Laws

by Plato

These political adjustments of Plato's will be criticised by the practical statesman as being for the most part fanciful and ineffectual. He will observe, first of all, that the only real check on democracy is the division into classes. The second of the three proposals, though ingenious, and receiving some light from the apathy to politics which is often shown by the higher classes in a democracy, would have little power in times of excitement and peril, when the precaution was most needed. At such political crises, all the lower classes would vote equally with the higher. The subtraction of half the persons chosen at the first election by the chances of the lot would not raise the character of the senators, and is open to the objection of uncertainty, which necessarily attends this and similar schemes of double representative government. Nor can the voters be expected to retain the continuous political interest required for carrying out such a proposal as Plato's. Who could select 180 persons of each class, fitted to be senators? And whoever were chosen by the voter in the first instance, his wishes might be neutralized by the action of the lot. Yet the scheme of Plato is not really so extravagant as the actual constitution of Athens, in which all the senators appear to have been elected by lot (apo kuamou bouleutai), at least, after the revolution made by Cleisthenes; for the constitution of the senate which was established by Solon probably had some aristocratic features, though their precise nature is unknown to us. The ancients knew that election by lot was the most democratic of all modes of appointment, seeming to say in the objectionable sense, that 'one man is as good as another.' Plato, who is desirous of mingling different elements, makes a partial use of the lot, which he applies to candidates already elected by vote. He attempts also to devise a system of checks and balances such as he supposes to have been intended by the ancient legislators. We are disposed to say to him, as he himself says in a remarkable passage, that 'no man ever legislates, but accidents of all sorts, which legislate for us in all sorts of ways. The violence of war and the hard necessity of poverty are constantly overturning governments and changing laws.' And yet, as he adds, the true legislator is still required: he must co-operate with circumstances. Many things which are ascribed to human foresight are the result of chance. Ancient, and in a less degree modern political constitutions, are never consistent with themselves, because they are never framed on a single design, but are added to from time to time as new elements arise and gain the preponderance in the state. We often attribute to the wisdom of our ancestors great political effects which have sprung unforeseen from the accident of the situation. Power, not wisdom, is most commonly the source of political revolutions. And the result, as in the Roman Republic, of the co-existence of opposite elements in the same state is, not a balance of power or an equable progress of liberal principles, but a conflict of forces, of which one or other may happen to be in the ascendant. In Greek history, as well as in Plato's conception of it, this 'progression by antagonism' involves reaction: the aristocracy expands into democracy and returns again to tyranny.

The constitution of the Laws may be said to consist, besides the magistrates, mainly of three elements,—an administrative Council, the judiciary, and the Nocturnal Council, which is an intellectual aristocracy, composed of priests and the ten eldest guardians of the law and some younger co-opted members. To this latter chiefly are assigned the functions of legislation, but to be exercised with a sparing hand. The powers of the ordinary council are administrative rather than legislative. The whole number of 360, as in the Athenian constitution, is distributed among the months of the year according to the number of the tribes. Not more than one-twelfth is to be in office at once, so that the government would be made up of twelve administrations succeeding one another in the course of the year. They are to exercise a general superintendence, and, like the Athenian counsellors, are to preside in monthly divisions over all assemblies. Of the ecclesia over which they presided little is said, and that little relates to comparatively trifling duties. Nothing is less present to the mind of Plato than a House of Commons, carrying on year by year the work of legislation. For he supposes the laws to be already provided. As little would he approve of a body like the Roman Senate. The people and the aristocracy alike are to be represented, not by assemblies, but by officers elected for one or two years, except the guardians of the law, who are elected for twenty years.

The evils of this system are obvious. If in any state, as Plato says in the Statesman, it is easier to find fifty good draught-players than fifty good rulers, the greater part of the 360 who compose the council must be unfitted to rule. The unfitness would be increased by the short period during which they held office. There would be no traditions of government among them, as in a Greek or Italian oligarchy, and no individual would be responsible for any of their acts. Everything seems to have been sacrificed to a false notion of equality, according to which all have a turn of ruling and being ruled. In the constitution of the Magnesian state Plato has not emancipated himself from the limitations of ancient politics. His government may be described as a democracy of magistrates elected by the people. He never troubles himself about the political consistency of his scheme. He does indeed say that the greater part of the good of this world arises, not from equality, but from proportion, which he calls the judgment of Zeus (compare Aristotle's Distributive Justice), but he hardly makes any attempt to carry out the principle in practice. There is no attempt to proportion representation to merit; nor is there any body in his commonwealth which represents the life either of a class or of the whole state. The manner of appointing magistrates is taken chiefly from the old democratic constitution of Athens, of which it retains some of the worst features, such as the use of the lot, while by doing away with the political character of the popular assembly the mainspring of the machine is taken out. The guardians of the law, thirty-seven in number, of whom the ten eldest reappear as a part of the Nocturnal Council at the end of the twelfth book, are to be elected by the whole military class, but they are to hold office for twenty years, and would therefore have an oligarchical rather than a democratic character. Nothing is said of the manner in which the functions of the Nocturnal Council are to be harmonized with those of the guardians of the law, or as to how the ordinary council is related to it.

Similar principles are applied to inferior offices. To some the appointment is made by vote, to others by lot. In the elections to the priesthood, Plato endeavours to mix or balance in a friendly manner 'demus and not demus.' The commonwealth of the Laws, like the Republic, cannot dispense with a spiritual head, which is the same in both—the oracle of Delphi. From this the laws about all divine things are to be derived. The final selection of the Interpreters, the choice of an heir for a vacant lot, the punishment for removing a deposit, are also to be determined by it. Plato is not disposed to encourage amateur attempts to revive religion in states. For, as he says in the Laws, 'To institute religious rites is the work of a great intelligence.'

Though the council is framed on the model of the Athenian Boule, the law courts of Plato do not equally conform to the pattern of the Athenian dicasteries. Plato thinks that the judges should speak and ask questions:—this is not possible if they are numerous; he would, therefore, have a few judges only, but good ones. He is nevertheless aware that both in public and private suits there must be a popular element. He insists that the whole people must share in the administration of justice—in public causes they are to take the first step, and the final decision is to remain with them. In private suits they are also to retain a share; 'for the citizen who has no part in the administration of justice is apt to think that he has no share in the state. For this reason there is to be a court of law in every tribe (i.e. for about every 2,000 citizens), and the judges are to be chosen by lot.' Of the courts of law he gives what he calls a superficial sketch. Nor, indeed is it easy to reconcile his various accounts of them. It is however clear that although some officials, like the guardians of the law, the wardens of the agora, city, and country have power to inflict minor penalties, the administration of justice is in the main popular. The ingenious expedient of dividing the questions of law and fact between a judge and jury, which would have enabled Plato to combine the popular element with the judicial, did not occur to him or to any other ancient political philosopher. Though desirous of limiting the number of judges, and thereby confining the office to persons specially fitted for it, he does not seem to have understood that a body of law must be formed by decisions as well as by legal enactments.

He would have men in the first place seek justice from their friends and neighbours, because, as he truly remarks, they know best the questions at issue; these are called in another passage arbiters rather than judges. But if they cannot settle the matter, it is to be referred to the courts of the tribes, and a higher penalty is to be paid by the party who is unsuccessful in the suit. There is a further appeal allowed to the select judges, with a further increase of penalty. The select judges are to be appointed by the magistrates, who are to choose one from every magistracy. They are to be elected annually, and therefore probably for a year only, and are liable to be called to account before the guardians of the law. In cases of which death is the penalty, the trial takes place before a special court, which is composed of the guardians of the law and of the judges of appeal.

In treating of the subject in Book ix, he proposes to leave for the most part the methods of procedure to a younger generation of legislators; the procedure in capital causes he determines himself. He insists that the vote of the judges shall be given openly, and before they vote they are to hear speeches from the plaintiff and defendant. They are then to take evidence in support of what has been said, and to examine witnesses. The eldest judge is to ask his questions first, and then the second, and then the third. The interrogatories are to continue for three days, and the evidence is to be written down. Apparently he does not expect the judges to be professional lawyers, any more than he expects the members of the council to be trained statesmen.

In forming marriage connexions, Plato supposes that the public interest will prevail over private inclination. There was nothing in this very shocking to the notions of Greeks, among whom the feeling of love towards the other sex was almost deprived of sentiment or romance. Married life is to be regulated solely with a view to the good of the state. The newly-married couple are not allowed to absent themselves from their respective syssitia, even during their honeymoon; they are to give their whole mind to the procreation of children; their duties to one another at a later period of life are not a matter about which the state is equally solicitous. Divorces are readily allowed for incompatibility of temper. As in the Republic, physical considerations seem almost to exclude moral and social ones. To modern feelings there is a degree of coarseness in Plato's treatment of the subject. Yet he also makes some shrewd remarks on marriage, as for example, that a man who does not marry for money will not be the humble servant of his wife. And he shows a true conception of the nature of the family, when he requires that the newly-married couple 'should leave their father and mother,' and have a separate home. He also provides against extravagance in marriage festivals, which in some states of society, for instance in the case of the Hindoos, has been a social evil of the first magnitude.

In treating of property, Plato takes occasion to speak of property in slaves. They are to be treated with perfect justice; but, for their own sake, to be kept at a distance. The motive is not so much humanity to the slave, of which there are hardly any traces (although Plato allows that many in the hour of peril have found a slave more attached than members of their own family), but the self-respect which the freeman and citizen owes to himself (compare Republic). If they commit crimes, they are doubly punished; if they inform against illegal practices of their masters, they are to receive a protection, which would probably be ineffectual, from the guardians of the law; in rare cases they are to be set free. Plato still breathes the spirit of the old Hellenic world, in which slavery was a necessity, because leisure must be provided for the citizen.

The education propounded in the Laws differs in several points from that of the Republic. Plato seems to have reflected as deeply and earnestly on the importance of infancy as Rousseau, or Jean Paul (compare the saying of the latter—'Not the moment of death, but the moment of birth, is probably the more important'). He would fix the amusements of children in the hope of fixing their characters in after-life. In the spirit of the statesman who said, 'Let me make the ballads of a country, and I care not who make their laws,' Plato would say, 'Let the amusements of children be unchanged, and they will not want to change the laws. The 'Goddess Harmonia' plays a great part in Plato's ideas of education. The natural restless force of life in children, 'who do nothing but roar until they are three years old,' is gradually to be reduced to law and order. As in the Republic, he fixes certain forms in which songs are to be composed: (1) they are to be strains of cheerfulness and good omen; (2) they are to be hymns or prayers addressed to the Gods; (3) they are to sing only of the lawful and good. The poets are again expelled or rather ironically invited to depart; and those who remain are required to submit their poems to the censorship of the magistrates. Youth are no longer compelled to commit to memory many thousand lyric and tragic Greek verses; yet, perhaps, a worse fate is in store for them. Plato has no belief in 'liberty of prophesying'; and having guarded against the dangers of lyric poetry, he remembers that there is an equal danger in other writings. He cannot leave his old enemies, the Sophists, in possession of the field; and therefore he proposes that youth shall learn by heart, instead of the compositions of poets or prose writers, his own inspired work on laws. These, and music and mathematics, are the chief parts of his education.