Part I, 7

Mr. Burke, as a member of the House of Commons, is part of the English government; and though he professes to be an enemy of war, he attacks the French Constitution, which seeks to abolish it. He holds up the English government, in every part, as a model for France; but he should first learn what the French say about it. In defense of their own constitution, they contend that the measure of liberty enjoyed in England is just enough to enslave a country more profitably than despotism could. Since revenue is the real object of every despotism, a government so constructed obtains more than it could either by outright despotism or under complete freedom, and therefore, in its own interest, opposes both. They also explain the eagerness such governments always show for war by pointing to the motives behind it. Under despotic governments, wars spring from pride; but under governments where wars become a means of taxation, the impulse to wage them becomes more enduring.

The French Constitution, therefore, to guard against both these evils, has taken the power to declare war from kings and ministers and placed that right where the expense must fall.

When the question of the right to make war and peace was under debate in the National Assembly, the people of England appeared deeply interested in the outcome and warmly applauded the decision. As a principle, it applies as much to one country as to another. William the Conqueror held the power of war and peace in his own hands as a conqueror, and his descendants have claimed it under him as a right ever since.

Although Mr. Burke has asserted the right of Parliament at the Revolution to bind and control the nation and posterity forever, he denies at the same time that Parliament or the nation had any right to alter what he calls the succession to the crown, except in part, or by a kind of modification. By taking this position he throws the question back to the Norman Conquest; and by tracing a line of succession from William the Conqueror to the present day, he makes it necessary to ask who and what William the Conqueror was, where he came from, and what the origins, history, and nature of the so-called prerogatives are. Everything must have had a beginning; the fog of time and antiquity should be penetrated to find it. Let Mr. Burke, then, bring forward his William of Normandy, for this is where his argument leads. Unfortunately for him, tracing this line of succession reveals another line beside it: if the succession follows the line of conquest, the nation follows the line of the conquered, and ought to free itself from that reproach.

But perhaps it will be said that although the power to declare war descends as an inheritance of conquest, it is checked by Parliament's right to withhold supplies. When a thing is wrong from the beginning, amendments will never make it right; and often they do as much harm in one direction as good in another. So it is here: if one party rashly declares war as a matter of right and the other flatly withholds supplies as a matter of right, the remedy becomes as bad as the disease, or worse. One forces the nation into battle and the other binds its hands; but the likelier result is that the contest will end in collusion between the parties and provide cover for both.

On this question of war, three things must be considered: first, the right to declare it; second, the expense of sustaining it; third, the way it is conducted once declared. The French Constitution places the right where the expense must fall, and that union can exist only in the nation. Once war is declared, it entrusts its conduct to the executive department. If this were the practice in every country, we should hear very little more of wars.

Before I turn to other parts of the French Constitution, and to relieve the fatigue of argument, I will tell an anecdote I heard from Dr. Franklin.

While the Doctor lived in France as Minister from America during the war, he received numerous proposals from projectors of every country and kind, all eager to go to America, the land that flows with milk and honey; among them was one who offered to become its king. He presented his proposal to the Doctor in a letter now in the hands of M. Beaumarchais of Paris—stating, first, that since the Americans had dismissed or sent away*6 their King, they would need another. Second, that he himself was a Norman. Third, that his family was older than the Dukes of Normandy and his descent more honorable, since his line had never been bastardized. Fourth, that England already had a precedent for kings coming from Normandy. On these grounds he rested his offer, instructing the Doctor to forward it to America. But the Doctor neither did so nor answered him, and the projector wrote a second letter. In this one he did not, to be sure, threaten to cross over and conquer America; with great dignity he merely proposed that, if his offer were refused, he might receive an acknowledgment of about L30,000 for his generosity! Now, since every argument about succession must trace that succession to some beginning, Mr. Burke's arguments on this subject show that English kings have no English origin, but descend from the Norman line by right of conquest. It may therefore help his doctrine to publicize this story and inform him that, should the royal line suffer the natural extinction to which all mortals are subject, Kings may once again be obtained from Normandy on more reasonable terms than William the Conqueror's. Consequently, the good people of England at the revolution of 1688 could have done much better if a generous Norman like this had known their needs and they had known his. The chivalric character Mr. Burke so admires is certainly far easier to bargain with than a hard-bargaining Dutchman. But to return to constitutional matters: the French Constitution says there shall be no titles; consequently, that whole class of dubious generation called "aristocracy" in some countries and "nobility" in others is abolished, and the peer is raised to the dignity of Man.

Titles are merely nicknames, and every nickname is a title. The thing itself is perfectly harmless, but it betrays a kind of foppery in human character that degrades it. In great matters it reduces man to a miniature of himself; in small matters, it makes him a counterfeit of women. It talks of its fine blue ribbon like a girl and displays its new garter like a child. A certain writer of some antiquity says: "When I was a child, I thought as a child; but when I became a man, I put away childish things."

It is the elevated mind of France that has brought down the folly of titles. France has outgrown the baby clothes of Count and Duke and dressed itself for manhood. France has not leveled; it has exalted. It has put down the dwarf to raise the man. The puny pretension of a senseless word like Duke, Count, or Earl no longer pleases. Even those who bore these titles have disowned the gibberish; as they outgrew their rickets, they came to despise the rattle. The authentic mind of man, thirsting for its native home in society, scorns the trinkets that divide him from it. Titles are like circles drawn by a magician's wand to shrink the sphere of man's happiness. He lives imprisoned within the Bastille of a word and gazes from afar at the life of man he envies.

Is it any wonder, then, that titles should fall in France? Is it not a greater wonder that they survive anywhere? What are they? What are they worth, and "what is their amount?" When we think or speak of a Judge or a General, we associate the word with an office and a character: gravity in one case, bravery in the other. But when we use a word merely as a title, no ideas come with it. In all Adam's vocabulary there is no such animal as a Duke or a Count; nor can we attach any definite idea to the words. Whether they signify strength or weakness, wisdom or folly, a child or a man, the rider or the horse, is altogether uncertain. What respect, then, can be paid to something that describes nothing and means nothing? Imagination has given shape and character to centaurs, satyrs, and the whole tribe of fairies; but titles defy even the powers of fancy and remain chimerical creatures without description.

But that is not all. If a whole country chooses to despise titles, their entire value vanishes and no one will claim them. Public opinion alone makes them something, nothing, or worse than nothing. There is no need to take titles away: they take themselves away when society joins in laughing at them. This kind of imaginary importance has visibly declined throughout Europe, and hastens toward its end as the world of reason rises. Once the lowest rank of the so-called nobility was held in higher regard than the highest is now, and a man in armor riding through Christendom in search of adventures attracted more stares than a modern Duke. The world has seen that folly fall, brought down by laughter, and the farce of titles will share its fate. The patriots of France have realized in time that rank and dignity in society must stand on new ground. The old ground has given way. Character, not the fantasy of titles, must now provide its solid foundation; they have brought their titles to the altar and offered them up as a burnt offering to Reason.

If no harm had been joined to the folly of titles, they would not have merited the solemn, formal destruction decreed by the National Assembly. This makes it necessary to examine more deeply the nature and character of aristocracy.

What is called aristocracy in some countries and nobility in others arose from governments founded on conquest. At first it was a military order established to support military government (for all governments founded on conquest were military). To perpetuate that order for its original purpose, every younger branch of those families was disinherited and the law of primogeniture established.

The nature and character of aristocracy reveal themselves in this law. It is a law against every other law of nature, and Nature herself demands its destruction. Establish justice within the family, and aristocracy falls. Under the aristocratic law of primogeniture, five children in a family of six are abandoned. Aristocracy has only one child. The rest are born to be devoured. They are cast as prey to the cannibal, and the natural parent prepares the unnatural feast.

As everything unnatural in man affects the interests of society to some degree, so does this. All the children whom aristocracy disowns—that is, all except the eldest—are generally cast like orphans upon a parish to be supported by the public, but at a greater cost. Unnecessary offices and positions in government and courts are created at public expense to maintain them.

With what feelings can a father or mother look upon their younger children? By nature they are children, and by marriage they are heirs; but by aristocracy they are bastards and orphans. In one respect they are their parents' flesh and blood; in another, they are no kin to them at all. To restore parents to their children, children to their parents, their mutual ties, and man to society—and to destroy the monster of aristocracy, root and branch—the French Constitution has abolished the law of primogeniture. Here, then, is the monster, and Mr. Burke, if he likes, may write its epitaph.

So far we have considered aristocracy chiefly from one point of view. Now we must consider it from another. But whether we view it from the front or behind, from the side or any other angle, in private or in public life, it remains a monster.

In France, aristocracy had one feature fewer than it has in some other countries. It did not constitute a body of hereditary legislators. It was not "a corporation of aristocracy," as I have heard M. de la Fayette describe the English House of Peers. Let us examine, then, why the French Constitution has resolved not to establish such a House in France.

First, because, as already noted, aristocracy is maintained by tyranny and injustice within the family.

Second, because aristocrats are unnaturally unfit to legislate for a nation. Their notions of distributive justice are corrupted at the source. They begin life by trampling on all their younger brothers and sisters and every other relation, and are taught and raised to do so. With what sense of justice or honor can a man enter a legislative house when he takes into his own hands the inheritance of an entire family of children, or parcels out to them some paltry share with the insolence of one giving alms?

Third, because the idea of hereditary legislators is as inconsistent as hereditary judges or hereditary juries, as absurd as a hereditary mathematician or a hereditary wise man, and as ridiculous as a hereditary poet laureate.

Fourth, because a body of men who hold themselves accountable to no one ought to be trusted by no one.

Fifth, because it perpetuates the uncivilized principle of governments founded on conquest and the base notion that one man owns another and governs him by personal right.

Sixth, because aristocracy tends to diminish the quality of the human species. The universal economy of nature makes it known, and the example of the Jews proves it, that any small group of people separated from society at large and constantly marrying among themselves tends to degenerate. Aristocracy even defeats its supposed purpose, and in time becomes the opposite of what is noble in man. Mr. Burke speaks of nobility; let him show us what it is. The greatest figures the world has known have risen from the democratic floor. Aristocracy has not kept pace with democracy in anything like equal measure. The artificial Noble shrinks to a dwarf before the Noble of Nature; and in the few instances—there are some in every country—in which nature has miraculously survived within aristocracy, Those Men Despise It.—But it is time to turn to a new subject.

Mr. Burke is a member of the House of Commons, so he is part of the English government. Although he says he opposes war, he attacks the French Constitution, which tries to put an end to it. He presents every part of the English government as a model for France. But first he should learn what the French say about that government. In defense of their own, they argue that England gives people just enough freedom to make their enslavement more profitable than outright despotism. Since every despotism ultimately seeks revenue, this kind of government collects more than either an outright despotism or a fully free country could. For that financial reason, it opposes both. The French also explain why such governments are always so ready to go to war by pointing to the different reasons wars begin. In despotic governments, wars come from pride. But where war provides a way to raise taxes, the incentive to start wars lasts longer.

The French Constitution therefore guards against both problems. It takes the power to declare war away from kings and ministers and gives that right to those who must pay the cost.

When the National Assembly debated who should have the right to decide on war and peace, people in England seemed deeply interested in the outcome and strongly approved its decision. The principle applies as much to one country as to another. William the Conqueror held the power to decide on war and peace because he was a conqueror. His descendants have claimed it as an inherited right ever since.

Mr. Burke claims that Parliament at the Revolution had the right to bind and control the nation and all future generations forever. Yet he also denies that Parliament or the nation had the right to change what he calls the succession to the crown, except partly or by some limited adjustment. This position takes us back to the Norman Conquest. By tracing an unbroken line from William the Conqueror to today, he makes us ask who William was, where he came from, and how the powers called royal prerogatives began and developed. Everything has a beginning. We should look through the fog of age and tradition to find it. Let Mr. Burke, then, produce his William of Normandy, since that is where his argument leads. Unfortunately for his argument, this line of succession has a parallel: if the succession follows the line of conquest, the nation follows the line of the conquered. The nation should free itself from that disgrace.

Someone may say that, even if the power to declare war was inherited from the conquest, Parliament can restrain it by refusing funds. But when something is wrong from the start, amendments do not make it right. They often cause as much harm in one direction as they prevent in another. That is what happens here. If one side rashly declares war as its right and the other firmly refuses funding as its right, the cure becomes as bad as, or worse than, the disease. One side forces the nation into a fight; the other ties its hands. More likely, the two sides will secretly come to an agreement and use their conflict as cover for both of them.

There are three things to consider about war. First, who has the right to declare it; second, who pays for it; and third, who directs it once it has been declared. The French Constitution gives the right to those who bear the expense. Only the nation can unite those two roles. Once war is declared, the constitution gives its direction to the executive branch. If every country did this, we would hear much less about wars.

Before I examine other parts of the French Constitution, I will offer a story Dr. Franklin told me, to give us a break from argument.

While Dr. Franklin lived in France as America's minister during the war, people from every country brought him all kinds of proposals. They wanted to go to America, the land flowing with milk and honey. Among them was a man who offered to become king. He sent the Doctor a letter, now held by M. Beaumarchais of Paris. He began by saying that since the Americans had dismissed or sent away*6 their king, they would need another. Second, he was a Norman. Third, his family was older than the Dukes of Normandy and his ancestry more honorable, since his line had never included an illegitimate birth. Fourth, England already had a precedent for kings coming from Normandy. On those grounds he made his offer and told the Doctor to send it to America. The Doctor neither sent it nor replied. So the man wrote again. He did not actually threaten to cross the ocean and conquer America. Instead, with great dignity, he proposed that if his offer was refused, he might receive about L30,000 as a token of appreciation for his generosity! Every argument about succession must trace that succession to a beginning. Mr. Burke's arguments therefore imply that English kings have no English origin: they descend from the Norman line through the right of conquest. It may help his doctrine to publicize this story and let him know that, if the royal line dies out—as all mortal lines can—Normandy can again supply kings, on better terms than William the Conqueror offered. The good people of England might therefore have done much better at the revolution of 1688 if this generous Norman had known what they needed and they had known what he offered. The chivalrous character Mr. Burke admires is certainly easier to bargain with than a tough Dutch negotiator. But back to the constitution. The French Constitution says there will be no titles. That removes the whole class of uncertain origin called "aristocracy" in some countries and "nobility" in others. It raises the peer to the status of a human being.

Titles are just nicknames, and every nickname is a title. In themselves they are harmless. But they reveal a kind of human vanity that lowers a person. They make a man a lesser version of himself in important matters, and a caricature of women in trivial ones. He talks about his fine blue ribbon like a girl and displays his new garter like a child. A writer from long ago says: "When I was a child, I thought as a child; but when I became a man, I put away childish things."

France's change in attitude is what brought down the foolish practice of titles. France has outgrown the baby clothes of Count and Duke and put on the clothes of adulthood. It has not lowered people; it has raised them. It has removed the dwarf to make room for the man. Feeble words like Duke, Count, and Earl no longer appeal. Even their former holders have rejected the nonsense. As they recovered from the stunted growth it caused, they came to despise its toy rattle. A true human mind longs to return to its natural home, society, and looks down on the trinkets that separate it from others. Titles are like circles drawn with a magician's wand, shrinking the space in which a person can be happy. A titled man lives walled up inside the Bastille of a word and watches ordinary human life from a distance, envying it.

Is it surprising that titles have fallen in France? Isn't it more surprising that they survive anywhere? What are they? What are they worth, and "what is their amount?" When we speak of a Judge or a General, we think of a position and a character: seriousness in one case, bravery in the other. But when such a word is only a title, it brings no ideas to mind. In all the words Adam could name things with, there is no creature called a Duke or a Count. Nor can we attach any clear idea to those words. Do they mean strength or weakness, wisdom or foolishness, a child or a man, a rider or a horse? We cannot tell. Why respect something that describes and means nothing? The imagination can give shape and character to centaurs, satyrs, and every kind of fairy. Titles defeat even the imagination: they are imaginary things that cannot be described.

And there is more. If a whole country chooses to scorn titles, they lose all value and nobody wants one. Public opinion alone makes them worth something, nothing, or worse than nothing. Nobody needs to take titles away: they disappear on their own when society agrees to laugh at them. This imaginary importance has visibly declined across Europe, and it is disappearing faster as reason spreads. Once, people thought more highly of the lowest class of so-called nobility than they now think of its highest class. An armored man riding across Christendom looking for adventures once drew more attention than a modern Duke. The world has watched that foolishness die from ridicule, and titles will meet the same fate. France's patriots have realized in time that social standing and dignity need a new basis. The old one has collapsed. Standing must now rest on a person's character, not the illusion of a title. The patriots have brought their titles to the altar and burned them as an offering to Reason.

If titles were merely foolish and caused no harm, they would not deserve the serious, formal abolition ordered by the National Assembly. Their harmful effects make it necessary to look more closely at the nature of aristocracy.

What some countries call aristocracy and others call nobility began in governments founded on conquest. Originally it was a military class meant to support military government, as all governments founded on conquest were. To keep that class going for its original purpose, the younger children of those families were disinherited, and the rule that the eldest child inherits was established.

This rule reveals what aristocracy is like. It goes against every other law of nature, and nature itself demands its destruction. Give families fair treatment, and aristocracy falls. Under the aristocratic rule of inheritance by the eldest, five children out of a family of six are left with nothing. Aristocracy only ever has one child. The others are born to be eaten. They are thrown to a cannibal, and their own parent prepares this unnatural meal.

Everything unnatural in human behavior affects society to some degree, and this does too. Generally, all the children aristocracy rejects—that is, all but the eldest—are left like orphans for the local parish and the public to support, at a greater cost. Unneeded government and court jobs are created at public expense to maintain them.

How can a father or mother think about their younger children? By nature they are children, and through their parents' marriage they are heirs. But under aristocracy they are treated as illegitimate children and orphans. In one sense they are their parents' flesh and blood; in the other, they are treated as no relation at all. The French Constitution has therefore abolished inheritance by the eldest child. It has done this to restore parents and children to one another, restore people to society, and destroy the monster of aristocracy, roots and all. There lies the monster. Mr. Burke may write its epitaph if he likes.

So far we have looked at aristocracy mainly from one angle. Now we must look from another. But whether we look at it from the front, the back, or the side, in private life or public life, it remains a monster.

In France, aristocracy lacked one feature found in some other countries: it did not form a body of lawmakers whose seats passed down through families. It was not "a corporation of aristocracy," as I have heard M. de la Fayette call the English House of Peers. Let us examine why the French Constitution rejects such a house in France.

First, as already noted, aristocracy survives through tyranny and injustice within families.

Second, aristocrats are particularly unsuited to make laws for a nation. Their idea of fair treatment is corrupted at its source. They begin life by trampling on their younger brothers, sisters, and other relatives. They are taught to do it. What sense of justice or honor can a man bring into a legislature if he takes for himself the inheritance meant for a whole family of children, or arrogantly hands the others a miserable portion as if it were a gift?

Third, lawmakers who inherit their seats make no more sense than judges or juries who inherit theirs. They are as absurd as a hereditary mathematician or wise person, and as ridiculous as a hereditary poet laureate.

Fourth, no one should trust a group of men who believe they answer to nobody.

Fifth, this keeps alive the uncivilized principle behind governments founded on conquest: the degrading idea that one person can own another and rule him by personal right.

Sixth, aristocracy tends to make the human species worse. According to the general workings of nature, as the example of the Jews proves, a small group separated from the rest of society and constantly marrying within the group tends to degenerate. Aristocracy even defeats its own stated purpose and eventually becomes the opposite of what is noble in human beings. Mr. Burke talks about nobility. Let him show us what it is. The greatest people the world has known have come from the common people. Aristocracy has not kept pace with democracy. The artificially made Noble shrinks to a dwarf beside a person who is noble by nature. A few such people do exist within the aristocracy, as they do in every country. In them, nature has survived aristocracy almost miraculously—and those people despise it. But it is time for a new subject.