The following is an excerpt from the famous satirical "Peitition of the Candlemakers," by Frederic Bastiat, written in the middle of the 19th Century. Bastiat was an economist and a member of the French Parliament (the Chamber of Deputies).
A PETITION From the Manufacturers of Candles,... generally of Everything Connected with Lighting.
To the Honourable Members of the Chamber of Deputies. Gentlemen...
We are suffering from the ruinous competition of a rival who apparently works under conditions so far superior to our own for the production of light that he is flooding the domestic market with it at an incredibly low price; for the moment he appears, our sales cease, all the consumers turn to him, and a branch of French industry whose ramifications are innumerable is all at once reduced to complete stagnation. This rival, which is none other than the sun, is waging war on us so mercilessly we suspect he is being stirred up against us by perfidious Albion (excellent diplomacy nowadays!), particularly because he has for that haughty island a respect that he does not show for us[1].
We ask you to be so good as to pass a law requiring the closing of all windows, dormers, skylights, inside and outside shutters, curtains, casements, bull's-eyes, deadlights, and blinds -- in short, all openings, holes, chinks, and fissures through which the light of the sun is wont to enter houses, to the detriment of the fair industries with which, we are proud to say, we have endowed the country, a country that cannot, without betraying ingratitude, abandon us today to so unequal a combat.
Frederic Bastiat (1801-1850), Sophismes Èconomiques, 1845
[1] A reference to Britain's reputation as a foggy island.
the full petition can be read here.
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