The Social Contract Quote
The right of the first occupant,’ although more real than the ‘right of the strongest,’ does not become a true right until the institution of property. Every man has a natural right to what he needs; but the positive act which makes a man the proprietor of any estate excludes him from everything else. His share having once been settled, he must confine himself to it, and he has no further right against the community. Thus we see how ‘the right of the first occupant,’ weak as it is in the state of nature, compels in political society the respect of all men. What this right makes one aware of is less what belongs to others than what does not belong to oneself.
As a general rule, to justify the right of the first occupant to any piece of land whatever, the following conditions must obtain: first, that the land shall not already be inhabited by anyone else; secondly, that the claimant occupies no more than he needs for subsistence; thirdly, that he takes possession, not by an idle ceremony, but by actually working and cultivating the soil – the only sign of ownership which need be respected by other people in the absence of a legal title.
It can, indeed, be said that tying ‘the right of the first occupant’ to need and work is stretching it as far as it will go. Can one really avoid setting limits on the right? Is it enough to put one’s feet on a piece of common land in order to claim it at once as one’s own? Is it enough to have the power to keep other men off for one moment in order to deprive them of the right ever to return? How could a man or a people seize a vast territory and keep out the rest of the human race except by a criminal usurpation – since the action would rob the rest of mankind of the shelter and the food that nature has given them all in common? When Nunez Balbao stood on the shore and took possession of the southern seas and of South America in the name of the Crown of Castille, was that enough to dispossess all the inhabitants and to exclude all the other princes of the world? If so, such idle ceremonies would have had no end; and the Catholic King might without leaving his royal chamber have taken possession of the whole universe, only excepting afterwards those parts of his empire already belonging to other princes. -The Social Contract, by Jean Jacques Rousseau
The right of the first occupant,’ although more real than the ‘right of the strongest,’ does not become a true right until the institution of property. Every man has a natural right to what he needs; but the positive act which makes a man the proprietor of any estate excludes him from everything else. His share having once been settled, he must confine himself to it, and he has no further right against the community. Thus we see how ‘the right of the first occupant,’ weak as it is in the state of nature, compels in political society the respect of all men. What this right makes one aware of is less what belongs to others than what does not belong to oneself.
As a general rule, to justify the right of the first occupant to any piece of land whatever, the following conditions must obtain: first, that the land shall not already be inhabited by anyone else; secondly, that the claimant occupies no more than he needs for subsistence; thirdly, that he takes possession, not by an idle ceremony, but by actually working and cultivating the soil – the only sign of ownership which need be respected by other people in the absence of a legal title.
It can, indeed, be said that tying ‘the right of the first occupant’ to need and work is stretching it as far as it will go. Can one really avoid setting limits on the right? Is it enough to put one’s feet on a piece of common land in order to claim it at once as one’s own? Is it enough to have the power to keep other men off for one moment in order to deprive them of the right ever to return? How could a man or a people seize a vast territory and keep out the rest of the human race except by a criminal usurpation – since the action would rob the rest of mankind of the shelter and the food that nature has given them all in common? When Nunez Balbao stood on the shore and took possession of the southern seas and of South America in the name of the Crown of Castille, was that enough to dispossess all the inhabitants and to exclude all the other princes of the world? If so, such idle ceremonies would have had no end; and the Catholic King might without leaving his royal chamber have taken possession of the whole universe, only excepting afterwards those parts of his empire already belonging to other princes. -The Social Contract, by Jean Jacques Rousseau
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