Anatole France: Law Forbids Rich Begging
on Thursday, June 16, 2016Anatole France Money Quote saying the wealthy are forbidden from panhandling and stealing food, just as it does the poor. Anatole France said:
“The law, in its majestic equality, forbids the rich as well as the poor, to sleep under bridges, to beg in the streets and to steal bread” — Anatole France
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This quote by Anatole France is satirizing the notion of equal treatment and fairness under the law. On a surface level, it points out that laws against things like sleeping outdoors, begging, or stealing technically apply to all people regardless of wealth or social status.
However, the deeper meaning is that such laws have an unequal practical impact, as the rich are not truly prevented in the same way from meeting basic needs. A rich person would never realistically resort to sleeping under a bridge or stealing food due to easy access to alternative options using wealth and resources.
So while the law may be written in a way that is equally prohibitive on paper, it does not recognize social and economic inequalities that can effectively exempt the wealthy from its strictures in reality. The quote highlights the disconnect between legal equality and lived experience of inequality in society.
Birthday: April 16, 1844 – Death: October 12, 1924