date

1820 Oct. 16 Spanish liberticide measures
1820 Oct. 16 Spanish liberticide measures 6 Letter 3? Introd. Letter 1 6

 Postpone this to Letter III.

Will it be said – Anglo-Columbia is not Spain? – I admitt it. But if from such

liberty, carried to such perfection, the danger, if any, is in that Republic so

minute it would be still less in your monarchy. In the Monarchy there are no

such facilities for the abuse of the liberty as in the Republic: in the Monarchy

/Republic/ there are /no/ such means of immediate repression as in the Republic

/Monarchy/ have in existence. In the Monarchy there exists not on the part of

the people at large such habit of assembling for discussion on political

subjects as in the Republic; no such formed habits of concert and arrangement on

those occasions: in the Monarchy the proportion of those who are in possession

of fire arms and of the habit of using them is in comparison of what it is in

the Republic extremely small: in the Monarchy, the proportion of the armed and

trained military men under the command of the public functionaries – regulars

and militia together is much larger than in the Republic and much more uniformly

distributed/ -ly small: in the /your/ Monarchy the supreme command of the

military force regulars and militia together is concentrated in one visible and

perpetually existing and vigilant hand: in the Republic it is in an unseen and

ever-changing body/.
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  • Title: [1820. Octr 18 Spanish liberticide measures]
    Description: 1820. Octr 18 Spanish liberticide measures 11 Letter 2. Public Discussion 11

    Mr Gorelli makes no distinction. He will neither have excitation nor

    instruction: wherever he sees free discussion there he sees an enemy.

    Had the provision /his means of safety/ been temporary, some excuse might have

    made of it: but so far as words go it is everlasting. In one single town A

    danger whatever may have been amount of it had place for a few days: no actual

    mischief, as far I can understand, was the result of it. If so The mischief was

    after all but ideal. For remedy against a danger thus blown over – for this it

    is that Mr Goreli organizes a danger designed to last as long as the

    Constitution lasts, and designed for I can not see what less is designed to

    destroy it.

    A guard – a military guard – under the command of the President of the Cortes

    for the time being – had this been his means of safety – necessary or not

    necessary – I should have seen no danger in it. On the particular occasion in

    question, one regiment, the regiment of | | offered (I see it said) its

    services. Let these services be accepted and as above perpetual. I have no fear

    from them. Neither the Nation /people/, nor the King with all the remaining

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    this one regiment under such command, nor from many such regiments put together.

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  • Title: [1820 Oct. 10 Spanish liberticide measures]
    Description: 1820 Oct. 10 Spanish liberticide measures Letter 2. Public discussion 2.

    Torreno

    I want words to express my astonishment and grief.

    My best hopes were turned to /stood/ /founded in/ Lord Torreno: if these laws

    stand long all my hopes are gone.

    After other speeches of which I see no account comes Count Torreno’s: by which

    the Debate is closed. He too is blind of Mr Goreli’s blindness: for nothing less

    could serve. In his eyes there is no difference between liberty and power

    between impunity for speaking ill of Ministers /censuring the conduct of public

    functionaries/, and impunity for murdering them: to him to the difference

    between the abuse of the tongue and the abuse of the hand /arm/ is unknown. So

    pressed is he for argument he scruples not to insinuate, that by those by whom

    the right of assembling for the purpose of speaking, well or ill, as their

    judgment dictates of the conduct of the members of government, along with that

    right is assumed the right which is given to the King – the right of committing

    crimes of all sorts without being punishable without being responsible for it.

    Take this assumption from him he has no argument. Whoever proposed that /Where

    is the madman that ever proposed/ that these or any other societies should have

    place /existence/ without responsibility on the part of its members! The abuse

    that might arise from such societies without responsibility! He puts a case that

    has never happened, that never could happen, and on no better ground than this

    he divests the people of all security for their rights and himself and those

    with whom he acts of all effectual responsibility for every abuse they may make

    of those powers of which they profess to hold from the people.

    The abuses that might arise! By the same argument by which he justifies /thinks

    to justify/ the stopping men’s tongues from saying any thing of him and his

    Colleagues, any thing that they would wish should not be heard, he might give

    himself an equally good justification for cutting them out.
  • Title: [[clxiv. 268] 1820. Sept. 5. 1822 Aug]
    Description: [clxiv. 268]

    1820. Sept. 5. 1822 Aug. 9 Inapplicable or Superseded

    Emancipation Spanish /Constitut Code/

    Summary

    ? Corruptive influence?

    or ? Domination impossible?

    GG. If you cannot exclude Monarchy, minimize its power.

    If Naples prefers your Constitutional Monarchy to a Republic, it /Monarchy/ is best for her: if Sicily prefers a Republic to your Constitutional Monarchy, it /a Republic/ is best for her. Would to God I /Oh that I could but see/ both countries united in any form! united under a Constitutional Monarchy, or under a Republic, or the one under the one form of government the other under the other. At this distance I can not take upon me to be sure /to say/ that these men were in the wrong, who in Spanish America used their endeavours to establish a Constitutional Monarchy under a different Monarch in preference to a Republic. To /For/ all Candidates for office /who look to office/ true it is that a Monarchy is beyond comparison better than a Republic and for the same reason a mixt Monarchy better than a pure one. True. But in this or that particular State it follows not that mixt Monarchy only because it is best for the influential few is relatively a bad one: for if no better is to be had it is best for the subject many likewise. In a Republic there are no needless or overpaid offices, because there is no Corrupter-General to employ the pay of them in paying /luring/ the Representatives of the people to betray their trust, and join with him in plundering their constituents. In a pure Monarchy though the pride and vanity of the Monarch [...?] needless Offices, it is only through the /his/ indolence and negligence of the Monarch if there be any overpaid ones: for as there exists no man to whom any declared resistance can be opposed to his will can be opposed, so there is no one in whose instance resistance requires to be softened. As to a republic, so it be at once practicable and palatable what makes me prefer it to a mixt Monarchy is that not only a /is the best/ mixt Monarchy is not only not so good as a republic at the first, but that by its very nature it is destined to grow worse and worse: worse and worse till by repose it sinks into a pure Monarchy, as ours has so long been sinking, or by convulsion rises into a republic, as ours, if ever it rises at all, seems destined to rise. A republic (bating extraneous accident such as all governments and all men are exposed /liable/ to) will in proportion as it changes, grow better and better, because there is something to make it better till it arrives at the best and nothing in it to make it worse. A pure Monarchy can not grow worse, because /for/ it is at all times at the worst. A mixt Monarchy alone is by its very nature destined to change, and that only one way, namely by less bad to worse. It is made worse and worse, by every man added to the army under the Monarch, and by every penny added to the taxes. By the every man it is made the more tyrannical; by the every penny it is made the more corrupt, and by every armed man not only the more tyrannical but the more corrupt: for to encrease the army is to encrease not only force but patronage.