Nationalism and Culture (25 page)

All advocates of the power idea, even though, like Machiavelli and Hobbes, they cared nothing for traditional religion, were compelled to assign to the state the part of a terrestrial Providence, surrounded with the same mystical halo that shines about every godhead, and to endow it with all those superhuman qualities without which no power can maintain itself, whether it be of celestial or terrestrial nature. For no power persists by virtue of special characteristics inherent in it; its greatness rests always on borrowed qualities which the faith of man has ascribed to it. Like God, so every temporal power is but "a blank tablet" which gives back only what man has written on it.

The doctrine of the social contract, especially Buchanan's idea that all power emanates from the people, later aroused the Independents in England to a new rebellion, not only against Catholicism, but also against the state religion founded by the Calvinistic Presbyterians, and demanded the complete autonomy of the congregations in all matters of faith. Since the administration of the state church was now acting only as an obedient tool of the princely power, the religious and the political opposition of the ever spreading Puritanism flowed from one and the same source. The well-known English historian, Macaulay, remarks quite correctly regarding the Puritans that they added hatred of the state to their hatred of the church, so that the two emotions mingled and mutually embittered each other.

Animated by this spirit, the poet of Paradise Lost^ John Milton, was the first to step forward in defense of freedom of the press, in order to

safeguard the religious and political freedom of conscience of the citizens. In his tract, Dejensio fro fopulo Anglicano, he defended also the unqualified right of the nation to bring a treacherous and faithless tyrant to judgment and to condemn him to death. Like men starving for spiritual food, the best minds of Europe greedily absorbed this book, especially after it had been publicly burned by the hangman at the command of the King of France.

These ideas were most openly advocated among the Levelers, the adherents of John Lilburnes, and found their boldest expression in the scheme of "the people's covenant," presented to the masses by this most radical wing of the revolutionary movement of that time. Almost all of the social-philosophical thinkers of that period, from Gerard Winstanley to P. C. Plockboy and John Bellers, from R. Hooker and A, Sidney to John Locke, were convinced defenders of the doctrine of the social contract.

While on the continent absolutism almost everywhere won unlimited dominion, in England it achieved under the Stuarts only a temporary success, and was soon unhorsed again by the second revolution of 1688. By the Declaration of Rights, in which all of the principles set forth in Magna Charta, were reaffirmed in extended form, the covenantal relationship between crown and people was reestablished. Owing to this course of historical development, especially in England, the idea of the social contract and the concept of natural rights never lost currency, and had, consequently, a deeper influence on the intellectual attitude of the people than in any other country.

The Continent had become used to surrendering realms and peoples to the unlimited power of princes. The words of Louis XIV, "I am the State," acquired a symbolic significance for the whole epoch of absolutism. In England, however, where the Crown's striving for power was always confronted by the resolute opposition of the citizens—which could be only temporarily silenced, and never for long—there developed quite a different understanding of social issues. Acquired rights were zealously guarded, and despotism was effectively checked by the requirement of parliamentary approval. John Pym, the brilliant leader of the opposition in the House of Commons against the absolutist claims of the crown, gave eloquent expression to this sentiment when he launched these words against the royalist minority:

That false principle which inspires the princes and makes them believe that the countries over which they rule are their personal property—as if the kingdom existed for the sake of the king and not the king for the sake of the kingdom—is at the root of all the misery of their subjects, the cause of all the attacks on their rights and liberties. According to the recognized laws

of this country not even the crown jewels are the property of the king; they are merely entrusted to him for his adornment and use. And merely entrusted to him are also the cities and fortresses, the treasure-rooms and storehouses, the public offices, in order to safeguard the security, the welfare and the profit of the people and the kingdom. He can, therefore, exercise his power only after invoking the advice of both houses of Parliament.

In these words resounds the echo of all English history j they reveal the eternal struggle between might and right which will end only with the conquest of the power principle. For the principle of representative government had then quite a different meaning than now. That which today only helps to block the way for new forms of social life was then an earnest effort to set definite limits to power, a hopeful beginning toward the complete elimination of all schemes for political power from the life of society.

Furthermore, the doctrine of contractual relationship as the basis of all the political institutions in society had very early in England far-reaching consequences. Thus, the theologian, Richard Hooker, in his work. Laws of Ecclesiastical Polityy published in 1593, maintained that it is unworthy of a man to submit blindly, like a beast, to the compulsion of any kind of authority without consulting his own reason. Hooker bases the doctrine of the social contract on the fact that no man is really able to rule over a large number of his fellowmen unless these have given their consent. According to Hooker's idea such consent could only be obtained by mutual agreementj hence, the contract. In his dissertation concerning the nature of government Hooker declares quite frankly that "in the nature of things it is by no means impossible that men could live in social relations without public government." This work later served John Locke^ as a foundation for his two celebrated treatises on Civil Government^ from which the germinating liberalism drew its main nourishment.

Locke likewise based his social-philosophical theories on natural rights. In contradistinction to Hobbes, he believed, however, that the freedom of the natural man was by no means a state of rude caprice wherein the right of the individual was limited only by the brute force at his disposal. He maintained, rather, that common and binding relationships existed between primitive men, emanating from their social disposition and from considerations of reason. Locke was also of the opinion that in the natural state there existed already a certain form of property. It was true that God had given men all nature for disposal, so that the earth itself belonged to nobody j the harvest, however, which the individual had created by his own labor, did. For this reason there gradually developed certain obligations between men, especially after the separate family groups collected In larger unions. In this manner Locke thought to explain the

origin of the state, which in his view existed only as an insurance company on which rested the obligation of guarding the personal security and the property of the citizens.

But if the state has no other task than this, it follows logically that the highest power rests not with the head of the state, but with the people, and finds expression in the elective legislative assemblies. Hence, the holder of the state's power stands not above but, like every other member of society, under the law, and is responsible to the people for his action. If he misuses the power entrusted to him, he can be recalled by the legislative assembly like any other official who acts contrary to his duty.

These arguments of Locke's are directed against Hobbes and, most of all, against Sir Robert Filmer, the author of Patriarcha^ one of the most uncompromising defenders of absolute princely power. According to Filmer a king was subject to no human control, nor was he bound in his decisions by the precedents set by his predecessors. The king is chosen by God himself to act as lawgiver for his people, and he only stands above the law. All laws under whose protection men have lived up to now have been delivered to them by God's elect; for it is contrary to reason to assume that a common man can make laws for himself. The idea that a people has the right to judge its king and deprive him of the crown seemed positively criminal to Filmerj for in this case the representatives of the people are accuser and judge in one person, which mocks at every principle of justice. Hence, according to his idea, any limitation of the hereditary power is an evil, and must inevitably lead to the dissolution of all social ties.

Locke, who maintained that the king was only the executive organ of the popular will, logically denied him the right to make laws. What he strove for was a triple partition of public power, as the only protection against such misuse of power as must always endanger the public weal if all the agencies of power were united in one person. Hence the lawmaking power should be entrusted exclusively to the representatives of the people. The executive power, whose agents could at any time be recalled by the legislative assembly and replaced by others, was in all things subject to it and responsible to it.. There remained only the federative power which, according to Locke, had the task of representing the nation abroad, of making treaties and deciding concerning war and peace. This branch of public power also was to be responsible to the representatives of the people and concerned solely with putting their decisions into execution.

For Locke the legislative assembly was the specific instrument for safeguarding the rights of the people against the government; hence he assigned to it such a dominant role. If an irresponsible administration

violate its trust, it constitutes a breach of the existing legal relationship and then the people are free to oppose the revolution from above by the revolution from below, in order to protect their inalienable rights.

But though Locke strove to find in advance a solution for all possible or reasonably probable cases, there are deficiencies in his political program which cannot be removed by the separation of the power functions, because they are inherent in power itself, and are further enhanced by the economic inequalities in society. These inequalities constitute the weakness of liberalism itself and of all later constitutional schemes by which in various countries the attempt has been made to limit power and protect the rights of the citizens. This was already recognized by the French Girondist, Louvet, who in the midst of the high tide of enthusiasm for the new constitution spoke these weighty words: "Political equality and the constitution have no more dangerous enemy than the increasing inequality of property."

The stronger this inequality became in the course of time, the more unbridgeable became the social contrasts under victorious capitalism, undermining every communal interest, the faster faded the original significance of the measures which once played so important a part in society and in the struggle against the ambition for political power.

For all that, the idea of natural rights had for centuries the strongest influence of all those social cults in Europe which aimed to set limits to hereditary power and to widen the individual's sphere of independence. This influence persisted even after a line of eminent thinkers in England and France, like Lord Shaftesbury, Bern hard de Mandeville, William Temple, Montesquieu, John Bolingbroke, Voltaire, Buffon, David Hume, Mably, Henry Linguet, A. Ferguson, Adam Smith, and many others, inspired by biological and related science, had abandoned the concept of an original social contract and were seeking other explanations for the social and communal life. In doing so, some of them alread y recognize d the stat e as the political instrument ol: pri vileged mmorities m societ y for the ru lership of the great masses._

Likewise, the great founders of international law, like Hugo Grote, Samuel Pufendorf, Christian Thomasius (to mention only the best-known among them) whose great merit it is that in a time when the national separation of the peoples was becoming ever wider they made the first attempts to go beyond the limits of the state and to collect what is common to all men into a foundation for a common law—these also set out from the idea of natural rights. Grote regarded man as a social being and recognized in the social impulse the basis of all social ties. Social communal life developed definite habits, and these formed the first foundations of natural rights. In his work, Concerning the Law of War and Peace^ published in 1625, he traces the formation of the state to a tacit

covenant for the protection of rights and for the benefit of all. Since the state arose by the will of all individuals, the right that appertains to each one of its members can never be abrogated by the state. This natural and inalienable right cannot be changed even by God himself. This legal relationship is likewise the basis of all relations with other peoples and cannot be violated without punishment.

Pufendorf, like Thomasius and Grote, has his roots in the English social philosophers and boldly declares that natural rights exist not only for Christians, but also for Jews and Turks, a point of view very extraordinary in those times. Thomasius traces back all rights to the desire of the individual to live as happily and as long as possible. Since man can find his greatest happiness only in community with others, he should ever strive to make the welfare of all the guiding principle of his actions. For Thomasius this principle exhausts the whole content of natural rights.

All schemes having their roots in natural rights are based on the desire to free man from bondage to social institutions of compulsion in order that he may attain to consciousness of his humanity and no longer bow before any authority which would deprive him of the right to his own thoughts and actions. It is true that most of these schemes still contained a mass of authoritarian elements, and that these frequently grew again into new forms of rulership when they had partly or wholly obtained their ends. But this does not alter the fact that the great popular movements animated by these ideas smoothed the way for the overthrow of power and prepared the field in which the seeds of freedom will some day germinate vigorously.