This is clearly shown by the following example:--Take an estate consisting of arable land, meadows, and vineyards, containing the dwellings of the owner and the tenant; and worth, together with the farming implements, one hundred thousand francs, the rate of increase being three per cent.If, instead of consuming his revenue, the proprietor uses it, not in enlarging but in beautifying his estate, can he annually demand of his tenant an additional ninety francs on account of the three thousand francs which he has thus added to his capital?
Certainly not; for on such conditions the tenant, though producing no more than before, would soon be obliged to labor for nothing,--what do I say? to actually suffer loss in order to hold his lease.
In fact, revenue can increase only as productive soil increases:
it is useless to build walls of marble, and work with plows of gold.But, since it is impossible to go on acquiring for ever, to add estate to estate, to CONTINUE ONE'S POSSESSIONS, as the Latins said; and since, moreover, the proprietor always has means wherewith to capitalize,--it follows that the exercise of his right finally becomes impossible.
Well, in spite of this impossibility, property capitalizes, and in capitalizing increases its revenue; and, without stopping to look at the particular cases which occur in commerce, manufacturing operations, and banking, I will cite a graver fact,-- one which directly affects all citizens.I mean the indefinite increase of the budget.
The taxes increase every year.It would be difficult to tell in which department of the government the expenses increase; for who can boast of any knowledge as to the budget? On this point, the ablest financiers continually disagree.What is to be thought, Iask, of the science of government, when its professors cannot understand one another's figures? Whatever be the immediate causes of this growth of the budget, it is certain that taxation increases at a rate which causes everybody to despair.Everybody sees it, everybody acknowledges it; but nobody seems to understand the primary cause.Now, I say that it cannot be otherwise,--that it is necessary and inevitable.
"The financial situation of the English government was shown up in the House of Lords during the session of January 23.It is not an encouraging one.For several years the expenses have exceeded the receipts, and the Minister has been able to re-establish the balance only by loans renewed annually.The combined deficits of the years 1838 and 1839 amount to forty-seven million five hundred thousand francs.In 1840, the excess of expenses over receipts is expected to be twenty-two million five hundred thousand francs.Attention was called to these figures by Lord Ripon.Lord Melbourne replied: `The noble earl unhappily was right in declaring that the public expenses continually increase, and with him I must say that there is no room for hope that they can be diminished or met in any way.'"--National: January 26, 1840.
A nation is the tenant of a rich proprietor called the GOVERNMENT, to whom it pays, for the use of the soil, a farm-rent called a tax.Whenever the government makes war, loses or gains a battle, changes the outfit of its army, erects a monu-ment, digs a canal, opens a road, or builds a railway, it borrows money, on which the tax-payers pay interest; that is, the government, without adding to its productive capacity, increases its active capital,--in a word, capitalizes after the manner of the proprietor of whom I have just spoken.
Now, when a governmental loan is once contracted, and the interest is once stipulated, the budget cannot be reduced.For, to accomplish that, either the capitalists must relinquish their interest, which would involve an abandonment of property; or the government must go into bankruptcy, which would be a fraudulent denial of the political principle; or it must pay the debt, which would require another loan; or it must reduce expenses, which is impossible, since the loan was contracted for the sole reason that the ordinary receipts were insufficient; or the money expended by the government must be reproductive, which requires an increase of productive capacity,--a condition excluded by our hypothesis; or, finally, the tax-payers must submit to a new tax in order to pay the debt,--an impossible thing.For, if this new tax were levied upon all citizens alike, half, or even more, of the citizens would be unable to pay it; if the rich had to bear the whole, it would be a forced contribution,--an invasion of property.Long financial experience has shown that the method of loans, though exceedingly dangerous, is much surer, more convenient, and less costly than any other method; consequently the government borrows,--that is, goes on capitalizing,--and increases the budget.
Then, a budget, instead of ever diminishing, must necessarily and continually increase.It is astonishing that the economists, with all their learning, have failed to perceive a fact so simple and so evident.If they have perceived it, why have they neglected to condemn it?
HISTORICAL COMMENT.--Much interest is felt at present in a financial operation which is expected to result in a reduction of the budget.It is proposed to change the present rate of increase, five per cent.Laying aside the politico-legal question to deal only with the financial question,--is it not true that, when five per cent.is changed to four per cent., it will then be necessary, for the same reasons, to change four to three; then three to two, then two to one, and finally to sweep away increase altogether? But that would be the advent of equality of conditions and the abolition of property.Now it seems to me, that an intelligent nation should voluntarily meet an inevitable revolution half way, instead of suffering itself to be dragged after the car of inflexible necessity.
EIGHTH PROPOSITION.
