absolutely must attend to it.
Socialists Fear All Liberties
Well, what liberty should the legislators permit people to have? Liberty
of conscience? (But if this were permitted, we would see the people
taking this opportunity to become atheists.)
Then liberty of education? (But parents would pay professors to teach
their children immorality and falsehoods; besides, according to Mr.
Thiers, if education were left to national liberty, it would cease to be
national, and we would be teaching the ideas of Turks or Hindus; wheras,
thanks to this legal despotism over education, our children have the
good fortune to be taught the noble ideas of the Romans.)
Then liberty of labor? (But that would mean competition which, in turn,
leaves production unconsumed, ruins businessmen, and exterminates the
people.)
Perhaps liberty of trade? (But everyone knows - and the advocates of
protective tariffs have proved over and over again - that freedom of
trade ruins every person who engages in it, and that it is necessary to
suppress freedom of trade in order to prosper.)
Possibly then, liberty of association? (But, according to socialist
doctrine, true liberty and voluntary association are in contradiction to
each other, and the purpose of the socialists is to suppress liberty of
association precisely in order to force people to associate together in
true liberty.)
Clearly then, the conscience of the social democrats cannot permit
persons to have any liberty because they believe that the nature of
mankind tends always toward every kind of degradation and disaster.
Thus, of course, the legislators must make plans for the people in order
to save them from themselves.
This line of reasoning brings us to a challengeing question: If people
are as incapable, as immoral, and as ignorant as the politicians
indicate, then why is the right of these same people to vote defended
with such passionate insistence?
The Superman Idea
The claims of these organizers of humanity raise another question which
I have often asked them and which, so far as I know, they have never
answered: If the natural tendencies of mankind are so bad that it is
not safe to permit people to be free, how is it that the tendencies of
these organizers are always good? Do not the legislators and their
appointed agents also belong to the human race? Or do they believe that
they themselves are made of a finer clay than the rest of mankind? The
organizers maintain that society, when left undirected, rushes headlong
to its inevitable destruction because the instincts of the people are so
perverse. The legislators claim to stop this suicidal course and to
give it a saner direction. Apparently, then, the legislators and the
organizers hve received from Heaven an intelligence and virtue that
place them beyond and above mankind; if so, let them show their titles
to this superiority.
They would be the shepherds over us, their sheep. Certainly such an
arrangement presupposes that they are naturally superior to the rest of
us. And certainly we are fully justified in demanding from the
legislators and organizers proof of this natural superiority.
The Socialists Reject Free Choice
Please understand that I do not dispute their right to invent social
combinations, to advertise them, to advocate them, and to try them upon
themselves, at their own expense and risk. But I do dispute their right
to impose these plans upon us by law - by force - and to compel us to
pay for them with our taxes.
I do not insist that the supporters of these various social schools of
thought - the Proughonists, the Cabetists, the Fourierists, the
Universitarists, and the Protectionists - renounce their various ideas.
I insist only that they renounce this one idea that they have in common:
They need only to give up the idea of forcing us to acquiesce to
their groups and series, their socialized projects, their free-credit
banks, their Graeco-Roman concept of morality, and their commercial
regulations. I ask only that we be permitted to decide upon these plans
for ourselves; that we not be forced to accept them, directly or
indirectly, if we find them to be contrary to our best interests or
repugnant to our consciences.
But these organizers desire access to the tax funds and to the power of
the law in order to carry out their plans. In addition to being
oppressive and unjust, this desire also implies the fatal supposition
that the organizer is infallible and mankind is incompetent. But,
again, if persons are incompetent to judge for themselves, then why all
this talk about universal suffrage?
The Cause of French Revolutions
This contradiction in ideas is, unfortunately but logically, reflected
in events in France. For example, Frenchmen have led all other
Europeans in obtaining their rights - or, more accurately, their
political demands. Yet this fact has in no respect prevented us from
becoming the most governed, the most regulated, the most imposed upon,
the most harnessed, and the most exploited people in Europe. France
also leads all other nations as the one where revolutions are constantly
to be anticipated. And under the circumstances, it is quite natural
that this should be the case.
And this will remain the case so long as our politicians continue to
accept this idea that has been so well expressed by Mr. Louis Blanc:
"Society receives its momentum from power." This will remain the case
so long as human beings with feelings continue to remain passive; so
long as they consider themselves incapable of bettering their prosperity
and happiness by their own intelligence and their own energy; so long as
they imagine that their relationship to the state is the same as that of
the sheep to the shepherd.
The Enormous Power of Government
As long as these ideas prevail, it is clear that the responsibility of
government is enormous. Good fortune and bad fortune, wealth and
destitution, equality and inequality, virtue and vice - all then depend
upon political administration. It is burdened with everyting, it
undertakes everything, it does everything; therefore it is responsible
for everything.
If we are fortunate, then government has a claim to our gratitude; but
if we are unfortunate, then government must bear the blame. For are not
our persons and property now at the disposal of government? Is not the
law omnipotent? Is not the law omnipotent?
In creating a monopoly of education, the government must answer to the
hopes of the fathers of families who have thus been deprived of their
liberty; and if these hopes are shattered, whose fault is it?
In regulating industry, the government has contracted to make it
prosper; otherwise it is absurd to deprive industry of its liberty. And
if industry now suffers, whose fault is it?
In meddling with the balance of trade by playing with tariffs, the
government thereby contracts to make trade prosper; and if this results
in destruction instead of prosperity, whose fault is it?
In giving the maritime industries protection in exchange for their
liberty, the government undertakes to make them profitable; and if they
become a burden to the taxpayers, whose fault is it?
Thus there is not a grievance in the nation for which the government
does not voluntarily make itself responsible. Is it surprising, then,
that every failure increases the threat of another revolution in
France?
And what remedy is proposed for this? To extend indefinitely the domain
of the law; that is, the responsibility of government.
But if the government undertakes to control and to raise wages, and
cannot do it; if the government undertakes to care for all who may be in
want, and cannot do it; if the government undertakes to support all
unemployed workers, and cannot do it; if the government undertakes to
lend interest-free money to all borrowers, and cannot do it; if, in
these words that we regret to say escaped from the pen of Mr. de
Lamartine, "The state considers that its purpose is to enlighten, to
develop, to enlarge, to strengthen, to spiritualize, and to sanctify the
soul of the people" - and if the government cannot do all of these
things, what then? Is it not certain that after every government failure
- which, alas! is more than probable - there will be an equally
inevitable revolution?
Politics and Economics
[Now we return to a subject that was briefly discussed in the opening
pages of this thesis: the relationship of economics and of politics -
political economy.] [Translator's note: Mr. Bastiat has devoted three other books and several articles to the development of the ideas contained in the three sentences of the following paragraph.]
A science of economics must be developed before a science of politics
can be logically formulated. Essentially, economics is the science of
determining whether the interests of human beings are harmonious or
antagonistic. This must be known before a science of politics can be
formulated to determine the proper functions of government.
Immediately following the development of a science of econoomics, and at
the very beginning of the formulation of a science of politics, this
all-important question must be answered: What is Law? What ought it to
be? What is its scope; its limits? Logically, at what point do the just
powers of the legislator stop?
I do not hesitate to answer: Law is the common force organized to act
as an obstacle to injustice. In short, law is justice.
Proper Legislative Functions
It is not true that the legislator has absolute power over our persons
and property. The existence of persons and property preceded the
existence of the legislator, and his function is only to guarantee their
safety.
It is not true that the function of law is to regulate our consciences,
our ideas, our wills, our education, our opinions, our work, our trade,
our talents, or our pleasures. The function of law is to protect the
free exercise of these rights, and to prevent any person from
interfering with the free exercise of these same rights by any other
person.
Since law necessarily requires the support of force, its lawful domain
is only in the areas where the use of force is necessary. This is
justice.
Every individual has the right to use force for lawful self-defense. It
is for this reason that the collective force - which is only the
organized combination of the individual forces - may lawfully be used
for the same purpose; and it cannot be used legitimately for any other
purpose.
Law is solely the organization of the individual right of self-defense
which existed before law was formalized. Law is justice.
Law and Charity Are Not the Same
The mission of the law is not to oppress persons and plunder
them of their property, even though the law may be acting in a
philanthropic spirit. Its mission is to protect persons and
property.
Furthermore, it must not be said that the law may be philanthropic if,
in the process, it refrains from oppressing persons and plundering them
of their property; this would be a contradiction. The law cannot avoid
having an effect upon persons and property; and if the law acts in any
manner except to protect them, its actions then necessarily violate the
liberty of persons and their right to own property.
The law is justice - simple and clear, precise and bounded. Every eye
can see it, and every mind can grasp it; for justice is measurable,
immutable, and unchangeable. Justice is neither more than this nor less
than this.
If you exceed this proper limit - if you attempt to make the law
religious, fraternal, equalizing, philanthropic, industrial, literary,
or artistic - you will then be lost in an uncharted territory, in
vagueness and uncertainty, in a forced utopia or, even worse, in a
multitude of utopias, each striving to seize the law and impose it upon
you. This is true because fraternity and philanthropy, unlike justice,
do not have precise limits. Once started, where will you stop? And
where will the law stop itself?
The High Road to Communism
Mr. de Saint-Cricq would extend his philanthropy only to some of the
industrial groups; he would demand that the law control the consumers
to benefit the producers.
Mr. Considerant would sponsor the cause of the labor groups; he would
use the law to secure for them a guaranteed minimum of clothing,
housing, food, and all other necessities of life.
Mr. Louis Blanc would say - and with reason - that these minimum
guarantees are merely the beginning of complete fraternity; he would say
that the law should give tools of production and free education to all
working people.
Another person would observe that this arrangement would still leave
room for inequality; he would claim that the law should give to everyone
- even in the most inaccessible hamlet - luxury, literature, and art.
All of these proposals are the high road to communism; legislation will
then be - in fact, it already is - the battlefield for the fantasies and
greed of everyone.
The Basis for Stable Government
Law is justice. In this proposition a simple and enduring government can be conceived. And I defy anyone to say how even the thought of
revolution, of insurrection, of the slightest uprising could arise
against a government whose organized force was confined only to
suppressing injustice.
Under such a regime, there would be the most prosperity - and it would
be the most equally distributed. As for the sufferings that are
inseparable from humanity, no one would even think of accusing the
government for them. This is true because, if the force of government
were limited to suppressing injustice, then government would be as
innocent of these sufferings as it is now innocent of changes in the
temperature.
As proof of this statement, consider this question: Have the people
ever been known to rise against the Court of Appeals, or mob a Justice
of the Peace, in order to get higher wages, free credit, tools of
production, favorable tariffs, or government-created jobs? Everyone
knows perfectly well that such matters are not within the jurisdiction
of the Court of Appeals or a Justice of the Peace. And if government
were limited to its proper functions, everyone would soon learn that
these matters are not within the jurisdiction of the law itself.
But make the laws upon the principle of fraternity - proclaim that all
good, and all bad, stem from the law; that the law is responsible for
all individual misfortunes and all social inequalities-then the doors
open to an endless succession of complaints, irritations, troubles, and
revolutions.
Justice Means Equal Rights
Law is justice. And it would indeed be strange if law could properly be
anything else! Is not justice right? Are not rights equal? By what right
does the law force me to conform to the social plans of Mr. Mimerel,
Mr. de Melun, Mr. Thiers, or Mr. Louis Blanc? If the law has a moral
right to do this, why does it not, then, force these gentlemen to submit
to my plans? Is it logical to suppose that nature has not
given me sufficient imagination to dream up a utopia also?
Should the law choose one fantasy among many, and put the organized
force of government at its service only?
Law is justice. And let it not be said - as it continually is said -
that under this concept, the law would be atheistic, individualistic,
and heartless; that it would make mankind in its own image. This is an
absurd conclusion, worthy only of those worshippers of government who
believe that the law is mankind.
Nonsense! Do those worshippers of government believe that free persons
will cease to act? Does it follow that if we receive no energy from the
law, we shall receive no energy at all? Does it follow that if the law
is restricted to the function of protecting the free use of our
faculties, we will be unable to use our faculties? Suppose that the law
does not force us to follow certain forms of religion, or systems of
association, or methods of education, or regulations of labor, or
regulations of trade, or plans for charity; does it then follow that we
shall eagerly plunge into atheism, hermitary, ignorance, misery, and
greed? If we are free, does it follow that we shall no longer recognize
the power and goodness of God? Does it follow that we shall then cease
to associate with each other, to help each other, to love and succor our
unfortunate brothers, to study the secrets of nature, and to strive to
improve ourselves to the best of our abilities?
The Path to Dignity and Progress
Law is justice. And it is under the law of justice - under the reign of
right; under the influence of liberty, safety, stability, and
responsibility - that every person will attain his real worth and he
true dignity of his being. It is only under this law of justice that
mankind will achieve - slowly, no doubt, but certainly - God's design
for the orderly and peaceful progress of humanity.
It seems to me that this is theoretically right, for whatever the question under discussion - whether religious, philosophical, political,
or economic; whether it concerns prosperity, morality, equality, right,
justice, progress, responsibility, cooperation, property, labor, trade,
capital, wages, taxes, population, finance, or government - at whatever
point on the scientific horizon I begin my researches, I invariably
reach this one conclusion: The solution to the problems of human
relationships is to be found is liberty.
Proof of an Idea
And does not experience prove this? Look at the entire world. Which
countries contain the most peaceful, the most moral, and the happiest
people? Those people are found in the countries where the law least
interferes with private affairs; where government is least felt; where
the individual has the greatest scope, and free opinion the greatest
influence; where administrative powers are fewest and simplest; where
taxes are lightest and most nearly equal, and popular discontent the
least excited and the least justifiable; where individuals and groups
most actively assume their responsibilities, and, consequently, where
the morals of admittedly imperfect human beings are constantly
improving; where trade, assemblies, and associations are the least
restricted; where labor, capital, and populations suffer the fewest
forced displacements; where mankind most nearly follows its own natural
inclinations; where the inventions of men are most nearly in harmony
with the laws of God; in short, the happiest, most moral, and most
peaceful people are those who most nearly follow this principle:
Although mankind is not perfect, still, all hope rests upon the free and
voluntary actions of persons within the limits of right; law or force is
to be used for nothing except the administration of universal
justice.
The Desire to Rule Over Others
This must be said: There are too many "great" men in the world -
legislators, organizers, do-gooders, leaders of the people, fathers of
nations, and so on, and so on. Too many persons place themselves above
mankind; they make a career of organizing it, patronizing it, and ruling
it.
Now someone will say: "You yourself are doing this very thing."
True. But it must be admitted that I act in an entirely different
sense; if I have joined the ranks of the reformers, it is solely for the
purpose of persuading them to leave people alone. I do not look upon
people as Vancauson looked upon his automaton. Rather, just as the
physiologist accepts the human body as it is, so do I accept people as
they are. I desire only to study and admire.
My attitude toward all other persons is well illustrated by this story
from a celebrated traveler; He arrived one day in the midst of a tribee
of savages, where a child had just been born. A crowd of soothsayers,
magicians, and quacks - armed with rings, hooks, and cords - surrounded
it. One said: "This child will never smell the perfume of a peace-pipe
unless I stretch his nostrils." Another said: "He will never be able
to hear unless I draw his earlobes down to his shoulders." A third
said: "He will never see the sunshine unless I slant his eyes."
Another said: "He will never stand upright unless I bend his legs." A
fifth said: "He will never learn to think unless I flatten his
skull."
"Stop," cried the traveler. "What God does is well done. Do not claim
to know more than He. God has given organs to this frail creature; let
them develop and grow strong by exercise, use, experience, and
liberty."
Let us Now Try Liberty
God has given to men all that is necessary for them to accomplish their
destinies. He has provided a social form as well as a human form. And
these social organs of persons are so constituted that they will develop
themselves harmoniously in the clean air of liberty. Away, then, with
quacks and organizers! Away with their rings, chains, hooks, and
pincers! Away with their artificial systems! Away with the whims of
governmental administrators, their socialized projects, their
centralization, their tariffs, their government schools, their state
religions, their free credit, their bank monopolies, their regulations,
their restrictions, their equalization by taxation, and their pious
moralizations!
And now that the legislators and do-gooders have so futilely inflicted
so many systems upon society, may they finally end where they should
have begun: May they reject all systems, and try liberty; for liberty
is an acknowledgment of faith in God and His works.
Frederic Bastiat (1801 to 1850)
(Isaiah 33:22) For the Lord is our judge, the Lord is our lawgiver, the Lord is our king; he will save us.
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