THAT THE INSTITUTION OF GOVERNMENT IS NOT A CONTRACT
The legislative power once well established, the next thing is to
establish similarly the executive power; for this latter, which
operates only by particular acts, not being of the essence of the
former, is naturally separate from it. Were it possible for the
Sovereign, as such, to possess the executive power, right and fact
would be so confounded that no one could tell what was law and what was
not; and the body politic, thus disfigured, would soon fall a prey to
the violence it was instituted to prevent.
As the citizens, by the social contract, are all equal, all can
prescribe what all should do, but no one has a right to demand that
another shall do what he does not do himself. It is strictly this
right, which is indispensable for giving the body politic life and
movement, that the Sovereign, in instituting the government, confers
upon the prince.
It has been held that this act of establishment was a contract between
the people and the rulers it sets over itself.--a contract in which
conditions were laid down between the two parties binding the one to
command and the other to obey. It will be admitted, I am sure, that
this is an odd kind of contract to enter into. But let us see if this
view can be upheld.
First, the supreme authority can no more be modified than it can be
alienated; to limit it is to destroy it. It is absurd and contradictory
for the Sovereign to set a superior over itself; to bind itself to obey
a master would be to return to absolute liberty.
Moreover, it is clear that this contract between the people and such
and such persons would be a particular act; and from this it follows
that it can be neither a law nor an act of Sovereignty, and that
consequently it would be illegitimate.
It is plain too that the contracting parties in relation to each other
would be under the law of nature alone and wholly without guarantees
of their mutual undertakings, a position wholly at variance with the
civil state. He who has force at his command being always in a position
to control execution, it would come to the same thing if the name
"contract" were given to the act of one man who said to another; "I
give you all my goods, on condition that you give me back as much of
them as you please."
There is only one contract in the State, and that is the act of
association, which in itself excludes the existence of a second. It
is impossible to conceive of any public contract that would not be a
violation of the first.