13.: The Kings Must Disarm - Frédéric Bastiat, The Collected Works of Frédéric Bastiat. Vol. 1: The Man and the Statesman: The Correspondence and Articles on Politics [2011]
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The Collected Works of Frédéric Bastiat. Vol. 1: The Man and the Statesman: The Correspondence and Articles on Politics, translated from the French by Jane and Michel Willems, with an introduction by Jacques de Guenin and Jean-Claude Paul-Dejean. Annotations and Glossaries by Jacques de Guenin, Jean-Claude Paul-Dejean, and David M. Hart. Translation editor Dennis O’Keeffe (Indianapolis: Liberty Fund, 2011).
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13.
The Kings Must Disarm
[vol. 7, p. 221. According to Paillottet,
this article was originally published in
La République française, dated 29 February 1848.]
If only the kings of Europe were prudent, what would they do?
England would freely renounce the right of search. She would freely recognize that Algeria is French. She would not wait for these burning questions to be raised, and she would disband half her navy and use these savings to benefit her people by reducing the duties on tea and wine accordingly.
The king of Prussia would liberalize the half-baked constitution of his country, and by giving notice to two-thirds of his army he would ensure the devotion of the people by relieving them of the weight of taxes and military service.
The emperor of Austria would quickly evacuate Lombardy and by reducing his army would put himself in a position to increase Austria’s proverbial power.
The tsar would return Poland to the Poles.
All this done, France, no longer anxious as to her future, would concentrate on internal reform and let moral considerations take charge.
The kings of Europe, however, would expect to lose out if they followed this policy, the only one that can save them.
They will do exactly the opposite; they will want to stifle liberalism. So they will arm and the republics will arm too. Lombardy, Poland, and perhaps Prussia will become the theater of war. The alternative laid down by Napoléon, that Europe will be Republican or Cossack, will have to be resolved to the sound of guns. In spite of her ardent love of peace, expressed unanimously by the newspapers, but forced by her evident interest, France will not be able to avoid throwing her sword into the balance and . . . kings perish but nations do not.
Under the honorable pretext of fighting the trade in slaves, the “right of search” in practice gave control of the seas to England. See “On Parliamentary Reform,” note 31, p. 378.
In fact, the kingdom of Prussia did not have a constitution but a set of laws.
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