American Institutions

and Their Preservation

PART I

CHAPTER I

"THE GREAT EXPERIMENT"

Ar the time of the Revolutionary War the republican form of
government was discredited throughout Europe and in fact the
whole world. Some vestiges of a republic remained in Switzer-
land, but it was only a league of states tending to oligarchy at
that time. France had an absolute monarchy; England under
George III practically so; Germany was under the uncontrolled
power of Frederick the Great; Spain, Italy, and the rest were
under kings. Holland had passed to a practical monarchy.
Monarchy in some form or other and a nobility or privileged class
in some form or other were deemed essential to good govern-
ment. Not even a constitutional monarchy found favor. Abso-
lute monarchy, the antipodes of popular sovereignty, ruled. As
Sidgwick in his "Development of European Polity" says, abso-
lute monarchy was regarded "as the final form of government
by which the task of establishing and maintaining a civ-
ilized political order had been, on the whole, successfully accom-
plished, after other modes of political construction had failed to
realize it." An absolute monarchy is where the king is the
state, as Louis XIV said of himself. Republican institutions
had in his time practically disappeared from the face of the
earth. As to the ancient world, Bryce says that it "having tried
many experiments in free government, relapsed wearily after

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their failure into an acceptance of monarchy and turned its mind quite away from political questions" and not until the sixteenth century was any persistent effort made to win political freedom. During the long intervening centuries when a rising occurred it was for good government and not self-government. "Despotic monarchies everywhere held the field." 1

The founders of the American Republic knew all this. Hence Washington expressed the universal conviction when he said in his inaugural, "The preservation of the sacred fire of liberty and the destiny of the republican model of government are justly considered as deeply, perhaps as finally, staked on the experiment entrusted to the hands of the American people." Nor was Europe at all convinced of the stability or safety of popular sovereignty even after America had established it. And with rea

The American ship of state rocked and rolled until a civil war swept land and sea. In the midst of that war Lincoln again expressed with tragic force the question whether popular sovereignty was possible. In his Gettysburg speech he said, "We here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain, that this nation under God shall have a new birth of freedom, and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth." Mr. Justice Brewer of the Supreme Court said that this Republic "was established in a place, at a time, and under circumstances peculiarly unique and fortunate conditions which can never be repeated, and if the effort here made to establish popular government fails we may well believe that the failure will be final and irretrievable. As Webster said: 'If, in our case, the representative system ultimately fail, popular governments must be pronounced impossible. No combination of circumstances more favorable to the experiment can ever be expected to occur. The last hopes of mankind, therefore, rest with us; and if it should be proclaimed that our example had become an argument against the experiment, the knell of popular liberty would be sounded throughout the

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earth."" And again in 1832 Webster said, "Gentlemen, for the earth which we inhabit, and the whole circle of the sun, for all the unborn races of mankind, we seem to hold in our hands, for their weal or woe, the fate of this experiment. If we fail, who shall venture the repetition? If our example shall prove to be one not of encouragement, but of terror, not fit to be imitated, but fit only to be shunned, where else shall the world look for free models? If this great Western Sun be struck out of the firmament, at what other fountain shall the lamp of liberty hereafter be lighted? What other orb shall emit a ray to glimmer, even, on the darkness of the world?" 2

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And the end is not yet. A hundred and fifty years are but a step in time. America has great power, population, and wealth, but they render self-government more difficult. Democracy in the United States is yet to demonstrate that it can survive overpopulation and poverty of the lower classes, and the ambition and greed of the upper classes. The words of Maine, the author of "The Ancient Law" and "Popular Government," are true. Popular sovereignty, he says, "is characterized by great fragility" and democracy "of all forms of government is by far the most difficult" so difficult that it "will tax to the utmost all the political sagacity and statesmanship of the world to keep it from misfortune." In other words, as Emerson says, "Nature is not democratic, nor limited monarchial, but despotic." 4 Professor Wrong of the Toronto University says, "The eighteenth century had little experience of republics and no great love for them. Switzerland was the only stable republic in Europe, and it was a loose federation of small states, safe in their obscurity, until, a little later, they should happen to stand across the path of a soldier like Napoleon, who would then use them as he pleased. The Venetian republic had a long and notable history, but it was in the control of a privileged oligarchy and its days were numbered. That a republic could not endure was a staple of Europe's political thinking." Lecky says, "As

we have, I think, abundantly seen, a tendency to democracy does not mean a tendency to parliamentary government, or even a tendency towards greater liberty. On the contrary, strong arguments may be adduced, both from history and from the nature of things, to show that democracy may often prove the direct opposite of liberty. In ancient Rome the old aristocratic republic was gradually transformed into a democracy, and it then passed speedily into an imperial despotism. In France a corresponding change has more than once taken place. A despotism resting on a plebiscite is quite as natural a form of democracy as a republic, and some of the strongest democratic tendencies are distinctly adverse to liberty. Equality is the idol of democracy, but, with the infinitely various capacities and energies of men, this can only be attained by a constant, systematic stringent repression of their natural development. Whenever natural forces have unrestricted play, inequality is certain to ensue. Democracy destroys the balance of opinions, interests, and classes, on which constitutional liberty mainly depends, and its constant tendency is to impair the efficiency and authority of parliaments, which have hitherto proved the chief organs of political liberty." Taylor, a recent English writer on the subject, says, "The almost insuperable problem of modern democracy consists in this, that while it is unjust and therefore impossible to exclude the wage-earning classes from the enjoyment of political rights they are, as regards education and knowledge of the world and general political capacity, much inferior to the class which by their superior numbers they displace. Republicanism, being based upon the assumption that the citizens will voluntarily abstain from anti-social conduct, shares the weakness which has been attributed to most liberal theories, 'that while satisfactory in times of peace, in times of trouble they almost invariably break down.' Much severe criticism has been expended upon the pomp and circumstance of kings, and the empty homage which is bestowed upon the exalted

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mortals whom accident, not merit, has placed upon the throne. Yet the exaggerated respect which monarchy inspires is a valuable bulwark against disorder, and though incapable of support on strictly rational grounds forms a barrier against political unrest unknown to a republic." 1 But even Taylor says, "It is impossible to doubt that some form of democratic government is the government of the future." Another very recent English writer, Wallace, devotes an entire volume, in ponderous style, to demonstrating that "We have not yet thoroughly awakened to the fact that a democratic age is essentially one of degradation, yet historical research warrants our making the assertion that an era of democracy is the concluding stage that marks the decay of a given civilization."2 These writers certainly have earned a title. On the other hand, Brown, another recent English writer, points out that "In the early nineteenth century, the democratic form of government was practically confined to a few communities on the eastern shores of the United States. In the early twentieth century, more than fifty countries, containing in all more than a quarter of the population of the globe, possess constitutional governments, in which taxation and legislation are controlled by the people or their representatives." And yet, he continues, "When I look at the horizon of the future I see the dark menace of grave dangers which are rapidly taking shape. I see a great people passing through strange ordeals, which will put its intelligence and its virtue to tests so severe that the ultimate issue is impossible to foretell. And I turn from this vision of the future to ask what the citizens of today are doing to prepare themselves to cope with the problems that lie before them problems that will demand clear heads as well as loyal hearts, enlightened statesmanship no less than reforming zeal. I ask a question: the answer I leave to the judgment of the reader." Matthew Arnold wrote, "To us, too, the future of the United States is of incalculable importance. Already we feel their influence much, and we shall feel it more. We have a good

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