THE INSTITUTION OF GOVERNMENT
Under what general idea then should the act by which government is
instituted be conceived as falling? I will begin by stating that the
act is complex, as being composed of two others--the establishment' of
the law and its execution.
By the former, the Sovereign decrees that there shall be a governing
body established in this or that form; this act is clearly a law.
By the latter, the people nominates the rulers who are to be entrusted
with the government that has been established. This nomination, being a
particular act, is clearly not a second law, but merely a consequence
of the first and a function of government.
The difficulty is to understand how there can be a governmental act
before government exists, and how the people, which is only Sovereign
or subject, can, under certain circumstances, become a prince or
magistrate.
It is at this point that there is revealed one of the astonishing
properties of the body politic, by means of which it reconciles
apparently contradictory operations; for this is accomplished by a
sudden conversion of Sovereignty into democracy, so that, without
sensible change, and merely by virtue of a new relation of all to all,
the citizens become magistrates and pass from general to particular
acts, from legislation to the execution of the law.
This changed relation is no speculative subtlety without instances
in practice: it happens every day in the English Parliament, where,
on certain occasions, the Lower House resolves itself into Grand
Committee, for the better discussion of affairs, and thus, from being
at one moment a sovereign court, becomes at the next a mere commission;
so that subsequently it reports to itself, as House of Commons, the
result of its proceedings in Grand Committee, and debates over again
under one name what it has already settled under another.
It is, indeed, the peculiar advantage of democratic government that it
can be established in actuality by a simple act of the general will.
Subsequently, this provisional government remains in power, if this
form is adopted, or else establishes in the name of the Sovereign the
government that is prescribed by law; and thus the whole proceeding
is regular. It is impossible to set up government in any other manner
legitimately and in accordance with the principles so far laid down.