The State has two possible origins. Some States came into existence when bands of thieves decided to confiscate for their own benefit the wealth that others produced. Thus some States, perhaps most, came into existence for the purpose of plunder. But another concept of government came from the idea of contract. Under contract the people may form a government for the purpose of protecting their pre-existing rights including the right to property.
The 19th century French parliamentarian Frederic Bastiat put it very well in his essay “The Law”. Bastiat said that all people are given the gift of life. But life “cannot maintain itself alone. Humans have “marvellous faculties to produce that which is required for life and man sits amidst a variety of natural resources.” “By the application of our faculties to these natural resources we convert them into products and use them. This process is necessary in order that life may run its appointed course.”
To survive, man must apply his rational mind to natural resources including minerals. Human action requires human freedom. Man must be free to harvest, to labour and to think. Life requires freedom, and if man is to survive he must keep the product of his labour or, in other words, he must have a property right in the product of his effort. It is for this reason that government based on contract is created.
Thomas Jefferson said the purpose of government is to secure rights already held by the individual. Bastiat explained it this way: “Life, faculties, production in other words, individuality, liberty, property this is man. And in spite of the cunning of artful political leaders, these three gifts from God [or nature if you prefer] precede all human legislation and are superior to it. Life, liberty, and property do not exist because men have made laws. On the contrary, it was the fact that life, liberty, and property existed beforehand that cause men to make laws in the first place.”
Bastiat argued that laws were created to protect man’s pre-existing rights to liberty and property both of which are required to exercise man’s gift of life. Illegitimate States were formed by bands that stole the produce of the people. Legitimate States are based on contract and require the consent of the people. But what powers can the people then give to the government of the State? If all power comes directly from the people then the only powers they can give the government are powers that they themselves already possess. If the people as individuals have the right to defend their rights then collectively they have the right to defend themselves and it is for that purpose that legitimate governments are created.
Governments follow the establishment of rights, including property rights and are therefore not the source of rights. But, as Bastiat notes, “since an individual cannot lawfully use force against the person, liberty or property of another individual, then the common force for the same reason cannot lawfully be used to destroy the person, liberty, or property of individuals or groups.” Bastiat wrote that when government is created to protect rights then people tend to be prosperous and happy. But he also argued: “It is impossible to introduce into society a greater change and a greater evil than this: the conversion of the law into an instrument of plunder.
Source: Jim Peron, who is a freelance researcher and writer. This article was written in response to the governments intention, as described in the Minerals Development Bill, to confiscate all privately owned minerals in South Africa.
