Page images
PDF
EPUB

This is about as wise a question as it would be to ask why, since the telescope is a mere substitute for the naked eye, we do not at once reject the telescope, and return to the simple, unassisted vision. In the same way we might ask why, if forks be a mere substitute for fingers, we do not at once abandon the use of the modern invention, and like the Eastern nations, plunge our five digits at once into the dish? Representative democracy is a great practical improvement on simple, or as our author prefers to call it market, democracy, so great an improvement that it has been. regarded as the most remarkable modern discovery, not merely in politics, but in science at large. Our author, when informed of this, gravely inquires why, if representative democracy be a mere improvement upon former system, we do not at once reject it and return to the old and exploded method? Such a question carries of course its own answer, and we may add, its own commentary with it.

As our author rejects the common theory of representative government, we feel some curiosity to know what his views are. Unfortunately his manner of explaining himself on this, as on all other parts of his work, is extremely vague, and he does not succeed in making his ideas at all clear. The nearest approach to a distinct and tangible statement is in the following passage.

"By the representative system, we obtain these two advantages. We restrict the impulse of the mass which is inherent to [in] the mass as such, and we avoid the being ruled by one leader as the Athenians in the latter portion of their history always were. We the people, therefore, are not absent from the legislative halls because for local reasons we cannot be there, but because we ought not to be there as people, as mass; for the same reason that in monarchies the king is not allowed to be present in the halls of justice, or as the legislators cannot debate in the presence of the monarch. In both cases the reason is the same. The prince, that is, the holder, must he limited and circumscribed by law," &c.

power

It is hardly necessary to insist upon the incorrect

ness of these ideas. So far is the law in a Representative or any other government from being intended to restrict the prince, taking this term as a general name for the law-giving power, that it is the expression of his will. The law is not intended. to act at all upon the law-giving power. Its action is upon the individual. In this country the state is not only not restricted by law, but is expressly exempted by the constitution from liability to any legal process. "We the People" not only have a right "to be in the legislative halls," that is, to make the law which is to govern us in our individual capacity, but we are the only rightful law-giving power. If the community is not to make the law for itself, by whom shall it be made? By some other community? By some one or more privileged families? Or, in Mr. Jefferson's language, have we found angels in the shape of kings to make the law for us?

"one

So much for one of the two supposed advantages of a Representative government. The other is equally questionable. "We avoid," says the author, "the being ruled by one leader, as the Athenians in the latter portion of their history always were." How does this appear? We see no reason why leader" may not exercise a decided preponderance in a representative body, as well as in a purely popular one. Experience is in fact directly opposed to our author's view. There are usually in representative bodies one or more persons exercising precisely the same sort of influence which is exercised by the leaders in a popular assembly. In either case, if there happen to be among these one of a very commanding character, he monopolizes the greater part of the influence, which is more commonly divided in unequal portions among a number. Did not Pitt sway the British House of Commons, and through it the nation, for twenty years in succession, with at least as complete a mastery as Pericles possessed in the assembly of Athens? Did Aristides, Themistocles, Alcibiades, Cymon, or any other popular leader ever reign more

despotically over that "fierce democratie" than Mirabeau did over the National Assembly of France?

The great virtue of the Representative principle lies in this, that it accomplishes the union, which could never be effected in any other way, between Power and Liberty. Liberty in ancient times was wild, turbulent, blood-stained, short-lived, because she was weak. In modern times, and in this country, she is discreet, temperate, humane, healthy, because she is strong. She was weak in ancient times and is at this time weak in Europe because she dwells in citystates, or in small rural republics administered on the principle of the market-democracy. She is strong in this country, because by the aid of the Representative Principle, in its double application to the Union and the States, she has been able to comprehend a vast continent under the same democratic system, and thus consolidate a purely popular power, which the mightiest monarchies of Europe have found by experience that it were not safe to trifle with.

When, therefore, our author inquires why, if representation be a mere substitute for pure democracy, we do not at once reject the former, and split up into city-states, we might answer, if it were worth the while to treat such a question seriously, that representation is not only a substitute for pure democracy but a great improvement upon it. We might answer, that city-states do not and cannot possess either the security or the stability which are essential to political prosperity, and which can only be enjoyed in large communities. Why is it, we might ask in turn, that our author, a native Prussian, is now reposing in peace. under the broad banner of the United States of America ? Is it not because our fathers, by employing the Representative in connexion with the democratic principle, were able to embody the latter in a community powerful enough to protect him against the bloodhounds of despotism, which have hunted him like a partridge upon the mountains, through the whole of Europe, and would follow him across the Atlantic if

they dared? Why did his countryman, the late lamented Dr. Follen, exchange the market-democracy of Switzerland, that classic land of liberty, for the representative democracy of this country? Read the letter which he addressed to the government of Basil, on his departure. "Because the Republicans of Switzerland, who have protected so many fugitive princes, noblemen, and priests, would not protect him, a republican like themselves, he is compelled to take refuge in the great asylum of liberty, the United States of America." The letter is, however, hardly just to Switzerland. She would willingly enough have protected her republican guest, if she had had the power. Her weakness, and not her will, consented to his departure. If then we do not in this country "split up into city-states" again, it is for this, among many other good reasons, that we may have the Power to protect our author and other foreigners, who honor us with their presence, against the diplomatic votes of their Excellencies, the ministers of Russia, Prussia, Austria, France, and Spain, who, if our refugees were living in a city-state or a market-democracy, would very soon get possession of them, in spite of all their learned citations from Wicquefort, Puffendorf, and Grotius.

It is time, however, to close this article. The work before us, such as we have shown it to be, is nevertheless introduced to the public by a strong recommendation, from no less a personage than Chancellor Kent. The facility, with which individuals, who enjoy the general confidence as men of learning and talent, lend their names to promote the circulation of worthless books, is a great and growing mischief, which ought to be corrected. Another recent and very remarkable instance of it is to be found in the testimony, publicly borne, to the merit of Mr. Otis's translation of the Tusculan Questions of Cicero, by President Quincy, the late William Sullivan, and what we should consider as much higher authority, Mr. Prescott and John Quincy Adams. Why should this be? Is it

not a fraud upon the public to pass a high encomium upon a book of no value, and thus cheat the people out of their money, by inducing them to buy it, or out of their time, by inducing them to read at least a portion of it; which is our own case in regard to the Tusculans? Are we at liberty to aid and abet others in doing what we have no right to do for ourselves? Is the moral obligation to be sincere and honest less imperative in the book-selling business than in others? Dr. Warren would think himself dishonored by endorsing a quack medicine. Why should Mr. Adams endorse a quack translation of Cicero; or Chancellor Kent a quack treatise on Political Ethics?

ART. IV. - PURE REASON, RIGHTS, - DUTY, — FREE

WILL.

-

IN the number of this Review for October last, I offered some reflections on subjects which seemed to me of deep importance. The chief point on which the Editor differed from my views is reserved for a further acquisition of knowledge and maturer thought, and I will only say now, that I then deemed there was a wide difference in the application of the categories of the Pure Reason, as taught by M. Victor Cousin, and the views entertained by myself; at least, I thought my own views more definitely applied. I refer to this portion of that communication, not as affirming more positively my convictions, but that no deductions of any character may be drawn from my silence on the point involved; for so far as I have given it reflection, the decision of my mind remains unaltered.

In that article I undertook to prove, what I shall here assume as established, that the Pure Reason existed from eternity; that there is no period in

[blocks in formation]
« PreviousContinue »