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 When a reviewer wishes to give special recognition to a book, he predicts that it will still
be read "a hundred years from now." The Law, first published as a pamphlet in June, 1850, is already more than a hundred years old. And because its truths are eternal, it will
still be read when another century has passed. Frederic Bastiat (1801-1850) was a French economist, statesman, and author. He did most of his writing during the years just
before--and immediately following--the Revolution of February 1848. This was the period when France was rapidly turning to complete socialism. As a Deputy to the Legislative
Assembly, Mr. Bastiat was studying and explaining each socialist fallacy as it appeared. And he explained how socialism must inevitably degenerate into communism. But most of
his countrymen chose to ignore his logic.
The Law is here presented again because the same situation exists in America today as in the France of 1848. The same socialist-communist ideas and plans that were then
adopted in France are now sweeping America. The explanations and arguments then advanced against socialism by Mr. Bastiat are--word for word--equally valid today. His ideas deserve a serious hearing.
The law perverted! And the police powers of the state perverted along with it! The law, I say, not only turned from its
proper purpose but made to follow an entirely contrary purpose! The law become the weapon of every kind of greed! Instead of checking crime, the law itself guilty of the evils it is supposed to punish!
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The Law by Frederic Bastiat
