Individual Rights and Social Control: Political Science in the French Institute

Author(s): Martin S. Staum

Source: Journal of the History of Ideas , Jul. - Sep., 1987, Vol. 48, No. 3 (Jul. - Sep.,
1987), pp. 411-430
Published by: University of Pennsylvania Press

Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/2709760

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 INDIVIDUAL RIGHTS AND SOCIAL CONTROL: POLITICAL
SCIENCE IN THE FRENCH INSTITUTE

BY MARTIN S. STAUM

Henri Gregoire's optimistic vision of the compatibility of social s

and freedom portrayed for his French Institute colleagues in 1
"revocable, representative government" committed to "innate rig
liberty and happiness," which alone would fearlessly encourage st
the "science of government." Similarly, a science of government
protect freedom" by its ceaseless probing of the foundation of autho
Thus, the first social sciences research academy, the Class of Mor
Political Sciences (1795-1803), promised to try to solve the pers
dilemma of the aspiration for freedom and the need for a science of
control.2 Revolutionary turmoil itself impelled Institute members to
to achieve social harmony based on a reliable "political science."
political and social phenomena would become, if not entirely predict
at least amenable to legislators' influence.
This discussion will attempt to show how the Institute mode
notion of political science retained a commitment to individual fr
from 1789 until the Restoration despite the objective of social co
Second, we shall demonstrate how political circumstances restrict
definition of freedoms and changed their balance with mechanis
control. Third, we shall offer an epilogue on how Institute poli
thought illuminates the vexed question of "bourgeois ideology" d
the Revolution.3
In this process we shall modify two recent interpretations o
Ideologue circle of philosophers who were among the major theor
Institute political science.4 The first interpretation overstresses the r
of social control in Ideologue thought by arguing that their im

1 "Reflexions ... sur les moyens de perfectionner les sciences politiques," Me

de l'Institut national des sciences et arts. Classe des sciences morales et politiques (h
MSMP), I (Paris, an VI) 552, 554-55, 558-60.
2 On the Academy see Jules Simon, Une Academie sous le directoire (Paris
on the Ideologue circle, Sergio Moravia, II Tramonto dell'illuminismo (Bari,
Pensiero degli Ideologues (Florence, 1974), esp. 675-804; Georges Gusdorf, La Con
revolutionnaire, les ideologues (Paris, 1978), esp. 173-284, 392-427.
3 For summaries of the historical controversy see William Doyle, Origins of the F
Revolution (Oxford, 1980), and Lynn Hunt, Politics, Culture, and Class in the
Revolution (Berkeley, 1984) 1-16.
4 The Ideologues were a loosely defined group committed to the constructio
social science and distinguishable by authorship of a major work in one of th
science disciplines, their membership in the Auteuil salon of Madame Helvetiu
ciation with the newspaper DJcade philosophique, and moderate republicanism.

411

Copyright 1987 by JOURNAL OF THE HISTORY OF IDEAS, INC

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412 MARTIN STAUM

organic social harmony with de

itivism of Saint-Simon and Co
the resemblance of Ideologue t
Bentham but more dubiously
merely rhetorical or non-existen
The marquis de Condorcet prov
impetus to base the political s
of man. "6 Indeed most authors
observing behavior, since even
and avoidance of pain had to b
in the late eighteenth century.7
about human attributes, but the
presupposed as an axiom of obs
blithely deduced such rights fro
cautious definition of individual
potential, while the privileged
prevented their political scienc
Institute authors were quite in
rights as natural or by the goal
Neither the language of rights
basic scientific project.
Aside from establishing rights
cerned, like Montesquieu, with
people, in this case French rep
mechanisms of control compatib
tesquieu, most authors were m
to be, rather than with historic
We shall investigate here the
various Institute sections-A.-L
and C.-F. Volney in the "analy
J. Sieyes and P.-L. Roederer in
F. Daunou in the "social scienc
consider some of the lesser figu
opponents of the Ideologues. T
actions to early Revolutionary
Tracy and Daunou.

5 Thomas E. Kaiser, "The Ideologue

dissertation, Harvard University, 1976)
and Utility: The French Ideologues an
1984), esp. 6-42, 97-134; my criticism
admirable analyses and excellent scho
6 Keith Baker, Condorcet: From Nat
1975), esp. 198, 225-44, 352; on Mont
7 For Destutt de Tracy's attitude to
Science: Destutt de Tracy and French

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 POLITICAL SCIENCE IN THE FRENCH INSTITUTE 413

FRENCH NATIONAL INSTITUTE

Class of Moral and Political Sciences,
1795-1803

Memoirs Published by
Social Science and Legislation Section Read Institute

Members

Pierre-Claude-Frangois Daunou (1761-1840) 4 2

Jean-Jacques Regis de Cambaceres (1753-1824) 3 1
Philippe-Antoine Merlin de Douai (1754-1838) 2 0
Emmanuel-Joseph-Pierre de Pastoret 1 0
(1756-1840)
Jean-Philippe Garran-Coulon (1748-1816) 0 0
Pierre-Charles-Louis Baudin des Ardennes 6 4
(1748-99)
Jean-Frangois Champagne (1751-1813) 3 1
Felix-Julien-Jean Bigot de Preameneu 1 0
(1747-1825)

Associates

Louis-Auguste Legrand-Laleu (1755-1819) 2 0

David Houard (1725-1802) 0 0
Julien Raimond (1740?-1802) 0 0
Louis-Frangois-Elisabeth Ramond (1755-1827) 0 0
Philippe-Antoine Grouvelle (1757-1806) 0 0
Ruffin-Castus Massa (1742-1829) 1 0

OTHER INSTITUTE AUTHORS

Analysis of Sensations and Ideas Section

Constantin-Frangois Volney (1757-1820)

Pierre-Jean-Georges Cabanis (1757-1808)
Antoine-Louis-Claude Destutt de Tracy (1754-1836)

Political Economy Section

Emmanuel-Joseph Sieyes (1748-1836)

Pierre-Louis Roederer (1754-1835)

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414 MARTIN STAUM

Of course in an academy spon

sulate, there were neither neo-Jac
comes from the moderate center
toward the Right. Among them
from staunch, if anti-Robespierri
Lepeaux), ex-Convention membe
perial councillors (Cambaceres),
(Pastoret, purged from the Institu
1797 royalist plot).8

I. Human Nature and Natur

Institute sources for axiomatic d

have been American, but author
Physiocrats. In 1789 Volney and
piricist view of a modifiable hum
rights of a Declaration.9 Sieyes in
this problem by deducing hum
"capacities." Neither a historica
was essential for this reasoning
fulfillment of needs or for happi
to a value-the right to a "social
security." As with Locke, rights
man is "proprietor of his own p
terminology of natural rights, "a
itarian goal, the "greatest happ
In 1793 Volney similarly deduc
but from the "physical attribu
Common human faculties and n
self-preservation. Liberty derived
senses, so that no one need subm
In modern political thought the
is not necessarily compatible wi
the greatest number. For aggreg
the individual to a community s
manuscripts unpublished until
ration of Rights would be "sowi

8 For a survey of political attitudes

Moral and Political Sciences, 1795-1803
9 Memoires de Garat (Paris, 1862) xii-
'1 E.-J. Sieyes, Preliminaire de la const
des droits de l'homme et du citoyen (P
" C.-F. Volney, La Loi naturelle ed. J
12 H.-L.-A. Hart, "Between Utility a
Freedom (Oxford, 1979), 78-98.

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 POLITICAL SCIENCE IN THE FRENCH INSTITUTE 415

"nonsense on stilts. "13 Yet the political science of Sieyes and Vo

little anarchic potential because of their overriding concern for
Even in 1789, before moderate concerns about the Terror
lotte demands, Sieyes called for equality only of civil rights
subjected political rights to a utilitarian standard. The attack
privilege was quite consistent with a defense of "inequality
and of property. Later that year he distinguished passive citi
the laws protect from those "active in forming public p
taxpaying "true shareholders of the social enterprise." In m
ernment, unlike ancient pure democracy, only those who at
untarily contributed to government revenue deserved repres
Future Institute associates echoed these views. Sieyes's frie
Grouvelle endorsed "necessary inequality" even while censu
tesquieu's views on nobility. In 1791 L.-F.-E. Ramond would
political activity to "chosen citizens in whom society can person
confidence. "15

II. Roederer's Social Science

After the overthrow of the monarchy even moderates like P

Daunou had to agree that primary assemblies of voters should b
of "fiscal conditions foreign to the virtues and talents of citize
supporting Condorcet's democratic draft constitution of 1793, h
avoided any implication of economic egalitarianism. Equal civil
meant only equitable opportunities for acquiring property.16
In the private Paris forum of the Lycee in 1793, the jurist a
ripheral Ideologue P.-L. Roederer lectured on "social organization
too, cautiously defined rights, while he sketched a political science
at stability. On the first theme Roederer agreed that liberty and pr
were fundamental rights "from the state of nature or which m
granted because of the nature of man." But civil equality shou
suggest dangerous "levelling." As a natural right, property was p
social convention and independent of "civil law and popular

13 "A Critical Examination of the Declaration of Rights," in Bentham's P

Thought, ed. Bhiku Parekh (London, 1973), 259, 269.
14 E.-J. Sieyes, Qu'est-ce que le tiers etat? ed. R. Zapperi (Geneva, 1970), 57-5
Preliminaire, 25, 36-37, 46; Paul Bastid, Sieyes et sa pensee (Paris, 1970), 89 str
"voluntary" aspect of the tax qualification in Sieyes, but for association of bo
pulsory and voluntary conditions, see Sieyes's manuscripts, Archives nationales (h
A.N.) 284 AP 3, dossier 2/1,10; 284 AP 18, doss. 2; and in 1799, 284 AP 5. d
fol. 44.
15 [Ph.-A. Grouvelle], De 'autorite de Montesquieu dans la revolution presente (Paris,
1789), 16, 35, 67-68, 137. L.-F.-E. Ramond, Opinion enoncee a la Societe de 1789 sur
les loix constitutionnelles (Paris, 1791), 20; see also Baker, 272-85, on the society of 1789.
16 P.-C.-F. Daunou, Essai sur la Constitution (Paris, 1793), 3, 5-6; see also Moravia,
Tramonto, 195-96 and Welch, 26-27.

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416 MARTIN STAUM

dices." 17 Thus he attacked Robesp

was intended to subordinate prope
ural rights here were far from su
concept of social order. Roedere
view of Adam Smith's theory of t
He introduced a favorite theme, r
97, that work would teach "mo
"dignity, satisfaction, and obed
would provide the best incentiv
he was more conservative than C
resentative republic" from the uni
To Roederer as to Sieyes a com
quality required interest in a poli
the Ideologue leaders formally def
the psychology of Locke, Condil
and ethics to rules as certain an
his break with the other Ideologu
and complete system" for moral,
Condillac, he derived all mental
vetius, he found self-love the m
for Roederer's social scientist was
passions but of the more malle
would prevent misconceptions f
judgment, and encourage usefu
festivals, monuments, and patri
senses. With appropriate laws t
personal glory into patriotism or
into productive industry useful t
The author of the Convention
similarly presented to the Insti
science with three distinct br
knowledge of interests, legislation
and ethics based on the study of
detailed discourse he completely
regulating passions. However, Ca

17 P.-L. Roederer, "Cours d'organisati

ed. A. M. Roederer VIII (Paris, 1857), 1
draft Declaration of Rights, May 5, 17
the French Revolution (New York, 195
Margerison, P.-L. Roederer: Political Tho
(Philadelphia, 1983), 94-113.
18 "Cours," VIII, 141-43, 148, 265-66;
in Oeuvres, V, 155-56.
19 "Cours," VIII, 131, 181-82, 187-90,
20 "Cours," VIII, 194, 206, 209-15, 22

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 POLITICAL SCIENCE IN THE FRENCH INSTITUTE 417

solutions. He feared that exalting rational calculation over

and feeling" might promote unbridled self-seeking. The da
reason was that it promoted too much freedom rather th
prisoner of unalterable impulses. In an implicit critique o
physiology he saw "the absurd man of the materialists," b
interest, as too free to follow his own inclinations. Historical
and the known consequences of laws should therefore tem
terialist excesses of reason.21
By 1797 Roederer persisted in hoping for a social scienc
or avoid conflicts of interest. An Institute memoir "organizin
the Legislative Body" aimed to prevent emotion and rhetorica
moving "great deliberative assemblies." Each law would go
cessive committees. The first would designate the interest
the law, the second, the intensity of each effect, the third w
upon a plan of action, and the fourth would draft the final de
itself could thus not sway the final debate. An even more
provision was the reduction of the numbers of laws (tho
referendum would ratify them), so that administration w
widest possible latitude in decrees applying the laws. We see h
anticipation of Bonaparte's plebiscitary style, in which R
quiesced. 22

III. The Debate on Rights in 1795

Traumatic social fears unleashed by the Terror made a stabilizing,

manipulative social science seem more urgent. Yet the future Institute
members participating in the 1795 constitutional debates in the Conven-
tion defended a modified Declaration of Rights. Daunou presented the
constitution draft, Baudin des Ardennes was a constitutional commission
colleague, while J.-A. Creuze-Latouche, J.-Ph. Garran-Coulon, and
L.-M. La Revelliere-Lepeaux spoke from the Convention floor.23
Almost all interpreters of the 1795 constitution justifiably stress the
changes made in the language of rights. The new Declaration excluded
articles such as "men are born free and remain equal in rights," while
the Convention added a Declaration of Duties to safeguard the "main-
tenance of property" and once again restricted political sovereignty to
taxpaying citizens.24 Yet Daunou insisted that some kind of Declaration

21MSMP, III, 4, 10-11, 13-14.

22 Oeuvres, VII, 71-84, "De l'Organisation des assemblees."
23 Jacques Godechot, Les Institutions de France sous la Revolution et l'Empire (Paris,
1951), 396-97; Jean Suratteau, "Compte rendu de Clive Church," Annales historiques
de la revolution francaise, 49 (1977), 151-53; Memoires de La Revelliere-Lepeaux (Paris,
1895), I, 227-45.
24 See also Georges Lefebvre, The French Revolution from 1793 to 1799 (New York,
1964), 160-62.

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 418 MARTIN STAUM

of Rights be retained as a "rall

mies of the Revolution." Unlik
the natural rights argument for
to an equal share of property,
the best defense of property c
to state the "rights of man in
the law were still constitutiona
socially utilitarian expedients.25
Redefining political rights w
debates. The intentions of the constitution-framers of 1795 differed little
from those of Sieyes in 1789. Yet one should not exaggerate the restric-
tiveness of voting rights in the first draft. Even Boissy d'Anglas's no-
torious discourse on the virtues of government by the propertied was in
context a plea for propertied representatives, not for propertied electors.
Daunou, supported by Baudin des Ardennes and Garran-Coulon, first
proposed direct elections with no intermediate electoral college and with
only domestic servants excluded from the vote.26 However, the Conven-
tion majority, which included future Institute members Creuze-Latouche,
Merlin, and La Revelliere-Lepeaux, chose the more conservative posi-
tion-restricting primary voting rights to taxpayers and establishing
higher income qualifications, as in 1791, for a much smaller number of
intermediate electors.27 In 1795 as in 1789 the defense of property and
the equality of civil rights preceded any utilitarian determination of the
social good. Political rights were, however, a function of fitness for
citizenship.

IV. Directory Political Science: From Rights to Technocratic Elitism

Except in the constitutional controversy, Institute members continued

to use the language of individual, and sometimes natural, rights. From
1797 to 1799 the legal scholar Garran-Coulon published a massive four-
volume Committee investigation of the Santo Domingo troubles. He
clearly supported "rights of citizens anterior to society" as a "natural,
social, and positive law." He praised the black leader Toussaint for
"justifying the principles of the Declaration of Rights and of our con-
stitution on the general liberty and equality of men."28 To give practical
application to the preaching of equal rights for men of color, Garran-
Coulon and Henri Gregoire defended the mulatto proprietor Julien Rai-

25 Moniteur universel (reimpression), XXV (Paris, 1847), 150, 214, 219.

26Ibid., 92-93, 108-9, 252, 260.
27Ibid., 171, 195, 215-16, 219.
28 J.-Ph. Garran-Coulon, Rapport sur les troubles de Saint-Domingue, 4 vols. (Paris,
an V-an VII), II, 89, IV, 647.

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 POLITICAL SCIENCE IN THE FRENCH INSTITUTE 419

mond against charges of misuse of funds and may have eng

1796 election as a "social science" associate of the Institute.29

The fourteen members and associates of the social science and leg-
islation section produced only twenty-three memoirs, eight of which were
unrelated to current political theory or practice.30 The exception to the
general distraction of active politics was the lawyer and deputy Baudin
des Ardennes. He illustrated both the effort to safeguard individual rights
and the goal of a science of social control. Baudin defined individual
rights as axiomatic-consequent to the "interests and needs of man as
a sociable being." Unlike Cambaceres, he even asserted that "experience
and observation have no weight in ethics and politics to counteract
principles of justice." But Baudin clearly found political rights unthrea-
tening, since he excluded from sovereignty the "ignorant and credulous
crowds." In a representative government, leadership would have an en-
lightened, wise will.31
Indeed the principles of "social" science according to Baudin en-
shrined the notion of a hierarchical society. The very enterprise of gov-
erning required the "necessity of relations of superiority and
subordination among members of political bodies." The treatises of Ar-
istotle and Montesquieu recommended the taming of passions, and they
"did not write for the faubourgs" (the rebellious Paris sansculotte sec-
tions). 32 Using Montesquieu's principle of the relativity of institutions to
different forms of government, Baudin found that factions, which stood
for "private interests, or esprit de corps," were most dangerous in a
republic. There they would attack not a governing elite but the "interest
of all citizens." History and experience could not be invoked to reinforce
the certain principles of political science. The Roman Gracchi exhibited
the dangers of factionalism, and "even their imitators are proof against
them" (a pointed allusion to "Gracchus" Babeuf, the egalitarian con-
spirator of 1796).33 Baudin's memoir on clubs also invoked the theory
of representative government, which rested sovereignty only in the elected
body, not in usurping pressure groups. The dangerous Parisian clubs

29 Gary Kates, The Cercle Social, The Girondins, and the French Revolution (Princeton,
1985), 217-18; Ruth Necheles, The Abbe Gregoire 1787-1831 (Westport, 1971), 84, 120,
126; Garran-Coulon, Rapport sur les troubles, III, 121-22, IV, 23; J.-Ph. Garran-Coulon,
Rapport sur Julien Raimond, 24 floreal III, 22, 33.
30 Archives de l'Institut, Sciences morales et politiques (hereafter AI-SMP), Liste
chronologique des memoires lus a la Classe des sciences morales et politiques, an IV-an
XI.

31 P.-C.-L. Baudin des Ardennes, "De l'origine de la loi," MSMP, II, 376-77, 387-
88, 390.
32 Ibid., II, 387-88, AI-SMP A 6, "De la seconde classe de l'Institut," 9.
33 "De l'esprit de faction," MSMP, I, 497-503.

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 420 MARTIN STAUM

were only the "fruit of indige

cities. "34
The most politically powerfu
liere-Lepeaux, Sieyes) walked th
and neo-Jacobinism. They saved
by tampering with elections or w
anti-Jacobin coups of 1797-98.
bers, the historians J.-B. de L
getically condemned the purge
with the Institute itself.35
There was no monolithic Instit
moderates reached their apoge
sought to construct a technoc
seemed willing to sacrifice a con
earlier Destutt de Tracy's essay
an Institute prize contest, rese
in all its details" to "hardly
citizens need to know some of th
to practice their craft, are con
without studying their basis in
doubtedly conceived their m
operation of mind, desire, and wi
and the economy in the secula
education systems. Tracy's pro
appeared most notably in his
authorize thorough advanced e
terminal primary schooling for
toil. "37
Since the politically weak Directory could not guarantee Ideologue
success, they helped engineer and defend Bonaparte's successful coup of
November 1799. Here we see the greatest Ideologue commitment to a
political science of managing government by institutional balance. They
wished to end popular disturbances and to safeguard legitimate dissent.
The Director Sieyes could at last be a prominent drafter of the Consti-
tution, while his Institute colleagues Talleyrand and Roederer helped

34 "Sur les Clubs et leurs rapports avec l'organisation sociale," ibid., 509-11, 529,
538.
35 F.-E. Toulongeon, Histoire de France depuis la revolution de 1789 VI (Paris, 1810),
190; J.-B. de Lisle de Sales, A l'Institut national de France sur la destitution des citoyens
Carnot, Barthelemy, Pastoret, Sicard, Fontanes (Paris, an VIII).
36A.-L.-C. Destutt de Tracy, "Quels sont les moyens de fonder la morale d'un
peuple," in Commentaire sur l'Esprit des lois de Montesquieu (Paris, 1819), 438, 461,
467.

37 See Martin S. Staum, "Human, not Secular Sciences: Ideology in the Central
Schools," Historical Reflections, 12 (1985), 49-76; B. W. Head, op. cit., 195-200; Emmet
Kennedy, A Philosophe in the Age of Revolution: Destutt de Tracy and the Origins of
"Ideology" (Philadelphia, 1978), 91.

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 POLITICAL SCIENCE IN THE FRENCH INSTITUTE 421

assure his support for the coup. In the purged Commission of th

of Five Hundred both Daunou and Cabanis entered constitutio
though all were overshadowed by Bonaparte's revisions.38
Sieyes's constitutional ideas show a consistent adoption of
quieu's principle of separation of powers. Even in 1789 his m
recommended a "tribunate" representing popular will, a Roy
representing legislative initiative, and a legislature itself exe
final judgment. Already he had contemplated selection of leg
taxpaying active citizens from a sifted, propertied list of "eligib
By 1795 Sieyes had concocted the notion of a "constitutio
a "tribunal of the rights of man," which would rule on constitu
of laws and propose amendments.40 When he had a more pow
in 1799, Sieyes's concern to stabilize government had trium
the guarantee of the "rights of man" formerly at the apex of al
tutional schemes. Sieyes and Daunou agreed to omit a Declar
Rights. The final draft actually carried out Sieyes's plans t
legislature chosen from above by a conservative Senate (a mod
stitutional jury) appointed largely from a national list of eligibl
in stages by their fellow citizens.41
Faced with the task of defending the 1799 constitution, C
not hesitate to derive "individual rights" from the "faculties
of men." Yet Cabanis placed his confidence in the supposedly
mechanism of checks and balances. Considering like Montes
advantages of each form of government, Cabanis advocated
executive without the obstruction of a royal veto. He also ho
representative government purged of turbulence would combine
tocratic service ideal with democratic popular sovereignty. Ac
Cabanis, revolutionary experience had shown the people "in
appropriating to each function men of suitable character an
Hence, he praised Sieyes's idea of guidance from above for a
sound democracy," while believing that the national lists would
an "aristocracy of talent and virtue." The science of separatin
powers would guarantee both decisive government and stron
tion. 42

38 Bastid, op. cit., 249-58.

39 A.N. 284 AP 3, dossier 2/1.
40 Opinion de Sieyes sur plusieurs articles des titres IV et V du projet de constitution,
2 thermidor an III, (Paris, an III); Sur les attributs et l'organisation du jury constitu-
tionnaire, 18 thermidor III (Paris, an III) 17; A.N. 284 AP 5, doss. 1/11.
41 Boulay de la Meurthe, Theorie constitutionnelle de Sieyes (Paris, 1836), 15; cf. A.N.
284 AP 5, doss. 2/4, where property qualifications are combined with a voluntary tribute;
see also F. A. Mignet, Histoire de la revolution franqaise depuis 1789 jusqu'a 1814, II
(Paris, 1827), 227-81 and diagram.
42 P.-J.-G. Cabanis, Oeuvres philosophiques, II (Paris, 1956), 462, 474, 482-83, 486-
87.

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 422 MARTIN STAUM

V. Resurgence of the Lan

By November 1800 even the m

Ruffino Massa, not an Ideologu
the people would assemble mor
anating from the Legislative b
the tribunes and legislators ag
would reduce laws to "decrees of the Senate of Rome in the time of the
Emperors; or the bills of today's English Parliament."43 The obviou
demise of civil liberties as well as popular democracy soon gave the
Ideologues reason to regret their lapse from strong support of the languag
of rights. Bonaparte's wrath against "metaphysicians" disillusioned th
Ideologue philosophic circle by 1801.44 The pliable Senate majorit
purged Ideologue opponents from the Tribunate and Massa from th
Legislative Body in 1802. The same year the new education law eliminated
favored Ideologue subjects, including general grammar and legislation
from the public secondary schools. Early in 1803 the Consuls suppress
the forum of the Class of Moral and Political Sciences itself. The spec
tribunals without juries and proclamation of the Life Consulate and
Empire helped end republican vitality.45
Of course the Ideologues accepted Bonaparte's appointments to th
Senate and Council of State. However, only Roederer broke with his
colleagues to support the purge of the Tribunate and the proclamatio
of the Life Consulate and to become an Imperial administrator in Nap
and Berg. Other opponents of the Ideologues in the Institute had few
qualms about becoming pillars of the regime. Cambaceres was Secon
Consul and Imperial Arch-Chancellor, while Bigot de Preameneu ad-
vanced from the Council of State to the Religious Affairs Ministry.46
One recent interpretation of the Ideologues has concluded that Ideo
logue utilitarianism virtually supplanted their concern for rights in view
of heightened Ideologue elitism after 1795.47 The issue is certainly no
the compatibility of utilitarianism with Ideologue philosophy, since th
language of rights and utility were both used even in 1789. However, the
Ideologue confrontation with arbitrary power led to a resurgence of the
language of rights. With the exception of the issue of paternal powe
the Ideologues found more safeguards in individual civil rights in th
Empire and Restoration than in a standard of the common good whic
could be easily twisted for reasons of state. Rights deduced from nee

43 Massa, "De la simplicite des loix," BN n.a. fr. 21910, Daunou MSS., fols. 127
137-38, 140.
44 Kennedy, 89-90.
45 Moravia, II Tramonto, 480-89, 496-502, 564-69.
46 Biographical information on Institute members appears in Michaud, Biograph
universelle ancienne et moderne, 45 vols. (Paris, 1854-62).
47 Welch, 114-34.

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 POLITICAL SCIENCE IN THE FRENCH INSTITUTE 423

were equally consistent with their basic philosophy. Nor d

economic liberalism produce a rigid proto-Positivist demarcati
roles.

The two most famous Ideologue political treatises of th

and Restoration periods were Destutt de Tracy's Comment
tesquieu's Spirit of the Laws (written in 1806-7, published i
Jefferson in 1811, in French in 1817) and Daunou's Essay o
Guarantees (in the Censeur europeen in 1818, and separate
in 1819). Both works continued to use the language of indiv
with political rights modified to guarantee social stability.
Destutt de Tracy reaffirmed Montesquieu's belief in nat
prior to positive laws. He also disapproved of any relativist
Montesquieu to excuse either slavery or despotism because
His main concern was to restructure Montesquieu's classificati
ernments, although the descriptive imperative usually gav
normative. Replacing the distinctions of monarchy, repub
potism, Tracy separated "special governments" based on Di
conquest, or the rule of rank or caste, from "national go
obedient to the general will. These latter regimes did not m
the common good but also guaranteed that "all rights and pow
to the entire body of the nation."49
Tracy went through the motions of describing the mec
"special governments," such as nobility, venal office, or re
tions. But he clearly preferred truly "national governments,"
monarchies," and representative democracy. Even in his well-k
approving constitutional monarchy for France in 1819, T
that any monarchy would deteriorate into a "special gover
did not "declare and consecrate the principal rights of man in
Yet pure democracy was fit only for primitive republics
anarchy. Only representative institutions in which "all cit
their delegates" would produce a "democracy of enlightene
for advanced civilization. Tracy's preference for a just govern
individual rights essential and not just dispensable guarante
social conditions. 51
In addition, Tracy's rejection of a formal declaration o
superfluous should not obscure his restatement of the cardina
of the 1789 Declaration in his preamble to an ideal consti
earlier Declaration had equated the general will with national s
Tracy rested "national government" on the "will of the ma
governed." Second, equality before the law to Tracy still mean

48 Commentaire, 4, 64, 298.

49 Ibid., 12, 21, 26-27.
50 Ibid., 211 n.; see also 38-44.
51 Ibid., 21-22, 42-43, 57.

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424 MARTIN STAUM

of privileged social groups. Thi

fixed that "violence is needed
principle, "no individual may ex
nation"). Fourth, the "careful
16 of 1789. Finally, Tracy's fund
articles concerning freedom of
the liberty and independence
external or internal peace," and
their sentiments on all kinds of
on religious matters."52
Like Sieyes and unlike Bentha
language and the utilitarian goal
(1815) Tracy derived rights an
pacities" of human nature.53 F
would also realize rights. Indiv
notion of good government.
To construct a political science
Sieyes's earlier plans for a "con
style coups. Stronger than Napol
be elected by all citizens and wou
choice of a plural executive.54
Most interpreters of Tracy hav
move away from the elitism of
Cut off from political power, h
freedoms. In 1798 he worried
Commentary he regretted the
fended all juries as an "obstacle
favored sphere of public educa
Despite his industrious monitori
recommendations in 1799-1800
now doubted the usefulness of
authorized government catechism
He still defined political righ
Cabanis in 1798, he called for a
that sovereignty at the highest l
of members of society must not
is done but on the contrary to a
observed sham popular sovere
electorate of the Restoration, h

52 Ibid., 231-32; for translation of th

53 Traite de la volonte et de ses effet
4 Commentaire, 203-8.
Kennedy, 175-78; Head, 181-82, 200
56 Commentaire, 72; cf. "Morale du
57Ibid., 45, 57, 60; see Kennedy, 17

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 POLITICAL SCIENCE IN THE FRENCH INSTITUTE 425

for both primary or intermediate electoral assemblies. P

enough social advantages, and indirect election in itself would
stabilize politics.58
Finally, Tracy's belief in the necessary inequalities due t
labor was not deduced from a Saint-Simonian division of
managers and workers or a denial of opportunity for individu
Rather, Malthusian economic pessimism influenced his o
the advancement of unskilled laborers. He accepted the be
ersupply of labor due to population increase and the inevitabl
of the necessary commodities produced by unskilled labor
down wages.59 Certainly, Tracy resembled the Positivists i
pertise and believed that most people needed enlightenment t
economic principles. But freedom of expression and diversity
were defenses against expert prescriptions. His liberalism did
the sober surveillance of Bentham's Panopticon, nor was
prison warden. Cheryl Welch has shown that Tracy's Commen
liberals, not Positivists.60 Moreover, despite his personal ti
liberals like Charles Comte and Charles Dunoyer who advo
regulating society, Tracy stressed the importance of dimi
quality, albeit by "means not violent," such as equal opportun
taxes, and equitable inheritance laws.6' In Tracy's social scie
tempered control.
Daunou's Essay of 1818 similarly maintained a concept o
rights despite his hope for stabilizing moral and political
ideal legislative assembly would "repulse any law again
rights" or "limiting sovereignty." To meet objections to the "
of social contract, or even natural rights," he eliminated s
from the Essay.62 But his history lectures of 1819 and 1822 a
de France called natural rights the "natural elements of the s
Adopting Tracy's terms, he defined "national" government
which "respect and protect all individual rights and contai
within assigned limits."63
Daunou's explanation of individual guarantees correspond
ably with the language of the 1789 Declaration. Guarantee
security, freedom from arbitrary state action, protection
freedom to express opinions, and freedom to exercise industr
edly also functioned as weapons in current Restoration d
trials for press offenses, denied under the law in 1818, c

58 Commentaire, 57, 172, 178-80; cf. Head, 165.

59 Trait6 de la volonte, 282-86.
Welch, 157-71.
61 Commentaire, 306.
62 P.-C.-F. Daunou, Essai sur les garanties individuelles que reclame l'tat actuel de
la societe (Paris, 1819), 6, 228.
63 Cours d'etudes historiques, II (Paris, 1842), 136, 270.

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 426 MARTIN STAUM

question of arbitrary legal acti

free trial juries and the presump
judiciary.64 Adopting the Lock
person," he defended inviolabil
freedom with personal independ
rent motivation was to preserv
from emigres' demands. Another
vote to all proprietors, not just
dom of expression targeted go
excessive security deposits req
Daunou, unlike Tracy, opposed
freedom of religion as a defense
State church.66
While Daunou extolled civil r
Tracy the framework of limite
abandoned briefly in the crisi
stability deserved to vote. Dau
propertied, though enlarged so t
... all degrees of fortune would
Daunou's commitment to economic liberalism endorsed even more
strongly than Tracy "necessary, inevitable, and desirable" economic
equality due to the division of labor. Daunou's sober work ethic,
pecting excessive idleness on numerous church holidays, echo
Roederer's sentiments of 1793.68 Daunou's notions of economic enterpr
resembled Benjamin Constant's parallel account of "modern liberty
a commercial society as contrasted to ancient Greek or Roman libe
requiring ceaseless public vigilance and intervention.69 For Daunou, me
dlesome public inspectors should not encroach on the liberty of t
industrial entrepreneur. Private industry rather than public bureaucra
promoted prosperity. He therefore favored small government budg
mostly to eliminate extravagant expenditure on Royal pensions and cou
tiers, rather than to reduce the almost non-existent government regulat
of industry. 70
Daunou's individual guarantees, like Tracy's fundamental princip
of government, enshrined individual civil rights, while they rejected so
contract theory or natural rights, which could be attacked as a histori
fiction. Most basic freedoms were not relativized by a shifting stan

64 Giranties, 5, 10-32, esp. 27-29.

65 Ibid., 33-47.
66 Ibid., 94-99, 115, 123; on religion, see also Cours d'tudes, II, 74, 132.
67 Garanties, 104, 189, 200.
68Ibid, 58-59, 211.
69 Stephen Holmes, Benjamin Constant and the Making of Modern Liberalism
Haven, 1984), 31.
70 Garanties, 41, 45, 48-65.

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 POLITICAL SCIENCE IN THE FRENCH INSTITUTE 427

of the common good. The single exception was paternal pow

the utilitarian good of the child preceded the rights either of t
the father. The social good of the wide distribution of pro
preceded the individual right to endow a favored son. Even this
conformed with the broader social ideals of individual mobil
work ethic.71 Both Tracy and Daunou advocated civil rights
as safeguards against tyranny and more serious threats to pr
misguided egalitarians.
From 1789 to the Restoration political sovereignty was a m
tional concept, diluted either by indirect elections or a prop
fication. As a recent interpreter of Benjamin Constant has ar
liberalism was not merely an economic defense against inter
the marketplace but also a political shield against arbitrary
Active vigilance had to maintain individual guarantees.
The Institute moderates thus combined the language of
rights with the language of utility. From the outset they often
rights from human attributes to make them nearly synonymou
utilitarian pursuit of happiness. Rights language did not ha
way entirely to utility since it still functioned to preclude p
mocracy. Only civil rights would be universal, and these did
social or economic equality. Thus, the moderates could try t
the Revolution.

If individual rights could be rational presuppositions of a political

science, the Institute moderates remained committed to formulating a
science to help defuse conflicts. For Roederer, the taming of dangerous
passions, with the assistance of the work ethic and artifices promoting
patriotism, was a necessary practical application of a political science.
Almost all Institute authors saw the essence of political science in
Montesquieu's description of suitable institutions for each form of gov-
ernment. Sieyes had been so confident in institutional schemas in 1789
that he wrote, "Politics is a science I believe I have completed. "73 Fram-
ing a republican constitution in 1795 and 1799 provided the most notable
challenge to devising institutional checks and balances. The Institute
moderates rejected the descriptive mode of Montesquieu and argued that
natural law required consent of the governed and separation of powers.
Civil liberty and some form of political participation were assumptions
shaping the mechanisms. But political liberty in representative govern-
ment remained more utilitarian than civil liberty. Writers like Baudin

71 On paternal power, see Martin S. Staum, "Images of Paternal Power: Intellectuals

and Social Change in the French National Institute," Canadian Journal of History, 17
(1982), 425-45.
72 Holmes, 72-78.
73 Letter to Etienne Dumont, 1789, cited in Bastid, 386.

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 428 MARTIN STAUM

denied the legitimacy of extra-

tions" as contrary to the theory o
There remained the dilemma b
political science justifying contro
and the Physiocrats had convin
Tracy that a social science was p
and early Consulate, they reache
and greatest support for control.
of Roederer, while the non-Ide
among his most prized legal exp
Ideologues themselves were in d
thus found liberal guarantees a n
unfriendly governments.

VI. The Question of Bour

Historians have long debated w

came to maturity during the Rev
ideology" reflecting the demise
mercial and industrial capitalism
complicated since the traditiona
the Revolution has foundered o
between the terms "bourgeois"
the movement of 1789 sponsor
bourgeoisie sharing non-capitalist
riers with nobles, and have found
even capitalist nobles participating
gap between interpretation and
For Sieyes, there was unquestionab
and unprivileged members of t
capitalism has proven an inadequ
non-entrepreneurial society of t
tables who dominated France from 1799 to 1830.

Yet we have shown how deeply imbued was the discourse of moderat
revolutionaries with principles of economic liberalism. They were largel
opposed both to privilege and to popular democracy. Equally striking
their celebration of the virtues of a vaguely defined "middle class." Bria
Head has suggested that Tracy's praise of the middle class might ev
have been an Aristotelian convention, going back to the image in t

74 For the revised image of the nobility, see Guy Chaussinand-Nogaret, The Fren
Nobility in the Eighteenth Century (Cambridge, 1985).

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 POLITICAL SCIENCE IN THE FRENCH INSTITUTE 429

Politics of "the most stable of all polities ... based on the

classes. "75
There are, though, a surprising number of Institute mem
echoed these sentiments. The school principal J.-F. Champagn
this excerpt in his translation of Aristotle.76 Grouvelle in 1789
"classe mitoyenne ... created by commerce and industry" the
"sacred morals, public reason, love of the laws."77 Roederer
spoke of the "fount of desirable virtues in the middle rank
velliere-Lepeaux in the 1795 constitutional debates insisted t
with mediocre fortune have virtue united to enlightenment."
in 1799 heralded the "triumph of enlightenment and property,
buted more justly by commerce and industry," which created th
of the middle class where alone one finds the greatest talen
most solid virtues."79 In his critique of Montesquieu, Destut
found the middle class "naturally imbued with the spirit of ord
justice, and reason, since by its position and direct interest i
distant from all excesses." Yet Tracy's attack on "idlers" incl
anciers and speculators, though it was largely intended for
landowners. 80
The ill-defined nature of this middle class hardly sustains its
to bourgeois capitalists. Nevertheless, we have seen evident
socioeconomic principles in the political thought of Institute
There was no doubt that they vigorously defended property, be
a hierarchical society albeit with individual mobility, and her
mercial and industrial entrepreneurship. Though there were
concern for a public good, it would not seem erroneous to use la
pro-capitalist (though not always laissez-faire) for these princip
over if the social historians are correct in their image of the do
by landed notables until at least 1830, this set of ideas, rat
reflecting social change in France (as contrasted to Britain),
it. The Institute moderates retained those elements of physiocra
stressing productive entrepreneurial activity and endorsed th
litical economy of Adam Smith.81
There was undoubtedly a symbiotic relationship between t

75 Head, 184; The Politics of Aristotle, ed. Ernest Barker (Oxford, 19

IV, ch. XI).
76 For Champagne's "republican" translation of Aristotle, which may
him election to the Institute, see Robert R. Palmer, The School of the Frenc
(Princeton, 1975), 172-75.
77 Grouvelle, 83.
78 Roederer, "Cours," VIII, 48; Moniteur, 25, 308.
79 Cabanis, Oeuvres, II, 481.
80 Commentaire, 44-45, cited in Head, 181.
81 See my forthcoming article, "The Institute Economists; From Physioc
trepreneurial Capitalism," History of Political Economy, 19 (1987).

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 430 MARTIN STAUM

a political science and liberalis

dilemma, the image of social scie
organic society as envisaged b
portraits of the future, there
disagreement with the expert ad
therapy rather than debate. The
not call forth the nightmarish i
a self-appointed elite monopolizi
Certainly, the Ideologues and m
belief that the ordinary people
never understand without guidan
But at the same time the stren
debacle in individual rights, espe
a shield, if not against econom
monopolists of knowledge and

The University of Calgary.

82 The most dramatic interpretatio

Foucault, as, for example, Discipline
The author wishes to acknowledge a
and Humanities Research Council of Canada.

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