s to say a thing unless we prove it. Now, to
explain my method fully would require no less than a formal treatise.
It is a thing so simple and so vast, so common and so extraordinary,
so true and so misunderstood, so sacred and so profane, that to name it
without developing and proving it would serve only to excite contempt
and incredulity. One thing at a time. Let us establish equality, and
this remedy will soon appear; for truths follow each other, just as
crimes and errors do.

SIXTH PROPOSITION.

Property is impossible, because it is the Mother of Tyranny.

What is government? Government is public economy, the supreme
administrative power over public works and national possessions.

Now, the nation is like a vast society in which all the citizens are
stockholders. Each one has a deliberative voice in the assembly; and,
if the shares are equal, has one vote at his disposal. But, under the
regime of property, there is great inequality between the shares of
the stockholders; therefore, one may have several hundred votes, while
another has only one. If, for example, I enjoy an income of one million;
that is, if I am the proprietor of a fortune of thirty or forty millions
well invested, and if this fortune constitutes 1/30000 of the national
capital,--it is clear that the public administration of my property
would form 1/30000 of the duties of the government; and, if the nation
had a population of thirty-four millions, that I should have as many
votes as one thousand one hundred and thirty-three simple stockholders.

Thus, when M. Arago demands the right of suffrage for all members of the
National Guard, he is perfectly right; since every citizen is enrolled
for at least one national share, which entitles him to one vote. But the
illustrious orator ought at the same time to demand that each elector
shall have as many votes as he has shares; as is the case in commercial
associations. For to do otherwise is to pretend that the nation has a
right to dispose of the property of individuals without consulting them;
which is contrary to the right of property. In a country where property
exists, equality of electoral rights is a violation of property.

Now, if each citizen's sovereignty must and ought to be proportional to
his property, it follows that the small stock holders are at the mercy
of the larger ones; who will, as soon as they choose, make slaves of
the former, marry them at pleasure, take from them their w