The Law
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Reviews for The Law
206 ratings7 reviews
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5A classic view of politics. This is another book that our current politicians should read carefully. Bastiat was absolutely correct when he said that "Law is justice" and that its primary purpose should be protect rights and not to dictate actions.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5One of the fundamental 19th century texts for understanding why communism and socialism are total failures and wholly and irretrievably immoral in application. Bastiat describes the basis for stable government, and explains why liberty is tied to theological, economic, and political ideas.
- Rating: 2 out of 5 stars2/5I was greatly greatly disappointed by this audio book. Like most writings of the 19th century I have read lately, this one was clearly written for an audience with a much larger attention span, and much more educated than the average 21st century American. I felt like Bastiat kept repeating the same thing over and over again. I'm not sure how much of this is true, and how much of this was the fact that I learned this particular MP3 CD exposed a bug in the radio in my VW. At one point, I learned, that my CD starts over at 27 minutes into the track regardless of where it left off. However, the fact it took several ignition cycles for me to figure this out indicates how uninteresting this book was. I had high hopes, I had friends indicate to me that this was the great Catholic Anarchinst novel. Bastiat i wouldn't take to be an anarchist after "reading" this and although he may be a Catholic, he didn't seem to be much of one either. I can some up this whole book as, the law is only valid if it protects individual rights, that what ever other libertarian says, nothing "new" here.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Filled to the brim with bright wonderful words. Bastiat is a shining example to all ages. Sets the thinking gears in motion on what are laws, and why do they eist, and what is our relation to them.
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Bastiat's "La Loi" is undoubtedly an interesting read, for those already of a libertarian-dispostion, and for others curious about the ideas and arguments of those who advocate a limited government. The arguments put across by Bastiat, however, did not win me round to the completely libertarian way of thinking.The book is certainly short, serving more as an introduction to the ideas of liberty, property and the role of government. However, the style the book is written in makes it difficult to pick out some of the more complex arguments, and makes the book quite boring at times. However, it is worth reading as the actual essay is fairly short.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5This is a formative, classic work. If you are into politics, do yourself a favor and read it ASAP. This is really a light-weight primer to libertarianism, and yet it is very powerful and heavy-duty at the same time. If more people would read (and adopt) these ideas, I think our political environment would slowly move in the right direction!
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Bastiat's most important work was probably "The Law." Published in the year of his death, it is a concise formulation of the case for classic liberalism, and a stern warning against the dark clouds of socialism that were descending upon Europe, particularly after the great upheavals of 1848.Bastiat begins by clarifying the proper role of law in an enlightened Liberal society: the preservation of life, liberty, and property:"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."Bastiat explains how the collectivist agitation sweeping Western Europe in the mid nineteenth century sought to use the law for purposes well outside its purview. In a passage that sounds like it was written today, he laments this unfortunate turn of events:"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, in order to protect plunder. And it has converted lawful defense into a crime, in order to punish lawful defense."One of the causes of this perversion of the law, says Bastiat, is greed. To satisfy his needs, man must labor. But needs can also be met by resorting to plunder, i.e., appropriating the fruits of someone else's labor. Socialism is nothing but generalized plunder, where groups who feel aggrieved enter the political process with the goal of using the law to steal from those they consider to be their oppressors.What are the consequences of this trend?"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 consciousness the distinction between justice and injustice...The nature of the 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."Bastiat's words bring to mind the contemporary wave of legislation and adjudications in the realm of affirmative action. This is one of our own highly-developed methods of legal plunder, and it has done much to "erase from everyone's conscience the distinction between justice and injustice."Taking the perversion of law to its logical extreme, Bastiat declares:"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?"On page after page, Bastiat picks apart socialist ideology, revealing its arrogance and its true intentions. I was particularly struck by the following passage, which carried the heading, "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 defend that the Constituent Assembly give him a small district with all its inhabitants, to try his experiments upon.I conclude with Bastiat's clarion call for classic liberalism:"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..."
Book preview
The Law - Frédéric Bastiat
THE LAW
By FREDERIC BASTIAT
Translated by DEAN RUSSELL
The Law
By Frederic Bastiat
Translated by Dean Russell
Print ISBN 13: 978-1-4209-5497-5
eBook ISBN 13: 978-1-4209-5498-2
This edition copyright © 2017. Digireads.com Publishing.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.
Cover Image: a detail of The Tax Collector
, c. 1543 (oil on canvas), Paul Vos (fl.1543) / Galleria Sabauda, Turin, Italy / Bridgeman Images.
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CONTENTS
The Law
Life Is a Gift from God
What Is Law?
A Just and Enduring Government
The Complete Perversion of the Law
A Fatal Tendency of Mankind
Property and Plunder
Victims of Lawful Plunder
The Results of Legal Plunder
The Fate of Non-Conformists
Who Shall Judge?
The Reason Why Voting Is Restricted
The Answer Is to Restrict the Law
The Fatal Idea of Legal Plunder
Perverted Law Causes Conflict
Slavery and Tariffs Are Plunder
Two Kinds of Plunder
The Law Defends Plunder
How to Identify Legal Plunder
Legal Plunder Has Many Names
Socialism Is Legal Plunder
The Choice Before Us
The Proper Function of the Law
The Seductive Lure of Socialism
Enforced Fraternity Destroys Liberty
Plunder Violates Ownership
Three Systems of Plunder
Law Is Force
Law Is a Negative Concept
The Political Approach
The Law and Charity
The Law and Education
The Law and Morals
A Confusion of Terms
The Influence of Socialist Writers
The Socialists Wish to Play God
The Socialists Despise Mankind
A Defense of Compulsory Labor
A Defense of Paternal Government
The Idea of Passive Mankind
Socialists Ignore Reason and Facts
Socialists Want to Regiment People
A Famous Name and an Evil Idea
A Frightful Idea
The Leader of the Democrats
Socialists Want Forced Conformity
Legislators Desire to Mold Mankind
Legislators Told How to Manage Men
A Temporary Dictatorship
Socialists Want Equality of Wealth
The Error of the Socialist Writers
What Is Liberty?
Philanthropic Tyranny
The Socialists Want Dictatorship
Dictatorial Arrogance
The Indirect Approach to Despotism
Napoleon Wanted Passive Mankind
The Vicious Circle of Socialism
The Doctrine of the Democrats
The Socialist Concept of Liberty
Socialists Fear All Liberties
The Superman Idea
The Socialists Reject Free Choice
The Cause of French Revolutions
The Enormous Power of Government
Politics and Economics
Proper Legislative Functions
Law and Charity Are Not the Same
The High Road to Communism
The Basis for Stable Government
Justice Means Equal Rights
The Path to Dignity and Progress
Proof of an Idea
The Desire to Rule Over Others
Let Us Now Try Liberty
The Law
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.
Life Is a Gift from God
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 Is Law?
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