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What does Frederick Bastiat have to say about the law?
The Law by Frederick Bastiat covers the ironic and hypocritical nature of law and government. He dives into the original purpose of law which included protecting the person, liberty, and property of individuals. He says that any goal beyond these three things would inevitably result in injustice and loss of freedom. The overarching idea that Bastiat explains is summed up in this quote: “Life, liberty, and property do not exist because men have made laws. On the contrary, it was the fact that life, liberty, and property existed beforehand that caused men to make laws in the first place” (Bastiat, pg.3). So because life, liberty, and property existed before the law, that means that the only purpose the law should have is to protect these things.
What would Bastiat’s ideas result in?
Under a system like this, people would be able to work hard for themselves; they would be able to protect what is theirs; and their fate would rest entirely on their own shoulders because the state would not be there to interfere unless to help protect against injustice. I agree with this idea because I cannot see a purpose for the law that is not to protect these preexisting things. Even within our corrupt government today, we are led to believe that our laws still have this goal. Unfortunately, I think that the law has departed from its original purpose.* Laws are becoming increasingly involved in various aspects of our lives*. This is a large contributing factor to the political turmoil the world is in today.
But where is our current system leading us?
The scary thing about legal plunder is that it is made almost unrecognizable. As Bastiat states, “legal plunder has two roots: One of them, as I have said before, is in human greed; the other is in false philanthropy” (Bastiat, pg.19). When the law is used for purposes other than organized justice, it becomes a weapon that threatens justice. Perhaps one of the most well known forms of legal plunder is socialism. Socialism has always seemed appealing from the outside because we are told that the goal is to create an equal world. The sad truth is that the law cannot give to one person without taking from another; this is in direct opposition to the purpose of the law: to protect persons, liberties, and properties of individuals. It is absolutely impossible for socialism to exist if everyone is to have an equal voice in making the law. If this were the case, then the world would reduce itself to a constant “money-grab.” If one class of people are able to take from another, what is stopping the other class from requesting the same rights? We could not allow everyone to have a vote because the votes would constantly contradict. Socialism would require us to leave the law-making to a select few. It is easy to believe that legal plunder only comes from the people at the top. This is not true. As Bastiat relays in his paper, people could also demand “…the right to relief, which is the poor man’s plunder” (Bastiat, pg.12). If we don’t restrict the law’s control, what will stop it from slowly taking over every aspect of our lives under the false pretense of creating equality for all?
What is the solution?
As you can probably gather by now, there is not a simple answer to this dilemma of the law. Whether the government has too much control, or not enough, there are problems presented at every turn. In the midst of this confusion, I think that the best answer is to allow everyone to have a voice. Democracy has to be our solution because anything else results in the loss of freedom. However, what if our freedom hurts the collective good?
Work Cited:
“Frederick Bastiat the Law.” Translated by Dean Russell, The Law, by Frederic Bastiat, The Foundation for Economic Education, Inc. , bastiat.org/en/the_law.html.