The citizens name mandatories. These mandatories meet, and decide,
by a majority, that a certain class of wants—the want of education,
for example—can no longer be supplied by free exertions [p430] and
free exchanges made by the citizens themselves, and they decree that
education shall be provided by functionaries specially delegated
and intrusted with the work of instruction. So much for the service
‹rendered›. As regards the services ‹received›, as the State has
secured the time and abilities of these new functionaries for the
benefit of the citizens, it must also take from the citizens a part
of their means for the benefit of the functionaries. This is effected
by an assessment or general contribution.
In all civilized communities such contributions are paid in money. It
is scarcely necessary to say that behind this money there is labour.
In reality, it is a payment in kind. In reality, the citizens work
for the functionaries, and the functionaries work for the citizens,
just as, in free and private transactions, the citizens work for one
another.
We set down this observation here, in order to elude a very
widely-spread sophism which springs from the consideration of
money. We hear it frequently said that money received by public
functionaries falls back like refreshing rain on the citizens. And
we are led to infer that this rain is a second benefit added to that
which results from the service. Reasoning in this way, people have
come to justify the existence of functions the most parasitical.
They do not consider that if this service had remained in the domain
of private activity, the money (which, in place of going to the
treasury, and from the treasury to the functionaries) would have gone
directly to men who voluntarily undertook the duty, and in the same
way would have fallen back like rain upon the masses. This sophism
will not stand examination, when we extend our regards beyond the
mere circulation of money, and see that at the bottom it is labour
exchanged for labour, services for services. In public life, it may
happen that functionaries receive services without rendering any in
return; and then there is a loss entailed on the taxpayer, however we
may delude ourselves with reference to this circulation of specie.