Johannes Althusius: Politica - Hubertlerch.com - HubertLerch.com

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[§ 47] Concord is fostered and protected by fairness ( aequabilitas) when right, liberty, and honor are extended to each citizen
according to the order and distinction of his worth and status. For it behooves the citizen to live by fair and suitable right with his
neighbor, displaying neither arrogance nor servility, and thus to will whatever is tranquil and honest in the city. Contrary to this
fairness is equality ( aequalitas), by which individual citizens are levelled among themselves in all those things I have discussed.
From this arises the most certain disorder and disturbance of matters.
[§ 48] THE ADMINISTRATION AND DIRECTION of the communication of these rights in the community is entrusted, with the consent
of the citizens, to the senatorial collegium. In the municipal cities the head or superior of the province, or his substitute serving
in his name, presides over the senatorial collegium. … [§ 49] In free cities, however, the leader of the senate or the consul,
who has royal privileges in connection with the territory, presides.
[§ 50 ] Things done by the senatorial collegium are considered done by the whole community that the collegium represents. [§
51] Under the control of this senatorial collegium is, therefore, the power of managing and executing the business of the
community and so of knowing and judging all that pertains to the community. This includes the right of holding investigations,
the administration of public matters both civil and ecclesiastical, the responsibility for and assignment of public duties and
offices, the planning, collection, care, and expenditure of public revenues, the right of publishing laws pertaining to good order
and self-sufficiency, the care of public properties, the punishment of law breakers, the censorship of customs, the management
of the urban community, and other such things.
[§ 52] Therefore, what the count is in the province, the prince or duke in the duchy, or the king in the kingdom, so this
senatorial collegium is, for the most part, in the city. …
Endnotes
[1]
[an association embracing all other associations within a given geographical area; a public as distinguished from a private
association. It is here used as a generic name inclusive of commonwealth, province, and city. This is an occasional use for
Althusius. Its more customary use is described in footnote 2 below.]
[2]
[a local community embracing all private associations within a municipal area; a city in its fullest associated expression, as
distinguished from a province (the other kind of particular public association) and a commonwealth (the universal public
association).]
[3] De jure universitatum, I, 1,2. [It is noteworthy that this book by Losaeus, which was published in 1601 at Turin, was not
mentioned by Althusius in the first edition (1603) of the Politica, but is referred to in the third edition (1614) sixty-two times in
the chapters on the collegium and the city alone, and occasionally thereafter throughout the reminder of the work.]
[4] [ persona repraesentata: literally, a person having come to represent.]
[5]
[6]
Digest, XLVI, 1, 22.
[Here follows an extended discussion of types of full and limited citizenship.]
[7] Baldus de Ubaldis, Commentarii (Digest III, 4, 7, 2); Paul Castro, Commentaria (Digest III, 4,7, 2).
[8] Bartolus, Commentarii (Digest XLVI, 1, 22); Andreas Gail, De pace publica, 1, 5; Nicolaus Losaeus, De jure universitatum,
I, 1, 41 and 42; Code, II, 58, 2, 5.
[9] De jure universitatum, 1, 2, 45.
[10]
[Suburbs beyond the wall, as well as open fields for cultivation within the wall, are considered by Althusius to be a part of
an urban community. Thus Althusius seems to have in mind a city that includes all the inhabitants of the surrounding district
under its jurisdiction and protection.]
[11]
[12]
[structure and power of rule.]
[do not exercise the rights and responsibilities of citizens.]
[13] See the Digest I, 2, 2, 9, which says that because the people was able to convene in so great a crowd of men only with
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