§ 1. Aristotle and others sometimes call “Πολιτείαν” (polity) “δημοκρατίαν” (democracy). But because we are now distinguishing the parts, each must be treated properly and precisely. Thus Aristotle too, in book 3, chapter 7 of the Politics:
“ὅταν δὲ τὸ πλῆθος πρὸς τὸ κοινὸν πολιτεύηται συμφέρον, καλεῖται κοινὸν ὄνομα πασῶν πολιτειῶν, πολιτεία. But when the multitude administers the city for the public good, that form of commonwealth is called by the name common to all constitutions, polity.” Polity must therefore be defined as “ἀρχὴ τοῦ πλήθους πρὸς τὸ κοινὸν συμφέρον,” government by the multitude which regards the common utility.
§ 2. The foundation and aim of this administration are liberty, and then equality. The people readily obtains liberty, but equality with the greatest difficulty. For although they are equal in this, that all command and obey in turn, nevertheless turns of commanding come to very few. Liberty, however, consists not in living according to one’s own judgment and being altogether under one’s own power, but in living according to the laws, subject to one’s own magistrate, and under this condition: that the power of commanding should also belong to oneself. For thus the right and honor of the city is equal for all.
§ 3. There are various degrees and forms of polity. That one is most perfect when, without distinction of birth or wealth, all dignities and magistracies can be entrusted to everyone. This, I say, is most perfect within its own kind, evidently the most exact preserver of liberty and equality. It is nevertheless weak, tumultuous, and a promoter of the most foul human beings.
§ 4. Other forms are more tempered. For since there are various kinds of human beings within a commonwealth—craftsmen of necessary and useful things; craftsmen of things serving pleasure and display; farmers; herdsmen; merchants; soldiers; rich men and nobles living from their revenues; learned men; priests—and since there is also great diversity among magistracies and civil functions—for some magistracies are primary, others secondary; certain functions honored but expensive, others difficult but profitable—from this arises a great variety in constituting polities.
For they do not entrust all functions to everyone, but different functions to different persons with discrimination: honored and expensive functions to nobles and the wealthy; laborious functions to the industrious; judicial functions to equitable, experienced, and prudent men. From this distribution arise great varieties of government, for nothing prevents magistracies from being in the hands of one group and judgments in those of a different group. For certain peoples it is sufficient to possess the power of choosing magistrates from the best men; some are content if an account of the honors administered is rendered to them.
§ 5. In preserving the popular form, very great labor is expended lest one man institute a tyranny or a few men an oligarchy. Consequently, the administration is generally accustomed to fall back into the vice called democracy.
The first measure is that men generally of the middle condition should be brought to the helm of the commonwealth. For they do not possess such power that one man can seize tyranny, and they are too numerous for the establishment of an oligarchy; nor are they turbulent because of poverty and domestic difficulties. Aristotle warned of this in book 4 of the Politics, chapter 12: “Moreover, the lawgiver must always assume the middle classes in the administration of the commonwealth. For whether he establishes laws suitable for oligarchy, he ought to direct the laws toward the middle classes, or whether laws agreeable to democracy, these men must be joined to the laws. But wherever the multitude of those in the middle exceeds either both extremes or only one of them, there it can happen that the form of administering the commonwealth is firm and stable. For it is not to be feared that the rich and poor will ever agree and conspire against these men, since neither will ever wish to serve the other.”
For that moderation of the middle classes possesses something good, and those who are in the middle are judged good citizens. Therefore Phocylides too, in the Philosopher’s judgment, spoke wisely:
Πολλὰ μέσοισιν ἄριστα, μέσος θέλω ἐν πόλει εἶναι. Many things are best for those in the middle; I wish to live as one in the middle within the city.
§ 6. The second measure is that within the polity and power of the people itself it should be arranged that a ready road to honors not lie open to every worst and most audacious man, but that great account should be taken of the best part among the people. For just as in an aristocracy the form of government is changed within a short time unless every best man obtains a magistracy, so also the best and most upright part must be sought from the people. “Βέλτιστος δὲ ὁ δῆμος, ὁ γεωργικὸς ἐστι. The best people,” says the Philosopher, “is that which practices agriculture.”
No one doubts that the matter formerly stood thus. Hence the rural tribes were honored in the city, while the urban tribes were not free from contempt and stigma; for the dregs of the people and those who lingered beneath the rostra were cast into those tribes. Aristotle supplies the reason why the urban common people were more corrupt: because, accustomed to leisure and assemblies, they become cunning, fraudulent, desirous of revolutions, and ambitious; but the rural people, occupied by agriculture or pasturing livestock, rarely attend assemblies and rarely approach seditious gatherings.
There was formerly also another cause: the idle little common people, accustomed to assemblies, theaters, and spectacles and conquered by pleasures, scarcely raised their thoughts to the consideration of what is honorable and equitable. But now in well-ordered cities the reasoning is different. For citizens are less infected by tribunician assemblies, detestable spectacles, and public corruptions of morals; next, in schools and churches they are instructed toward virtue and piety. The rural common people are less cultivated and frequently less religious. Accordingly, with the times changed, the urban common people must be regarded as better.
The most flourishing cities of Europe teach that I judge thus. In their tribes, which consist of merchants and craftsmen, the greatest account is taken of justice, public honor, and piety. From these men, especially in free cities, serious, prudent, and moderate men are annually chosen to govern the commonwealth, for they are far removed from the causes of ancient corruptions. For how many thousands are there among them who, instructed from childhood by sacred sermons, pious readings, and the institutions of the Christian faith, have not even once drunk in through their eyes or ears the foulness of the theater, the cruelty of the arena, or turbulent declamations? Indeed, they do not admit criminals and infamous persons; they expel those who have been admitted.
Therefore the warning which the Philosopher gives in book 6, chapter 3—that the urban multitude should never be summoned without the rural—has no place here. I shall concede it concerning those ancient buffoons who regarded nothing except bread and circuses, who judged that money from the treasury by which the fleet should have been supported ought to be expended upon payments for the theater, who deprived poets of payment because they had abstained from obscene words, and who crowded around every wicked and seditious man. The urban common people admit such men to no share in public affairs; they do not even possess a place in the tribes.
§ 7. The third measure is that the election of magistrates should not occur in an assembly of everyone according to the Roman custom. For crowds, fights, ambitions, and corruptions cannot be avoided there. Rather, let the ancient arrangement of the Mantineans be approved. Among them certain persons—“αἱρετοὶ κατὰ μέρος”—chosen according to a division of the people entrusted the magistracies.
I saw in Münster of Westphalia, a distinguished and cultivated city, certain persons first chosen by the whole people who would designate others, by whom the senate is chosen annually.
That arrangement is thoroughly popular, for those electors are established by the consent and vote of everyone. The election is then conducted with such care that no one can know who the final selectors are. They are enclosed after the manner of cardinals, decide concerning the whole senate, and elect it before night. There can be no corruption by gifts here, no solicitation for honor. Those electors judge it to pertain to their own reputation that they should mingle no man with their city’s council unless he possesses proven virtue and prudence. But if favor or kinship should induce one or another to nominate someone, the others would nevertheless resist and would not wish to bargain away their own reputation for another man’s honor. This arrangement certainly surpasses the Roman assemblies in many respects.
§ 8. The fourth measure is that they should establish, with no less care than the magistrates themselves, many serious men who demand from the magistrates an account of their administration of the commonwealth and present it to the tribes. “Τὸ γὰρ ἀπ᾽ ἄλλων κρέμασθαι, καὶ μὴ πᾶν ἐξεῖναι ποιεῖν, ὅπερ ἂν δόξῃ, συμφέρον ἐστίν. For to depend upon another’s judgment, and not to be permitted to do everything one pleases, is useful.” Indeed, there is no greater enticement to sin than impunity for sin.
This matter possesses such great importance that I judge the safety of the Republic of Venice to depend upon it for the greatest part. For the prefects of all the cities so conduct their government that they know certainly that an account must be rendered by them. Inquiry is made into their private life, their public acts, and their judgments.
This is easier and more effective in a polity than in the aristocracy of the Venetians. For in a popular form those who transgress in a magistracy can readily be punished because they are men of middle condition, not eminent in resources, clients, or power, so that they might evade or break the laws. In an aristocracy something is conceded to nobility, affinity, ancestors, and the hope of equal impunity.
§ 9. The fifth measure is that they should not offend or irritate the best men and the nobility, but should hold them in honor and esteem and revere them. They should entrust very many and the most honored magistracies to them; and when they have given commoners as colleagues to them, they should nevertheless grant the first place to the patricians. For thus the patricians will be most favorably disposed toward the common people and will strive to approve themselves to them.
Nor do I judge that any polity has thus far perished unless, first changed into a democracy, it vexed the best men and the rich with injuries and outrages. For from this certain men of the nobility have received an occasion to vindicate themselves. Men of great spirit and impatient of outrages, when they have despaired concerning their own affairs, readily overthrow the whole commonwealth. And just as, when kings degenerate into tyrants, there are many who seek the praise of a slain tyrant even at the danger of their life and are not deterred by the punishments of others, so, when a polity departs from law and seeks not the common utility but that of men of small means, and begins to oppress and despoil the nobles and best men through servitude, many avengers arise. For that commonwealth is a tyranny with many heads; just as it cannot be dispatched by a single blow, so it can be torn into parts and divided.
Read the Greek and Latin histories and, after the Empire ceased or declined, the Italian histories. You will find that the greatest calamities were introduced by exiles. Exiles, however, arose from the conflicts of citizens raging mutually against one another, and the struggles arose from the corrupt administration of the commonwealth.
To embrace the matter in one statement: the best form of popular commonwealth is that in which the supreme power is in the hands of the people, the highest honor in the hands of the best men, and those of small means are assisted with the greatest care; in which the dignity of the best men depends upon the votes of the people; and in which honor is conferred upon the best men by the willing people. For where that moderation is employed, no part of the city will wish the form of the commonwealth to be changed, and therefore they will defend the present condition by consent.