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Of the Corruption of the Principles of Democracy The principle of democracy is corrupted not only when the spirit of equality is
extinct, but likewise when they fall into a spirit
of extreme equality, and when each citizen
would fain be upon a level with those whom he
has chosen to command him. Then the people,
incapable of bearing the very power they have
delegated, want to manage everything themselves, to debate for the senate, to execute for
the magistrate, and to decide for the judges.
When this is the case, virtue can no longer
subsist in the republic. The people are desirous
of exercising the functions of the magistrates,
who cease to be revered....
Democracy has, therefore, two excesses to
avoid–the spirit of inequality, which leads to
aristocracy or monarchy, and the spirit of extreme equality, which leads to despotic power,
as the latter is completed by conquest....
Of the Spirit of extreme Equality In the state
of nature, indeed, all men are born equal, but
they cannot continue in this equality. Society
makes them lose it, and they recover it only by
the protection of the laws.
Such is the difference between a well-
regulated democracy and one that is not so, that
in the former men are equal only as citizens, but
in the latter they are equal also as magistrates, as
senators, as judges, as fathers, as husbands, or as
masters.
The natural place of virtue is near to liberty;
but it is not nearer to excessive liberty than to
servitude....
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In what Liberty consists... Democratic and
aristocratic states are not in their own nature
free. Political liberty is to be found only in moderate governments; and even in these it is not
always found. It is there only where there is no
abuse of power....
To prevent this abuse, it is necessary, from
the very nature of things, that power should be a
check to power. A government may be so constituted, as no man shall be compelled to do
things to which the law does not oblige him, nor
forced to abstain from things which the law
permits....
Of the Constitution of England When the
legislative and executive powers are united in
the same person, or in the same body of magistrates, there can be no liberty; because apprehensions may arise, lest the same monarch or senate
should enact tyrannical laws, to execute them in
a tyrannical manner....
Again, there is no liberty, if the judiciary
power be not separated from the legislative and
executive. Were it joined with the legislative, the
life and liberty of the subject would be exposed
to arbitrary control; for the judge would be then
the legislator. Were it joined to the executive
power, the judge might behave with violence
and oppression.
There would be an end of everything, were
the same man or the same body, whether of the
nobles or of the people, to exercise those three
powers, that of enacting laws, that of executing
the public resolutions, and of trying the causes
of individuals.
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