9. CHAPTER IX
OF PENSIONS AND SALARIES
An article which deserves the maturest consideration, and by means of
which political institution does not fail to produce the most important influence
upon opinion, is that of the mode of rewarding public services. The mode
which has obtained in all European countries is that of pecuniary reward.
He who is employed to act in behalf of the public is recompensed with a salary.
He who retires from that employment is recompensed with a pension. The arguments
in support of this system are well known. It has been remarked 'that indeed
it may be creditable to individuals to be willing to serve their country
without a reward; but that it is a becoming pride on the part of the public
to refuse to receive as an alms that for which they are well able to pay.
If one man, animated by the most disinterested motives, be permitted to serve
the public upon these terms, another will assume the exterior of disinterestedness,
as a step towards the gratification of a sinister ambition. If men be not
openly and directly paid for the services they perform, we may rest assured
that they will pay themselves, by ways a thousand times more injurious. He
who devotes himself to the public ought to devote himself entire: he will
therefore be injured in his personal fortune, and ought to be replaced. Add
to this that the servants of the public ought, by their appearance and mode
of living, to command respect both from their countrymen, and from foreigners;
and that this circumstance will require an expense, for which it is the office
of their country to provide.'[1]
Before this argument can be sufficiently estimated, it will be necessary
for us to consider the analogy between labour in its most usual acceptation,
and labour for the public service, what are the points in which they resemble,
and in which they differ. If I cultivate a field the produce of which is
necessary for my subsistence, this is an innocent and laudable action; the
first object it proposes is my own emolument; and it cannot be unreasonable
that that object should be much in my contemplation, while labour is performing.
If I cultivate a field the produce of which is not necessary to my subsistence,
but which I propose to give in barter for a garment, the case becomes different.
The action here does not, properly speaking, begin in myself. Its immediate
object is to provide food for another; and it seems to be, in some degree,
a perversion of intellect that causes me to place in an inferior point of
view the inherent quality of the action, and to do that which is, in the
first instance, beneficent, from a partial retrospect to my own advantage.
Still the perversion here, at least to our habits of reflecting and judging,
does not appear violent. The action differs only in form from that which
is direct. I employ that labour in cultivating a field which must otherwise
be employed in manufacturing a garment. The garment I propose to myself as
the end of my labour. We are not apt to conceive of this species of barter
and trade as greatly injurious to our moral discernment.
But then this is an action, in the slightest degree, indirect. It does
not follow, because we are induced to do some actions immediately beneficial
to others from a selfish motive, that we can admit of this, in all instances,
with impunity. It does not follow, because we are sometimes inclined to be
selfish, that we must never be generous. The love of our neighbour is the
great ornament of a moral nature: the perception of truth is the most solid
improvement of an intellectual nature. He that sees nothing in the universe
deserving of regard but himself, is a consummate stranger to the dictates
of general and impartial reason. He that is not influenced in his conduct
by the real and inherent nature of things is rational to no purpose. Admitting
that it is venial to do some actions, immediately beneficial to my neighbour,
from a partial retrospect to myself, surely there must be other actions in
which I ought to forget, or endeavour to forget myself. This duty is most
obligatory in actions most extensive in their consequences. If a thousand
men are to be benefited, I ought to recollect that I am only an atom in the
comparison, and to reason accordingly.
These considerations may enable us to decide upon the article of pensions
and salaries. Surely it ought not to be the end of a good political institution
to increase our selfishness, instead of suffering it to dwindle and decay.
If we pay an ample salary to him who is employed in the public service how
are we sure that he will not have more regard to the salary than to the public?
If we pay a small salary, yet the very existence of such a payment will oblige
men to compare the work performed, and the reward bestowed; and all the consequence
that will result will be to drive the best men from the service of their
country, a service first degraded by being paid, and then paid with an ill-timed
parsimony. Whether the salary be large or small, if a salary exist, many
will desire the office for the sake of its appendage. Functions the most
extensive in their consequences, will be converted into a trade. How humiliating
will it be to the functionary himself, amidst the complication and subtlety
of motives, to doubt whether the salary were not one of his inducements to
the accepting the office? If he stand acquitted to himself, it is however
still to be regretted that grounds should be afforded to his countrymen which
tempt them to misrepresent his views.
Another consideration of great weight in this instance is that of the
source from which salaries are derived: from public revenue, from taxes imposed
upon the community. The nature of taxation has perhaps seldom been sufficiently
considered. By some persons it has been supposed that the superfluities of
the community might be collected, and placed under the disposition of the
representative or executive power. But this is a gross mistake. The superfluities
of the rich are, for the most part, inaccessible to taxation; the burthen
falls, almost exclusively, upon the laborious and the poor. All wealth, in
a state of civilized society, is the produce of human industry.[2] To be
rich is merely to possess a patent, entitling one man to dispose of the produce
of another man's industry. Taxation therefore can no otherwise fall upon
the rich but so far as it operates to diminish their luxuries. But this it
does in a very few instances, and in a very small degree. Its genuine operation
is to impose a new portion of labour upon those whom labour has already plunged
deep in ignorance, degradation, and misery. The higher and governing part
of the community are like the lion who hunted in concert with the weaker
beasts. The landed proprietor first takes a very disproportionate share of
the produce to himself; the capitalist follows, and shows himself equally
voracious. Both these classes, in the form in which they now appear, might,
under a different mode of society, be dispensed with. Taxation comes in next,
and lays a new burthen upon those who are bowed down to the earth already.
Who is there, allowed the choice of an alternative, and possessing the spirit
of a man, that would choose to be thus fed, with the hard-earned morsel that,
through the medium of taxation, is wrested from the gripe of the peasant?
Too much stress however is not to be laid upon this argument. There is
no profession, there is perhaps no mode of life compatible with liberal and
intellectual pursuits, that does not include in it a portion of inquiry.
It is one of the evils of a corrupt state of society that it forces the most
enlightened and the most virtuous unwillingly to participate in its injustice.
It would be weakness, and not magnanimity, that should teach us to view these
things with a microscopical scrupulosity; and to refuse to be useful because
no usefulness is pure. The most important objection to emoluments flowing
from a public revenue is built upon their tendency to corrupt the mind of
the receiver, and the views of the spectators.
Let us proceed to consider the extent of the difficulty that would result
from the abolition of salaries. The majority of persons nominated to eminent
employments, under any state of mankind approaching to the present, will
possess a personal fortune adequate to their support. Those selected from
a different class will probably be selected for extraordinary talents, which
will naturally lead to extraordinary resources. It has been deemed dishonourable
Pensions and to subsist upon private liberality; but this dishonour is produced
only by the difficulty of reconciling this mode of subsistence and intellectual
independence. It is true that the fortunes of individuals, like public salaries,
are merely a patent, empowering them to engross the produce of other men's
labour. But large private fortunes cannot cease to exist till a spirit of
sobriety and reflection, hitherto unknown, has been infused into the great
mass of mankind. In the meantime the possessors of them are bound to consider
of the best mode of disposing of their incomes for the public interest: and
it would perhaps be difficult to point out a better than that here alluded
to. By this method no new addition would be made to the burthens of the laborious;
and the distribution would perhaps produce a better effect, than if it were
made in douceurs and prizes to the more ordinary classes of mankind. As to
the receiver, he, by the supposition, receives no more than his due; and
therefore prejudice alone can represent him as degraded, or imbue him with
servility. This source of emolument is free from many of the objections that
have been urged against a public stipend. I ought to receive your superfluity
as my due, while I am employed in affairs more important than that of earning
a subsistence; but at the same time to receive it with a total indifference
to personal advantage, taking only what I deem necessary for the supply of
my wants. He that listens to the dictates of justice, and turns a deaf ear
to the suggestions of pride, will probably wish that the customs of his country
should cast him for support on the virtue of individuals, rather than on
the public revenue. That virtue may be expected, in this, as in all other
instances, to increase, the more it is called into action.
'But what if he have a wife and children?' Let many aid him, if the aid
of one be insufficient. Let him do in his lifetime what Eudamidas did at
his decease, bequeath his daughter to be subsisted by one friend, and his
mother by another. This is the only true taxation, which he, in whom civil
policy has vested the means, assesses on himself, not which he endeavours
to discharge upon the shoulders of the poor. It is a striking example of
the power of venal governments in generating prejudice that this scheme of
serving the public functions without salaries, so common among the ancient
republicans, should, by liberal-minded men of the present day, be deemed
impracticable. Nor let us imagine that the safety of the community will depend
upon the services of an individual. In the country in which individuals fit
for the public service are rare, the post of honour will probably be his,
not that fills an official situation, but that, from his closet, endeavours
to waken the sleeping virtues of mankind. In the country where they are frequent,
it will not be difficult, by the short duration of the employment, to compensate
for the slenderness of the means of him that fills it.
It is not easy to describe the advantages that must result from this proceeding.
The public functionary would, in every article of his charge, recollect the
motives of public spirit and benevolence. He would hourly improve in the
vigour and disinterestedness of his character. The habits created by a frugal
fare and a cheerful poverty, not hid as now in obscure retreats, but held
forth to public view, and honoured with public esteem, would speedily pervade
the community, and auspiciously prepare them for still further improvements.
The objection 'that it is necessary for him who acts on' the part of the
public to make a certain figure, and to live in a style calculated to excite
respect, is scarcely to be considered as deserving a separate answer. The
whole spirit of this enquiry is in direct hostility to such an objection.
If therefore it have not been answered already, it would be vain to attempt
an answer in this place. It is recorded of the burghers of the Netherlands
who conspired to, throw off the Austrian yoke, that they came to the place
of consultation, each man with his knapsack of provisions: who is there that
feels inclined to despise this simplicity and honourable poverty? Who would
not exclaim with the imperial minister when he viewed the spectacle, Men
thus resolute and austere, are neither to be despised nor subdued? The abolition
of salaries would doubtless render necessary the simplification and abridgement
of public business. This would be a benefit, and not a disadvantage.
It will further be objected that there are certain functionaries, in the
lower departments of government, such as clerks and tax-gatherers, whose
employment is perpetual, and whose subsistence ought, for that reason, to
be made the result of their employment. If this objection were admitted,
its consequences would be of subordinate importance. The office of a clerk
or a tax-gatherer is considerably similar to those of mere barter and trade;
and therefore to degrade it altogether to their level would have little resemblance
to the fixing such a degradation upon offices that demand the most elevated
character. The annexation of a stipend to such employments, if considered
only as a matter of temporary accommodation, might perhaps be endured.
But the exception, if admitted, ought to be admitted with great caution.
He that is employed in an affair of direct public necessity ought to be conscious,
while he discharges it, of its true character. We should never allow ourselves
to undertake an office of a public nature without feeling ourselves animated
with a public zeal. We shall otherwise discharge our trust with comparative
coldness and neglect. Nor is this all. The abolition of salaries would lead
to the abolition of those offices to which salaries are thought necessary.
If we had neither foreign wars nor domestic stipends, taxation would be almost
unknown; and, if we had no taxes to collect, we should want no clerks to
keep an account of them. In the simple scheme of political institution which
reason dictates, we could scarcely have any burthensome offices to discharge;
and, if we had any that were so in their abstract nature, they might be rendered
light by the perpetual rotation of their holders.
If we have salaries, for a still further reason we ought to have no pecuniary
qualifications, or, in other words, no regulation requiring the possession
of a certain property as a condition to the right of electing, or the capacity
of being elected. It is an uncommon strain of tyranny to call upon men to
appoint for themselves a delegate, and at the same time forbid them to appoint
exactly the man whom they may judge fittest of the office. Qualification
in both kinds is a most flagrant injustice. It asserts the man to be of less
value than his property. It furnishes to the candidate a new stimulus to
the accumulation of wealth; and this passion, when once set in motion, is
not easily allayed. It tells him, 'Your intellectual and moral qualifications
may be of the highest order; but you have not enough of the means of luxuries
and vice.' To the non-elector it holds the most detestable language. It says,
'You are poor; you are unfortunate; the institutions of society oblige you
to be the perpetual witness of other men's superfluity: because you are sunk
this low, we will trample you yet lower; you shall not even be reckoned for
a man, you shall be passed by, as one of whom society makes no account, and
whose welfare and moral existence she disdains to recollect.'
[[1]]
The substance of these arguments may be found in Burke's Speech on
Oeconomical Reform.
[[2]]
Book VIII, Chap. II.