us. numbers. The very same conservatism which had hampered the antislavery movement for years, thwarted and delayed the secession movement, and thus gained precious months for Foremost among these influences is the legal character of public proceedings, already alluded to, the great influence of the legal profession, and the conservative character of the common law, which we have inherited from England, as compared with the civil law, in force on the Continent. "The English and American lawyers," says De Tocqueville, "investigate what has been done; the French advocate inquires what should have been done. The former produce precedents; the latter, reasons." Another is the complication and mutual interference of Federal and State action. Each has a natural jealousy of the other, which sometimes leads to embarrassment, and even peril, but, at all events, is to some extent a protection against misgovernment. Then the balance of power in elections is held in almost all the States by an uncertain, floating mass of " trimmers," always ready to quit the party that is carrying things with too high a hand, and put its rival in power. Party spirit, too-in its abuse a most dangerous thing has often a very beneficial effect in keeping the opposition compact and organized, well trained in defeating extreme measures by party discipline and parliamentary tactics. But, after all, the only sure and permanent safeguard is educated public opinion; - what Mill calls "the unwritten maxims of the Constitution, in other words, the positive political morality of the country." Such a public opinion is created and maintained in no other way so surely as by the thoroughly democratic institutions and administration of New England. - Having considered the nature of American Democracy, and the general charges which are preferred against it, we come to the special trial through which it is now passing. It seems to be thought by foreigners that we are living here in a genuine reign of terror, a despotism exercised alternately by Abraham Lincoln and the New York "shoulder-hitters," who, as Blackwood has it, form the strength of the Republican party. How grossly these evils are exaggerated we need not say. * Vol. I. p. 353. Twice when the war began, in April, 1861, and after Bull Run, in August of the same year the fearful peril in which the nation was placed called for extreme measures. The President took the responsibility with a vigor and decision that will make his name illustrious. The traitors were overawed, and the danger passed. Perhaps probably — there were arbitrary and unjustifiable arrests. It was impossible, at such a crisis, to discriminate with exactness; but the rights of the individual must give way when the nation is to be preserved. At the same time, sundry offensive persons and disloyal newspapers were mobbed. We have nothing to say in defence of this. Lynch law, however useful in the new settlements of the West, is not in keeping with our democratic institutions in the East. Our courts of justice are pure and sufficient, and any mob-law is a disaster. But if it was ever righteously exercised, it was when it was turned against that newspaper which had for years labored with all its energies to undermine the public virtue of the North; which had at every step defended the traitors who were in arms against their country; and had just before done its best to stir up a mob to crush free speech in the very cradle of liberty. It had sown the wind it reaped the whirlwind. And we must confess to a feeling of satisfaction at historical justice, when Breckinridge and Vallandingham were forbidden to talk treason in the city which four months before had almost been in open revolt. But when the crisis was passed, the people and the government settled down into their habitual good-nature. The easy dealing of our authorities with disloyalty has made us ridiculous in the eyes of friends and enemies, and seriously impaired the efficiency of our arms. And, at present, open sympathy with the rebellion is expressed every day in every Northern town. Perhaps the frothy declaimer ends with challenging the government to send him to Fort Lafayette; but the government has other work to do, and his cheap treason is only laughed at. The first and most important test to which our institutions were put by this contest was in respect to the spirit of republicanism. We were so accustomed to acquiesce in the result of elections, that we hardly realized at the time what a vital decision was made, when we determined to go to war rather than allow the Southern States to secede by force. Their taking part in the election was a tacit promise to abide by the result, and our action was to decide then and forever whether our republic was to follow the example of the South American republics. There was no avoiding the issue. A convention might have dissolved peaceably the bonds which held the States together, and that is what the North offered. But if the right of secession had been acknowledged, formally or tacitly, then farewell to all peace and order and liberty on this continent. This first severe trial democracy passed through triumphantly. Another peril like the first followed. When Sulla was unjustly deprived of his command, he refused to obey, the civil war followed, and the Roman republic was at an end. Twice during this war the same danger has seemed possible. If the insidious prompting of partisans, or the malicious whispers of enemies, or the open encouragement of the London Times, had had weight with Generals Frémont and McClellan, it seemed as if the terrible fate of Rome might have come upon us without a moment's warning. But these true and patriotic men no more thought it possible to disobey the orders relieving them of their commands, than the humblest line officer in the army. This peril also is past, and republicanism is safe. The second test was in the conduct of the war. Democracy was competent to manage in time of peace; could it conduct a tremendous civil war, sprung suddenly upon it? The result must show. Terrible mistakes have been made, and the war is still raging which we thought would have been ended before now. But if democracy is to be held responsible for the mismanagement on land, surely it should have the credit of the naval successes, the exploits of Du Pont, Foote, Farragut, Worden, Boggs, and the Porters. It is not often in history that a great crisis has found just the right man in power, and perhaps we are no exception.* It is, at any rate, something, that we have an honest, earnest, industrious man, who has no * It is a defect, not of democracy, but of our Constitution, that we are liable to be tied down to an incompetent official for a term of years, and that Buchanan had power nearly to ruin the nation after his successor was already designated. small measure of clear common-sense, and who is not afraid to assume responsibility. It seems to be a characteristic of the Anglican race, as it was of the Romans, to begin by blundering. We have no cause to be ashamed of our blunders when we compare them with those the English made in the Crimean war and the Indian revolt. But England has a habit of not being disheartened by failures, and of carrying her undertakings through by sheer pluck; and perhaps we have inherited something of this. Had we given up at the outset, or after the first failures, we should have deserved and received the execration and contempt of all time. And after all, what is the record? Of the four important departments, the navy has been spoken of already. On land, too, in spite of our reverses, we have gained vastly within the year. In foreign affairs, whatever mistakes have been made by Mr. Seward, he cannot be said to have failed, when we consider how few misunderstandings have arisen with foreign powers in affairs of such magnitude, delicacy, and complication. And as to Mr. Chase, no one can deny him the credit of having conducted the national finances with rare skill and success through a most perplexing period. It is easy to criticise individual measures; but if we look at the result, we must be astonished at the little embarrassment the government has experienced in providing itself, and the smallness of the debt incurred in proportion to the immense scale of operations." * Perhaps this is the most fitting place to introduce an extract from an article in the Quarterly Review for last October, which really deserves a place among the curiosities of literature. "If McClellan had been a Wellington, he would have done nothing under a superior, who . . . . put an empty braggart like Pope over his head, because he had known him in the West.' If Mr. Chase had been a Turgot, he could have done nothing with a master who had made up his mind not to levy a farthing of direct taxation till the elections for Congress were over." 1. Pope was never over McClellan's head; he commanded the Army of Virginia, and McClellan the Army of the Potomac, both under Halleck. 2. Pope was not an "empty braggart." A boaster, perhaps, but that he was not empty is shown by Northern Missouri, New Madrid, and Island No. 10. 3. As for Lincoln's "knowing him in the West," (if the expression is correctly quoted,) it means, of course, either that he knew him personally to be a capable officer, or that he knew it from his career in the West. 4. The President has nothing to do with taxation, except to sign the bills when they are passed. In this case, Mr. Chase and Congress waited until the people demanded taxation, a fact not perhaps to their credit, but certainly to that of the people. 5. The tax-bill was passed last spring, and the A third test is in the temper and habits of democracy. We enter upon this branch of the discussion with diffidence, because it will be hard to do justice to the conduct of our people during this contest without seeming to indulge in the spirit of boasting. We feel less reluctance, however, in view of the grossness of the slanders which have been heaped upon us. Those who are on the watch for discreditable manifestations have no difficulty in finding them; we take no pleasure in being obliged to call their attention to what they have chosen to overlook. Many of our national faults are such as the trials through which we are passing will serve to correct. Already we see their fruits in many directions. The subversive, levelling, "no-government" theories, which amused in times of peace, will never again find a foothold among us, and the lawlessness of Young America will, we trust, be checked somewhat by the new military spirit. We have learned to brag less, and at the same time have acquired a manlier bearing and truer confidence in ourselves; we have become less thinskinned, as we have found out how little the judgment of foreign journals is worth to us. The spirit of loyalty and of nationality, which had almost died out during those sad, shameful years of our degradation, have sprung up afresh and more buoyant than ever. We know now what it is to have a country of which we can be proud, a flag which symbolizes liberty and law, a nationality united, powerful, hopeful, and free. But such points as these can be better understood when the struggle is over; we are to speak now, not of what the war is to teach our people, but of the testimony it has already borne to their capacity for self-government, of the proofs that have appeared that our institutions have done the work expected of them, and educated the people to high political capabilities. First, in their logical comprehension of the issue. We have elections for Congress were held in the autumn, about six months later. This is a fair specimen of the article. The writer may have the benefit of the alternative, consummate ignorance or wilful misstatement. But what shall be said of the "Edinburgh," which, in order to give the weight of Hamilton's authority to the doctrine of the impossibility of coercing a State, quotes (from Spence) a passage from the Federalist, showing the weakness of the central government under the old Confederation, and designed to serve as an argument for the adoption of the Federal Constitution ? VOL. LXXIV. 5TH S. VOL. XII. NO. II. 25 |