This is severe on our pride, but it is an
inexorable
truth.
Proudhon - What is Property? An Inquiry into the Principle of Right and of Government
Probably
they are satisfied with half of their salary. Paid according to the
labor that they had performed, of what could they complain? and what
injury would they do to others? In this sense, it is fair to apply the
maxim,--TO EACH ACCORDING TO HIS RESULTS. It is the law of equality
itself.
Further, numerous difficulties, relative to the police system and the
organization of industry, might be raised here. I will reply to them all
with this one sentence,--that they must all be solved by the principle
of equality. Thus, some one might observe, "Here is a task which cannot
be postponed without detriment to production. Ought society to suffer
from the negligence of a few? and will she not venture--out of respect
for the right of labor--to assure with her own hands the product which
they refuse her? In such a case, to whom will the salary belong? "
To society; who will be allowed to perform the labor, either herself, or
through her representatives, but always in such a way that the general
equality shall never be violated, and that only the idler shall be
punished for his idleness. Further, if society may not use excessive
severity towards her lazy members, she has a right, in self-defence, to
guard against abuses.
But every industry needs--they will add--leaders, instructors,
superintendents, &c. Will these be engaged in the general task? No;
since their task is to lead, instruct, and superintend. But they must be
chosen from the laborers by the laborers themselves, and must fulfil
the conditions of eligibility. It is the same with all public functions,
whether of administration or instruction.
Then, article first of the universal constitution will be:--
"The limited quantity of available material proves the necessity of
dividing the labor among the whole number of laborers. The capacity,
given to all, of accomplishing a social task,--that is, an equal
task,--and the impossibility of paying one laborer save in the products
of another, justify the equality of wages. "
% 7. --That Inequality of Powers is the Necessary Condition of Equality
of Fortunes.
It is objected,--and this objection constitutes the second part of the
St. Simonian, and the third part of the Fourierstic, maxims,--
"That all kinds of labor cannot be executed with equal ease. Some
require great superiority of skill and intelligence; and on this
superiority is based the price. The artist, the savant, the poet, the
statesman, are esteemed only because of their excellence; and this
excellence destroys all similitude between them and other men: in the
presence of these heights of science and genius the law of equality
disappears. Now, if equality is not absolute, there is no equality.
From the poet we descend to the novelist; from the sculptor to the
stonecutter; from the architect to the mason; from the chemist to the
cook, &c. Capacities are classified and subdivided into orders, genera,
and species. The extremes of talent are connected by intermediate
talents. Humanity is a vast hierarchy, in which the individual estimates
himself by comparison, and fixes his price by the value placed upon his
product by the public. "
This objection always has seemed a formidable one. It is the
stumbling-block of the economists, as well as of the defenders of
equality. It has led the former into egregious blunders, and has caused
the latter to utter incredible platitudes. Gracchus Babeuf wished all
superiority to be STRINGENTLY REPRESSED, and even PERSECUTED AS A SOCIAL
CALAMITY. To establish his communistic edifice, he lowered all citizens
to the stature of the smallest. Ignorant eclectics have been known to
object to the inequality of knowledge, and I should not be surprised if
some one should yet rebel against the inequality of virtue. Aristotle
was banished, Socrates drank the hemlock, Epaminondas was called to
account, for having proved superior in intelligence and virtue to some
dissolute and foolish demagogues. Such follies will be re-enacted, so
long as the inequality of fortunes justifies a populace, blinded and
oppressed by the wealthy, in fearing the elevation of new tyrants to
power.
Nothing seems more unnatural than that which we examine too closely, and
often nothing seems less like the truth than the truth itself. On the
other hand, according to J. J. Rousseau, "it takes a great deal of
philosophy to enable us to observe once what we see every day;" and,
according to d'Alembert, "the ordinary truths of life make but little
impression on men, unless their attention is especially called to them. "
The father of the school of economists (Say), from whom I borrow these
two quotations, might have profited by them; but he who laughs at the
blind should wear spectacles, and he who notices him is near-sighted.
Strange! that which has frightened so many minds is not, after all,
an objection to equality--it is the very condition on which equality
exists! . . .
Natural inequality the condition of equality of fortunes! . . . What
a paradox! . . . I repeat my assertion, that no one may think I have
blundered--inequality of powers is the sine qua non of equality of
fortunes.
There are two things to be considered in society--FUNCTIONS and
RELATIONS.
I. FUNCTIONS. Every laborer is supposed to be capable of performing the
task assigned to him; or, to use a common expression, "every workman
must know his trade. " The workman equal to his work,--there is an
equation between functionary and function.
In society, functions are not alike; there must be, then, different
capacities. Further,--certain functions demand greater intelligence
and powers; then there are people of superior mind and talent. For
the performance of work necessarily involves a workman: from the need
springs the idea, and the idea makes the producer. We only know what our
senses long for and our intelligence demands; we have no keen desire
for things of which we cannot conceive, and the greater our powers of
conception, the greater our capabilities of production.
Thus, functions arising from needs, needs from desires, and desires
from spontaneous perception and imagination, the same intelligence which
imagines can also produce; consequently, no labor is superior to the
laborer. In a word, if the function calls out the functionary, it is
because the functionary exists before the function.
Let us admire Nature's economy. With regard to these various needs which
she has given us, and which the isolated man cannot satisfy unaided,
Nature has granted to the race a power refused to the individual. This
gives rise to the principle of the DIVISION OF LABOR,--a principle
founded on the SPECIALITY OF VOCATIONS.
The satisfaction of some needs demands of man continual creation;
while others can, by the labor of a single individual, be satisfied for
millions of men through thousands of centuries. For example, the need of
clothing and food requires perpetual reproduction; while a knowledge
of the system of the universe may be acquired for ever by two or
three highly-gifted men. The perpetual current of rivers supports our
commerce, and runs our machinery; but the sun, alone in the midst of
space, gives light to the whole world. Nature, who might create
Platos and Virgils, Newtons and Cuviers, as she creates husbandmen and
shepherds, does not see fit to do so; choosing rather to proportion the
rarity of genius to the duration of its products, and to balance the
number of capacities by the competency of each one of them.
I do not inquire here whether the distance which separates one man from
another, in point of talent and intelligence, arises from the deplorable
condition of civilization, nor whether that which is now called the
INEQUALITY OF POWERS would be in an ideal society any thing more than
a DIVERSITY OF POWERS. I take the worst view of the matter; and, that
I may not be accused of tergiversation and evasion of difficulties, I
acknowledge all the inequalities that any one can desire. [16]
Certain philosophers, in love with the levelling idea, maintain that all
minds are equal, and that all differences are the result of education.
I am no believer, I confess, in this doctrine; which, even if it were
true, would lead to a result directly opposite to that desired. For, if
capacities are equal, whatever be the degree of their power (as no one
can be coerced), there are functions deemed coarse, low, and degrading,
which deserve higher pay,--a result no less repugnant to equality than
to the principle, TO EACH CAPACITY ACCORDING TO ITS RESULTS. Give me,
on the contrary, a society in which every kind of talent bears a proper
numerical relation to the needs of the society, and which demands from
each producer only that which his special function requires him to
produce; and, without impairing in the least the hierarchy of functions,
I will deduce the equality of fortunes.
This is my second point.
II. RELATIONS. In considering the element of labor, I have shown that in
the same class of productive services, the capacity to perform a social
task being possessed by all, no inequality of reward can be based upon
an inequality of individual powers. However, it is but fair to say that
certain capacities seem quite incapable of certain services; so that, if
human industry were entirely confined to one class of products, numerous
incapacities would arise, and, consequently, the greatest social
inequality. But every body sees, without any hint from me, that the
variety of industries avoids this difficulty; so clear is this that
I shall not stop to discuss it. We have only to prove, then, that
functions are equal to each other; just as laborers, who perform the
same function, are equal to each other.
Property makes man a eunuch, and then reproaches him for being nothing
but dry wood, a decaying tree.
Are you astonished that I refuse to genius, to knowledge, to
courage,--in a word, to all the excellences admired by the world,--the
homage of dignities, the distinctions of power and wealth? It is not I
who refuse it: it is economy, it is justice, it is liberty. Liberty! for
the first time in this discussion I appeal to her. Let her rise in her
own defence, and achieve her victory.
Every transaction ending in an exchange of products or services may be
designated as a COMMERCIAL OPERATION.
Whoever says commerce, says exchange of equal values; for, if the values
are not equal, and the injured party perceives it, he will not consent
to the exchange, and there will be no commerce.
Commerce exists only among free men. Transactions may be effected
between other people by violence or fraud, but there is no commerce.
A free man is one who enjoys the use of his reason and his faculties;
who is neither blinded by passion, nor hindered or driven by oppression,
nor deceived by erroneous opinions.
So, in every exchange, there is a moral obligation that neither of the
contracting parties shall gain at the expense of the other; that is,
that, to be legitimate and true, commerce must be exempt from all
inequality. This is the first condition of commerce. Its second
condition is, that it be voluntary; that is, that the parties act freely
and openly.
I define, then, commerce or exchange as an act of society.
The negro who sells his wife for a knife, his children for some bits
of glass, and finally himself for a bottle of brandy, is not free. The
dealer in human flesh, with whom he negotiates, is not his associate; he
is his enemy.
The civilized laborer who bakes a loaf that he may eat a slice of bread,
who builds a palace that he may sleep in a stable, who weaves rich
fabrics that he may dress in rags, who produces every thing that he may
dispense with every thing,--is not free. His employer, not becoming
his associate in the exchange of salaries or services which takes place
between them, is his enemy.
The soldier who serves his country through fear instead of through love
is not free; his comrades and his officers, the ministers or organs of
military justice, are all his enemies.
The peasant who hires land, the manufacturer who borrows capital, the
tax-payer who pays tolls, duties, patent and license fees, personal and
property taxes, &c. , and the deputy who votes for them,--all act
neither intelligently nor freely. Their enemies are the proprietors, the
capitalists, the government.
Give men liberty, enlighten their minds that they may know the meaning
of their contracts, and you will see the most perfect equality in
exchanges without regard to superiority of talent and knowledge; and
you will admit that in commercial affairs, that is, in the sphere of
society, the word superiority is void of sense.
Let Homer sing his verse. I listen to this sublime genius in comparison
with whom I, a simple herdsman, an humble farmer, am as nothing. What,
indeed,--if product is to be compared with product,--are my cheeses and
my beans in the presence of his "Iliad"? But, if Homer wishes to take
from me all that I possess, and make me his slave in return for his
inimitable poem, I will give up the pleasure of his lays, and dismiss
him. I can do without his "Iliad," and wait, if necessary, for the
"AEneid. "
Homer cannot live twenty-four hours without my products. Let him accept,
then, the little that I have to offer; and then his muse may instruct,
encourage, and console me.
"What! do you say that such should be the condition of one who sings of
gods and men? Alms, with the humiliation and suffering which they bring
with them! --what barbarous generosity! ". . . Do not get excited, I beg
of you. Property makes of a poet either a Croesus or a beggar; only
equality knows how to honor and to praise him. What is its duty? To
regulate the right of the singer and the duty of the listener. Now,
notice this point, which is a very important one in the solution of this
question: both are free, the one to sell, the other to buy. Henceforth
their respective pretensions go for nothing; and the estimate, whether
fair or unfair, that they place, the one upon his verse, the other
upon his liberality, can have no influence upon the conditions of the
contract. We must no longer, in making our bargains, weigh talent; we
must consider products only.
In order that the bard of Achilles may get his due reward, he must first
make himself wanted: that done, the exchange of his verse for a fee of
any kind, being a free act, must be at the same time a just act; that
is, the poet's fee must be equal to his product. Now, what is the value
of this product?
Let us suppose, in the first place, that this "Iliad"--this chef-d'
oeuvre that is to be equitably rewarded--is really above price, that we
do not know how to appraise it. If the public, who are free to purchase
it, refuse to do so, it is clear that, the poem being unexchangeable,
its intrinsic value will not be diminished; but that its exchangeable
value, or its productive utility, will be reduced to zero, will be
nothing at all. Then we must seek the amount of wages to be paid between
infinity on the one hand and nothing on the other, at an equal distance
from each, since all rights and liberties are entitled to equal respect;
in other words, it is not the intrinsic value, but the relative value,
of the thing sold that needs to be fixed. The question grows simpler:
what is this relative value? To what reward does a poem like the "Iliad"
entitle its author?
The first business of political economy, after fixing its definitions,
was the solution of this problem; now, not only has it not been solved,
but it has been declared insoluble. According to the economists,
the relative or exchangeable value of things cannot be absolutely
determined; it necessarily varies.
"The value of a thing," says Say, "is a positive quantity, but only for
a given moment. It is its nature to perpetually vary, to change from one
point to another. Nothing can fix it absolutely, because it is based
on needs and means of production which vary with every moment. These
variations complicate economical phenomena, and often render them very
difficult of observation and solution. I know no remedy for this; it is
not in our power to change the nature of things. "
Elsewhere Say says, and repeats, that value being based on utility, and
utility depending entirely on our needs, whims, customs, &c. , value
is as variable as opinion. Now, political economy being the science
of values, of their production, distribution, exchange, and
consumption,--if exchangeable value cannot be absolutely determined,
how is political economy possible? How can it be a science? How can two
economists look each other in the face without laughing? How dare they
insult metaphysicians and psychologists? What! that fool of a Descartes
imagined that philosophy needed an immovable base--an _aliquid
inconcussum_--on which the edifice of science might be built, and he was
simple enough to search for it! And the Hermes of economy, Trismegistus
Say, devoting half a volume to the amplification of that solemn text,
_political economy is a science_, has the courage to affirm immediately
afterwards that this science cannot determine its object,--which is
equivalent to saying that it is without a principle or foundation! He
does not know, then, the illustrious Say, the nature of a science; or
rather, he knows nothing of the subject which he discusses.
Say's example has borne its fruits. Political economy, as it exists at
present, resembles ontology: discussing effects and causes, it knows
nothing, explains nothing, decides nothing. The ideas honored with the
name of economic laws are nothing more than a few trifling generalities,
to which the economists thought to give an appearance of depth by
clothing them in high-sounding words. As for the attempts that have been
made by the economists to solve social problems, all that can be said
of them is, that, if a glimmer of sense occasionally appears in their
lucubrations, they immediately fall back into absurdity. For twenty-five
years political economy, like a heavy fog, has weighed upon France,
checking the efforts of the mind, and setting limits to liberty.
Has every creation of industry a venal, absolute, unchangeable, and
consequently legitimate and true value? --Yes.
Can every product of man be exchanged for some other product of
man? --Yes, again.
How many nails is a pair of shoes worth?
If we can solve this appalling problem, we shall have the key of the
social system for which humanity has been searching for six thousand
years. In the presence of this problem, the economist recoils confused;
the peasant who can neither read nor write replies without hesitation:
"As many as can be made in the same time, and with the same expense. "
The absolute value of a thing, then, is its cost in time and expense.
How much is a diamond worth which costs only the labor of picking it
up? --Nothing; it is not a product of man. How much will it be worth when
cut and mounted? --The time and expense which it has cost the laborer.
Why, then, is it sold at so high a price? --Because men are not free.
Society must regulate the exchange and distribution of the rarest
things, as it does that of the most common ones, in such a way that each
may share in the enjoyment of them. What, then, is that value which is
based upon opinion? --Delusion, injustice, and robbery.
By this rule, it is easy to reconcile every body. If the mean term,
which we are searching for, between an infinite value and no value at
all is expressed in the case of every product, by the amount of time and
expense which the product cost, a poem which has cost its author thirty
years of labor and an outlay of ten thousand francs in journeys, books,
&c. , must be paid for by the ordinary wages received by a laborer during
thirty years, PLUS ten thousand francs indemnity for expense incurred.
Suppose the whole amount to be fifty thousand francs; if the society
which gets the benefit of the production include a million of men, my
share of the debt is five centimes.
This gives rise to a few observations.
1. The same product, at different times and in different places, may
cost more or less of time and outlay; in this view, it is true that
value is a variable quantity. But this variation is not that of the
economists, who place in their list of the causes of the variation of
values, not only the means of production, but taste, caprice, fashion,
and opinion. In short, the true value of a thing is invariable in its
algebraic expression, although it may vary in its monetary expression.
2. The price of every product in demand should be its cost in time and
outlay--neither more nor less: every product not in demand is a loss to
the producer--a commercial non-value.
3. The ignorance of the principle of evaluation, and the difficulty
under many circumstances of applying it, is the source of commercial
fraud, and one of the most potent causes of the inequality of fortunes.
4. To reward certain industries and pay for certain products, a society
is needed which corresponds in size with the rarity of talents, the
costliness of the products, and the variety of the arts and sciences.
If, for example, a society of fifty farmers can support a schoolmaster,
it requires one hundred for a shoemaker, one hundred and fifty for a
blacksmith, two hundred for a tailor, &c. If the number of farmers rises
to one thousand, ten thousand, one hundred thousand, &c. , as fast as
their number increases, that of the functionaries which are earliest
required must increase in the same proportion; so that the highest
functions become possible only in the most powerful societies. [17] That
is the peculiar feature of capacities; the character of genius, the seal
of its glory, cannot arise and develop itself, except in the bosom of
a great nation. But this physiological condition, necessary to the
existence of genius, adds nothing to its social rights: far from
that,--the delay in its appearance proves that, in economical and
civil affairs, the loftiest intelligence must submit to the equality
of possessions; an equality which is anterior to it, and of which it
constitutes the crown.
This is severe on our pride, but it is an inexorable truth. And here
psychology comes to the aid of social economy, giving us to understand
that talent and material recompense have no common measure; that, in
this respect, the condition of all producers is equal: consequently,
that all comparison between them, and all distinction in fortunes, is
impossible.
_ _In fact, every work coming from the hands of man--compared with the
raw material of which it is composed--is beyond price. In this respect,
the distance is as great between a pair of wooden shoes and the trunk of
a walnut-tree, as between a statue by Scopas and a block of marble.
The genius of the simplest mechanic exerts as much influence over the
materials which he uses, as does the mind of a Newton over the inert
spheres whose distances, volumes, and revolutions he calculates. You ask
for talent and genius a corresponding degree of honor and reward. Fix
for me the value of a wood-cutter's talent, and I will fix that of
Homer. If any thing can reward intelligence, it is intelligence itself.
That is what happens, when various classes of producers pay to each
other a reciprocal tribute of admiration and praise. But if they
contemplate an exchange of products with a view to satisfying mutual
needs, this exchange must be effected in accordance with a system of
economy which is indifferent to considerations of talent and genius, and
whose laws are deduced, not from vague and meaningless admiration, but
from a just balance between DEBIT and CREDIT; in short, from commercial
accounts.
Now, that no one may imagine that the liberty of buying and selling
is the sole basis of the equality of wages, and that society's sole
protection against superiority of talent lies in a certain force of
inertia which has nothing in common with right, I shall proceed to
explain why all capacities are entitled to the same reward, and why a
corresponding difference in wages would be an injustice. I shall prove
that the obligation to stoop to the social level is inherent in talent;
and on this very superiority of genius I will found the equality of
fortunes. I have just given the negative argument in favor of rewarding
all capacities alike; I will now give the direct and positive argument.
Listen, first, to the economist: it is always pleasant to see how he
reasons, and how he understands justice. Without him, moreover, without
his amusing blunders and his wonderful arguments, we should learn
nothing. Equality, so odious to the economist, owes every thing to
political economy.
"When the parents of a physician [the text says a lawyer, which is
not so good an example] have expended on his education forty thousand
francs, this sum may be regarded as so much capital invested in his
head. It is therefore permissible to consider it as yielding an annual
income of four thousand francs. If the physician earns thirty thousand,
there remains an income of twenty-six thousand francs due to the
personal talents given him by Nature. This natural capital, then, if we
assume ten per cent. as the rate of interest, amounts to two hundred
and sixty thousand francs; and the capital given him by his parents, in
defraying the expenses of his education, to forty thousand francs. The
union of these two kinds of capital constitutes his fortune. "--Say:
Complete Course, &c.
Say divides the fortune of the physician into two parts: one is composed
of the capital which went to pay for his education, the other represents
his personal talents. This division is just; it is in conformity with
the nature of things; it is universally admitted; it serves as the
major premise of that grand argument which establishes the inequality of
capacities. I accept this premise without qualification; let us look at
the consequences.
1. Say CREDITS the physician with forty thousand francs,--the cost of
his education. This amount should be entered upon the DEBIT side of the
account. For, although this expense was incurred for him, it was not
incurred by him. Then, instead of appropriating these forty thousand
francs, the physician should add them to the price of his product, and
repay them to those who are entitled to them. Notice, further, that
Say speaks of INCOME instead of REIMBURSEMENT; reasoning on the false
principle of the productivity of capital. The expense of educating a
talent is a debt contracted by this talent. From the very fact of its
existence, it becomes a debtor to an amount equal to the cost of its
production. This is so true and simple that, if the education of some
one child in a family has cost double or triple that of its brothers,
the latter are entitled to a proportional amount of the property
previous to its division. There is no difficulty about this in the case
of guardianship, when the estate is administered in the name of the
minors.
2. That which I have just said of the obligation incurred by talent of
repaying the cost of its education does not embarrass the economist. The
man of talent, he says, inheriting from his family, inherits among other
things a claim to the forty thousand francs which his education costs;
and he becomes, in consequence, its proprietor. But this is to abandon
the right of talent, and to fall back upon the right of occupancy; which
again calls up all the questions asked in Chapter II. What is the right
of occupancy? what is inheritance? Is the right of succession a right of
accumulation or only a right of choice? how did the physician's father
get his fortune? was he a proprietor, or only a usufructuary? If he was
rich, let him account for his wealth; if he was poor, how could he incur
so large an expense? If he received aid, what right had he to use that
aid to the disadvantage of his benefactors, &c. ?
3. "There remains an income of twenty-six thousand francs due to
the personal talents given him by Nature. " (Say,--as above quoted. )
Reasoning from this premise, Say concludes that our physician's talent
is equivalent to a capital of two hundred and sixty thousand francs.
This skilful calculator mistakes a consequence for a principle. The
talent must not be measured by the gain, but rather the gain by
the talent; for it may happen, that, notwithstanding his merit, the
physician in question will gain nothing at all, in which case will it be
necessary to conclude that his talent or fortune is equivalent to zero?
To such a result, however, would Say's reasoning lead; a result which is
clearly absurd.
Now, it is impossible to place a money value on any talent whatsoever,
since talent and money have no common measure. On what plausible ground
can it be maintained that a physician should be paid two, three, or a
hundred times as much as a peasant? An unavoidable difficulty, which has
never been solved save by avarice, necessity, and oppression. It is not
thus that the right of talent should be determined. But how is it to be
determined?
4. I say, first, that the physician must be treated with as much favor
as any other producer, that he must not be placed below the level of
others. This I will not stop to prove. But I add that neither must he be
lifted above that level; because his talent is collective property for
which he did not pay, and for which he is ever in debt.
Just as the creation of every instrument of production is the result of
collective force, so also are a man's talent and knowledge the product
of universal intelligence and of general knowledge slowly accumulated
by a number of masters, and through the aid of many inferior industries.
When the physician has paid for his teachers, his books, his diplomas,
and all the other items of his educational expenses, he has no more paid
for his talent than the capitalist pays for his house and land when he
gives his employees their wages. The man of talent has contributed to
the production in himself of a useful instrument. He has, then, a share
in its possession; he is not its proprietor. There exist side by side in
him a free laborer and an accumulated social capital. As a laborer, he
is charged with the use of an instrument, with the superintendence of a
machine; namely, his capacity. As capital, he is not his own master; he
uses himself, not for his own benefit, but for that of others.
Even if talent did not find in its own excellence a reward for the
sacrifices which it costs, still would it be easier to find reasons for
lowering its reward than for raising it above the common level.
Every producer receives an education; every laborer is a talent, a
capacity,--that is, a piece of collective property. But all talents are
not equally costly. It takes but few teachers, but few years, and but
little study, to make a farmer or a mechanic: the generative effort
and--if I may venture to use such language--the period of social
gestation are proportional to the loftiness of the capacity. But while
the physician, the poet, the artist, and the savant produce but little,
and that slowly, the productions of the farmer are much less uncertain,
and do not require so long a time. Whatever be then the capacity of a
man,--when this capacity is once created,--it does not belong to him.
Like the material fashioned by an industrious hand, it had the power
of BECOMING, and society has given it BEING. Shall the vase say to the
potter, "I am that I am, and I owe you nothing"?
The artist, the savant, and the poet find their just recompense in the
permission that society gives them to devote themselves exclusively to
science and to art: so that in reality they do not labor for themselves,
but for society, which creates them, and requires of them no other duty.
Society can, if need be, do without prose and verse, music and painting,
and the knowledge of the movements of the moon and stars; but it cannot
live a single day without food and shelter.
Undoubtedly, man does not live by bread alone; he must, also (according
to the Gospel), LIVE BY THE WORD OF GOD; that is, he must love the
good and do it, know and admire the beautiful, and study the marvels of
Nature. But in order to cultivate his mind, he must first take care of
his body,--the latter duty is as necessary as the former is noble. If it
is glorious to charm and instruct men, it is honorable as well to feed
them. When, then, society--faithful to the principle of the division
of labor--intrusts a work of art or of science to one of its members,
allowing him to abandon ordinary labor, it owes him an indemnity for
all which it prevents him from producing industrially; but it owes him
nothing more. If he should demand more, society should, by refusing his
services, annihilate his pretensions. Forced, then, in order to live, to
devote himself to labor repugnant to his nature, the man of genius would
feel his weakness, and would live the most distasteful of lives.
They tell of a celebrated singer who demanded of the Empress of Russia
(Catherine II) twenty thousand roubles for his services: "That is more
than I give my field-marshals," said Catherine. "Your majesty," replied
the other, "has only to make singers of her field-marshals. "
If France (more powerful than Catherine II) should say to Mademoiselle
Rachel, "You must act for one hundred louis, or else spin cotton;" to
M. Duprez, "You must sing for two thousand four hundred francs, or else
work in the vineyard,"--do you think that the actress Rachel, and the
singer Duprez, would abandon the stage? If they did, they would be the
first to repent it.
Mademoiselle Rachel receives, they say, sixty thousand francs annually
from the Comedie-Francaise. For a talent like hers, it is a slight fee.
Why not one hundred thousand francs, two hundred thousand francs? Why!
not a civil list? What meanness! Are we really guilty of chaffering with
an artist like Mademoiselle Rachel?
It is said, in reply, that the managers of the theatre cannot give more
without incurring a loss; that they admit the superior talent of
their young associate; but that, in fixing her salary, they have been
compelled to take the account of the company's receipts and expenses
into consideration also.
That is just, but it only confirms what I have said; namely, that an
artist's talent may be infinite, but that its mercenary claims are
necessarily limited,--on the one hand, by its usefulness to the society
which rewards it; on the other, by the resources of this society: in
other words, that the demand of the seller is balanced by the right of
the buyer.
Mademoiselle Rachel, they say, brings to the treasury of the
Theatre-Francais more than sixty thousand francs. I admit it; but then I
blame the theatre. From whom does the Theatre-Francais take this
money? From some curious people who are perfectly free. Yes; but the
workingmen, the lessees, the tenants, those who borrow by pawning their
possessions, from whom these curious people recover all that they pay to
the theatre,--are they free? And when the better part of their products
are consumed by others at the play, do you assure me that their families
are not in want? Until the French people, reflecting on the salaries
paid to all artists, savants, and public functionaries, have plainly
expressed their wish and judgment as to the matter, the salaries of
Mademoiselle Rachel and all her fellow-artists will be a compulsory tax
extorted by violence, to reward pride, and support libertinism.
It is because we are neither free nor sufficiently enlightened, that we
submit to be cheated in our bargains; that the laborer pays the duties
levied by the prestige of power and the selfishness of talent upon the
curiosity of the idle, and that we are perpetually scandalized by these
monstrous inequalities which are encouraged and applauded by public
opinion.
The whole nation, and the nation only, pays its authors, its savants,
its artists, its officials, whatever be the hands through which their
salaries pass. On what basis should it pay them? On the basis of
equality. I have proved it by estimating the value of talent. I shall
confirm it in the following chapter, by proving the impossibility of all
social inequality.
What have we shown so far? Things so simple that really they seem
silly:--
That, as the traveller does not appropriate the route which he
traverses, so the farmer does not appropriate the field which he sows;
That if, nevertheless, by reason of his industry, a laborer may
appropriate the material which he employs, every employer of material
becomes, by the same title, a proprietor;
That all capital, whether material or mental, being the result of
collective labor, is, in consequence, collective property;
That the strong have no right to encroach upon the labor of the weak,
nor the shrewd to take advantage of the credulity of the simple;
Finally, that no one can be forced to buy that which he does not want,
still less to pay for that which he has not bought; and, consequently,
that the exchangeable value of a product, being measured neither by the
opinion of the buyer nor that of the seller, but by the amount of time
and outlay which it has cost, the property of each always remains the
same.
Are not these very simple truths? Well, as simple as they seem to you,
reader, you shall yet see others which surpass them in dullness and
simplicity. For our course is the reverse of that of the geometricians:
with them, the farther they advance, the more difficult their problems
become; we, on the contrary, after having commenced with the most
abstruse propositions, shall end with the axioms.
But I must close this chapter with an exposition of one of those
startling truths which never have been dreamed of by legists or
economists.
% 8. --That, from the Stand-point of Justice, Labor destroys Property.
This proposition is the logical result of the two preceding sections,
which we have just summed up.
The isolated man can supply but a very small portion of his wants; all
his power lies in association, and in the intelligent combination of
universal effort. The division and co-operation of labor multiply the
quantity and the variety of products; the individuality of functions
improves their quality.
There is not a man, then, but lives upon the products of several
thousand different industries; not a laborer but receives from society
at large the things which he consumes, and, with these, the power to
reproduce. Who, indeed, would venture the assertion, "I produce, by
my own effort, all that I consume; I need the aid of no one else"?
The farmer, whom the early economists regarded as the only real
producer--the farmer, housed, furnished, clothed, fed, and assisted
by the mason, the carpenter, the tailor, the miller, the baker, the
butcher, the grocer, the blacksmith, &c. ,--the farmer, I say, can he
boast that he produces by his own unaided effort?
The various articles of consumption are given to each by all;
consequently, the production of each involves the production of all.
One product cannot exist without another; an isolated industry is an
impossible thing. What would be the harvest of the farmer, if others
did not manufacture for him barns, wagons, ploughs, clothes, &c. ? Where
would be the savant without the publisher; the printer without the
typecaster and the machinist; and these, in their turn, without a
multitude of other industries? . . . Let us not prolong this catalogue--so
easy to extend--lest we be accused of uttering commonplaces. All
industries are united by mutual relations in a single group; all
productions do reciprocal service as means and end; all varieties of
talent are but a series of changes from the inferior to the superior.
Now, this undisputed and indisputable fact of the general participation
in every species of product makes all individual productions common; so
that every product, coming from the hands of the producer, is mortgaged
in advance by society. The producer himself is entitled to only
that portion of his product, which is expressed by a fraction whose
denominator is equal to the number of individuals of which society is
composed. It is true that in return this same producer has a share in
all the products of others, so that he has a claim upon all, just as
all have a claim upon him; but is it not clear that this reciprocity of
mortgages, far from authorizing property, destroys even possession? The
laborer is not even possessor of his product; scarcely has he finished
it, when society claims it.
"But," it will be answered, "even if that is so--even if the product
does not belong to the producer--still society gives each laborer an
equivalent for his product; and this equivalent, this salary, this
reward, this allowance, becomes his property. Do you deny that this
property is legitimate? And if the laborer, instead of consuming his
entire wages, chooses to economize,--who dare question his right to do
so? "
The laborer is not even proprietor of the price of his labor, and cannot
absolutely control its disposition. Let us not be blinded by a spurious
justice. That which is given the laborer in exchange for his product is
not given him as a reward for past labor, but to provide for and secure
future labor. We consume before we produce. The laborer may say at the
end of the day, "I have paid yesterday's expenses; to-morrow I shall pay
those of today. " At every moment of his life, the member of society is
in debt; he dies with the debt unpaid:--how is it possible for him to
accumulate?
They talk of economy--it is the proprietor's hobby. Under a system of
equality, all economy which does not aim at subsequent reproduction or
enjoyment is impossible--why? Because the thing saved, since it cannot
be converted into capital, has no object, and is without a FINAL CAUSE.
This will be explained more fully in the next chapter.
To conclude:--
The laborer, in his relation to society, is a debtor who of necessity
dies insolvent. The proprietor is an unfaithful guardian who denies the
receipt of the deposit committed to his care, and wishes to be paid for
his guardianship down to the last day.
Lest the principles just set forth may appear to certain readers
too metaphysical, I shall reproduce them in a more concrete form,
intelligible to the dullest brains, and pregnant with the most important
consequences.
Hitherto, I have considered property as a power of EXCLUSION; hereafter,
I shall examine it as a power of INVASION.
CHAPTER IV. THAT PROPERTY IS IMPOSSIBLE.
The last resort of proprietors,--the overwhelming argument whose
invincible potency reassures them,--is that, in their opinion, equality
of conditions is impossible. "Equality of conditions is a chimera," they
cry with a knowing air; "distribute wealth equally to-day--to-morrow
this equality will have vanished. "
To this hackneyed objection, which they repeat everywhere with the most
marvellous assurance, they never fail to add the following comment, as
a sort of GLORY BE TO THE FATHER: "If all men were equal, nobody would
work. " This anthem is sung with variations.
"If all were masters, nobody would obey. "
"If nobody were rich, who would employ the poor? "
And, "If nobody were poor, who would labor for the rich? "
But let us have done with invective--we have better arguments at our
command.
If I show that property itself is impossible--that it is property which
is a contradiction, a chimera, a utopia; and if I show it no longer
by metaphysics and jurisprudence, but by figures, equations, and
calculations,--imagine the fright of the astounded proprietor! And you,
reader; what do you think of the retort?
Numbers govern the world--mundum regunt numeri. This proverb applies
as aptly to the moral and political, as to the sidereal and molecular,
world. The elements of justice are identical with those of algebra;
legislation and government are simply the arts of classifying
and balancing powers; all jurisprudence falls within the rules of
arithmetic. This chapter and the next will serve to lay the foundations
of this extraordinary doctrine. Then will be unfolded to the reader's
vision an immense and novel career; then shall we commence to see in
numerical relations the synthetic unity of philosophy and the sciences;
and, filled with admiration and enthusiasm for this profound and
majestic simplicity of Nature, we shall shout with the apostle: "Yes,
the Eternal has made all things by number, weight, and measure! " We
shall understand not only that equality of conditions is possible, but
that all else is impossible; that this seeming impossibility which
we charge upon it arises from the fact that we always think of it
in connection either with the proprietary or the communistic
regime,--political systems equally irreconcilable with human nature. We
shall see finally that equality is constantly being realized without our
knowledge, even at the very moment when we are pronouncing it incapable
of realization; that the time draws near when, without any effort or
even wish of ours, we shall have it universally established; that with
it, in it, and by it, the natural and true political order must make
itself manifest.
It has been said, in speaking of the blindness and obstinacy of the
passions, that, if man had any thing to gain by denying the truths of
arithmetic, he would find some means of unsettling their certainty: here
is an opportunity to try this curious experiment. I attack property,
no longer with its own maxims, but with arithmetic. Let the proprietors
prepare to verify my figures; for, if unfortunately for them the figures
prove accurate, the proprietors are lost.
In proving the impossibility of property, I complete the proof of its
injustice. In fact,--
That which is JUST must be USEFUL;
That which is useful must be TRUE;
That which is true must be POSSIBLE;
Therefore, every thing which is impossible is untrue, useless, unjust.
Then,--a priori,--we may judge of the justice of any thing by its
possibility; so that if the thing were absolutely impossible, it would
be absolutely unjust.
PROPERTY IS PHYSICALLY AND MATHEMATICALLY IMPOSSIBLE.
DEMONSTRATION.
AXIOM. --Property is the Right of Increase claimed by the Proprietor over
any thing which he has stamped as his own.
This proposition is purely an axiom, because,--
1. It is not a definition, since it does not express all that is
included in the right of property--the right of sale, of exchange, of
gift; the right to transform, to alter, to consume, to destroy, to
use and abuse, &c. All these rights are so many different powers of
property, which we may consider separately; but which we disregard here,
that we may devote all our attention to this single one,--the right of
increase.
2. It is universally admitted. No one can deny it without denying the
facts, without being instantly belied by universal custom.
3. It is self-evident, since property is always accompanied (either
actually or potentially) by the fact which this axiom expresses; and
through this fact, mainly, property manifests, establishes, and asserts
itself.
4. Finally, its negation involves a contradiction. The right of increase
is really an inherent right, so essential a part of property, that, in
its absence, property is null and void.
OBSERVATIONS.
they are satisfied with half of their salary. Paid according to the
labor that they had performed, of what could they complain? and what
injury would they do to others? In this sense, it is fair to apply the
maxim,--TO EACH ACCORDING TO HIS RESULTS. It is the law of equality
itself.
Further, numerous difficulties, relative to the police system and the
organization of industry, might be raised here. I will reply to them all
with this one sentence,--that they must all be solved by the principle
of equality. Thus, some one might observe, "Here is a task which cannot
be postponed without detriment to production. Ought society to suffer
from the negligence of a few? and will she not venture--out of respect
for the right of labor--to assure with her own hands the product which
they refuse her? In such a case, to whom will the salary belong? "
To society; who will be allowed to perform the labor, either herself, or
through her representatives, but always in such a way that the general
equality shall never be violated, and that only the idler shall be
punished for his idleness. Further, if society may not use excessive
severity towards her lazy members, she has a right, in self-defence, to
guard against abuses.
But every industry needs--they will add--leaders, instructors,
superintendents, &c. Will these be engaged in the general task? No;
since their task is to lead, instruct, and superintend. But they must be
chosen from the laborers by the laborers themselves, and must fulfil
the conditions of eligibility. It is the same with all public functions,
whether of administration or instruction.
Then, article first of the universal constitution will be:--
"The limited quantity of available material proves the necessity of
dividing the labor among the whole number of laborers. The capacity,
given to all, of accomplishing a social task,--that is, an equal
task,--and the impossibility of paying one laborer save in the products
of another, justify the equality of wages. "
% 7. --That Inequality of Powers is the Necessary Condition of Equality
of Fortunes.
It is objected,--and this objection constitutes the second part of the
St. Simonian, and the third part of the Fourierstic, maxims,--
"That all kinds of labor cannot be executed with equal ease. Some
require great superiority of skill and intelligence; and on this
superiority is based the price. The artist, the savant, the poet, the
statesman, are esteemed only because of their excellence; and this
excellence destroys all similitude between them and other men: in the
presence of these heights of science and genius the law of equality
disappears. Now, if equality is not absolute, there is no equality.
From the poet we descend to the novelist; from the sculptor to the
stonecutter; from the architect to the mason; from the chemist to the
cook, &c. Capacities are classified and subdivided into orders, genera,
and species. The extremes of talent are connected by intermediate
talents. Humanity is a vast hierarchy, in which the individual estimates
himself by comparison, and fixes his price by the value placed upon his
product by the public. "
This objection always has seemed a formidable one. It is the
stumbling-block of the economists, as well as of the defenders of
equality. It has led the former into egregious blunders, and has caused
the latter to utter incredible platitudes. Gracchus Babeuf wished all
superiority to be STRINGENTLY REPRESSED, and even PERSECUTED AS A SOCIAL
CALAMITY. To establish his communistic edifice, he lowered all citizens
to the stature of the smallest. Ignorant eclectics have been known to
object to the inequality of knowledge, and I should not be surprised if
some one should yet rebel against the inequality of virtue. Aristotle
was banished, Socrates drank the hemlock, Epaminondas was called to
account, for having proved superior in intelligence and virtue to some
dissolute and foolish demagogues. Such follies will be re-enacted, so
long as the inequality of fortunes justifies a populace, blinded and
oppressed by the wealthy, in fearing the elevation of new tyrants to
power.
Nothing seems more unnatural than that which we examine too closely, and
often nothing seems less like the truth than the truth itself. On the
other hand, according to J. J. Rousseau, "it takes a great deal of
philosophy to enable us to observe once what we see every day;" and,
according to d'Alembert, "the ordinary truths of life make but little
impression on men, unless their attention is especially called to them. "
The father of the school of economists (Say), from whom I borrow these
two quotations, might have profited by them; but he who laughs at the
blind should wear spectacles, and he who notices him is near-sighted.
Strange! that which has frightened so many minds is not, after all,
an objection to equality--it is the very condition on which equality
exists! . . .
Natural inequality the condition of equality of fortunes! . . . What
a paradox! . . . I repeat my assertion, that no one may think I have
blundered--inequality of powers is the sine qua non of equality of
fortunes.
There are two things to be considered in society--FUNCTIONS and
RELATIONS.
I. FUNCTIONS. Every laborer is supposed to be capable of performing the
task assigned to him; or, to use a common expression, "every workman
must know his trade. " The workman equal to his work,--there is an
equation between functionary and function.
In society, functions are not alike; there must be, then, different
capacities. Further,--certain functions demand greater intelligence
and powers; then there are people of superior mind and talent. For
the performance of work necessarily involves a workman: from the need
springs the idea, and the idea makes the producer. We only know what our
senses long for and our intelligence demands; we have no keen desire
for things of which we cannot conceive, and the greater our powers of
conception, the greater our capabilities of production.
Thus, functions arising from needs, needs from desires, and desires
from spontaneous perception and imagination, the same intelligence which
imagines can also produce; consequently, no labor is superior to the
laborer. In a word, if the function calls out the functionary, it is
because the functionary exists before the function.
Let us admire Nature's economy. With regard to these various needs which
she has given us, and which the isolated man cannot satisfy unaided,
Nature has granted to the race a power refused to the individual. This
gives rise to the principle of the DIVISION OF LABOR,--a principle
founded on the SPECIALITY OF VOCATIONS.
The satisfaction of some needs demands of man continual creation;
while others can, by the labor of a single individual, be satisfied for
millions of men through thousands of centuries. For example, the need of
clothing and food requires perpetual reproduction; while a knowledge
of the system of the universe may be acquired for ever by two or
three highly-gifted men. The perpetual current of rivers supports our
commerce, and runs our machinery; but the sun, alone in the midst of
space, gives light to the whole world. Nature, who might create
Platos and Virgils, Newtons and Cuviers, as she creates husbandmen and
shepherds, does not see fit to do so; choosing rather to proportion the
rarity of genius to the duration of its products, and to balance the
number of capacities by the competency of each one of them.
I do not inquire here whether the distance which separates one man from
another, in point of talent and intelligence, arises from the deplorable
condition of civilization, nor whether that which is now called the
INEQUALITY OF POWERS would be in an ideal society any thing more than
a DIVERSITY OF POWERS. I take the worst view of the matter; and, that
I may not be accused of tergiversation and evasion of difficulties, I
acknowledge all the inequalities that any one can desire. [16]
Certain philosophers, in love with the levelling idea, maintain that all
minds are equal, and that all differences are the result of education.
I am no believer, I confess, in this doctrine; which, even if it were
true, would lead to a result directly opposite to that desired. For, if
capacities are equal, whatever be the degree of their power (as no one
can be coerced), there are functions deemed coarse, low, and degrading,
which deserve higher pay,--a result no less repugnant to equality than
to the principle, TO EACH CAPACITY ACCORDING TO ITS RESULTS. Give me,
on the contrary, a society in which every kind of talent bears a proper
numerical relation to the needs of the society, and which demands from
each producer only that which his special function requires him to
produce; and, without impairing in the least the hierarchy of functions,
I will deduce the equality of fortunes.
This is my second point.
II. RELATIONS. In considering the element of labor, I have shown that in
the same class of productive services, the capacity to perform a social
task being possessed by all, no inequality of reward can be based upon
an inequality of individual powers. However, it is but fair to say that
certain capacities seem quite incapable of certain services; so that, if
human industry were entirely confined to one class of products, numerous
incapacities would arise, and, consequently, the greatest social
inequality. But every body sees, without any hint from me, that the
variety of industries avoids this difficulty; so clear is this that
I shall not stop to discuss it. We have only to prove, then, that
functions are equal to each other; just as laborers, who perform the
same function, are equal to each other.
Property makes man a eunuch, and then reproaches him for being nothing
but dry wood, a decaying tree.
Are you astonished that I refuse to genius, to knowledge, to
courage,--in a word, to all the excellences admired by the world,--the
homage of dignities, the distinctions of power and wealth? It is not I
who refuse it: it is economy, it is justice, it is liberty. Liberty! for
the first time in this discussion I appeal to her. Let her rise in her
own defence, and achieve her victory.
Every transaction ending in an exchange of products or services may be
designated as a COMMERCIAL OPERATION.
Whoever says commerce, says exchange of equal values; for, if the values
are not equal, and the injured party perceives it, he will not consent
to the exchange, and there will be no commerce.
Commerce exists only among free men. Transactions may be effected
between other people by violence or fraud, but there is no commerce.
A free man is one who enjoys the use of his reason and his faculties;
who is neither blinded by passion, nor hindered or driven by oppression,
nor deceived by erroneous opinions.
So, in every exchange, there is a moral obligation that neither of the
contracting parties shall gain at the expense of the other; that is,
that, to be legitimate and true, commerce must be exempt from all
inequality. This is the first condition of commerce. Its second
condition is, that it be voluntary; that is, that the parties act freely
and openly.
I define, then, commerce or exchange as an act of society.
The negro who sells his wife for a knife, his children for some bits
of glass, and finally himself for a bottle of brandy, is not free. The
dealer in human flesh, with whom he negotiates, is not his associate; he
is his enemy.
The civilized laborer who bakes a loaf that he may eat a slice of bread,
who builds a palace that he may sleep in a stable, who weaves rich
fabrics that he may dress in rags, who produces every thing that he may
dispense with every thing,--is not free. His employer, not becoming
his associate in the exchange of salaries or services which takes place
between them, is his enemy.
The soldier who serves his country through fear instead of through love
is not free; his comrades and his officers, the ministers or organs of
military justice, are all his enemies.
The peasant who hires land, the manufacturer who borrows capital, the
tax-payer who pays tolls, duties, patent and license fees, personal and
property taxes, &c. , and the deputy who votes for them,--all act
neither intelligently nor freely. Their enemies are the proprietors, the
capitalists, the government.
Give men liberty, enlighten their minds that they may know the meaning
of their contracts, and you will see the most perfect equality in
exchanges without regard to superiority of talent and knowledge; and
you will admit that in commercial affairs, that is, in the sphere of
society, the word superiority is void of sense.
Let Homer sing his verse. I listen to this sublime genius in comparison
with whom I, a simple herdsman, an humble farmer, am as nothing. What,
indeed,--if product is to be compared with product,--are my cheeses and
my beans in the presence of his "Iliad"? But, if Homer wishes to take
from me all that I possess, and make me his slave in return for his
inimitable poem, I will give up the pleasure of his lays, and dismiss
him. I can do without his "Iliad," and wait, if necessary, for the
"AEneid. "
Homer cannot live twenty-four hours without my products. Let him accept,
then, the little that I have to offer; and then his muse may instruct,
encourage, and console me.
"What! do you say that such should be the condition of one who sings of
gods and men? Alms, with the humiliation and suffering which they bring
with them! --what barbarous generosity! ". . . Do not get excited, I beg
of you. Property makes of a poet either a Croesus or a beggar; only
equality knows how to honor and to praise him. What is its duty? To
regulate the right of the singer and the duty of the listener. Now,
notice this point, which is a very important one in the solution of this
question: both are free, the one to sell, the other to buy. Henceforth
their respective pretensions go for nothing; and the estimate, whether
fair or unfair, that they place, the one upon his verse, the other
upon his liberality, can have no influence upon the conditions of the
contract. We must no longer, in making our bargains, weigh talent; we
must consider products only.
In order that the bard of Achilles may get his due reward, he must first
make himself wanted: that done, the exchange of his verse for a fee of
any kind, being a free act, must be at the same time a just act; that
is, the poet's fee must be equal to his product. Now, what is the value
of this product?
Let us suppose, in the first place, that this "Iliad"--this chef-d'
oeuvre that is to be equitably rewarded--is really above price, that we
do not know how to appraise it. If the public, who are free to purchase
it, refuse to do so, it is clear that, the poem being unexchangeable,
its intrinsic value will not be diminished; but that its exchangeable
value, or its productive utility, will be reduced to zero, will be
nothing at all. Then we must seek the amount of wages to be paid between
infinity on the one hand and nothing on the other, at an equal distance
from each, since all rights and liberties are entitled to equal respect;
in other words, it is not the intrinsic value, but the relative value,
of the thing sold that needs to be fixed. The question grows simpler:
what is this relative value? To what reward does a poem like the "Iliad"
entitle its author?
The first business of political economy, after fixing its definitions,
was the solution of this problem; now, not only has it not been solved,
but it has been declared insoluble. According to the economists,
the relative or exchangeable value of things cannot be absolutely
determined; it necessarily varies.
"The value of a thing," says Say, "is a positive quantity, but only for
a given moment. It is its nature to perpetually vary, to change from one
point to another. Nothing can fix it absolutely, because it is based
on needs and means of production which vary with every moment. These
variations complicate economical phenomena, and often render them very
difficult of observation and solution. I know no remedy for this; it is
not in our power to change the nature of things. "
Elsewhere Say says, and repeats, that value being based on utility, and
utility depending entirely on our needs, whims, customs, &c. , value
is as variable as opinion. Now, political economy being the science
of values, of their production, distribution, exchange, and
consumption,--if exchangeable value cannot be absolutely determined,
how is political economy possible? How can it be a science? How can two
economists look each other in the face without laughing? How dare they
insult metaphysicians and psychologists? What! that fool of a Descartes
imagined that philosophy needed an immovable base--an _aliquid
inconcussum_--on which the edifice of science might be built, and he was
simple enough to search for it! And the Hermes of economy, Trismegistus
Say, devoting half a volume to the amplification of that solemn text,
_political economy is a science_, has the courage to affirm immediately
afterwards that this science cannot determine its object,--which is
equivalent to saying that it is without a principle or foundation! He
does not know, then, the illustrious Say, the nature of a science; or
rather, he knows nothing of the subject which he discusses.
Say's example has borne its fruits. Political economy, as it exists at
present, resembles ontology: discussing effects and causes, it knows
nothing, explains nothing, decides nothing. The ideas honored with the
name of economic laws are nothing more than a few trifling generalities,
to which the economists thought to give an appearance of depth by
clothing them in high-sounding words. As for the attempts that have been
made by the economists to solve social problems, all that can be said
of them is, that, if a glimmer of sense occasionally appears in their
lucubrations, they immediately fall back into absurdity. For twenty-five
years political economy, like a heavy fog, has weighed upon France,
checking the efforts of the mind, and setting limits to liberty.
Has every creation of industry a venal, absolute, unchangeable, and
consequently legitimate and true value? --Yes.
Can every product of man be exchanged for some other product of
man? --Yes, again.
How many nails is a pair of shoes worth?
If we can solve this appalling problem, we shall have the key of the
social system for which humanity has been searching for six thousand
years. In the presence of this problem, the economist recoils confused;
the peasant who can neither read nor write replies without hesitation:
"As many as can be made in the same time, and with the same expense. "
The absolute value of a thing, then, is its cost in time and expense.
How much is a diamond worth which costs only the labor of picking it
up? --Nothing; it is not a product of man. How much will it be worth when
cut and mounted? --The time and expense which it has cost the laborer.
Why, then, is it sold at so high a price? --Because men are not free.
Society must regulate the exchange and distribution of the rarest
things, as it does that of the most common ones, in such a way that each
may share in the enjoyment of them. What, then, is that value which is
based upon opinion? --Delusion, injustice, and robbery.
By this rule, it is easy to reconcile every body. If the mean term,
which we are searching for, between an infinite value and no value at
all is expressed in the case of every product, by the amount of time and
expense which the product cost, a poem which has cost its author thirty
years of labor and an outlay of ten thousand francs in journeys, books,
&c. , must be paid for by the ordinary wages received by a laborer during
thirty years, PLUS ten thousand francs indemnity for expense incurred.
Suppose the whole amount to be fifty thousand francs; if the society
which gets the benefit of the production include a million of men, my
share of the debt is five centimes.
This gives rise to a few observations.
1. The same product, at different times and in different places, may
cost more or less of time and outlay; in this view, it is true that
value is a variable quantity. But this variation is not that of the
economists, who place in their list of the causes of the variation of
values, not only the means of production, but taste, caprice, fashion,
and opinion. In short, the true value of a thing is invariable in its
algebraic expression, although it may vary in its monetary expression.
2. The price of every product in demand should be its cost in time and
outlay--neither more nor less: every product not in demand is a loss to
the producer--a commercial non-value.
3. The ignorance of the principle of evaluation, and the difficulty
under many circumstances of applying it, is the source of commercial
fraud, and one of the most potent causes of the inequality of fortunes.
4. To reward certain industries and pay for certain products, a society
is needed which corresponds in size with the rarity of talents, the
costliness of the products, and the variety of the arts and sciences.
If, for example, a society of fifty farmers can support a schoolmaster,
it requires one hundred for a shoemaker, one hundred and fifty for a
blacksmith, two hundred for a tailor, &c. If the number of farmers rises
to one thousand, ten thousand, one hundred thousand, &c. , as fast as
their number increases, that of the functionaries which are earliest
required must increase in the same proportion; so that the highest
functions become possible only in the most powerful societies. [17] That
is the peculiar feature of capacities; the character of genius, the seal
of its glory, cannot arise and develop itself, except in the bosom of
a great nation. But this physiological condition, necessary to the
existence of genius, adds nothing to its social rights: far from
that,--the delay in its appearance proves that, in economical and
civil affairs, the loftiest intelligence must submit to the equality
of possessions; an equality which is anterior to it, and of which it
constitutes the crown.
This is severe on our pride, but it is an inexorable truth. And here
psychology comes to the aid of social economy, giving us to understand
that talent and material recompense have no common measure; that, in
this respect, the condition of all producers is equal: consequently,
that all comparison between them, and all distinction in fortunes, is
impossible.
_ _In fact, every work coming from the hands of man--compared with the
raw material of which it is composed--is beyond price. In this respect,
the distance is as great between a pair of wooden shoes and the trunk of
a walnut-tree, as between a statue by Scopas and a block of marble.
The genius of the simplest mechanic exerts as much influence over the
materials which he uses, as does the mind of a Newton over the inert
spheres whose distances, volumes, and revolutions he calculates. You ask
for talent and genius a corresponding degree of honor and reward. Fix
for me the value of a wood-cutter's talent, and I will fix that of
Homer. If any thing can reward intelligence, it is intelligence itself.
That is what happens, when various classes of producers pay to each
other a reciprocal tribute of admiration and praise. But if they
contemplate an exchange of products with a view to satisfying mutual
needs, this exchange must be effected in accordance with a system of
economy which is indifferent to considerations of talent and genius, and
whose laws are deduced, not from vague and meaningless admiration, but
from a just balance between DEBIT and CREDIT; in short, from commercial
accounts.
Now, that no one may imagine that the liberty of buying and selling
is the sole basis of the equality of wages, and that society's sole
protection against superiority of talent lies in a certain force of
inertia which has nothing in common with right, I shall proceed to
explain why all capacities are entitled to the same reward, and why a
corresponding difference in wages would be an injustice. I shall prove
that the obligation to stoop to the social level is inherent in talent;
and on this very superiority of genius I will found the equality of
fortunes. I have just given the negative argument in favor of rewarding
all capacities alike; I will now give the direct and positive argument.
Listen, first, to the economist: it is always pleasant to see how he
reasons, and how he understands justice. Without him, moreover, without
his amusing blunders and his wonderful arguments, we should learn
nothing. Equality, so odious to the economist, owes every thing to
political economy.
"When the parents of a physician [the text says a lawyer, which is
not so good an example] have expended on his education forty thousand
francs, this sum may be regarded as so much capital invested in his
head. It is therefore permissible to consider it as yielding an annual
income of four thousand francs. If the physician earns thirty thousand,
there remains an income of twenty-six thousand francs due to the
personal talents given him by Nature. This natural capital, then, if we
assume ten per cent. as the rate of interest, amounts to two hundred
and sixty thousand francs; and the capital given him by his parents, in
defraying the expenses of his education, to forty thousand francs. The
union of these two kinds of capital constitutes his fortune. "--Say:
Complete Course, &c.
Say divides the fortune of the physician into two parts: one is composed
of the capital which went to pay for his education, the other represents
his personal talents. This division is just; it is in conformity with
the nature of things; it is universally admitted; it serves as the
major premise of that grand argument which establishes the inequality of
capacities. I accept this premise without qualification; let us look at
the consequences.
1. Say CREDITS the physician with forty thousand francs,--the cost of
his education. This amount should be entered upon the DEBIT side of the
account. For, although this expense was incurred for him, it was not
incurred by him. Then, instead of appropriating these forty thousand
francs, the physician should add them to the price of his product, and
repay them to those who are entitled to them. Notice, further, that
Say speaks of INCOME instead of REIMBURSEMENT; reasoning on the false
principle of the productivity of capital. The expense of educating a
talent is a debt contracted by this talent. From the very fact of its
existence, it becomes a debtor to an amount equal to the cost of its
production. This is so true and simple that, if the education of some
one child in a family has cost double or triple that of its brothers,
the latter are entitled to a proportional amount of the property
previous to its division. There is no difficulty about this in the case
of guardianship, when the estate is administered in the name of the
minors.
2. That which I have just said of the obligation incurred by talent of
repaying the cost of its education does not embarrass the economist. The
man of talent, he says, inheriting from his family, inherits among other
things a claim to the forty thousand francs which his education costs;
and he becomes, in consequence, its proprietor. But this is to abandon
the right of talent, and to fall back upon the right of occupancy; which
again calls up all the questions asked in Chapter II. What is the right
of occupancy? what is inheritance? Is the right of succession a right of
accumulation or only a right of choice? how did the physician's father
get his fortune? was he a proprietor, or only a usufructuary? If he was
rich, let him account for his wealth; if he was poor, how could he incur
so large an expense? If he received aid, what right had he to use that
aid to the disadvantage of his benefactors, &c. ?
3. "There remains an income of twenty-six thousand francs due to
the personal talents given him by Nature. " (Say,--as above quoted. )
Reasoning from this premise, Say concludes that our physician's talent
is equivalent to a capital of two hundred and sixty thousand francs.
This skilful calculator mistakes a consequence for a principle. The
talent must not be measured by the gain, but rather the gain by
the talent; for it may happen, that, notwithstanding his merit, the
physician in question will gain nothing at all, in which case will it be
necessary to conclude that his talent or fortune is equivalent to zero?
To such a result, however, would Say's reasoning lead; a result which is
clearly absurd.
Now, it is impossible to place a money value on any talent whatsoever,
since talent and money have no common measure. On what plausible ground
can it be maintained that a physician should be paid two, three, or a
hundred times as much as a peasant? An unavoidable difficulty, which has
never been solved save by avarice, necessity, and oppression. It is not
thus that the right of talent should be determined. But how is it to be
determined?
4. I say, first, that the physician must be treated with as much favor
as any other producer, that he must not be placed below the level of
others. This I will not stop to prove. But I add that neither must he be
lifted above that level; because his talent is collective property for
which he did not pay, and for which he is ever in debt.
Just as the creation of every instrument of production is the result of
collective force, so also are a man's talent and knowledge the product
of universal intelligence and of general knowledge slowly accumulated
by a number of masters, and through the aid of many inferior industries.
When the physician has paid for his teachers, his books, his diplomas,
and all the other items of his educational expenses, he has no more paid
for his talent than the capitalist pays for his house and land when he
gives his employees their wages. The man of talent has contributed to
the production in himself of a useful instrument. He has, then, a share
in its possession; he is not its proprietor. There exist side by side in
him a free laborer and an accumulated social capital. As a laborer, he
is charged with the use of an instrument, with the superintendence of a
machine; namely, his capacity. As capital, he is not his own master; he
uses himself, not for his own benefit, but for that of others.
Even if talent did not find in its own excellence a reward for the
sacrifices which it costs, still would it be easier to find reasons for
lowering its reward than for raising it above the common level.
Every producer receives an education; every laborer is a talent, a
capacity,--that is, a piece of collective property. But all talents are
not equally costly. It takes but few teachers, but few years, and but
little study, to make a farmer or a mechanic: the generative effort
and--if I may venture to use such language--the period of social
gestation are proportional to the loftiness of the capacity. But while
the physician, the poet, the artist, and the savant produce but little,
and that slowly, the productions of the farmer are much less uncertain,
and do not require so long a time. Whatever be then the capacity of a
man,--when this capacity is once created,--it does not belong to him.
Like the material fashioned by an industrious hand, it had the power
of BECOMING, and society has given it BEING. Shall the vase say to the
potter, "I am that I am, and I owe you nothing"?
The artist, the savant, and the poet find their just recompense in the
permission that society gives them to devote themselves exclusively to
science and to art: so that in reality they do not labor for themselves,
but for society, which creates them, and requires of them no other duty.
Society can, if need be, do without prose and verse, music and painting,
and the knowledge of the movements of the moon and stars; but it cannot
live a single day without food and shelter.
Undoubtedly, man does not live by bread alone; he must, also (according
to the Gospel), LIVE BY THE WORD OF GOD; that is, he must love the
good and do it, know and admire the beautiful, and study the marvels of
Nature. But in order to cultivate his mind, he must first take care of
his body,--the latter duty is as necessary as the former is noble. If it
is glorious to charm and instruct men, it is honorable as well to feed
them. When, then, society--faithful to the principle of the division
of labor--intrusts a work of art or of science to one of its members,
allowing him to abandon ordinary labor, it owes him an indemnity for
all which it prevents him from producing industrially; but it owes him
nothing more. If he should demand more, society should, by refusing his
services, annihilate his pretensions. Forced, then, in order to live, to
devote himself to labor repugnant to his nature, the man of genius would
feel his weakness, and would live the most distasteful of lives.
They tell of a celebrated singer who demanded of the Empress of Russia
(Catherine II) twenty thousand roubles for his services: "That is more
than I give my field-marshals," said Catherine. "Your majesty," replied
the other, "has only to make singers of her field-marshals. "
If France (more powerful than Catherine II) should say to Mademoiselle
Rachel, "You must act for one hundred louis, or else spin cotton;" to
M. Duprez, "You must sing for two thousand four hundred francs, or else
work in the vineyard,"--do you think that the actress Rachel, and the
singer Duprez, would abandon the stage? If they did, they would be the
first to repent it.
Mademoiselle Rachel receives, they say, sixty thousand francs annually
from the Comedie-Francaise. For a talent like hers, it is a slight fee.
Why not one hundred thousand francs, two hundred thousand francs? Why!
not a civil list? What meanness! Are we really guilty of chaffering with
an artist like Mademoiselle Rachel?
It is said, in reply, that the managers of the theatre cannot give more
without incurring a loss; that they admit the superior talent of
their young associate; but that, in fixing her salary, they have been
compelled to take the account of the company's receipts and expenses
into consideration also.
That is just, but it only confirms what I have said; namely, that an
artist's talent may be infinite, but that its mercenary claims are
necessarily limited,--on the one hand, by its usefulness to the society
which rewards it; on the other, by the resources of this society: in
other words, that the demand of the seller is balanced by the right of
the buyer.
Mademoiselle Rachel, they say, brings to the treasury of the
Theatre-Francais more than sixty thousand francs. I admit it; but then I
blame the theatre. From whom does the Theatre-Francais take this
money? From some curious people who are perfectly free. Yes; but the
workingmen, the lessees, the tenants, those who borrow by pawning their
possessions, from whom these curious people recover all that they pay to
the theatre,--are they free? And when the better part of their products
are consumed by others at the play, do you assure me that their families
are not in want? Until the French people, reflecting on the salaries
paid to all artists, savants, and public functionaries, have plainly
expressed their wish and judgment as to the matter, the salaries of
Mademoiselle Rachel and all her fellow-artists will be a compulsory tax
extorted by violence, to reward pride, and support libertinism.
It is because we are neither free nor sufficiently enlightened, that we
submit to be cheated in our bargains; that the laborer pays the duties
levied by the prestige of power and the selfishness of talent upon the
curiosity of the idle, and that we are perpetually scandalized by these
monstrous inequalities which are encouraged and applauded by public
opinion.
The whole nation, and the nation only, pays its authors, its savants,
its artists, its officials, whatever be the hands through which their
salaries pass. On what basis should it pay them? On the basis of
equality. I have proved it by estimating the value of talent. I shall
confirm it in the following chapter, by proving the impossibility of all
social inequality.
What have we shown so far? Things so simple that really they seem
silly:--
That, as the traveller does not appropriate the route which he
traverses, so the farmer does not appropriate the field which he sows;
That if, nevertheless, by reason of his industry, a laborer may
appropriate the material which he employs, every employer of material
becomes, by the same title, a proprietor;
That all capital, whether material or mental, being the result of
collective labor, is, in consequence, collective property;
That the strong have no right to encroach upon the labor of the weak,
nor the shrewd to take advantage of the credulity of the simple;
Finally, that no one can be forced to buy that which he does not want,
still less to pay for that which he has not bought; and, consequently,
that the exchangeable value of a product, being measured neither by the
opinion of the buyer nor that of the seller, but by the amount of time
and outlay which it has cost, the property of each always remains the
same.
Are not these very simple truths? Well, as simple as they seem to you,
reader, you shall yet see others which surpass them in dullness and
simplicity. For our course is the reverse of that of the geometricians:
with them, the farther they advance, the more difficult their problems
become; we, on the contrary, after having commenced with the most
abstruse propositions, shall end with the axioms.
But I must close this chapter with an exposition of one of those
startling truths which never have been dreamed of by legists or
economists.
% 8. --That, from the Stand-point of Justice, Labor destroys Property.
This proposition is the logical result of the two preceding sections,
which we have just summed up.
The isolated man can supply but a very small portion of his wants; all
his power lies in association, and in the intelligent combination of
universal effort. The division and co-operation of labor multiply the
quantity and the variety of products; the individuality of functions
improves their quality.
There is not a man, then, but lives upon the products of several
thousand different industries; not a laborer but receives from society
at large the things which he consumes, and, with these, the power to
reproduce. Who, indeed, would venture the assertion, "I produce, by
my own effort, all that I consume; I need the aid of no one else"?
The farmer, whom the early economists regarded as the only real
producer--the farmer, housed, furnished, clothed, fed, and assisted
by the mason, the carpenter, the tailor, the miller, the baker, the
butcher, the grocer, the blacksmith, &c. ,--the farmer, I say, can he
boast that he produces by his own unaided effort?
The various articles of consumption are given to each by all;
consequently, the production of each involves the production of all.
One product cannot exist without another; an isolated industry is an
impossible thing. What would be the harvest of the farmer, if others
did not manufacture for him barns, wagons, ploughs, clothes, &c. ? Where
would be the savant without the publisher; the printer without the
typecaster and the machinist; and these, in their turn, without a
multitude of other industries? . . . Let us not prolong this catalogue--so
easy to extend--lest we be accused of uttering commonplaces. All
industries are united by mutual relations in a single group; all
productions do reciprocal service as means and end; all varieties of
talent are but a series of changes from the inferior to the superior.
Now, this undisputed and indisputable fact of the general participation
in every species of product makes all individual productions common; so
that every product, coming from the hands of the producer, is mortgaged
in advance by society. The producer himself is entitled to only
that portion of his product, which is expressed by a fraction whose
denominator is equal to the number of individuals of which society is
composed. It is true that in return this same producer has a share in
all the products of others, so that he has a claim upon all, just as
all have a claim upon him; but is it not clear that this reciprocity of
mortgages, far from authorizing property, destroys even possession? The
laborer is not even possessor of his product; scarcely has he finished
it, when society claims it.
"But," it will be answered, "even if that is so--even if the product
does not belong to the producer--still society gives each laborer an
equivalent for his product; and this equivalent, this salary, this
reward, this allowance, becomes his property. Do you deny that this
property is legitimate? And if the laborer, instead of consuming his
entire wages, chooses to economize,--who dare question his right to do
so? "
The laborer is not even proprietor of the price of his labor, and cannot
absolutely control its disposition. Let us not be blinded by a spurious
justice. That which is given the laborer in exchange for his product is
not given him as a reward for past labor, but to provide for and secure
future labor. We consume before we produce. The laborer may say at the
end of the day, "I have paid yesterday's expenses; to-morrow I shall pay
those of today. " At every moment of his life, the member of society is
in debt; he dies with the debt unpaid:--how is it possible for him to
accumulate?
They talk of economy--it is the proprietor's hobby. Under a system of
equality, all economy which does not aim at subsequent reproduction or
enjoyment is impossible--why? Because the thing saved, since it cannot
be converted into capital, has no object, and is without a FINAL CAUSE.
This will be explained more fully in the next chapter.
To conclude:--
The laborer, in his relation to society, is a debtor who of necessity
dies insolvent. The proprietor is an unfaithful guardian who denies the
receipt of the deposit committed to his care, and wishes to be paid for
his guardianship down to the last day.
Lest the principles just set forth may appear to certain readers
too metaphysical, I shall reproduce them in a more concrete form,
intelligible to the dullest brains, and pregnant with the most important
consequences.
Hitherto, I have considered property as a power of EXCLUSION; hereafter,
I shall examine it as a power of INVASION.
CHAPTER IV. THAT PROPERTY IS IMPOSSIBLE.
The last resort of proprietors,--the overwhelming argument whose
invincible potency reassures them,--is that, in their opinion, equality
of conditions is impossible. "Equality of conditions is a chimera," they
cry with a knowing air; "distribute wealth equally to-day--to-morrow
this equality will have vanished. "
To this hackneyed objection, which they repeat everywhere with the most
marvellous assurance, they never fail to add the following comment, as
a sort of GLORY BE TO THE FATHER: "If all men were equal, nobody would
work. " This anthem is sung with variations.
"If all were masters, nobody would obey. "
"If nobody were rich, who would employ the poor? "
And, "If nobody were poor, who would labor for the rich? "
But let us have done with invective--we have better arguments at our
command.
If I show that property itself is impossible--that it is property which
is a contradiction, a chimera, a utopia; and if I show it no longer
by metaphysics and jurisprudence, but by figures, equations, and
calculations,--imagine the fright of the astounded proprietor! And you,
reader; what do you think of the retort?
Numbers govern the world--mundum regunt numeri. This proverb applies
as aptly to the moral and political, as to the sidereal and molecular,
world. The elements of justice are identical with those of algebra;
legislation and government are simply the arts of classifying
and balancing powers; all jurisprudence falls within the rules of
arithmetic. This chapter and the next will serve to lay the foundations
of this extraordinary doctrine. Then will be unfolded to the reader's
vision an immense and novel career; then shall we commence to see in
numerical relations the synthetic unity of philosophy and the sciences;
and, filled with admiration and enthusiasm for this profound and
majestic simplicity of Nature, we shall shout with the apostle: "Yes,
the Eternal has made all things by number, weight, and measure! " We
shall understand not only that equality of conditions is possible, but
that all else is impossible; that this seeming impossibility which
we charge upon it arises from the fact that we always think of it
in connection either with the proprietary or the communistic
regime,--political systems equally irreconcilable with human nature. We
shall see finally that equality is constantly being realized without our
knowledge, even at the very moment when we are pronouncing it incapable
of realization; that the time draws near when, without any effort or
even wish of ours, we shall have it universally established; that with
it, in it, and by it, the natural and true political order must make
itself manifest.
It has been said, in speaking of the blindness and obstinacy of the
passions, that, if man had any thing to gain by denying the truths of
arithmetic, he would find some means of unsettling their certainty: here
is an opportunity to try this curious experiment. I attack property,
no longer with its own maxims, but with arithmetic. Let the proprietors
prepare to verify my figures; for, if unfortunately for them the figures
prove accurate, the proprietors are lost.
In proving the impossibility of property, I complete the proof of its
injustice. In fact,--
That which is JUST must be USEFUL;
That which is useful must be TRUE;
That which is true must be POSSIBLE;
Therefore, every thing which is impossible is untrue, useless, unjust.
Then,--a priori,--we may judge of the justice of any thing by its
possibility; so that if the thing were absolutely impossible, it would
be absolutely unjust.
PROPERTY IS PHYSICALLY AND MATHEMATICALLY IMPOSSIBLE.
DEMONSTRATION.
AXIOM. --Property is the Right of Increase claimed by the Proprietor over
any thing which he has stamped as his own.
This proposition is purely an axiom, because,--
1. It is not a definition, since it does not express all that is
included in the right of property--the right of sale, of exchange, of
gift; the right to transform, to alter, to consume, to destroy, to
use and abuse, &c. All these rights are so many different powers of
property, which we may consider separately; but which we disregard here,
that we may devote all our attention to this single one,--the right of
increase.
2. It is universally admitted. No one can deny it without denying the
facts, without being instantly belied by universal custom.
3. It is self-evident, since property is always accompanied (either
actually or potentially) by the fact which this axiom expresses; and
through this fact, mainly, property manifests, establishes, and asserts
itself.
4. Finally, its negation involves a contradiction. The right of increase
is really an inherent right, so essential a part of property, that, in
its absence, property is null and void.
OBSERVATIONS.
