The Explosion of 1789 361
remarkable parallelism between the French Declaration and the Virginia Declara-
tion of 1776. This parallelism can be readily explained by the presence of Jefferson
in Paris and the activity of his friend Lafayette in the preparation of the French
document; but this explanation is hardly necessary, since the wording of the first
three articles, the principal articles of the French Declaration, was devised not by
Lafayette but by Mounier, who, though familiar with American bills of rights, was
not in much contact with Jefferson. The content of the French declaration was in-
digenous to France, and resemblances to American declarations are evidence of
the community of ideas, and of basic problems as felt and identified on the two
sides of the Atlantic. The French declaration, in comparison to the American ones,
was more condensed, systematic, and abstract as a statement of public law. It gave
a sharper definition to the conception of citizenship, individual liberty, and rightful
public authority.
It is hard to comment on the Declaration without quoting it in extenso and ver-
batim. “Men are born and remain free and equal in rights,” according to the first
article, whose intent, of course, was to repudiate all legal and hereditary differences
of rank or order. There may be “social distinctions,” if based on “common utility.”
The natural rights, for whose preservation the state is to exist, are said to be “lib-
erty, property, security and resistance to oppression.” The liberty of each man is
bounded by the rights of others; its limits can be determined only by law. There
must be liberty to consent to laws and taxes, to communicate thought and opinion,
to have equal access to all public office according only to “virtues and talents,” to be
free from arbitrary arrest, unduly severe punishment, or molestation for religious
belief.
Half the Declaration is concerned with the nature of law and authority. “The
principle of all sovereignty rests essentially in the nation. No body, and no indi-
vidual, may exercise authority which does not emanate from the nation expressly.”
No man, or set of men, in other words, may hold public power by virtue of status,
rank, family, inheritance or group membership, or by divine right, special training,
special expertness, elite status, or other leadership principle of any kind. Royal ab-
solutism, dynastic right, parlements, seigneurial jurisdiction, church courts pos-
sessed no coercive authority of their own. Men may be compelled only by law; law
must express the general will; arbitrary use of power is a crime; but true law must
be obeyed “instantly.” The law must be the same for all. Armed forces must exist,
but they exist for the benefit of the public, not of those who command them. Pub-
lic expenditures must be publicly authorized. Public officers are accountable to the
public for their conduct in office. Public need may require the condemnation of
private property, but only by legal process, and only with fair compensation.
Zeitschrift, vol. 142 (1930), 516–45, which will lead back to the older studies by Jellinek and Marcaggi.
The textual comparison of the French and Virginia declarations, presented in Appendix IV below,
should help to clarify this ancient subject of scholarly polemics. Professor Gilbert Chinard has ana-
lyzed a French publication of 1791 giving textual comparison of the French and American declara-
tions and thus anticipating the whole historical discussion; see his “Notes on the American origins of
the Déclaration des droits de l ’ homme et du citoyen” in Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society, vol.
98, No. 6 (December 23, 1954). See also Crane Brinton in the Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences, art.,
“Declaration of the Rights of Man.”