deal to learn from them; we shall find in them, also, many things to beware of, many points in which it is to be hoped our democracy may not be like theirs. As our country becomes more democratic, the malady here may no longer be that we have an upper class materialized, a middle class vulgarized, and a lower class brutalized." 1

"The Great Experiment" has not yet been finished. If it fails, the world goes backward. As Bryce says, "If ever those moral forces which have led more than a hundred millions of men, filling a vast continent, to obey that common will which they have provided peaceful means for ascertaining, if ever these forces that have created and preserved the sense of common duty and common interest, should show signs of decay, what hope would remain for the world?" 2 It is true that the American form of government has been followed in France, Switzerland, Central and South America, China, Portugal, Austria, and Germany, and has revolutionized the basis of the British government itself. But law and order have not always followed the American example. Russia shows what an unbridled democracy leads to. The Central and South American republics are the sport of irresponsible revolutionists. Mexico shows how a republic is impossible with an ignorant and poverty-stricken people. China is in chaos.

Not only is the reliability of the republican form of government still assailed but the civilizing effect of that kind of government is denied. Godkin, himself a defender of democracy, summarizes candidly the arguments against it as follows, namely, that "It is fatal in the long run to any high degree of excellence in the arts, science, literature, or statesmanship; that it is hostile to every form of distinction, and thus tends to extinguish the nobler kinds of ambition, to create and perpetuate mediocrity, to offer a serious bar to progress, and even to threaten civilization with stagnation; that, by making equality of conditions the highest political good, it makes civil liberty appear valuable

only so long or so far as its existence is compatible with equality; that it converts the ideal of the worst trained and most unthinking portion of the community into the national standard of capacity, and thus drives the ablest men out of public life; that it sets up mere success in the accumulation of money as the proof and test of national prosperity, and elevates material luxury into the great end of social progress; that it takes from manners all their grace and polish and dignity, makes literature feeble and tawdry, and oratory bombastic and violent; that it infuses bitterness into party struggles, while removing the barriers which in aristocratic societies soften and restrain its expression; and, finally, that, by the pains it takes to preserve the equality of conditions, it forces every member of the community to engage as soon as he reaches manhood in an eager scramble for wealth, thus rendering impossible the existence of a class with sufficient leisure to devote themselves to the cultivation of the arts and sciences, or to speculative inquiry in any field of knowledge." 1

Democracy wrathfully replies that kings and aristocracies have contributed very little to civilization; that the great men and great movements and great religions in all ages have sprung from the plain people; that kings and aristocracies are noted chiefly for deeds of blood, spoliation, conquest, oppression, and for preying on the people; that the storms of democracy clear the air and that the French Deputy from the tribune was right when he said, "March without the people and you march into night their instincts are a finger-pointing of Providence." 2 Godkin, himself, says: "We owe to the Roman aristocracy the great fabric of Roman jurisprudence; but, since their time, what has any aristocracy done for art and literature, or law?" 3 Fisher Ames, as cited by Emerson, said that "a monarchy is a merchantman, which sails well, but will sometime strike on a rock and go to the bottom; whilst a republic is a raft, which would never sink, but then your feet are always in water." 4 Bryce in his "American Commonwealth" discussed democracy,

and his views are summarized in the note hereto.1 Coit, an English writer, says, "The great problem becomes simply this: Are the best less likely to govern if the people select them than if the people have no voice in saying who the few shall be that are to govern? In answer, one may fairly say that the few, chosen by a comparatively illiterate and sordid public, are not liable to be worse servants of the people than any self-appointed few would be who were not subject to efficient censure by the people. The haughty prejudice of a highly-educated and gifted, but irresponsible, class is as apt to blind its members as to who would serve the state best as ever the sordid ignorance of the masses themselves could be. But when the people have as much leisure, education, and wealth distributed among them as had the American colonists in 1776, and the new voters of England in 1832, we may safely say that they have reached a point where the 'few' whom they will choose will be the best. Even more may be claimed for democracy.'

"2

The mission of the American nation is to demonstrate that a people can govern itself. That is the warp and woof of American life. When that principle of self-government is endangered, it rouses to action the dormant fierce nature of the nation, whether the menace comes from rebellion, capital, labor, European war, or European communism. Instinctively and intuitively the American people respond to the call that the republic is in danger. This is a fundamental characteristic that underlies the American nation and will tolerate no dissent. Privileged aristocracies, monarchies, feudal chiefs, ancient and medieval conquering cities, princes with unlimited power over vassals or subjects, have filled the pages of history and some still survive. But they are becoming effete and parasitic anachronisms. This is due to the "Great Experiment" in America. Emerson says, "Our political constitution is the hope of the world." John Bright said in the midst of the American War of the Rebellion, "Privilege thinks it has a great interest in the American contest, and every morn

without State

ing, with blatant voice, it comes into our streets and curses the American Republic. Privilege has beheld an afflicting spectacle for many years past. It has beheld thirty millions of men happy and prosperous, without emperors - without kings - without the surroundings of a court-without nobles, except such as are made by eminence in intellect and virtue bishops and State priests, those venders of the love that works salvation — without great armies and great navies - without a great debt and great taxes and Privilege has shuddered at what might happen to old Europe if this great experiment should succeed." 1

A republic is the culmination of civilized government. It is not a recovery of mystical lost liberties of the plain man. The assumption by Rousseau that man in his native state had more real liberty than under civilization has been exploded. Equally so Locke's theory that government is a compact. By evolution in the course of centuries a few races qualified themselves for selfgovernment. It was a long, hard struggle to establish that form of government. It led to the American republic. It remains to be seen whether the centrifugal forces render a republic impossible even in the most civilized nation. Professor Sumner of Yale said, "The government of a Roman Emperor, a Czar, a Sultan, or a Napoleon, has been only a raid of a lot of hungry sycophants upon the subject mass; the aristocracy of Venice and other city states has been only a plutocratic oligarchy, using the state as a means of its own selfish ends; democracy has never yet been tried enough to know what it will do, but with Jacobinism, communism, and social democracy lying in wait for it on one side, and plutocracy on the other, its promise is not greater than that of the old forms. It remains to be proved that democracy possesses any stability and that it can guarantee rights.'

2

Americans are proud of their institutions and nationality. The time has gone by when an American when abroad refers to

It

himself as a citizen of New York or of Massachusetts or of Virginia or of Pennsylvania or any other state. Judge Brewer of the Supreme Court well said, "In the days of the Cæsars 'I am a Roman citizen' was a proud, exultant declaration. It was protection. It was more; it was honor and glory. Twenty centuries of advancing civilization have given to the declaration 'I am an American citizen' a higher and a nobler place. It stands today in the forefront of earthly titles. It proclaims a sharing in the greatest opportunities. It is a trumpet-call to the highest fidelity. It is the diploma of the world, the highest which humanity has to bestow."1 Americans did not have this pride of nationality at once after the Revolutionary War. has been of slow growth, and it was not until the war of 1812 that the East and West were fused into one. As Henry Adams says, "In 1815 for the first time Americans ceased to doubt the path they were to follow. . . . American character was formed if not fixed." " By 1815, says Professor Adams, "there had arisen a belief in national destiny, a sense of remoteness from older nations and older customs, a consciousness of a separate and distinct existence for America, in short, an ideal of unity and of nationality." And the spirit grew. President Andrew Jackson looked Calhoun full in the face at a banquet and gave the toast, "Our Federal Union: It must be preserved," and Calhoun is said to have turned pale. Years later Webster in his debate with Hayne expressed the dominating spirit of the nation when he exclaimed, "Liberty and Union, now and forever, one and inseparable." Later still the war of the Rebellion solidified the nation. Later still American armies swept over Europe to preserve the liberties of the world.

"The Great Experiment" so far has succeeded. The American form of government is the oldest now existing in the civilized world. In England the King has been reduced to a social leader and most of the masses have been given a vote. In continental Europe republic has succeeded republic in one country after