CHAPTER XI - On the solicitude of the State for security with respect to such of the citizens' actions as relate directly to others (Civil laws)

Summary

The subject to which we have now to direct our attention—one of less difficulty, at least for the present inquiry—is the case of actions which immediately affect others. For where rights are infringed by such actions, it is clearly the duty of the State to restrict them, and compel the agents to repair the injury they have inflicted. But according to our previous definition, these actions are unjust only when they deprive another of a part of his freedom or possessions without his consent or against his will. When any one has suffered wrong, he has a right to redress; but when once, as a member of a community, he has transferred his private revenge to the State, to nothing more. The man, therefore, who has committed the wrong, is bound to restore to the man who has sustained it whatever he has been deprived of; or, if this be impossible, to make compensation to the full extent of his means, and of what he can earn. To deprive a man of his personal liberty—as is practised, for instance, in the case of insolvent debtors—can only be regarded as a subsidiary means, where otherwise the creditor should run the risk of losing the debtor's future earnings. Now while the State is not to refuse any just means of redress to the person injured, it must take care that a spirit of revenge does not turn this fair demand into a pretext for injustice.