Abstract
Scholars generally do not invite students and readers to look at the second half of book 20 closely. The neglect of this section of Book 20 leaves the political dimension of Montesquieu’s argument for free trade in modern monarchy not only incomplete; it has also tended to add to the confusion surrounding Montesquieu’s larger political goal in The Spirit of the Laws. In the second half of book 20, Montesquieu mounts an important challenge to the tradition of honor, while preparing for a much longer discussion, in book 21, of the ways in which commerce as a profession can be made honorable.
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Notes
Groenewegen has made a compelling argument that his theory of trade was essentially made obsolete by the explosion of political economy shortly after his major publication. He concludes that the major reason why Montesquieu’s economic writings are neglected today is because many of his arguments in book 20 simply faded away. Many of the issues that he raised here were solved — or deemed not to be puzzles— by around 1760, with the proliferation of scientific, systematic economic theory. In Groenewegen’s words: “Many of the trade problems of the pre-1750 literature faded away. Notable examples are concern over the adequacy of the money supply and the balance of trade. Both were shown to be non-problems (at least in the long run).” See Peter Groenewegen. 2002. Eighteenth Century Economics, New York: Routledge, 63.
Henry C. Clark. 2006. Compass of Society: Commerce and Absolutism in Old-Regime France. Lanham: Lexington, 114.
For one reading of Montesquieu’s role in the debate over the nobility’s relationship to commerce, see Annelien de Dijn. 2008. French Political Thought from Montesquieu to Tocqueville: Liberty in a Levelled Society? Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. De Dijn rightly observes the political significance of Montesquieu’s economic writings, but errs too far in the direction of Althusser’s Marxist critique of Montesquieu in his Politics and History: specifically, that Montesquieu’s aim was simply to “uphold the status quo” and “defend the monarchy from republican attacks.”
Paul Rahe. 2009. Montesquieu and the Logic of Liberty. New Haven: Yale University Press, esp. 288–311.
For a more complex analysis of Montesquieu’s position, see Hont, Istvan. 2005. Jealousy of Trade: International Competition and the Nation State in Historical Perspective. Cambridge: Belknap Press.
See Henry C. Clark. 2003. Commerce, Culture, and Liberty: Readings on Capitalism before Adam Smith. Indianapolis: Liberty Fund. Barbon, in Clark says this is a “common objection” that a public bank cannot be safe in a monarchy.
Samuel Bernard, quoted in Colin Jones. 2002. The Great Nation: France from Louis XV to Napoleon 1715–99. New York: Columbia University Press, 85.
See John Shovlin. 2000. “Toward a Reinterpretation of Revolutionary Antinobilism: The Political Economy of Honor in the Old Regime.” The Journal of Modern History 72 (1): 35–66.
Larrère, Shovlin, and de Dijn adopt similar positions on this. For an excellent summary of the debate engendered by La noblesse commerçante, see J. Q. C. Mackrell. 1973. The Attack on “Feudalism” in Eighteenth-Century France. London: Routledge, 77–103.
There is some question as to whether this was falsely attributed to Helvetius. For some, it is an impossible project to try and reconcile the liberal commercial humanist with the reactionary aristocrat. A middle ground is staked out in Cheney, who believes that Montesquieu sought a “fusion” in trying to accommodate new forms of class and wealth. Paul Cheney. 2010. Revolutionary Commerce: Globalization and the French Monarchy. CambridgeMA: Harvard University Press, 64.
Mathiez was one of the first to attempt to reinterpret Montesquieu along these lines—that is, as a reactionary landowning magistrate. Ford calls him a “rationalizer of reaction.” See Franklin L. Ford. 1953. Robe and Sword; the Regrouping of the French Aristocracy after Louis XIV. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 243;
Mathiez, Albert. 1930. “La place de Montesquieu dans l’histoire des doctrines politiques du XVIIIe siècle.” Annales historiques de la Révolution française 7: 97–112.
Louis Althusser. 2007. Politics and History. London: Verso, 106. Annelien de Dijn has an informative discussion in French Political Thought, 24–25, although the argument assumes his “aristocratic liberalism” from the start. De Dijn also underestimates Montesquieu’s appreciation for the English constitution, and does not consider the possibility of a new constitutional form (i.e., a “republic hidden under the form of a monarchy”).
Melzer has argued that Rousseau thought the ancient régime was “irreversibly corrupt” by his own day. This argument above is being made in a similar vein, although I don’t cite this as evidence that Montesquieu had exactly the same purposes as Rousseau. Arthur M. Melzer. 1983. “Rousseau’s ‘Mission’ and the Intention of His Writings.” American Journal of Political Science 27 (2): 294–320. Tocqueville notes, similar, that “The French nobility had not had contact with public administration for a long time except for one aspect … the political aspect had vanished; the monetary portion alone had remained and sometimes had considerably increased.”
A notable exception is Michael Sonenscher. 2007. Before the Deluge: Public Debt, Inequality, and the Intellectual Origins of the French Revolution. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
Felix “The Economy.” See also William Doyle. 1984. “The Price of Offices in Pre-Revolutionary France.” The Historical Journal 27 (4): 831–860.
Ibid. Also William Doyle. 1996. Venality: The Sale of Offices in Eighteenth-Century France. Oxford: Clarendon Press. They both agree it was “unusual.” For Doyle, venality in the ancient regime had evolved from being a mild vice (a means to raise extra revenue by the sale of posts of public responsibility) to a principal cause of unrest, as evidenced by the fact that it was one of the first aspects of the old regime to be eliminated in the French Revolution.
Franklin L. Ford. 1953. Robe and Sword; the Regrouping of the French Aristocracy after Louis XIV. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 107.
It was also an insult to noble pride. As Hulliung explains: “the rapid proliferation of the number of persons claiming nobility cheapened the meaning of nobility and insulted the old aristocracies of the Sword and Race by inviting wealthy parvenus to assume aristocratic pretension.” Mark Hulliung. 1976. Montesquieu and the Old Regime. Berkeley: University of California Press.
Ehrard, Jean. 2009. “Montesquieu and Us.” In Montesquieu and His Legacy, ed. Rebecca Kingston. Albany: SUNY Press.
This is noted by Gail Bossenga. 2001. “Society.” In Doyle, Old Regime France. and Sonenscher, Before the Deluge.
Cited in John Lough. 1970. The “Encyclopedie” in Eighteenth-Century England and Other Studies. New Castle: Oriel Press, 357.
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Bibby, A.S. (2016). Commerce, Honor, and Monarchy. In: Montesquieu’s Political Economy. Recovering Political Philosophy. Palgrave Macmillan, New York. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137477224_4
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