Book Twelve - About The Laws Which Create Political Liberty, in its Relation to The Citizen

Summary

Chapter 1: An Idea for This Book

It is not sufficient to have discussed political liberty in its relationship to the constitution. It is necessary to show it in the relationship it has with the citizen.

I have said that, in the first case, it is created by a certain distribution of the three powers. But, in the second, it is necessary to examine it under another aspect. It consists of the safety—or, at least of the opinion one holds about his safety.

It will possibly occur that the constitution will be free, while the citizen will not. The citizen will possibly be free, while the constitution will not. In these cases, the constitution will be free in right but not in fact, and the citizen will be free in fact but not in right.

It is only the arrangement of the laws, and even of the fundamental laws, that creates liberty in relationship to the constitution. But in relation to the citizen, morals, manners, and received examples can cause it to arise. And certain civil laws encourage it, as we are going to see in the present book.

Further, in most states, liberty being more hobbled, shocked, or overthrown than the constitution requires, it is good to talk about the particular laws which, in each constitution, are able to assist or injure the principle of liberty to which each of them may be susceptible. Chapter 2: About the Citizen's Liberty

Philosophical liberty consists of the exercise of one's will, or at least (if it is necessary to speak in every system) of the opinion which one has that he is exercising his will. Political liberty consists of safety, or at least of the opinion one holds about his safety.

That safety is never attacked more than in public or private accusations. Therefore, it is upon the goodness of the criminal laws that the citizen's liberty mainly depends.

The criminal laws were not perfected all at once. Even in the places where they have most sought liberty, they have not always found it. Aristotle (a) tells us that, at Cumae, the accuser's relatives were able to be witnesses. Under the Roman kings, the law was so imperfect that Servius Tullus declared the sentence against Ancus Martius’ children, [who] were charged with having assassinated his father-in-law, the king (b).