This author’s opinion of crime is best expressed by the following quotation taken from his “De la législation ou principes des lois”:
“The more I reflect upon it the more I am convinced that inequality of fortune and condition disorders man and alters the natural sentiments of his heart, for the habit of luxury gives him a desire for things that are useless for his true happiness and fills his mind with the most unjust and absurd prejudices and errors. I believe that equality, while satisfying modest requirements, keeps those requirements modest, and preserves in the soul a peace which is opposed to the birth and progress of the passions. By what strange folly should we have cultivated a studied elegance and refinement in our needs if inequality of fortune had not accustomed us to regard this ridiculous fastidiousness as a proof of superiority, and attained thereby a certain consideration? Why should I consider as below me a man who is perhaps my superior in merit; why should I pretend to have authority over him and so open the door to tyranny, to servitude, and all the vices most fatal to society, if the inequality of conditions had not exposed my soul to ambition, as the inequality of fortune has exposed it to avarice? It is inequality alone that has taught men to prefer many useless and harmful things to virtue. I believe that it has been demonstrated that in a state of equality nothing would be easier than to prevent abuses and maintain the law. [[15]]Equality is certain to produce all good, because it unites men, elevates their souls, and prepares them for mutual feelings of benevolence and amity. Inequality, on the other hand, produces all evil, because it degrades men, humiliates them, and sows division and hatred among them.”[16]
IX.
J. P. Brissot de Warville.
In his “Théorie des loix criminelles” we find among others the following passages that are of interest in connection with the subject which occupies our attention:
“A man is not born an enemy to society. It is circumstances which give him that title, such as poverty or misfortune. He does not disturb the general tranquillity until he has lost his own. He ceases to be a good citizen only when the name becomes meaningless in his case; and it is when poverty has destroyed his own privileges that he dares to attack those of his fellows. To make all citizens happy is, then, to prevent the inception of crime; and the rarity of crime is in direct ratio to the goodness of the administration. This simple principle, however unknown to administrators even to the present day, is no less solid on that account, no less luminous, and ought no less to serve as the basis for government. If it has been neglected, it is because it has appeared easier to rulers to punish the unfortunate being who demands the rights that nature gave him, than to satisfy his just demand; to stifle the cries of anguish, than to change them to shouts of applause. The penal code of every nation is much like the bull of Phalaris; its imposing garb of juridical forms, like the timbrels and other instruments surrounding the brazen monster, prevent the cries of the victims from reaching the ear. Tyrants cry out to the credulous spectators that blood is necessary to the public safety; good legislators are greedy of it.
“The first and most efficacious means of preventing crimes consists, then, in a wise administration that procures the general happiness. When the rays of the beneficent star that rules extend their influence even to the lowest ranks of society, they are rarely sullied by punishments; each, concentrating itself upon the spot where heaven has thrown it, makes the day that it lightens joyous and blessed (and crime is so near to the man who is forced to curse his fate!). If the taxes are light and not severely felt, if subsistence is [[16]]easy, the number of marriages increases, they are happy, and the population multiplies. The people then do not regret their labors, since they are interspersed with pleasures. They are attached to the fatherland, which offers them good fortune, and to life, which gives them the means of enjoying it. A man does not disturb the public peace, because his own prosperity is the fruit of it. A property-holder himself, he takes good care not to do any violence to the right of property, and even where he would not naturally have a horror of bloodshed, his days are too precious to him for him to dare to cut short those of his fellow-citizens.”[17]
“… What sovereign, I say, cannot easily see that he has in his hand the true means of restraining crime, namely to secure the public well-being by means of civil legislation. Yes, the more perfect civil legislation becomes the less need there will be for criminal legislation. And this need will disappear entirely when the twofold basis upon which civil legislation ought to rest becomes fixed and invariable; when the property and the liberty of subjects are respected by the monarch; when the unfortunate man who has been born without property (though with the same needs as others) can, by working, correct the injustice of fate, and destroy the inequality of the distribution of wealth; when, finally, the fruit of his labor will not be the prey of the greedy tax-gatherer. The rich man can then enjoy his wealth in safety, because despair will no longer expose him to the knife of the poor man whom his proud opulence insults. We posit here as the foundation of good legislation the security of real and personal property, but a masterpiece of statesmanship would be, to make them useless, if it were possible, by abolishing them altogether. This would be to tear up crime by the roots. It was thus that Lycurgus, whose laws have been so calumniated because to narrow minds they seemed impossible of imitation, cleverly dried up the source of all crime. To avoid attacks upon property he abolished it; to prevent adultery he had all women held in common; to make the Spartan a hero he made him the slave of his harsh legislation; finally to prevent the sad effects of the passions he permitted none but the passion for the public weal. This is why crimes were so rare in Sparta as long as these laws were faithfully observed. But when Lysander brought back from the fatal conquest of Athens treasures, the taste for art and the rage for luxury, all the vices were rapidly introduced. Then crimes broke out; ambition made men commit perjuries, assassinations, treasons; then the virtuous Agis, who wanted to revive [[17]]morality, perished under the perfidious knife of the royal servitude; then men like Nabis and Machanidas appeared; and finally a penal code was introduced, and Sparta was reduced to the status of an ordinary city.”[18]
“Ought we to be astonished that the attacks upon the social laws are so multiplied to-day, and that there are always so many thieves and assassins, when to the causes of crime which we have developed it is necessary to add that horrible malady of European states, mendicity? When the water destined by nature to quench the thirst of all men is artificially diverted into particular channels for the exclusive use of certain individuals, the unfortunate man, tormented by need, falls into despair, and in a rage breaks these fatal channels, making the fragments fall upon the heads of his enemies. Exclusive possession of property has everywhere produced poverty in the most numerous class, and poverty has given birth to mendicity, which, robbing with one hand to satisfy hunger, with the other plunges a dagger into the bosom of the rich to stop their cries. Here we have in two words the origin of theft and murder. To destroy the roots of these it would be necessary to restore among men the equality of condition so praised by modern philosophers, but not at all included in the programs of modern governments. It would be necessary to distribute wealth equally among all citizens, to eradicate from their hearts the corrosive desire of ambition, and to blunt the spur of their personal interest.”[19]