Part 5

Depart from this point, make the law religious, fraternal, equalizing, industrial, literary, or artistic, and you will be lost in vagueness and uncertainty; you will be upon unknown ground, in a forced Utopia, or, what is worse, in the midst of a multitude of contending Utopias, each striving to gain possession of the law, and to impose it upon you; for fraternity and philanthropy have no fixed limits, as justice has. Where will you stop? Where is the law to stop? One person, Mr. de Saint Cricq, will only extend his philanthropy to some of the industrial classes, and will require the law to slight the consumers in favor of the producers. Another, like Mr. Considérant, will take up the cause of the working classes, and claim for them by means of the law, at a fixed rate, clothing, lodging, food, and

{51}

everything necessary for the support of life. A third, Mr. Louis Blanc, will say, and with reason, that this would be an incomplete fraternity, and that the law ought to provide them with tools of labor and education. A fourth will observe that such an arrangement still leaves room for inequality, and that the law ought to introduce into the most remote hamlets luxury, literature, and the arts. This is the high road to communism; in other words, legislation will be--as it now is--the battlefield for everybody's dreams and everybody's covetousness.

Law is justice.

In this proposition we represent to ourselves a simple, immovable Government. And I defy anyone to tell me whence the thought of a revolution, an insurrection, or a simple disturbance could arise against a public force confined to the repression of injustice. Under such a system, there would be more well-being, and this well-being would be more equally distributed; and as to the sufferings inseparable from humanity, no one would think of accusing the Government of them, for it would be as innocent of them as it is of the variations of the temperature. Have the people ever been known to rise against the court of appeals, or assail the justices of the peace, for the sake of claiming the rate of wages, free credit, tools of labor, the advantages of the tariff, or the social workshop? They know perfectly well that these matters are beyond the jurisdiction of the justices of the peace, and they would soon learn that they are not within the jurisdiction of the law quite as much.

But if the law were to be made upon the principle of fraternity, if it were to be proclaimed that from it proceed all benefits and all evils--that it is responsible for every individual grievance and for every social inequality--then

{52}

you open the door to an endless succession of complaints, irritations, troubles, and revolutions.

_Law is justice_.

And it would be very strange if it could properly be anything else! Is not justice right? Are not rights equal? With what show of right can the law interfere to subject me to the social plans of Messrs. Mimerel, de Melun, Thiers, or Louis Blanc, rather than to subject these gentlemen to my plans? Is it to be supposed that Nature has not bestowed upon me sufficient imagination to invent a Utopia too? Is it for the law to make choice of one amongst so many fancies, and to make use of the public force in its service?

_Law is justice_.

And let it not be said, as it continually is, that the law, in this sense, would be atheistic, individual, and heartless, and that it would mold mankind in its own image. This is an absurd conclusion, quite worthy of the governmental infatuation which sees mankind in the law.

What then? Does it follow that if we are free, we shall cease to act? Does it follow that if we do not receive an impulse from the law, we shall receive no impulse at all? Does it follow that if the law confines itself to securing to us the free exercise of our faculties, our faculties will be paralyzed? Does it follow, that if the law does not impose upon us forms of religion, modes of association, methods of education, rules for labor, directions for exchange, and plans for charity, we shall plunge headlong into atheism, isolation, ignorance, misery, and greed? Does it follow, that we shall no longer recognize the power and goodness of God; that we shall cease to associate together, to help each other, to love and assist our unfortunate brethren, to

{53}

study the secrets of nature, and to aspire after perfection in our existence?

_Law is justice_.

And it is under the law of justice, under the reign of right, under the influence of liberty, security, stability, and responsibility, that every man will attain to the fullness of his worth, to all the dignity of his being, and that mankind will accomplish with order and with calmness--slowly, it is true, but with certainty--the progress ordained for it.

I believe that my theory is correct; for whatever be the question upon which I am arguing, whether it be religious, philosophical, political, or economical; whether it affects well-being, morality, equality, right, justice, progress, responsibility, property, labor, exchange, capital, wages, taxes, population, credit, or Government; at whatever point of the scientific horizon I start from, I invariably come to the same thing--the solution of the social problem is in liberty.

And have I not experience on my side? Cast your eye over the globe. Which are the happiest, the most moral, and the most peaceable nations? Those where the law interferes the least with private activity; where the Government is the least felt; where individuality has the most scope, and public opinion the most influence; where the machinery of the administration is the least important and the least complicated; where taxation is lightest and least unequal, popular discontent the least excited and the least justifiable; where the responsibility of individuals and classes is the most active, and where, consequently, if morals are not in a perfect state, at any rate they tend incessantly to correct themselves; where transactions, meetings, and associations are the least fettered; where labor, capital, and production suffer the least from artificial

{54}

displacements; where mankind follows most completely its own natural course; where the thought of God prevails the most over the inventions of men; those, in short, who realize the most nearly this idea that within the limits of right, all should flow from the free, perfectible, and voluntary action of man; nothing be attempted by the law or by force, except the administration of universal justice.

I cannot avoid coming to this conclusion--that there are too many great men in the world; there are too many legislators, organizers, institutors of society, conductors of the people, fathers of nations, etc., etc. Too many persons place themselves above mankind, to rule and patronize it; too many persons make a trade of looking after it. It will be answered--"You yourself are occupied upon it all this time." Very true. But it must be admitted that it is in another sense entirely that I am speaking; and if I join the reformers it is solely for the purpose of inducing them to relax their hold.

I am not doing as Vaucauson did with his automaton, but as a physiologist does with the human frame; I would study and admire it.

I am acting with regard to it in the spirit that animated a celebrated traveler. He found himself in the midst of a savage tribe. A child had just been born, and a crowd of soothsayers, magicians, and quacks were around it, armed with rings, hooks, and bandages. One said--"This child will never smell the perfume of a calumet, unless I stretch his nostrils." Another said--"He will be without the sense of hearing, unless I draw his ears down to his shoulders." A third said--"He will never see the light of the sun, unless I give his eyes an oblique direction." A fourth said--"He will never be upright, unless I bend his legs." A fifth said--"He will not be able to think, unless I press his

{55}

brain." "Stop!" said the traveler. "Whatever God does, is well done; do not pretend to know more than He; and as He has given organs to this frail creature, allow those organs to develop themselves, to strengthen themselves by exercise, use, experience, and liberty."

God has implanted in mankind also all that is necessary to enable it to accomplish its destinies. There is a providential social physiology, as well as a providential human physiology. The social organs are constituted so as to enable them to develop harmoniously in the grand air of liberty. Away, then, with quacks and organizers! Away with their rings, and their chains, and their hooks, and their pincers! Away with their artificial methods! Away with their social laboratories, their governmental whims, their centralization, their tariffs, their universities, their State religions, their inflationary or monopolizing banks, their limitations, their restrictions, their moralizations, and their equalization by taxation! And now, after having vainly inflicted upon the social body so many systems, let them end where they ought to have begun--reject all systems, and try liberty--liberty, which is an act of faith in God and in His work.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 1: First published in 1850.]

[Footnote 2: General Council of Manufactures, Agriculture, and Commerce, 6th of May, 1850.]

[Footnote 3: If protection were only granted in France to a single class, to the engineers, for instance, it would be so absurdly plundering, as to be unable to maintain itself. Thus we see all the protected trades combine, make common cause, and even recruit themselves in such a way as to appear to embrace the mass of the national labor. They feel instinctively that plunder is slurred over by being generalized.]

[Footnote 4: Political economy precedes politics: the former has to discover whether human interests are harmonious or antagonistic, a fact which must be settled before the latter can determine the prerogatives of Government.]

INDEX

Action, human. See Individualism;

Mankind

Agriculture analogy to society, 35 Persian, 26 Antiquity. See Greece; Rome Authority. See Government

Beggars, 11 Billaud-Varennes, Jean Nicolas, 38 Blanc, Louis competition, 45 doctrine, 42, 43 force of society, 47, 48 labor, 42 law, 50, 52 Bonaparte, Napoleon, 41 Bossuet, Jacques Bénigne, 25, 26

Cabetists, 46, 47 Capital displacement, 2 Carlier, Pierre, 13 Carthage, 32 Charity, vii, 5, 17 See also Wealth, equality of; Welfare Classical studies, 25, 26, 36, 37, 38 Collectivism, 2, 3 See also Government Communism, 18 Competition meaning, 45 results, 45 Condillac, Étienne Bonnot de, 35, 38 Constituent Assembly, 24 Conventionality, 37 Crete, 28

Defense right of, 2, 3, 37, 49, 50 Democracy, vi, 43, 44 Democrats, 43 Dictatorship, vii, 39, 40 Disposition, fatal, 5, 37, 38 Distribution, 33, 34 Dole, 10, 11 See also Welfare Dupin, Charles, 13

Education classical, 26, 38 controlled, 33 Greek, 26

{57}

{58}

liberty in, 44 free, 21, 22 government provided, 22, 48 Egypt, 25, 26, 27 Elections, 43, 44 See also Voting Employment assigned, 26 See also Labor Equality of wealth, 11, 20, 29, 36

Fénelon, François de Salignac de La Mothe antiquity, 27, 29 Telemachus, 27 Force common or collective, 2, 3 individual, 2, 3 motive, of society, 40, 43 See also Government; Law Forced conformity, viii Fourier, François Marie Charles, 41 Fourierists, 46 France revolutions, 47 Fraternity legally enforced, 16, 17, 21, 22 Fraud, 13, 14 Freedom. See Liberty French Revolution, 38 public services, 10, 11 purpose of, v relaxed, 35 republican, 30, 39 responsibility and, 3, 47, 48, 51 results, 28 stability, 31 virtue, 39 See also Communism, Socialism

Greece education, 26 law, 26, 27 republic, 29, 30 Sparta, 32, 36, 38 Greed, 5

Happiness of the governed, 28 History, 5 Humanity lost, 19, 20

Imports. See Trade Individualism, 3 Industry, protected. See Protectionism

Jobs. See Employment Justice and injustice, distinction between, 7 generalized, 7 immutable, 49, 50 intentions and, 17, 18 law and, 3, 6, 49 reigning, 19 General welfare, 19 Government American ideal of, v corrupting education by, vi democratic, 29, 43, 44 education, 23, 48 force, 2, 3 function, 38 monopoly, 45 morality, 39 motive force, 40, 43 power, v, 47

Labor displaced, 4 Land. See Property Law Cretan, 28 defined, 2, 16

{59}

Egyptian, 25, 26, 27, 28 fraternity and, 17 functions, 16, 31, 33, 49, 50 Greek, 26, 28, 29 justice and, 3, 4, 16, 51 morality and, 7, 21 motive force, 25 object of, 19 omnipotence, 44, 49 Persian, 26 perverted, v, 1, 5 philanthropic, 17 plunder and, 5, 13 posterior and inferior, 2, 3 respect for, 7, 9 Rousseau's views, 31, 33, 38 spirit of, 32 study of, 25 United States, 12 See also Legislation Lamartine, Alphonse Marie Louis de, fraternity, 17 government power, 48, 49 Lawgiver, 38, 43 Legislation conflict in, 32 monopoly on, 5 struggle for control of, 11, 12 universal right of, 7 See also Law Legislator. See Lawgiver; Politicians Lepéletier, Louis Michel de Saint Fargeau, 39 Liberty competition and, 44, 45 defined, 42 denied, 44, 45 described, 53 education and, 44, 45 individual, 3 as power, 43 returned to, 55 seeking, 38

Life, faculties of, 1 Louis XIV 27 Lycurgus government, 30, 35, 36 influence, 33, 40

Mably, Abbé Gabriel Bonnot de, 35, 39 Mankind assimilation, 2 concern for, 54 degraded, 25 divided, 23 inert, 23, 25, 26, 28, 31, 35, 36, 38, 39, 42, 43, 44, 47 inertia, 44 as machine, 31 nature of, 33 violation of, 52

Melun, Armand de, 52 Mentor, 28, 29 Mimerel de Roubaix, Pierre Auguste Remi, 52 Monopoly, 5, 45 Montalembert, Charles, Comte de, 13, 15 Montesquieu, Charles Louis de Secondât, Baron de, 29, 31 Morality law and, 21, 22 Morelly, 41

Napoleon, 41 Natural rights, v Nature, gifts of, 1

Oliver de Serres, Guillaume Antoine, 29 Order, 3 Owen, Robert, 41 Ownership. See Property

Paraguay, 30 Persia, 26

{60}

Personality, 2 Phalansteries, 55 Philanthropy. See Charity Plato republic, 30 Plunder absence of, 16 burdens of, 5, 6 defined, 17 general welfare and, 19 extralegal, 13 kinds, 13 legal, v, ix, 6, 13, 22 organized, 14 origin of, 6 partial, 15, 16 socialistic, 13 universal, 15, 16 Politicians dreams of, 36 genius of, 30 goodness of, 25 importance of, 22, 23 responsibility of, 27 social engineers, 22, 24, 32, 34, 37, 38, 40, 42, 44, 45 superior, 46, 54 Politics exaggerated importance of, 8 and favors, vi plunder through, vi Poor relief. See Charity; Welfare Power. See Government Property man and, 2 origin of, 5 Protectionism, 18 United States, 12 Proudhonians, 46 Providence, 55 Public relief, 10, 20, 29

Raynal, Abbé Guillaume, 33, 35 Religion, State, 22 Rent seeking, vi, vii Republic kinds of, 29 virtues of, 39 Revolt, 6 Revolution, 47 French, 38 Rhodes, 32 Rights individual, v, 2, 3 Roberspierre, Jean Jacques government, 38 lawgiver, 40 Rome virtue, 32 Rousseau, Jean Jacques disciples, 8, 9 on the lawgiver, 31, 33

Saint-Cricq, Barthélémy, Pierre Laurent, Comte de, 50 Saint-Just, Louis Antoine Léon de, 38 Saint-Simon, Claude Henri, Comte de doctrine, 41 Salentum, 27, 29 Security consequences, 3 Self-defense, 2, 37, 49, 50 Selfishness, 5 Serres, Oliver de, 29 Slavery, United States, viii, 12 universality, 5 Socialism confused, ix, 22 defined, 14, 15 disguised, 22 experiments, 23, 24 legal plunder, 13 sincerely believed, 18 social engineers, 22, 24 refutation of, 15 Socialists, vii Society enlightened, 37

{61}

experiments, 23 motive force, 40, 43 object of, 36, 37 parable of the traveler, 54, 55

Solon, 33, 35 Sparta, 32, 36 Spoliation. See Plunder State. See Government Suffrage. See Universal suffrage

Tariffs, vi, viii Telemachus, 27 Terror as means of republican government, 39, 40 Theirs, Louis Adolphe doctrine, 52 education, 45 Tyre, 32

United States, viii, 12 Declaration of Independence, v Universal suffrage demand for, 9, 43, 44, 46, 47 importance of, 10 incapacity and, 9 objections, 9

Vaucanson, Jacques de, 54 Vested interests, 13, 14 Virtue and vice, 28, 30, 35, 36, 40 Voting responsibility and, 9, 10 right of, 10 See also Universal suffrage

Want satisfaction, 4 Wealth equality of, 11, 21, 29, 36 transfer of, vii Welfare, 10, 20, 28

The law perverted! The law--and, in its wake, all the collective forces of the nation. The law, I say, not only diverted from its proper direction, but made to pursue one entirely contrary! The law becomes the tool of every kind of avarice, instead of being its check! The law guilty of that very inequity which it was its mission to punish! Truly, this is a serious fact, if it exists, and one to which I feel bound to call the attention of my fellow-citizens.

--Frédéric Bastiat