22.18. 18. Of the Payment of Public Debts.
It is necessary that there
should be a proportion between the state as creditor and the state as
debtor. The state may be a creditor to infinity, but it can only be a
debtor to a certain degree, and when it surpasses that degree the title
of creditor vanishes.
If the credit of the state has never received the least blemish, it
may do what has been so happily practised in one of the kingdoms of
Europe;
[32]
that is, it may require a great quantity of specie, and
offer to reimburse every individual, at least if they will not reduce
their interest. When the state borrows, the individuals fix the
interest; when it pays, the interest for the future is fixed by the
state.
It is not sufficient to reduce the interest: it is necessary to
erect a sinking-fund from the advantage of the reduction, in order to
pay every year a part of the capital: a proceeding so happy that its
success increases every day.
When the credit of the state is not entire, there is a new reason
for endeavouring to form a sinking-fund, because this fund being once
established will soon procure the public confidence.
1. If the state is a republic, the government of which is in its own
nature consistent with its entering into projects of a long duration,
the capital of the sinking-fund may be inconsiderable; but it is
necessary in a monarchy for the capital to be much greater.
2. The regulations ought to be so ordered that all the subjects of
the state may support the weight of the establishment of these funds,
because they have all the weight of the establishment of the debt; thus
the creditor of the state, by the sums he contributes, pays himself.
3. There are four classes of men who pay the debts of the state: the
proprietors of the land, those engaged in trade, the labourers and
artificers, and, in fine, the annuitants either of the state or of
private people. Of these four classes the last, in a case of necessity
one would imagine, ought least to be spared, because it is a class
entirely passive, while the state is supported by the active vigour of
the other three. But as it cannot be higher taxed, without destroying
the public confidence, of which the state in general and these three
classes in particular have the utmost need; as a breach in the public
faith cannot be made on a certain number of subjects without seeming to
be made on all; as the class of creditors is always the most exposed to
the projects of ministers, and always in their eye, and under their
immediate inspection, the state is obliged to give them a singular
protection, that the part which is indebted may never have the least
advantage over that which is the creditor.
Footnotes
