date

1823 Feb. 19 Greece Beginning
1823 Feb. 19

Greece

Beginning

Of the delegation thus made by the people of operative power the sole use and object being by the supposition the doing /giving effect/ by means of those substitutes to that which would be their will had they time for forming it, it follows that for this purpose the dependence of the conduct of those substitutes to the will of those same principles in so far as they have time and means of forming one /it/ can not be too absolute and entire.

So much for the set of substitutes chosen in the first place. But by the same cause, namely want of time and appropriate information included, by which it has been rendered impossible for the delegates constituted as above in an /a direct and/ immediate way by the choice and appointment made of them by the people in their quality of possessors of the relative constitutive power, the physical possibility of going through in its entirety the whole of the business so allotted to the abovementioned possessors of the operative power stands in like manner excluded: detail of the arrangements which require to be made for defence of the people against external adversaries by land and water details of the arrangements for defence against internal adversaries in the character of criminals © details of the arrangements necessary to be made for the exaction and distribution of the pecuniary supplies necessary for the purchase of the materials employed in the business of /things and persons applied to the purposes of/ such national defence by these brief indicators thus /briefly/ given proofs sufficient of the impossibility in question are already brought to view. In addition to the necessity of clearing the hands of the people at large of the whole of the operative part of the business of government thus causes the necessity of clearing of large portions of it the hands in which at the first step the whole of the operative part was lodged or conceived of /regarded/ as if lodged
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  • Title: [1823 Feb. 19 Greece Beginning]
    Description: 1823 Feb. 19

    Greece

    Beginning

    On this occasion, the proper object of all arrangements taken for the enabling the people thus to act by delegation is the production of such arrangements as it may be presumed would be taken by the people themselves had they respectively sufficient time for the making them an additon to sufficient time for qualifying themselves for the making of them by means of appropriate information in all its various shapes.

    Of the mode of election best adjusted to this end mention will be made a little further on in its place

    At present suppose for argument sake this best mode found and carried into practice.

    Here then we have already two distinguishable bodies of men in the government. 1. The people at large by whom for the taking of these arrangements of detail by which their greatest happiness is to be provided for a set of functionaries have been provided: functionaries placed by the choice or election made of them for that purpose: substitutes delegates functionaries who in point of physical possibility might be chosen out of any assemblage of men but who most naturally and as to the greater portion at any rate most beneficially will have chosen by them from among themselves. In these immediate delegates of the people is supposed /conceived/ as yet to reside the whole of the power just©mentioned: call it the ”Operative power•: in /to/ the people at large remains and resides the power of determining at all times in what individuals that same operative power shall have place: in a word to constitute them what with relation to that function they are: call it the ”Constitutive power•.
  • Title: [1823 Feb. 19 Greece Beginning]
    Description: 1823 Feb. 19

    Greece

    Beginning

    Maximize people's will's efficiency viz

    2. by delegation, possible and proper

    Insert here inaptitude of the ”one• and the ”many•

    What remains to be seen is © in what degree and by what means the maximum of efficiency can in the nature of the case be given to the will of the people

    1. That which it is not physically speaking in their power to do in any political community large enough to maintain its independence © and in particular in any such political community as that of Greece is to take any part in the individual arrangements by which its /their/ own greatest happiness is to be produced which have for their objects the production of such their greatest happiness.

    The obstacles to their taking any such part are manifest and altogether insuperable. Unless the necessary means of subsistence be produced, all arrangements taken for the security of it from /against/ invasion would be fruitless and absurd. But with the continuity of the labours necessary to the production of the means of subsistence any thing like an equal continuity in the labour of giving existence to the political arrangements necessary to the security of this when produced is on the part of the greatest number altogether /in point of physical possibility absolutely/ incompatible.

    2. If all could find time, no place would hold all or more than a minute part of all while occupied conjunctly occupied in the formation of the general will.

    It being therefore physical impossible that the /to the/ body of the people should in their own persons respectively seek /endeavour/ to give efficiency to their respective wills in the production of the arrangements which have for their object the production of their greatest happiness, the utmost that remains within the field of physical possibility as capable of being done for this purpose, is that this endeavour of theirs be made by them by proxy: that is to say that in the greatest number possible, they should concurr in the choice of substitutes or say delegates for that purpose being for this purpose distributed into groupes, each groupe concurring in the choice of one such delegate.
  • Title: [1823. Feb. 21 Greece Beginning]
    Description: 1823. Feb. 21

    Greece

    Beginning

    The greatest happiness etc /principle/ requires that the power of the Executive department be lodged in a single hand. Reasons © 1. Certainty of the conformity of the functionary's conduct to the will of the Supreme Operative /Legislative/ maximized. 2. Promptitude of execution, maximized: 3. Responsibility to legal and popular sanctions maximized: 4. Expence minimized.

    The greatest happiness principle requires that the immediate displacing of this functionary be at all times in the power of the Legislative. Reason. Certainty of conformity as above. By no other means could any such certainty be produced, or any approach to it made. If for a day together it were in the power of this functionary to resist the declared will of the supreme Legislative, he would thereby for and during that time be in possession of an equal share in the legislative power in addition to the whole of the Executive.