Note 202-3 — Chapter VI
John J. (John Joseph) Lalor translation
Hence it is, that in so many constitutions, charters of cities, etc., the exercise of the higher rights of citizenship is conditioned by the possession of a certain quantity of land, and that landownership is considered as a species of public function.
I read, a short time ago, the life of a North-German noblemen who, in 1813, had fought bravely against the French, "although he was a man of large estates, and the enemy might therefore very easily have laid hands on them." If this "although" of his eulogist expressed the actual feeling of large landed proprietors, a great many old political institutions would have lost all foundation.
Ad. Müller was of opinion that the rights of primogeniture, etc., might be an obstacle in the way of the development of the net income of a nation's economy; but that they gave to the state and to the national life the warlike tone so necessary to them, etc. (Elemente, II, 90.)