the plan of the Constitution
under discussion. The first article, for instance, of the _political
state_ of citizens, (v. Title ii. of the Constitution,) says:

"Every man born and resident in France, who, being twenty-one years of
age, has inscribed his name on the Civic Register of his Canton, and who
has lived afterwards one year on the territory of the Republic, and who
pays any direct contribution whatever, real or personal, is a French
citizen." (1)

1 The article as ultimately adopted substituted "person" for
"man," and for "has inscribed his name" (a slight
educational test) inserted "whose name is inscribed."--
_Editor._

I might here ask, if those only who come under the above description are
to be considered as citizens, what designation do you mean to give the
rest of the people? I allude to that portion of the people on whom the
principal part of the labour falls, and on whom the weight of indirect
taxation will in the event chiefly press. In the structure of the social
fabric, this class of people are infinitely superior to that privileged
order whose only qualification is their wealth or territorial
possessions. For what is trade without merchants? What is land without
cultivation? And what is the produce of the land without manufactures?
But to return to the subject.

In the first place, this article is incompatible with the three first
articles of the Declaration of Rights, which precede the Constitutional
Act.

The first article of the Declaration of Rights says:

"The end of society is the public good; and the institution of
government is to secure to every individual the enjoyment of his
rights."

But the article of the Constitution to which I have just adverted
proposes as the object of society, not the public good, or in other
words, the good of _all_, but a partial good; or the good only of a
_few_; and the Constitution provides solely for the rights of this few,
to the exclusion of the many.

The second article of the Declaration of Rights says:

"The Rights of Man in society are Liberty, Equality, Security of his
person and property."

But the article alluded to in the Constitution has a direct tendency to
establish the reverse of this position, inasmuch as the persons excluded
by this _inequality_ can neither be said to possess liberty, nor
security against oppression. They are consigned totally to the caprice
and tyranny of the rest.

The third article of t