Introduction
In the 1840s, powerful lobbyists managed to get most European governments to pass legislation protecting their industries from being undercut by rivals. Frédéric Bastiat held this short-sighted indulgence up to ridicule, penning a tongue-in-cheek ‘Petition’ to the Chamber of Deputies in which French candlemakers begged them to crack down on a particularly glaring example of unfair competition.
WE are suffering from the intolerable competition of a foreign rival, placed, it would seem, in a condition so far superior to ours for the production of light, that he absolutely inundates our national market with it at a price fabulously reduced. The moment he shows himself, our trade leaves us — all consumers apply to him and a branch of native industry, having countless ramifications, is all at once rendered completely stagnant.
This rival, who is no other than the Sun, wages war to the knife against us, and we suspect that he has been raised up by Perfidious Albion (good policy as times go);* inasmuch as he displays towards that haughty island a circumspection with which he dispenses in our case.*
What we pray for is, that it may please you to pass a law ordering the shutting up of all windows, sky-lights, dormer-windows, outside and inside shutters, curtains, blinds, bull’s-eyes; in a word, of all openings, holes, chinks, clefts, and fissures, by or through which the light of the sun has been in use to enter houses, to the prejudice of the meritorious manufactures with which we flatter ourselves we have accommodated our country, — a country which, in gratitude, ought not to abandon us now to a strife so unequal.
* ‘Albion’ is England, so named from the White Cliffs of Dover; describing her as perfidious (treacherous) has a long history reaching back into the Middle Ages, but it was given a boost in France by Augustin Louis de Ximénès, who in 1793 used the phrase ‘perfidious Albion’ in his poem L’Ère des Français.
* A reference to England’s reputation as a rainy, foggy land.
Précis
In 1845, French economist Frédéric Bastiat wrote a tongue-in-cheek ‘Petition’ to his Government, in which candlemakers asked for legal protection from a business rival. The rival was the sun, which (they said) ate into their profits by providing a steady source of free daylight, and they demanded that every opening from windows to peep-holes be blocked up by law. (59 / 60 words)
In 1845, French economist Frédéric Bastiat wrote a tongue-in-cheek ‘Petition’ to his Government, in which candlemakers asked for legal protection from a business rival. The rival was the sun, which (they said) ate into their profits by providing a steady source of free daylight, and they demanded that every opening from windows to peep-holes be blocked up by law.
Variations: 1.increase the length of this precis to exactly 65 words. 2.reduce the length of this precis to exactly 55 words. 3.introduce one of the following words into the precis: because, just, not, or, otherwise, since, whereas, who.
If you like what I’m doing here on Clay Lane, from time to time you could buy me a coffee.
Buy Me a Coffee is a crowdfunding website, used by over a million people. It is designed to help content creators like me make a living from their work. ‘Buy Me a Coffee’ prides itself on its security, and there is no need to register.
