an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof." Judge Cooley says, "by establishment of religion is meant the setting up or recognition of a state church, or at least the conferring upon one church of special favors and advantages which are denied to others."1 Nearly all of the state constitutions now prohibit the states from favoring any one religion at the expense of others; religious equality is ordered; no distinctions are allowed; free exercise of religion and free expression of religious opinions following the dictates of conscience are established by positive enactment. This is not mere religious toleration; it is religious equality and no state church; religious liberty in that no sect is favored by the state and no advantage given by law over other sects. It has been a matter of slow growth even in America. Massachusetts, Connecticut, and New Hampshire as late as 1816 supported religious institutions by law. "Church and state," says Professor Holcombe, "are not yet completely separated in the United States. There is still one State in which none but Protestants may hold the highest offices, and there are several in which the State contributes to the support of ecclesiastical institutions. But the principle of toleration is universally and firmly established." 2

This freedom from religious persecution can be appreciated only by reading what religious persecution in the past has done throughout the world. Religious toleration, like pure air, is now silent and unseen, but in the beginning it cleared away the political pestilence of a combination of church and state. The original Christian religion based on the teachings of Christ clearly separated the state from the church-"the kingdom of this world and the kingdom of the world to come." But when the Roman Empire adopted the Christian religion and founded the Roman Catholic Church, the two kingdoms were united, and gradually the church dominated the state. Their separation is an American institution. Even now there are established religions in England, Scotland, Greece, Sweden, Norway, Denmark,

Prussia, Austria, Spain, and Italy. On the other hand, following the American precedent, an established church was abolished in the following countries on the following dates: Holland, 1795; Belgium, 1831; France, 1905; Russia, 1918; Portugal, 1911, and never existed at all under the constitution of the German Empire formed in 1871. America for a hundred and fifty years has led the way. Professor Sumner says, "The most notable product of democracy, especially of American democracy, up to this time is the maxim of the separation of church and state." 1

(10) Equality of Opportunity. Europe and Asia prior to the American Revolution were bound in iron hoops of caste. The extraordinary man in all ages might burst through, but there was little equality of opportunity for him and none at all for the common man. The strata were fixed and the layer in which a man was born was the layer in which he died. The classes weighed down and lived upon the masses. Kings and landowning aristocracies formed an upper crust almost impervious. Even the American colonies brought with them this system - classes in Massachusetts, classes in Virginia. But the class system rapidly broke up. The wealthy and well born had to take their chances with the rest. Universal suffrage swept aside all artificial distinctions. In other words, equality of opportunity became an American institution. It tolerated no restriction, recognized no exception, and demanded that the son of the farmer or frontiersman have the same opportunity as the son of the merchant prince or landowning aristocrat. And there is no American institution more cherished or more fiercely insisted upon today than this. The American knows that he and his children may rise to the highest positions. The young man feels that opportunity beckons him on to his utmost and that education is open to him. No caste, no aristocracy bars his way. If he has character, brain power, and force, he can achieve distinction. From a rail-splitter to the Presidency was Lincoln's career; Garfield's from the tow-path; Jackson's from the wild frontier of Tennessee; Cool

idge's from an obscure attorney in Vermont. "The tools to him who can handle them" was Napoleon's maxim, and every American "heart vibrates to that iron string." No primogeniture or entail prefers the eldest son and ties up vast estates. No landlordism monopolizes for generations the fertile lands. If he has high social gifts, the young American can marry into the highest social circles and live to regret it. Society is no comrade for ambition. The young American's future depends on himself. Fate may have shot him into a lowly place but he can hew and carve his way to the front. Wealth, social standing, political position, professional life, learning, science, and literature all are open to him if he is willing and able to pay the price of fixed purpose, discipline of intellect, and concentration of mind. "America is opportunity," said Emerson. The American has individuality, independence, and initiative. And the world is open before him. There are no titled classes to truckle to; no caste to embalm men. Every avenue is open. Even predatory corporations are curbed. The rich die or retire or fail. As Emerson says, "the aristocracy of trade has no permanence, is not entailed, was the result of toil and talent, the result of merit of some kind, and is continually falling, like the waves of the sea, before new claims of the same sort." 1 It is true that each man is but a drop in the great ocean of American life, yet each drop has a chance to glisten and glitter on the crest of the topmost wave. Nor do business combinations restrict equality of opportunity and individuality. On the contrary, the tens of thousands of positions now requiring capacity, honesty, and force of character are incessantly changing and in a few years will be filled with new men coming up from the ranks. The field is unlimited, the opportunity boundless, and the prizes greater than ever. Individuality still exists and rises easier than ever. A hundred years ago opportunity was limited to politics, free land, and the accumulation of a small fortune. Today there is colossal trade, manufacturing, mining, the professions, science, and public

service in and outside of politics. No wonder that Americans worship a constitution and institutions that give them all this. The average American is not a constitutional lawyer. He may not know the details of the Constitution. But he does know that his country gives him and his children equality of opportunity. That is a concrete fact which he hugs. Equality of condition is a different proposition and is considered elsewhere.*

Equality of opportunity includes the right of a man to keep what is his own. The American does not have to divide what

he earns. No king or aristocracy takes the lion's share. No monopoly of land takes the profit, leaving a bare subsistence. No taxes are levied except by the people's own representatives. No huge incomes go to a titled aristocracy to expend in extravagance, idleness, and waste. The people's money is not diverted, and they are free to expend it as they wish.

And in recent years these principles of freedom of opportunity and protection of what is a man's own have led to positive statutes protecting those rights. When railroad freight charges took more than a fair share of the value of wheat, corn, beef, and pork, Congress organized the Interstate Commerce Commission to regulate rates so that the farmer might not be deprived of the profit of his labor. When "trusts" were formed to monopolize manufacturing and increase prices, Congress prohibited them by the anti-trust act of July 2, 1890, so that the public should not be deprived of its property by excessive prices. When immigration threatened the living wage of self-respecting labor, Congress stopped immigration. When labor unions illegally stopped non-union men working, the courts by injunctions preserved the right of men to work when and where and at such wages as they see fit. When a money trust sought to control the country, the white light of legislative investigation drove it out. Every American feels that he is protected against extortion.

Now these ten American institutions are not dry abstractions. *See Chapter XXX infra.

They are living, vital, throbbing actualities entering into the daily life of Americans, and every one of them has had a profound influence on Europe and Asia. They are institutions which are cherished with an almost religious devotion by Americans.

Are we competent to maintain this Constitution and these American institutions? What kind of people are we; how were we made up; which is the dominant type of the many-sided population? These are the questions which today are being discussed in a multitude of books - books so numerous as to indicate that the American people realize the seriousness of the situation.

The dominant type is a composite. Some nationalities do not enter into it at all, such as the Slovaks, the Ruthenians, the Russians, the negro, and the Asiatics. Some have a local influence and separate racial existence, such as the Italians, the Jews, and the southeastern Europeans. There is, however, a dominant composite type. It is the Anglo-Saxon, modified by the ScotchIrish, Dutch, Huguenot, German, Irish, and the Scandinavian races. Hence it is well to pass in review the most important of these elements and consider their characteristics, and it is well also to consider other powerful influences which bear upon the safety of American institutions. America always has been and is still ready and willing to fight for its institutions, but the problem now is how to preserve them, not by fighting but by preserving the American type of 1776.