Inspired by the declaration of American independence in 1776 and the spirit of the Enlightenment, the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen of 1789 marked the beginning of a new political era. It has since ceased to be a reference. The Fifth Republic made its attachment to it explicit by citing it in the preamble to its constitution, and the Constitutional Council recognized its constitutional value in 1971.
The story
The Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen was born in the summer of 1789, from the project of the Constituent Assembly, formed by the meeting of the States General, to draft a new Constitution, and to precede it with a declaration of principles.
Proposals are pouring in. The Constituent Assembly charged five deputies, Démeunier, La Luzerne, Tronchet, Mirabeau and Redon, with examining the various draft declarations, merging them into one and presenting it to the Assembly. Article by article, the French declaration was voted on from August 20 to 26, 1789.
Through its preamble and its seventeen articles, it defines “natural and imprescriptible” rights which are freedom, property, security, resistance to oppression, it recognizes equality before the law and justice, and it affirms the principle of the separation of powers.
Ratified only on October 5 by Louis XVI under the pressure of the Assembly and the people who rushed to Versailles, it served as a preamble to the first Constitution of the French Revolution of 1791. Although the text was subsequently flouted by a number of revolutionaries, and that two other declarations of the rights of man were followed in 1793 and 1795, it is the text of August 26, 1789 which imposed itself on posterity, it is it which inspired texts similar in many European and Latin American countries throughout the 19th century, and it is on it that the French constitutions of 1852, 1946 and 1958 are based.
The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, signed in Paris on December 10, 1948, just like the European Convention on Human Rights, born in Rome on November 4, 1950, claim the same heritage.
The text
The representatives of the French people, constituted in the National Assembly, considering that ignorance, forgetfulness or contempt for the rights of man are the only causes of public misfortunes and the corruption of governments, have resolved to expose, in a solemn declaration, the natural, inalienable and sacred rights of man, so that this declaration, constantly present to all the members of the social body, constantly reminds them of their rights and their duties; so that the acts of the legislative power and those of the executive power, which can at any time be compared with the aim of any political institution, may be more respected; so that the complaints of the citizens, henceforth founded on simple and indisputable principles, always turn to the maintenance of the Constitution and to the happiness of all.
Consequently, the National Assembly recognizes and declares, in the presence and under the auspices of the Supreme Being, the following rights of man and of the citizen.
First article
– Men are born and remain free and equal in rights. Social distinctions can only be based on common utility.
Section 2.
– The goal of any political association is the conservation of the natural and imprescriptible rights of man. These rights are liberty, property, security and resistance to oppression.
Section 3.
– The principle of all sovereignty resides essentially in the Nation. No body, no individual can exercise authority which does not emanate expressly from it.
Section 4.
– Freedom consists in being able to do anything that does not harm others: thus, the exercise of the natural rights of each man has no limits other than those that ensure the other members of society the enjoyment of these same rights. These limits can only be determined by law.
Section 5.
The law has the right to defend only actions harmful to society. Anything that is not forbidden by law cannot be prevented, and no one can be compelled to do what it does not order.
Section 6.
– The law is the expression of the general will. All citizens have the right to contribute personally or through their representatives to its formation. It must be the same for all, whether it protects or punishes. All citizens, being equal in his eyes, are equally admissible to all dignities, places and public employments, according to their capacity and without any other distinction than that of their virtues and their talents.
Section 7.
– No man can be accused, arrested or detained except in the cases determined by the law and according to the forms it has prescribed. Those who solicit, expedite, execute or cause to be executed arbitrary orders must be punished; but every citizen summoned or seized by virtue of the law must obey immediately; he makes himself guilty by resistance.
Section 8.
– The law should establish only strictly and obviously necessary penalties, and no one can be punished except by virtue of a law established and promulgated prior to the offense, and legally applied.
Section 9.
Every man being presumed innocent until he has been declared guilty, if it is deemed essential to arrest him, any rigor which would not be necessary to ascertain his person must be severely punished by law.
Section 10.
– No one should be disturbed for his opinions, even religious ones, provided that their manifestation does not disturb the public order established by law.
Section 11.
– The free communication of thoughts and opinions is one of the most precious human rights; any citizen can thus speak, write, print freely, except to answer for the abuse of this freedom in the cases determined by the law.
Section 12.
– The guarantee of the rights of man and of the citizen requires a public force; this force is therefore instituted for the benefit of all, and not for the particular utility of those to whom it is entrusted.
Section 13.
– For the maintenance of the public force, and for the expenses of administration, a common contribution is essential; it must be equally distributed among the citizens, by reason of their faculties.
Section 14.
– Citizens have the right to ascertain, by themselves or through their representatives, the need for the public contribution, to consent to it freely, to monitor its use, and to determine the quota, the base, recovery and duration.
Section 15.
– The company has the right to ask any public official to account for its administration.
Section 16.
– Any society in which the guarantee of rights is not assured nor the separation of powers determined, has no Constitution.
Section 17.
– Property being an inviolable and sacred right, no one can be deprived of it, except when public necessity, legally established, obviously requires it, and under the condition of a fair and prior indemnity.
