The Idea of Justice in Political Economy [2]
that which causes pain and pleasure, measured by uniform objective standards. The specific conception of justice, the one which principally interests us here, is that of justice in distribution; it always presupposes the proportionality of two opposite quantities, one of human beings and one of goods which are to be distributed. We necessarily classify in series, according to objective characteristics, every multiplicity of persons which appears to us in some respect as a unity; and the ideal conception of what ought to be, demands the distribution of goods and evils according to this classification. By this standard our ideal always measures reality. Our moral judgment is always active in estimating the actions of men, their vices as well as their virtues and their achievements that is in comparing and classifying them. Our social instinct is ever active in fixing the relation of the individual and his doings to the whole of the community, of the State and of humanity, in measuring and locating them accordingly. With relentless necessity the conviction always governs us that this classification must determine the distribution of honors and political influence, of position, of incomes and punishments. The similar should be treated alike, the dissimilar unlike. It is a reciprocity of human actions which we demand. The maintenance of reciprocity appears just, its disregard unjust. In an unjust proportion one part obtains too much, the other too little. The unjust usurps too much of the good to be distributed, the unjustly suffering receives too little. We call an election system just which distributes political influence according to individual ability and merit in state and community. We call a penal code just which, in spite of the manifold variety of misdemeanors and crimes, in spite of the seeming incomparability of the different punishments, has found a uniformly weighing system which parallels offences and punishments in accordance with public sentiment. We speak of a just gradation of salaries, of a just promotion of officers in every stock company, in every railroad, as well as in the army, and in the hierarchy of State officials. We speak of a just distribution of taxes, of a just gradation of wages, of just profits, of a just interest on loans. And always there is the same conception in the background: men are grouped and classified according to certain characteristics, qualities, deeds and accomplishments, descent and prosperity. Burdens and advantages should correspond to these classes. The profit of an undertaking is said to be justly higher than the rate of interest, because a greater risk and an indemnity for labor are therein involved, both of which are foreign to interest. Interest on capital is just because the lender foregoes a possible profit or enjoyment, because the borrower is in a much worse position without this aid, and because for the service of the one a consideration from the other seems just. The high earnings of the well-known physician or lawyer are just, such is Adam Smith's argument, because of the large number who go to great expense in their studies; many have very small incomes; the chosen, able ones are thus in a manner compensated therefor. Every house-wife, every servant girl, daily and hourly thinks this price and that unjust, and this always on the ground of comparisons, classifications and valuations. Most important, however, is the judgment of the justice or injustice of the condition of social classes in general. Aristotle calls slavery just when master and slave are by nature as different as soul and body, as governing will and external instrument. Then, he says, it is a natural, intrinsically justified slavery; the external legal relation of society corresponds to human nature. Exactly the same can be said of all social gradations and classifications. We feel them to be just as far as we find them in accord with our observations of similar or dissimilar qualities of the classes in question. The public mind has never, apart from times of error and excitement, begrudged