Immanuel Kant

“ Men thus enter into a Civil Union, in which every one has it determined by Law what shall be recognised as his; and this is secured to him by a competent external Power distinct from his own individuality. Such is the primary Obligation, on the part of all men, to enter into the relations of a Civil State of Society.
The natural condition of mankind need not, on this ground, be represented as a state of absolute Injustice, as if there could have been no other relation originally among men but what was merely determined by force. ”

“ It is the duty of the People to bear any abuse of the Supreme Power, even then though it should be considered to be unbearable. And the reason is, that any Resistance of the highest Legislative Authority can never but be contrary to the Law, and must even be regarded as tending to destroy the whole legal Constitution. In order to be entitled to offer such Resistance, a Public Law would be required to permit it. But the Supreme Legislation would by such a Law cease to be supreme, and the People as Subjects would be made sovereign over that to which they are subject; which is a contradiction. ”

“ Hence, as it can be said of vegetable growths, such as potatoes, as well as of domesticated animals, that because the abundance in which they are found is a product of human labour, they may be used, destroyed, and consumed by man; so it seems that it may be said of the Sovereign as the Supreme Power in the State, that he has the Right to lead his Subjects, as being for the most part productions of his own, to war, as if it were to the chase, and even to march them to the field of battle, as if it were on a pleasure excursion. ”

“ A Law which is so holy and inviolable that it is practically a crime even to cast doubt upon it, or to suspend its operation for a moment, is represented of itself as necessarily derived from some Supreme, unblameable Lawgiver. And this is the meaning of the maxim, 'All Authority is from God;' which proposition does not express the historical foundation of the Civil Constitution, but an ideal Principle of the Practical Reason. ”

“ But as soon as a Supreme Head of the State in person—be it as King, or Nobility, or the whole body of the People in a democratic Union—becomes also representative, the United People then does not merely represent the Sovereignty, but they are themselves sovereign. It is in the People that the Supreme Power originally resides, and it is accordingly from this Power that all the Rights of individual Citizens as mere Subjects, and especially as Officials of the State, must be derived. When the Sovereignty of the People themselves is thus realized, the Republic is established ”

“ By such a Congress is here meant only a voluntary combination of different States that would be dissoluble at any time, and not such a union as is embodied in the United States of America, founded upon a political constitution, and therefore indissoluble. It is only by a Congress of this kind that the idea of a Public Right of Nations can be established, and that the settlement of their differences by the mode of a civil process, and not by the barbarous means of war, can be realized. ”

“ But what then is an unjust enemy according to the conceptions of the Right of Nations, when, as holds generally of the state of Nature, every State is judge in its own cause? It is one whose publicly expressed Will, whether in word or deed, betrays a maxim which, if it were taken as a universal rule, would make a state of Peace among the nations impossible, and would necessarily perpetuate the state of Nature. ”

“ Neither the conquered State nor its Subjects, lose their political liberty by conquest of the country, so as that the former should be degraded to a colony, or the latter to slaves; for otherwise it would have been a penal war, which is contradictory in itself. A colony or a province is constituted by a people which has its own constitution, legislation, and territory, where persons belonging to another State are merely strangers, but which is nevertheless subject to the supreme executive power of another State. ”

“ Nor, above all, should it deaden the sensibilities of the People by the spectacle of Justice being exhibited in the mere carnage of a slaughtering bench. In such circumstances the Sovereign must always be allowed to have it in his power to take the part of the Judge upon himself as a case of Necessity,—and to deliver a Judgment which, instead of the penalty of death, shall assign some other punishment to the Criminals, and thereby preserve a multitude of the People. ”

“ No individual in the State can indeed be entirely without Dignity; for he has at least that of being a Citizen, except when he has lost his Civil Status by a Crime. As a Criminal he is still maintained in life, but he is made the mere instrument of the Will of another, whether it be the State or a particular Citizen. ”

“ The Right of the Supreme Legislation in the Commonwealth is not an alienable Right, but is the most personal of all Rights. Whoever possesses it, can only dispose by the collective Will of the People, in respect of the People; he cannot dispose in respect of the Collective Will itself, which is the ultimate foundation of all public Contracts. ”

“ The Commonwealth is the people viewed as united altogether into a State. And thus it is not to be said that the individual in the State has sacrificed a part of his inborn external Freedom for a particular purpose; but he has abandoned his wild lawless Freedom wholly, in order to find all his proper Freedom again entire and undiminished, but in the form of a regulated order of dependence, that is, in a Civil state regulated by laws of Right. This relation of Dependence thus arises out of his own regulative law-giving Will. ”

“ Such Dependence on the Will of others and the consequent Inequality are, however, not inconsistent with the Freedom and Equality of the individuals as Men helping to constitute the people. Much rather is it the case that it is only under such conditions, that a People can become a State and enter into a Civil Constitution. But all are not equally qualified to exercise the Right of the Suffrage under the Constitution, and to be full Citizens of the State, and not mere passive Subjects under its protection. ”

“ By the fundamental principle of the State, the Government is justified and entitled to compel those who are able, to furnish the means necessary to preserve those who are not themselves capable of providing for the most necessary wants of Nature. For the existence of persons with property in the State, implies their submission under it for protection and the provision by the State of what is necessary for their existence; and accordingly the State founds a Right upon an obligation on their part to contribute of their means for the preservation of their fellow-citizens. ”

“ The Legislative Power, viewed in its rational Principle, can only belong to the united Will of the People. For, as all Right ought to proceed from this Power, it is necessary that its Laws should be unable to do wrong to any one whatever. Now, if any one individual determines anything in the State in contradistinction to another, it is always possible that he may perpetrate a wrong on that other ”

“ Juridical Punishment can never be administered merely as a means for promoting another Good either with regard to the Criminal himself or to Civil Society, but must in all cases be imposed only because the individual on whom it is inflicted has committed a Crime. For one man ought never to be dealt with merely as a means subservient to the purpose of another, nor be mixed up with the subjects of Real Right. ”

“ Origin of the Civil Union and Public Right. It is not from any Experience prior to the appearance of an external authoritative Legislation, that we learn of the maxim of natural violence among men, and their evil tendency to engage in war with each other. Nor is it assumed here that it is merely some particular historical condition or fact, that makes public legislative constraint necessary; for however well-disposed or favourable to Right men may be considered to be of themselves, the rational Idea of a state of Society not yet regulated by Right, must be taken as our starting-point. ”

“ But with the too great extension of such a Union of States over vast regions any government of it, and consequently the protection of its individual members, must at last become impossible; and thus a multitude of such corporations would again bring round a state of war. Hence the Perpetual Peace, which is the ultimate end of all the Right of Nations, becomes in fact an impracticable idea. ”

“ And although the realization of this purpose may always remain but a pious wish, yet we do certainly not deceive ourselves in adopting the maxim of action that will guide us in working incessantly for it; for it is a duty to do this. To suppose that the moral Law within us is itself deceptive, would be sufficient to excite the horrible wish rather to be deprived of all Reason than to live under such deception, and even to see oneself, according to such principles, degraded like the lower animals to the level of the mechanical play of Nature. ”

“ In the case of a Subject who has committed a Crime that renders all society of his fellow-citizens with him prejudicial to the State, the Supreme Power has also the Right of inflicting Banishment to a Country abroad. ”

“ And because it cannot be supposed of any individual that he will throw away his Freedom, it is impossible that the common Will of all the People should agree to such a groundless Prerogative, and hence the Sovereign cannot make it valid.—It may happen, however, that such an anomaly as that of Subjects who would be more than Citizens, in the manner of born Officials or hereditary Professors, has slipped into the mechanism of the Government in olden times, as in the case of the Feudal System, which was almost entirely organized with reference to War. ”

“ In this way, that whoever steals anything makes the property of all insecure; he therefore robs himself of all security in property, according to the Right of Retaliation. Such a one has nothing, and can acquire nothing, but he has the Will to live; and this is only possible by others supporting him. But as the State should not do this gratuitously, he must for this purpose yield his powers to the State to be used in penal labour; and thus he falls for a time, or it may be for life, into a condition of slavery.—But whoever has committed Murder, must die. ”

“ It is therefore a System of those Laws that are requisite for a People as a multitude of men forming a Nation, or for a number of Nations, in their relations to each other. Men and Nations, on account of their mutual influence on one another, require a juridical Constitution uniting them under one Will, in order that they may participate in what is right.—This relation of the Individuals of a Nation to each other, constitutes the Civil Union in the social state ”

“ In other words, it is not the People taken distributively, but the Tribunal of public Justice, as distinct from the Criminal, that prescribes Capital Punishment; and it is not to be viewed as if the Social Contract contained the Promise of all the individuals to allow themselves to be punished, thus disposing of themselves and their lives. For if the Right to punish must be grounded upon a promise of the wrongdoer, whereby he is to be regarded as being willing to be punished, it ought also to be left to him to find himself deserving of the Punishment ”

“ Hence, unless the institution of Right is to be renounced, the first thing incumbent on men is to accept the Principle that it is necessary to leave the state of Nature, in which every one follows his own inclinations, and to form a union of all those who cannot avoid coming into reciprocal communication, and thus subject themselves in common to the external restraint of public compulsory Laws. ”

“ To say, 'I will to be punished, if I murder any one,' can mean nothing more than, 'I submit myself along with all the other citizens to the Laws;' and if there are any Criminals among the People, these Laws will include Penal Laws. The individual who, as a Co-legislator, enacts Penal Law, cannot possibly be the same Person who, as a Subject, is punished according to the Law; for, quâ Criminal, he cannot possibly be regarded as having a voice in the Legislation, the Legislator being rationally viewed as just and holy. ”

“ It is therefore reasonable that any one should constrain another by force, to pass from such a non-juridical state of life and enter within the jurisdiction of a civil state of Society. For, although on the basis of the ideas of Right held by individuals as such, external things may be acquired by Occupancy or Contract, yet such acquisition is only provisory so long as it has not yet obtained the sanction of a Public Law. ”