date

1823. Feb. 23 Greece. J.B. to Greek Legislators
1823. Feb. 23 Greece. J.B. to Greek Legislators Independence Division of power

No such wars, no such distant dependencies, no such drains /running sores/ would

England have had, had it at the time of the Revolution received a Constitution

such as that at present enjoyed by the Anglo©American United States have

succeeded in giving themselves.

But /Meantime/ if for the people, for the greatest number © the Revolution with

its independence of King on Lords and of Lords on King, and of both on the great

body of people has done so little © for the Lords and the proprietors and

commanders of seats in the House of Commons it has done every thing

Independence of them all upon the absolute will of the Monarch © division of

absolute power between the Monarch on the one part and themselves on the other ©

what could have been more delightful? Under James they would have been the sport

of the caprice and bigotry of a cruel, a merciless a tyrant, without an atom of

power, any the least share in the plunderage of the people but on condition of a

prostrate and unreserved submission to his will. Under William and his

successors they acquired /enjoyed/ a power independent of the King placed almost

on a level with that of the King, and putting /placing/ them into a condition to

bargain with him upon little less than equal terms for a share in the patronage

and the plunderage.

the patronage of all the Churches would form the trade of their younger sons

In vain would their sons have received the Holy Ghost: the loaves and fishes

would not have come with him.
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  • Title: [1823. Feb. 23 Greece J.B. to Greek Legislators]
    Description: 1823. Feb. 23 Greece J.B. to Greek Legislators Independence Division of power

    But the greatest number © the great body of the people © the four millions ©

    what were they the better for it? Not in the least. Nor should they have been:

    never were they so much as thought of From their then present compleatly

    unsecure state they have been brought to their present so imperfectly secure

    state by the influence of other causes: causes of abundantly slow /snails©pace/

    operation, too complex to be capable of being here brought to view

    In the year 1688 came the Revolution so called by way of distinction

    /preeminence/ not to speak of any intermediate Revolutions On this occasion came

    the division of absolute power: the division between the Monarch on the one

    part, and the House of Lords with the Aristocrats whose wealth by the magnitude

    of it, or the form in which it had place gave them the command of the seats in

    the other House. Here was the division of power principle of division in all its

    glory: and the people © the greatest number what did they get by it? assuredly

    not absolutely nothing: what they got was the difference between the state of

    the people under the present English government and the state of the people

    under the Austrian Government: the difference between a quick pace and a slow

    pace in the descent to the abyss of national misery. Not to mention Williams and

    Anns wars which were to a considerable degree if not altogether wars of defence,

    they got George the first's War and George the 2d's German wars, and George the

    thirds American and French liberticide wars, the last of which, because

    according to the Englishmans creed /of English bigotry/ the King can do no wrong

    is with so much injustice placed to the account of William Pitt: they got

    moreover one after another upon their gulled and overloaded backs those

    milstones called Colonies: sources of patronage and emolument to the ruling few,

    drains on the pockets of the subject many who in return for the money extorted

    form them for the maintenance of that grievance /keeping up that ever running

    sore/, have the satisfaction of being taught to say in speaking of them © our

    Colonies.
  • Title: [1823. Feb. 23 Greece. J.B. to Greek Legislators]
    Description: 1823. Feb. 23 Greece. J.B. to Greek Legislators Independence Division of power

    Better? Yes: but why? Only because, and in so far as when a mass of power which

    is thus independent of the people is thus divided, there is at all times a

    chance of disagreement as between the possessors, and in so far as such

    disagreement leads to /is productive of/ public discussion a certainty of a sort

    of appeal on both parts to the people In this /in which/ case though the people

    not being capable of acting in a body as the two contending parties are can not

    make formal demands for themselves nor therefore obtain contracts as between

    equal and equal, yet the two contending parties while contending or the

    predominant one at the close of the contest, may feel or fancy itself under the

    necessity of doing something even /though it were/ at its own expence for the

    benefit of the people, or of the most influential part of it.

    Thus it was that in the days of King John of England, the contest for power

    between the King /Monarch/ and the Aristocracy terminated in that sort of paper

    security so celebrated under the name of Magna Charta. At the close of this

    contest as neither party could have contended with the other or could see any

    prospect of contending with the other in future without the assistance that part

    of the great mass of the people which were in the state of freedom as

    contradistinguished from domestic or [...?] slavery: so the security such as it

    was was extended to all such freedom. Now then taking the people in a body

    consisting suppose of four millions it was better then that sort of security

    whatever it was that was enjoyed /possessed/ as against depredation and

    oppression at the hands of a single despot should be in possession of each one

    of the number of two hundred thousand than that it should be confined to no more

    than two hundred: and such /this/ was the utility of the division of power such

    as it was that had place in that state of things compared with unity of power in

    the hands of one single despot.
  • Title: [1823. Feb¼y¼. 23 Greece. J.B. to Greek Legislators]
    Description: 1823. Feb¼y¼. 23 Greece. J.B. to Greek Legislators Independence Division of

    power

    Connected with the idea of independence is the idea of the division of power.

    Connected with the belief if any such there be that independence of every body

    the greatest number of the people not excepted is with reference to the greatest

    happiness of the greatest number a useful quality in a public [...?] /public

    [...?]/ is the persuasion that the division of power as between one functionary

    or set of functionaries in the highest grade © division of power instead of the

    most perfect subjection of the power of both to the wills of the greatest number

    is /has a like tendency to be/ productive of the like benefit.

    A functionary in the exercise of whose power the will of the people depends for

    its accomplishment is he if for the possession of that power independent of the

    will of the people more likely to endeavour to give effect to that will than if

    he were dependent. The affirmative is too grossly /manifestly/ absurd to be

    seriously contended for

    The people © if the only power they are capable of exercising © namely the

    constitutive power as above explained with relation to the hands by which the

    operative power shall be exercised were shared by them with some other

    functionary or set of functionaries, say for example a single functionary © a

    Monarch © would they stand a better chance of having their will on each occasion

    [...?] to their interest better provided for than in the case of their [...?]

    same power the whole of it to themselves? Here we have another question the

    answer to which is not less manifest than that to the preceding one.

    Division of power? Yes ©in a certain sense that state of things must of

    necessity, as you have seen have place it is of necessity: just as in the case

    of the individual, food is necessary to existence. What the [...? ...?] upon

    [...?] © is a division /schism of/ other than that which has been seen to be the

    work of inevitable necessity: and it is as applied to such a /every such/ schism

    that the answer is so clear, and the truth of it so incontrovertible.