The Enormous Power of Government

by Frédéric Bastiat

　　As long as these ideas prevail, it is clear that theresponsibility of government is enormous. Good fortune and badfortune, wealth and destitution, equality and inequality, virtue andvice -- all then depend upon political administration. It is burdenedwith everything, it undertakes everything, it does everything;therefore it is responsible for everything.

　　If we are fortunate, then government has a claim to our gratitude;but if we are unfortunate, then government must bear the blame. Forare not our persons and property now at the disposal of government? Isnot the law omnipotent?

　　In creating a monopoly of education, the government must answer tothe hopes of the fathers of families who have thus been deprived oftheir liberty; and if these hopes are shattered, whose fault is it?

　　In regulating industry, the government has contracted to make itprosper; otherwise it is absurd to deprive industry of its liberty.And if industry now suffers, whose fault is it?

　　In meddling with the balance of trade by playing with tariffs, thegovernment thereby contracts to make trade prosper; and if thisresults in destruction instead of prosperity, whose fault is it?

　　In giving protection instead of liberty to the industries fordefense, the government has contracted to make them profitable; and ifthey become a burden to the taxpayers, whose fault is it?

　　Thus there is not a grievance in the nation for which thegovernment does not voluntarily make itself responsible. Is itsurprising, then, that every failure increases the threat of anotherrevolution in France?

　　And what remedy is proposed for this? To extend indefinitely thedomain of the law; that is, the responsibility of government.

　　But if the government undertakes to control and to raise wages,and cannot do it; if the government undertakes to care for all who maybe in want, and cannot do it; if the government undertakes to supportall unemployed workers, and cannot do it; if the government undertakesto lend interest- free money to all borrowers, and cannot do it; if,in these words that we regret to say escaped from the pen of Mr. deLamartine, "The state considers that its purpose is to enlighten, todevelop, to enlarge, to strengthen, to spiritualize, and to sanctifythe soul of the people" -- and if the government cannot do all ofthese things, what then? Is it not certain that after everygovernment failure -- which, alas! is more than probable -- therewill be an equally inevitable revolution?