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The Right of Property
§ 1. The moral
law, being the law of the social state, is obliged wholly to ignore the ante-social
state. Constituting, as the principles of pure morality do, a code of conduct
for the perfect man, they cannot be made to adapt themselves to the actions
of the uncivilized man, even under the most ingenious hypothetical conditions–
cannot be made even to recognize those actions so as to pass any definite
sentence upon them. Overlooking this fact, thinkers, in their attempts to
prove some of the first theorems of ethics, have commonly fallen into the
error of referring back to an imaginary state of savage wildness, instead
of referring forward to an ideal civilization, as they should have done;
and have, in consequence, entangled themselves in difficulties arising out
of the discordance between ethical principles and the assumed premises. To
this circumstance is attributable that vagueness by which the arguments used
to establish the right of property in a logical manner are characterized.
While possessed of a certain Plausibility, they yet cannot be considered
conclusive, inasmuch as they suggest questions and objections that admit
of no satisfactory answers. Let us take a sample of these arguments and examine
its defects.
"Though the earth and all inferior creatures,"
says Locke, "be common to all men, yet every man has a property in his
own person: this nobody has a right to but himself. The labour of his body,
and the work of his hands, we may say are properly his. Whatever, then,
he removes out of the state that nature hath provided and left it in, he
hath mixed his labour with, and joined to it something that is his own, and
thereby makes it his property. It being by him removed from the common state
nature hath placed it in, it hath by this labour something annexed to it
that excludes the common right of other men. For this labour being the unquestionable
property of the labourer, no man but he can have a right to what that is
once joined to, at least when there is enough and as good left in common
for others."
If inclined to cavil, one might in reply to
this observe that as, according to the premises, "the earth and all inferior
creatures"– all things, in fact, that the earth produces– are "common to
all men," the consent of all men must be obtained before any article can
be equitably "removed from the common state nature hath placed it in." It
might be argued that the real question is overlooked, when it is said that,
by gathering any natural product, a man "hath mixed his labour with it, and
joined to it something that is his own, and thereby made it his property";
for that the point to be debated is whether he had any right to gather, or
mix his labor with that which, by the hypothesis, previously belonged to
mankind at large. The reasoning used in the last chapter to prove that no
amount of labor, bestowed by an individual upon a part of the earth's surface,
can nullify the title of society to that part might be similarly employed
to show that no one can, by the mere act of appropriating to himself any
wild unclaimed animal or fruit, supersede the joint claims of other men to
it. It may be quite true that the labor a man expends in catching or gathering
gives him a better right to the thing caught or gathered than any one other
man; but the question at issue is whether by labor so expended he has made
his right to the thing caught or gathered greater than the pre-existing rights
of all other men put together. And unless he can prove that he has done
this, his title to possession cannot be admitted as a matter of right, but
can be conceded only on the ground of convenience.
Further difficulties are suggested by the qualification
that the claim to any article of property thus obtained is valid only "when
there is enough and as good left in common for others." A condition like
this gives birth to such a host of queries, doubts, and limitations as practically
to neutralize the general proposition entirely. It may be asked, for example:
How is it to be known that enough is left in common for others"? Who can
determine whether what remains is "as good" as what is taken? How if the
remnant is less accessible? If there is not enough "left in common for others,"
how must the right of appropriation be exercised? Why, in such case, does
the mixing of labor with the acquired object cease to "exclude the common
right of other men"? Supposing enough to be attainable, but not all equally
good, by what rule must each man choose? Out of which inquisition it seems
impossible to liberate the alleged right, without such mutilations as to render
it, in an ethical point of view, entirely valueless.
Thus, as already hinted, we find that the circumstances
of savage life render the principles of abstract morality inapplicable;
for it is impossible, under ante-social conditions, to determine the rightness
or wrongness of certain actions by an exact measurement of the amount of
freedom assumed by the parties concerned. We must not expect, therefore,
that the right of property can be satisfactorily based upon the premises afforded
by such a state of existence.
§ 2. But under the system of land tenure
pointed out in the last chapter as the only one that is consistent with the
equal claims of all men to the use of the earth, these difficulties disappear,
and the right of property obtains a legitimate foundation. We have seen
that, without any infraction of the law of equal freedom, an individual
may lease from society a given surface of soil, by agreeing to pay in return
a stated amount of the produce he obtains from that soil. We found that,
in doing this, he does no more than what every other man is equally free
with himself to do; that each has the same power with himself to become the
tenant; and that the rent he pays accrues alike to all. Having thus hired
a tract of land from his fellow men, for a given period, for understood purposes,
and on specified terms– having thus obtained, for a time, the exclusive
use of that land by a definite agreement with its owners, it is manifest
that an individual may, without any infringement of the rights of others,
appropriate to himself that portion of produce which remains after he has
paid to mankind the promised rent. He has now, to use Locke's expression,
"mixed his labour with" certain products of the earth; and his claim to
them is in this case valid, because he obtained the consent of society before
so expending his labor; and having fulfilled the condition which society
imposed in giving that consent– the payment of rent–society, to fulfill
its part of the agreement, must acknowledge his title to that surplus which
remains after the rent has been paid. "Provided you deliver to us a stated
share of the produce which by cultivation you can obtain from this piece
of land, we give you the exclusive use of the remainder of that produce":
these are the words of the contract; and in virtue of this contract, the
tenant may equitably claim the supplementary share as his private property;
may so claim it without any disobedience to the law of equal freedom; and
has therefore a right so to claim it.
Any doubt that may be felt as to the fact that
this is a logical deduction from our first principle, that every man has
freedom to do all that he wills, provided he infringes not the equal freedom
of any other man, may be readily cleared up by comparing the respective
degrees of freedom assumed in such a case by the occupier and the members
of society with whom he bargains. As was shown in the preceding chapter,
if the public altogether deprive any individual of the use of the earth,
they allow him less liberty than they themselves claim; and by so breaking
the law of equal freedom commit a wrong. If, conversely, an individual
usurps a given portion of the earth, to which, as we have seen, all other
men have as good a title as himself, he breaks the law by assuming more
liberty than the rest. But when an individual holds land as a tenant of
society, a balance is maintained between these extremes, and the claims
of both parties are respected. A price is paid by the one for a certain
privilege granted by the other. By the fact of the agreement being made,
it is shown that such price and privilege are considered. to be equivalents.
The lessor and the lessee have both, within the prescribed limits, done
that which they willed: the one in letting a certain holding for a specified
sum, the other in agreeing to give that sum. And so long as this contract
remains intact, the law of equal freedom is duly observed. If, however, any
of the prescribed conditions be not fulfilled, the law is necessarily broken,
and the parties are involved in one of the predicaments above named. If
the tenant refuses to pay the rent, then he tacitly lays claim to the exclusive
use and benefit of the land he occupies– practically asserts that he is
the sole owner of its produce, and consequently violates the law by assuming
a greater share of freedom than the rest of mankind. If, on the other hand,
society take from the tenant that portion of the fruits obtained by the culture
of his farm, which remains with him after the payment of rent, they virtually
deny him the use of the earth entirely (for by the use of the earth we mean
the use of its products), and in so doing claim for themselves a greater
share of liberty than they allow him. Clearly, therefore, this surplus produce
equitably remains with the tenant; society cannot take it without trespassing
upon his freedom; he can take it without trespassing on the freedom of society.
And as, according to the law, he is free to do all that he wills, provided
he infringes not the equal freedom of any other, he is free to take possession
of such surplus as his property.
§ 3. The doctrine that all men have equal
rights to the use of the earth does indeed, at first sight, seem to countenance
a species of social organization at variance with that from which the right
of property has just been deduced; an organization, namely, in which the
public, instead of letting out the land to individual members of their body,
shall retain it in their own hands, cultivate it by joint-stock agency,
and share the produce: in fact, what is usually termed Socialism or Communism.
Plausible though it may be, such a scheme is
not capable of realization in strict conformity with the moral law. Of
the two forms under which it may be presented, the one is ethically imperfect;
and the other, although correct in theory, is impracticable.
Thus, if an equal portion of the earth's produce
is awarded to every man, irrespective of the amount or quality of the labor
he has contributed toward the obtainment of that produce, a breach of equity
is committed. Our first principle requires, not that all shall have like
shares of the things which minister to the gratification of the faculties,
but that all shall have like freedom to pursue those things– shall have like
scope. It is one thing to give to each an opportunity of acquiring the objects
he desires; it is another, and quite a different thing, to give the objects
themselves, no matter whether due endeavor has or has not been made to obtain
them. The one we have seen to be the primary law of the Divine scheme; the
other, by interfering with the ordained connection between desire and gratification,
shows its disagreement with that scheme. Nay, more, it necessitates an
absolute violation of the principle of equal freedom. For when we assert
the entire liberty of each, bounded only by the like liberty of all, we
assert that each is free to do whatever his desires dictate, within the
prescribed limits; that each is free, therefore, to claim for himself all
those gratifications and sources of gratification attainable by him within
those limits–all those gratifications and sources of gratification which
he can procure without trespassing upon the spheres of action of his neighbors.
If, therefore, out of many starting with like fields of activity, one obtains
by his greater strength, greater ingenuity, or greater application more
gratifications and sources of gratification than the rest, and does this
without in any way trenching upon the equal freedom of the rest, the moral
law assigns him an exclusive right to all those extra gratifications and
sources of gratification; nor can the rest take from him without claiming
for themselves greater liberty of action than he claims, and thereby violating
that law. Whence it follows that an equal apportionment of the fruits of
the earth among all is not consistent with pure justice.
If, on the other hand, each is to have allotted
to him a share of produce proportionate to the degree in which he has aided
production, the proposal, while it is abstractedly just, is no longer practicable.
Were all men cultivators of the soil, it would perhaps be possible to form
an approximate estimate of their several claims. But to ascertain the respective
amounts of help given by different kinds of mental and bodily laborers toward
procuring the general stock of the necessaries of life is an utter impossibility.
We have no means of making such a division save that afforded by the law
of supply and demand, and this means the hypothesis excludes.*
* These inferences do not
at all militate against joint-stock systems of production and living, which
are in all probability what Socialism prophesies.
§ 4. An argument fatal to the communist
theory is suggested by the fact that a desire for property is one of the
elements of our nature. Repeated allusion has been made to the admitted
truth, that acquisitiveness is an unreasoning impulse quite distinct from
the desires whose gratifications property secures– an impulse that is often
obeyed at the expense of those desires. And if a propensity to personal
acquisition be really a component of man's constitution, then that cannot
be a right form of society which affords it no scope. Socialists do indeed
allege that private appropriation is an abuse of this propensity, whose normal
function, they say, is to impel us to accumulate for the benefit of the public
at large. But in thus attempting to escape from one difficulty, they do
but entangle themselves in another. Such an explanation overlooks the fact
that the use and abuse of a faculty (whatever the etymology of the words
may imply) differ only in degree; whereas their assumption is that they
differ in kind. Gluttony is an abuse of the desire for food; timidity, an
abuse of the feeling which in moderation produces prudence; servility, an
abuse of the sentiment that generates respect; obstinacy, of that from which
firmness springs: in all of which cases we find that the legitimate manifestations
differ from the illegitimate ones merely in quantity and not in quality.
So also with the instinct of accumulation. It may be quite true that its
dictates have been and still are followed to an absurd excess, but it is
also true that no change in the state of society will alter its nature and
its office. To whatever extent moderated, it must still be a desire for personal
acquisition. Whence it follows that a system affording opportunity for its
exercise must ever be retained; which means that the system of private property
must be retained, and this presupposes a right of private property, for by
right we mean that which harmonizes with the human constitution as divinely
ordained.
§ 5. There is, however, a still more awkward
dilemma into which M. Proudhon and his party betray themselves. For if,
as they assert, "all property is robbery"– if no one can equitably become
the exclusive possessor of any article, or, as we say, obtain a right to
it– then, among other consequences, it follows that a man can have no right
to the things he consumes for food. And if these are not his before eating
them, how can they become his at all? As Locke asks, "When do they begin
to be his? When he digests? Or when he eats? Or when he boils? Or when he
brings them home?" If no previous acts can make them his property, neither
can any process of assimilation do it; not even their absorption into the
tissues. Wherefore, pursuing the idea, we arrive at the curious conclusion
that as the whole of his bones, muscles, skin, etc., have been thus built
up from nutriment not belonging to him, a man has no property in his own flesh
and blood, can have no valid title to himself, has no more claim to his own
limbs than he has to the limbs of another, and has as good a right to his
neighbor's body as to his own! Did we exist after the same fashion as those
compound polyps, in which a number of individuals are based upon a living
trunk common to them all, such a theory would be rational enough. But until
Communism can be carried to that extent, it will he best to stand by the
old doctrine.
§ 6. Further argument appears to be unnecessary.
We have seen that the right of property is deducible from the law of freedom,
that it is presupposed by the human constitution, and that its denial involves
absurdities.
Were it not that we shall frequently have to
refer to the fact hereafter, it would be scarcely needful to show that
the taking away another's property is an infringement of the law of equal
freedom and is therefore wrong. If A appropriates to himself something
belonging to B, one of two things must take place: either B does the like
to A, or he does not. If A has no property, or if his property is inaccessible
to B, B has evidently no opportunity of exercising equal freedom with A
by claiming from him something of like value, and A has therefore assumed
a greater share of freedom than he allows B and has broken the law. If, again,
A's property is open to B, and A permits B to use like freedom with himself
by taking an equivalent, there is no violation of the law, and the affair
practically becomes one of barter. But such a transaction will never take
place save in theory, for A has no motive to appropriate B's property with
the intention of letting B take an equivalent; seeing that if he really means
to let B have what B thinks an equivalent, he will prefcr to make the exchange
by consent in the ordinary way.
The only case simulating this is one in which
A takes from B a thing that B does not wish to part with–that is, a thing
for which A can give B nothing that B thinks an equivalent–and as the amount
of gratification which B has in the possession of this thing is the measure
of its value to him, it follows that if A cannot give B a thing which affords
B equal gratification, or in other words what he thinks an equivalent, then
A has taken from B what affords A satisfaction, but does not return to
B what affords B satisfaction, and has therefore broken the law by assuming
the greater share of freedom. Wherefore we find it to be a logical deduction
from the law of equal freedom that no man can rightfully take property from
another against his will.
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