erful refutation of Karl Marx's Communist Manifesto, published two years earlier, Bastiat discusses: What is law?, Why socialism constitutes legal plunder, the proper function of the law, the law and morality, "the vicious circle of socialism", and the basis for stable government. French political libertarian and economist CLAUDE FRÉDÉRIC BASTIAT (1801-1850) was one of the most eloquent champions of the concept that property rights and individual freedoms flowed from natural law.