Book III, Chapter XVIII: Means Of Preventing Usurpations Of The
GOVERNMENT.
From these explanations it follows, in confirmation of chapter XVL., that the act which institutes the government is not a contract, but a law; that the depositaries of the executive power are not the masters of the people, but its officers; that the people can appoint them and dismiss them at pleasure; that for them it is not a question of contracting, but of obeying ; and that in undertaking the functions which the State imposes on them, they simply fulfil their duty as citizens, without having in any way a right to discuss the conditions.®?
When, therefore, it happens that the people institute a hereditary government, whether monarchical in a family or aristocratic in one order of citizens, it is not an engagement that they make, but a provisional form which they give to the administration, until they please to regulate it differently.
It is true that such changes are always dangerous, and that the established government must never be touched except when it becomes incompatible with the public good; but this circumspection is a maxim of policy, not a rule of right; and the State is no more bound to leave the civil authority to its chief men than the military authority to its generals.
Moreover, it is true that in such acase all the formalities requisite to distinguish a regular and lawful act from a seditious tumult, and the will of a whole people from the clamours of a faction, cannot be too carefully observed. It is especially in this case that only such concessions should be made as cannot in strict justice be refused ; and from this obligation also the Prince derives a great advantage in preserving its power in spite of the people, without their being able to say that it has usurped the power ; for while appearing to exercise nothing but its nights, it may very easily extend them, and, under pretext of maintaining the public peace, obstruct the assemblies designed to re-establish
good order; so that it takes advantage of a silence which it pre194
vents from being broken, or of irregularities which it causes to be committed, so as to assume in its favour the approbation of those whom fear renders silent and punish those that dare to speak. It is in this way that the Decemvirs, having at first been elected for one year, and then kept in office for another year, attempted to retain their power in perpetuity by no longer permitting the comitia to assemble; and it is by this easy method that all the governments in the world, when once invested with the public force, usurp sooner or later the sovereign authority.
The periodical assemblies of which I have spoken before are fitted to prevent or postpone this evil, especially when they need no formal convocation ; for then the Prince cannot interfere with them, without openly proclaiming itself a violator of the laws and an enemy of the State.
These assemblies, which have as their object the maintenance of the social treaty, ought always to be opened with two propositions, which no one should be able to suppress, and which should pass separately by vote.
The first : ‘‘ Whether it pleases the sovereign to maintain the present form of government.”
The second: “ Whether it pleases the people to leave the administration to those at present entrusted with it.”
I presuppose here what I believe that I have proved, viz. that there is in the State no fundamental law which cannot be revoked, not even the social compact ; for if all the citizens assembled in order to break this compact by a solemn agreement, no one can doubt that it would be quite legitimately broken. Grotius 70 even thinks that each man can renounce the State of which he is a member, and regain his natural freedom and _ his property by quitting the country. Now it would be absurd jf all the citizens combined should be unable to do what each of them can do separately.