Every transgression of a law only can and must be explained as arising from a maxim of the transgressor making such wrong-doing his rule of action; for were it not committed by him as a free being, it could not be imputed to him.But it is absolutely impossible to explain how any rational individual forms such a maxim against the clear prohibition of the law-giving reason; for it is only events which happen according to the mechanical laws of nature that are capable of explanation.Now a transgressor or criminal may commit his wrong-doing either according to the maxim of a rule supposed to be valid objectively and universally, or only as an exception from the rule by dispensing with its obligation for the occasion.In the latter case, he only diverges from the law, although intentionally.He may, at the same time, abhor his own transgression, and without formally renouncing his obedience to the law only wish to avoid it.In the former case, however, he rejects the authority of the law itself, the validity of which, however, he cannot repudiate before his own reason, even while he makes it his rule to act against it.His maxim is, therefore, not merely defective as being negatively contrary to the law, but it is even positively illegal, as being diametrically contrary and in hostile opposition to it.So far as we can see into and understand the relation, it would appear as if it were impossible for men to commit wrongs and crimes of a wholly useless form of wickedness, and yet the idea of such extreme perversity cannot be overlooked in a system of moral philosophy.
There is thus a feeling of horror at the thought of the formal execution of a monarch by his people.And the reason it is that, whereas an act of assassination must be considered as only an exception from the rule which has been constituted a maxim, such an execution must be regarded as a complete perversion of the principles that should regulate the relation between a sovereign and his people.For it makes the people, who owe their constitutional existence to the legislation that issued from the sovereign, to be the ruler over him.Hence mere violence is thus elevated with bold brow, and as it were by principle, above the holiest right; and, appearing like an abyss to swallow up everything without recall, it seems like suicide committed by the state upon itself and a crime that is capable of no atonement.There is therefore reason to assume that the consent that is accorded to such executions is not really based upon a supposed principle of right, but only springs from fear of the vengeance that would be taken upon the people were the same power to revive again in the state.And hence it may be held that the formalities accompanying them have only been put forward in order to give these deeds a look of punishment from the accompaniment of a judicial process, such as could not go along with a mere murder or assassination.But such a cloaking of the deed entirely fails of its purpose, because this pretension on the part of the people is even worse than murder itself, as it implies a principle which would necessarily make the restoration of a state, when once overthrown, an impossibility.
An alteration of the still defective constitution of the state may sometimes be quite necessary.But all such changes ought only to proceed from the sovereign power in the way of reform, and are not to be brought about by the people in the way of revolution; and when they take place, they should only effect the executive, and not the legislative, power.A political constitution which is so modified that the people by their representatives in parliament can legally resist the executive power, and its representative minister, is called a limited constitution.Yet even under such a constitution there is no right of active resistance, as by an arbitrary combination of the people to coerce the government into a certain active procedure; for this would be to assume to perform an act of the executive itself.All that can rightly be allowed, is only a negative resistance, amounting to an act of refusal on the part of the people to concede all the demands which the executive may deem it necessary to make in behoof of the political administration.And if this right were never exercised, it would be a sure sign that the people were corrupted, their representatives venal, the supreme head of the government despotic, and his ministers practically betrayers of the people.
Further, when on the success of a revolution a new constitution has been founded, the unlawfulness of its beginning and of its institution cannot release the subjects from the obligation of adapting themselves, as good citizens, to the new order of things; and they are not entitled to refuse honourably to obey the authority that has thus attained the power in the state.A dethroned monarch, who has survived such a revolution, is not to be called to account on the ground of his former administration; and still less may he be punished for it, when with drawing into the private life of a citizen he prefers his own quiet and the peace of the state to the uncertainty of exile, with the intention of maintaining his claims for restoration at all hazards, and pushing these either by secret counter-revolution or by the assistance of other powers.However, if he prefers to follow the latter course, his rights remain, because the rebellion that drove him from his position was inherently unjust.
