Book 4.

Section 3:
Looking Back! Slavery by Law

This essay reviews a small book, "The Law", written in 1850 by Frederick Bastiat (French).  Translated by Dean Russell it was reprinted in 1950 to a total of near 400,000 copies by 1987.  Publisher:  "The Foundation for Economic Education, inc.," USA.

This book reveals a time when the educated analysed areas of cultural philosophy and says much that needs to be said on a subject that now needs thought. 

In today's culture it seems that this human ability has died, such work is something we are unlikely to get from today’s academia and it deserves recognition of modern comment. 

Our world community has now been made so complicated by laws directed to social engineering that it is beyond intelligent logic.  People at every level are becoming less honest, more irritable and more violent.

A return to simple exchange of social communion is needed or most of those living in our new century will suffer injustice increasing to death.

Fanatics seek to re-invent mankind but are so ignorant as to think humans should live better as ants – it should be self-evident, even to do-gooders with minds twisted to self-righteous, that in their advocacy they themselves do not behave within limits of their claimed desires of enslavement. 

Social law has only one rightful purpose: to maintain freedom within limits of justice.

Isn’t it now abundantly clear – with all the trouble in our world – with millions of lives destroyed by fake ideology – with protest and suffering growing by the day – that law is being used immorally?

Socialists claim that religions are the cause of most wars and we certainly have to agree with them that in recent centuries it is; unfortunately for them it is their religion/faith, “humanism”, that is the worst offender.  There is no evidence of any powerful philosophy in earlier times ever descending to more viscous cruelty

It should certainly be clear that those who use the law to enforce social engineering – who presume the right to shape humanity to simplistic design – who use all power of law to experiment with lives and deform all to their twisted ideas – that here is the heart of our sickness. 

Social engineering is by far our most vile weapon of mass destruction for it is the cause of those other abominations.  I begin with a statement made near the end of the book, The Law, because it sets out clearly the nature of "true human law" under the heading of: 

P.71 "Justice Means Equal Rights. Quote:
Law is justice. And it would indeed be strange if law could properly be anything else! Is not justice right? Are not rights equal? By what right does the law force me to conform to the social plans of Mr. Mimeral, Mr. de Melun, Mr. Thiers, or Mr. Louis Blanc?

If the law has a moral right to do this, why does it not, then, force these gentlemen to submit to "my plans"?
Is it logical to suppose that nature has not given me sufficient imagination to dream up a utopia also? "Should the law choose one fantasy among many, and put the organised force of government at its service only?

"Law is justice. And let it not be said - as it continually is said - that under this concept, the law would be atheistic, individualistic, and heartless; that it would make mankind in its own image. This is an absurd conclusion; worthy only of those worshippers of government who believe the law IS mankind.

"Nonsense! Do those worshippers of government believe that free persons will cease to act? Does it follow that if we receive no energy [direction] from the law, we will receive no energy [direction] at all? Does it follow that if the law is restricted to the functions of protecting the free use of our faculties, we will be unable to use our faculties?

"Suppose that the law does not force us to follow certain forms of religion or, systems of association, or methods of education, or regulations of labour, or regulations of trade, or plans for charity; does it then follow that we shall eagerly plunge into atheism, hermitary, ignorance, misery, and greed?" End Quote.

Feminists may like to know that in those times, in general use, "man" was used in the sense of 'mankind'; male and female were equal.

The importance of "The Law" is that it states a position in logic not emotion. 

Most (with memory for it) see that when we lived, even if only in partial freedom from restraints of law now accepted, we did not ignore but took more heed, of the needs of others – did not submit so totally to religious faith in political murder as now, by simple indoctrination, is sweeping the world – we were not less enterprising, less honest, less socially supportive!

The French Revolution didn't sweep the world!  Deception had to worm into the minds of children to achieve success.  It is unjust use of law that is dehumanising!  Today 'caring' is the claimed attitude of educators but, in its result, natural caring is being replaced by an appearance of caring.

We may also see that the plunder of our wages, taken to reward those who see no need to exert themselves (law enforced charity may serve them as well or even better than their own efforts) has resulted in the demeaning or degradation of human life rather than its advance.  The pleasure of self-sufficiency is being replaced by a culture of beggars.

Surely there must be questions?  Do those with the arrogance to claim the right to enslave the whole of mankind for social experiment really have any such right?  Why are they not classed as criminals, fools or at very least egomaniacs?  What gives them right or reason to believe that they can create mankind to a better design than that of creation itself – or to endanger natural humanity?

Are they themselves not created by natural force?  If creation is by chance as they claim then how is it that they think their tiny intelligence can create advance when all they offer is reduction to a lower level?  By what measure are they so superior to their brothers, sisters, aunts and cousins that they have rights of limit and control without adult agreement? 

What gives their delusions the right to force of law without permission of those on whom they work their experiments?  Were I to claim, and try to enforce, that people looked better without hair on their heads, I would be restrained; why are maniacs allowed law to limit the intellectual ability of my children?

Were we free within the limitations of a law that is only concerned with justice, would we not, more enthusiastically, use our abilities for study, experiment and production?  Would this not advance the common good more quickly, equitably and justly, than when we are robbed of the rewards of our efforts – our enlightenment destroyed to save face of fools?

Would it not be better if everyone were encouraged to “Best Effort” rather than “dumbed-down” to least effort?  Is it justice for the sick that healthy people be given the money needed for hospitals?  Should the lazy be paid so we cannot afford to build safe roads?  What are the consequences of law without justice? Who benefits when culture gives false value to ego? Quote:

P.72,  The Path to Dignity and Progress
”Law is justice.  And it is under the law of justice - under the reign of right; under the influence of liberty, safety, stability, and responsibility – that every person will attain his real worth and the true dignity of his being. It is only under this law of justice that mankind will achieve – slowly, no doubt, but certainly – God's design for the orderly and peaceful progress of humanity
.
"It seems to me that this is theoretically right, for whatever the question under discussion – whether religious, philosophical, political, or economic; whether it concerns prosperity, morality, equality, right, justice, progress, responsibility, cooperation, property, labor, trade, capital, wages, taxes, finance, population, or government – at whatever point on the scientific horizon I begin my researches, I invariably reach the same conclusion: The solution to the problem of human relationships is to be found in liberty. "E.Q.

Meaning, of course, liberties within the law of justice – nature's principles only bend so far.  Bastiat must also suffer fools. "You are doing the same thing - trying to reform society to your ideas."
 
Those of clear mind will see that criticism as adolescent.  Social engineers treat mankind as cattle to be changed to their desire while Bastiat says: 'Leave people with the natural limitations of moral law and they will create a greater and more rewarding culture'; he is happy to explain nature; their ego is to change nature – to be their own god.

There is a world of difference between forcing human culture to a crippled stagnation by artificial restraint or design, and of leaving culture to freely attain the highest level possible for its nature.  It is the difference between slavery and freedom.  However Bastiat provides his own defence:

P.74:  Quote: "My attitude towards all other persons is well illustrated by this story from a celebrated traveller: He arrives one day in the midst of a tribe of savages, where a child had just been born. A crowd of soothsayers, magicians and quacks - armed with rings, hooks, and cords, - surround it.

 One said, "This child will never smell the perfume of a peace-pipe unless I stretch his nostrils." Another said: "He will never be able to hear unless I draw his ear-lobes down to his shoulders." A third said: "He will never see the sunshine unless I slant his eyes." ...

"Stop," cried the traveller. .. God has given organs to this frail creature; let them develop and grow strong by exercise, use, experience, and liberty." E. Q.

Why do we (world-wide) give social quacks a right to promote simplistic ideas for re-shaping humans?  Why do we allow the blind to rob us of our individual potentials and power for independent decision-making?  Why allow meddlers to restrict us to their setting?  If they decline effort and do not see that our advance or decline carries them, do they prefer to destroy all?  They work through children because those adult scorn their arguments? 

The law is now being used to deform humanity in a way that robs all (even the I-am-god 'elite') of the right and ability to learn the truth about life and the laws of nature that apply to it.

Remember, "The Law" was written more than 150 years ago.  After the French revolution and before the even more disastrous social engineering experiments in the USSR and Cambodia; socialism learning nothing, attacks through children; tricks by Hegelian Dialectic manipulation and perverts common law to make of law a farce.

If European law, even then, was so visibly perverted, how low has this creeping cancer of socialist people-shapers now brought us?  Certainly the most common complaints I hear are firstly, that the law is an ass, and secondly, that the law now gives more attention to protecting the criminals than protecting the victims.

Government has no moral right to use law for social engineering!  The law only one legitimate purpose and I now refer you to the book's opening statement before going to interwoven social problems:

Quote: P.5.  "The law is perverted! And the police powers of the state perverted along with it!  The law, I say, not only turned from its proper purpose but made to follow an entirely contrary purpose!

" The law become the weapon of every kind of greed!  Instead of checking crime, the law itself guilty of the evils it is supposed to punish!

"If this is true, it is a serious fact, and moral duty requires me to call the attention of my fellow-citizens to it." E Q.

Yes, we do have that moral duty! 
A/   Control freaks are driven by ego, fear and a religious faith in
       imagination:
B/  They use the force of the law to achieve their designs because  they
      have no logic to convince adults.

The creation has given us, along with the miracle of life, the miracles of love, intelligence, compassion, self-awareness, and the physical means to use these gifts creatively, all far above the abilities of common animals.  Who can deny our moral duty to use and defend these gifts?

Would you deny that we do not know what new miracles we may yet discover if we do use and defend these gifts?  Do you deny that it would be the most detestable and cruel desecration of our potential if we should allow the most arrogant and selfish to lead future generations to stagnation and degradation?

Some feel the majority cannot be trusted.  But who knows how we will respond if given knowledge and responsibility?  Let's learn a little more from Frederick Bastiat:

Quote: P. 6 "What is Law?
"What then is law? It is the collective organisation of the individual right to lawful defence. Each of us has a natural right - from God - to defend his person, his liberty, and his property. These are the three basic requirements of life, and the preservation of any one of them is completely dependent upon the preservation of the other two. For what are our faculties but the extension of our individuality? And what is property but the extension of our faculties?

"If every person has a right to defend - even by force - his person, his liberty, and his property, then it follows that a group of men have the right to organise and support a common force to protect these rights constantly.

"Thus the principle of collective right - its reason for existing, its lawfulness - is based on individual right. And the common force that protects this collective right cannot logically have any other purpose or any other mission than that for which it acts as a substitute.

"Thus, since an individual cannot lawfully use force against the person, liberty, or property of another individual, then the common force - for the same reason - cannot lawfully be used to destroy the person, liberty, or property of individuals or groups.

"Such a perversion of force would be, in both cases, contrary to our premise. Force has been given to us to defend our individual rights. Who will dare to say that force has been given us to destroy the equal rights of our brothers? Since no individual acting separately can lawfully use force to destroy the rights of others, does it not logically follow that the same principle also applies to the common force that is nothing more than the organised combination of the individual forces?

"If this is true, then nothing can be more evident than this: The law is the organisation of the natural right of lawful defence. It is the substitution of a common force for individual forces. And this common force is to do only what the individual forces have a natural and lawful right to do: to protect persons, liberties, and properties; to maintain the right of each, and to cause JUSTICE to reign over us all.

P.7 "A Just and Enduring Government
If a nation were founded on this basis, it seems to me that order would prevail among the people, in thought as well as in deed. It seems to me that such a nation would have the most simple, easy to accept, economical, limited, non-oppressive, just, and enduring government imaginable ...

P.9 "The Fatal Tendency of Mankind
Self-preservation and self-development are common aspirations among all people. And if everyone enjoyed the unrestricted use of his faculties and the free disposition of the fruits of his labor, social progress would be ceaseless, uninterrupted, and unfailing.

"But there is another tendency that is common among people. When they can, they wish to live and prosper at the expense of others. This is no rash accusation.

Nor does it come from a gloomy and uncharitable spirit.   The annals of history bear witness to the truth of it: the incessant wars, mass migrations, religious persecutions, universal slavery, dishonesty in commerce, and monopolies.

"This fatal desire has its origin in the very nature of man – in that primitive, universal, and insuppressible [animal] instinct that impels him to satisfy his desires with the least possible pain.

P.10 "Property and Plunder
"Man can live and satisfy his wants only by ceaseless [continuing] labor; by the ceaseless application of his faculties to natural resources.  This process is the origin of property.

"But it is also true that a man may live and satisfy his wants by seizing and consuming the products of the labor of others. This process is the origin of plunder. [Usury]

"Now since man is naturally inclined to avoid pain – and since labor is pain in itself – it follows that men will resort to plunder whenever plunder is easier than work.  History shows this quite clearly. And under these conditions, neither religion nor morality can stop it.

"When, then, does plunder stop? It stops when it becomes more painful and more dangerous than labor.

"It is evident, then, that the proper purpose of the law is to use the power of its collective force to stop this fatal tendency to plunder instead of work. All the measures of the law should protect property and punish plunder.

"But, generally, the law is made by one man or one class of men. And since law cannot operate without the sanction and support of dominating force, this force must be entrusted to those who make the laws.

"This fact, combined with the fatal tendency that exists in the heart of man to satisfy his wants with the least possible effort, explains the almost universal perversion of the law. Thus it is easy to understand how law, instead of checking injustice, becomes the invincible weapon of injustice. It is easy to understand why the law is used by the legislator to destroy in varying degrees among the rest of the people, their personal independence by slavery, their liberty by oppression, and their property by plunder. This is done for the benefit of the person who makes the law, and in proportion to the power he holds." End Quote.

Quite so!  But to whom do we give power?
We, in sham democracies and republics, have been happy to give power out of our own hands and into the hands of the egocentric; the best liars and most determined to ruin the lives of others – the very ones worst fitted to lead and most likely to rob us!  We then complain because they act, as we should expect. 

We find one small flaw in thinking of Fred Bastiat when he says: men will resort to plunder whenever plunder is easier than work. ... under these conditions, neither religion nor morality can stop it.  It seems to me now well proven that mankind (in general) IS quite well able to control his desire to plunder (effect usury) even when given free opportunity. 

The problem is that artificial forces, more easily seen today, are discouraging of honesty.  We elect the morally weak to plunder on our behalf, and the cancer grows.  But let Fred himself expose the problem:

Quote: P.11 "Victims of Lawful Plunder
Men naturally rebel against the injustice of which they are victims. Thus, when plunder is organised by law for the profit of those who make the law, all the plundered classes try somehow to enter - by peaceful means or revolution - into making of laws.

"According to their degree of enlightenment, these plundered classes may propose one of two entirely different purposes when they attempt to attain political power: Either they may wish to stop lawful plunder or they may wish to share in it.

"Woe to the nation when this latter purpose prevails among the mass victims of lawful plunder when they, in turn, seize the power to make laws!

"Until that happens, the few practice lawful plunder upon the many, a common practice where the right to participate in the making of law is limited to a few persons. But then, participation in the making of law becomes universal. And then, men seek to balance their conflicting interests by universal plunder.

"Instead of rooting out the injustices found in society, they make these injustices general. As soon as the plundered classes gain political power, they establish a system of reprisals against other classes.

"They do not abolish legal plunder. (This objective would demand more enlightenment than they posses.) Instead, they emulate their evil predecessors by participating in this legal plunder, even though it is against their own interests.* 

"It is as if it were necessary, before a reign of justice appears, for everyone to suffer a cruel retribution - some for their evilness, and some for their lack of understanding.

[*At that point we then begin to see the true socialist/communist state as we have today in disguise of capitalism.  But this State is unnatural and we see it in decay.  Globalists understand this but use its plausibility as temptation to gain ultimate power.]  

P.12 "The Results of Legal Plunder
It is impossible to introduce into society a greater change and a greater evil than this: the conversion of the law into an instrument of plunder.

"What are the consequences of such a perversion? It would require volumes to describe them all. Thus we must content ourselves with pointing out the most striking.

"In the first place, it erases from everyone's conscience the distinction between justice and injustice. No society can exist unless the laws are respected to a certain degree. The safest way to make laws respected is to make them respectable.

"When law and morality contradict each other, the citizen has the cruel alternative of either losing his moral sense or losing his respect for the law. These two evils are of equal consequence, and it would be difficult for a person to choose between them.

"The nature of law is to maintain justice. This is so much the case that, in the minds of the people, law and justice are one and the same thing. There is in all of us a strong disposition to believe that anything lawful is also legitimate.

"This belief is so widespread that many persons have erroneously held that things are "just" because law makes them so. Thus, in order to make plunder appear just and sacred to many consciences, it is only necessary for the law to decree and sanction it.

 Slavery, restrictions, and monopoly find defenders not only among those who profit from them but also among those who suffer from them." End Quotes.

"The Law" has its warnings now confirmed. 
We see now that (to many people) law seems to make the ‘moral – immoral’ or the ‘immoral – moral’.  But we have also seen the rise and fall of "The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics" and the general failure of socialism.  Lacking intellectual freedom, all dogma driven culture fails.

"Meanwhile the fake, in process of setting up socialism by deceit, goes from strength to strength; but did the sudden collapse of one of the two most powerful nations seem unreal to you?  By any test we live in a world that (whatever its claims) is Globalist. 

Under humanist socialism even the might of the USA is now bogging down.

Globalism is the dictatorial solution to attainment of power: claim democracy, teach socialism, gain approval of the great majority and dumb-down.

Quote: P.28 "Law Is Force
"Since the law organises justice, the socialists ask why the law should not also organise labor, education, and religion.

"Why should not law be used for those purposes?
"Because it could not organise labor, education, and religion without destroying justice. We must remember that law is force, and that, consequently, the proper functions of the law cannot lawfully extend beyond the proper functions of force.

[Socialists may once have had honest intent but not the vision to see that communism was unworkable – out of true order it needs the force and deceit of dictated stagnation.  Globalism always knew what it is about: attainment of total power.] 

P.28 "Law Is a Negative Concept.  Quote:
The harmlessness of the mission performed by law and lawful defence is self-evident; the usefulness is obvious; and the legitimacy cannot be disputed.

But when the law, by means of its necessary agent, force, imposes on men a regulation of labor, a method or subject of education, a religious faith or creed - then the law is no longer negative; it acts positively upon people. It substitutes the will of the legislator for their own wills or human instincts; the initiative of the legislator for their own initiatives.

"When this happens, the people no longer need to discuss, to compare, to plan ahead; the law does all this for them.

Intelligence becomes a useless drain on the people; they cease to be men; they lose their personality, their liberty, their property.

"Try to imagine a regulation of labor imposed by force that is not a violation of liberty; a transfer of wealth imposed by force that is not a violation of property. If you cannot reconcile these contradictions, then you must conclude that the law cannot organise labor and industry without organising injustice." E.Q.

If you read the whole of "The Law" you may feel irritated.  A rational law of logical justice is today so far from petty indoctrination that "The Law" could hardly have been published today.  So brainwashed are we to ideas of social justice that are in principle unjust, that to imagine a logical concept of law being applied now seems 'politically incorrect' and unacceptable.

But just think: at this very time an argument is being acted out between worker and employer. Now think, if you will, how deeply entrenched has become the law enforcing regulation of labour, how eagerly this has been accepted because it appears to favour the weak.

Do behind scenes forces that rule under the name of "world government" now feel they have successfully imposed such a level of ignorance and such stagnation of intelligence (as a result of their use of law as a force for regulation of education, news and public attitude) that they can now use law totally naked of justice?

Why should they not feel confident?  Not only is the general public ignorant and inefficient at use of intelligence but the injustice generated by seducing a large section of the labour force (given protection of law), now allows law to be extended to total enslavement.

World government will win any contest against a commonalty bereft of knowledge.  It will create divisions and increase regulation because one section of the community can be played against another until all are confused divided and totally at the mercy of Globalism.

Remember Machiavelli 500 years ago: quote "One of the great secrets of the day is to know how to take possession of popular prejudices and passions in such a way as to introduce a confusion of principles which makes impossible all understanding between those who speak the same language and have the same interests."  E.Q.  We can now believe it because we can see it?

A ratchet-like undermining of public understanding and unity, plus misuse of law, leaves the community socially confused and living in nightmares.  Then, by 'gradualism' the spiral of deceit begins, generation-by-generation, like coils of a boa constrictor it squeezes, all rational response out of the community.

Without logic we can all believe as we want and so long as we avoid logical challenge we self-satisfy.

This essay views a 150-year progressive enslavement.  For those who will claim that we cannot change this I offer these thoughts: "If you want change you have to begin change - if you want to go somewhere then you have to start from where you are". 

This is where we are!  We were brought here by incredible ego and gradualism.  We, the many, by understanding and positive thought can quickly reverse this!  Now let's dig a little deeper!

Section 4:  >>
Subversion by Education: