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Page 21
There is nothing to prove that this latter class calls for more sympathy
than the former. M. Lamartine does not say that it is so. He himself
says that the labour of the theatres is _as_ fertile, _as_ productive as
any other (not more so); and this may be doubted; for the best proof
that the latter is not so fertile as the former lies in this, that the
other is to be called upon to assist it.
But this comparison between the value and the intrinsic merit of
different kinds of labour forms no part of my present subject. All I
have to do here is to show, that if M. Lamartine and those persons who
commend his line of argument have seen on one side the salaries gained
by the _providers_ of the comedians, they ought on the other to have
seen the salaries lost by the _providers_ of the taxpayers: for want of
this, they have exposed themselves to ridicule by mistaking a
_displacement_ for a _gain_. If they were true to their doctrine, there
would be no limits to their demands for government aid; for that which
is true of one franc and of 60,000 is true, under parallel
circumstances, of a hundred millions of francs.
When taxes are the subject of discussion, you ought to prove their
utility by reasons from the root of the matter, but not by this unlucky
assertion--"The public expenses support the working classes." This
assertion disguises the important fact, that _public expenses always_
supersede _private expenses_, and that therefore we bring a livelihood
to one workman instead of another, but add nothing to the share of the
working class as a whole. Your arguments are fashionable enough, but
they are too absurd to be justified by anything like reason.
V.--Public Works.
Nothing is more natural than that a nation, after having assured itself
that an enterprise will benefit the community, should have it executed
by means of a general assessment. But I lose patience, I confess, when I
hear this economic blunder advanced in support of such a
project--"Besides, it will be a means of creating labour for the
workmen."
The State opens a road, builds a palace, straightens a street, cuts a
canal, and so gives work to certain workmen--_this is what is seen_: but
it deprives certain other workmen of work--and this is what _is not
seen_.
The road is begun. A thousand workmen come every morning, leave every
evening, and take their wages--this is certain. If the road had not been
decreed, if the supplies had not been voted, these good people would
have had neither work nor salary there; this also is certain.
But is this all? Does not the operation, as a whole, contain something
else? At the moment when M. Dupin pronounces the emphatic words, "The
Assembly has adopted," do the millions descend miraculously on a
moonbeam into the coffers of MM. Fould and Bineau? In order that the
evolution may be complete, as it is said, must not the State organise
the receipts as well as the expenditure? must it not set its
tax-gatherers and tax-payers to work, the former to gather and the
latter to pay?
Study the question, now, in both its elements. While you state the
destination given by the State to the millions voted, do not neglect to
state also the destination which the tax-payer would have given, but
cannot now give, to the same. Then you will understand that a public
enterprise is a coin with two sides. Upon one is engraved a labourer at
work, with this device, _that which is seen_; on the other is a labourer
out of work, with the device, _that which is not seen_.
The sophism which this work is intended to refute is the more dangerous
when applied to public works, inasmuch as it serves to justify the most
wanton enterprises and extravagance. When a railroad or a bridge are of
real utility, it is sufficient to mention this utility. But if it does
not exist, what do they do? Recourse is had to this mystification: "We
must find work for the workmen."
Accordingly, orders are given that the drains in the Champ-de-Mars be
made and unmade. The great Napoleon, it is said, thought he was doing a
very philanthropic work by causing ditches to be made and then filled
up. He said, therefore, "What signifies the result? All we want is to
see wealth spread among the labouring classes."
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