|
Main
- books.jibble.org
My Books
- IRC Hacks
Misc. Articles
- Meaning of Jibble
- M4 Su Doku
- Computer Scrapbooking
- Setting up Java
- Bootable Java
- Cookies in Java
- Dynamic Graphs
- Social Shakespeare
External Links
- Paul Mutton
- Jibble Photo Gallery
- Jibble Forums
- Google Landmarks
- Jibble Shop
- Free Books
- Intershot Ltd
|
books.jibble.org
Previous Page
| Next Page
Page 57
Serious objections may be made to it.
In the first place, the word _universal_ conceals a gross sophism. There
are, in France, 36,000,000 of inhabitants. To make the right of suffrage
universal, 36,000,000 of electors should be reckoned. The most extended
system reckons only 9,000,000. Three persons out of four, then, are
excluded; and more than this, they are excluded by the fourth. Upon what
principle is this exclusion founded? Upon the principle of incapacity.
Universal suffrage, then, means--universal suffrage of those who are
capable. In point of fact, who are the capable? Are age, sex, and
judicial condemnations the only conditions to which incapacity is to be
attached?
On taking a nearer view of the subject, we may soon perceive the motive
which causes the right of suffrage to depend upon the presumption of
incapacity; the most extended system differing only in this respect from
the most restricted, by the appreciation of those conditions on which
this incapacity depends, and which constitutes, not a difference in
principle, but in degree.
This motive is, that the elector does not stipulate for himself, but for
everybody.
If, as the republicans of the Greek and Roman tone pretend, the right of
suffrage had fallen to the lot of every one at his birth, it would be an
injustice to adults 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 the elector does not reap
alone the responsibility of his vote; because every vote engages and
affects the community at large; because the community has a right to
demand some securities, as regards the acts upon which his well-being
and his existence depend.
I know what might be said in answer to this. I know what might be
objected. But this is not the place to exhaust a controversy of this
kind. What I wish to observe is this, that this same controversy (in
common with the greater part of political questions) which agitates,
excites, and unsettles the nations, would lose almost all its importance
if the law had always been what it ought to be.
In fact, if law were confined to causing all persons, all liberties, and
all properties to be respected--if it were merely the organisation of
individual right and individual defence--if it were the obstacle, the
check, the chastisement opposed to all oppression, to all plunder--is it
likely that we should dispute much, as citizens, on the subject of the
greater or less universality of suffrage? Is it likely that it would
compromise that greatest of advantages, the public peace? Is it likely
that the excluded classes would not quietly wait for their turn? Is it
likely that the enfranchised classes would be very jealous of their
privilege? And is it not clear, that the interest of all being one and
the same, some would act without much inconvenience to the others?
But if the fatal principle should come to be introduced, that, under
pretence of organisation, regulation, protection, or encouragement, the
law may take from one party in order to give to another, help itself to
the wealth acquired by all the classes that it may increase that of one
class, whether that of the agriculturists, the manufacturers, the
shipowners, or artists and comedians; then certainly, in this case,
there is no class which may not pretend, and with reason, to place its
hand upon the law, which would not demand with fury its right of
election and eligibility, and which would overturn society rather than
not obtain it. Even beggars and vagabonds will prove to you that they
have an incontestable title to it. They will say--"We never buy wine,
tobacco, or salt, without paying the tax, and a part of this tax is
given by law in perquisites and gratuities to men who are richer than we
are. Others make use of the law to create an artificial rise in the
price of bread, meat, iron, or cloth. Since everybody traffics in law
for his own profit, we should like to do the same. We should like to
make it produce the _right to assistance_, which is the poor man's
plunder. To effect this, we ought to be electors and legislators, that
we may organise, on a large scale, alms for our own class, as you have
organised, on a large scale, protection for yours. Don't tell us that
you will take our cause upon yourselves, and throw to us 600,000 francs
to keep us quiet, like giving us a bone to pick. We have other claims,
and, at any rate, we wish to stipulate for ourselves, as other classes
have stipulated for themselves!" How is this argument to be answered?
Yes, as long as it is admitted that the law may be diverted from its
true mission, that it may violate property instead of securing it,
everybody will be wanting to manufacture law, either to defend himself
against plunder, or to organise it for his own profit. The political
question will always be prejudicial, predominant, and absorbing; in a
word, there will be fighting around the door of the Legislative Palace.
The struggle will be no less furious within it. To be convinced of
this, it is hardly necessary to look at what passes in the Chambers in
France and in England; it is enough to know how the question stands.
Previous Page
| Next Page
|
|