EXAMPLE OF AMERICAN ADMINISTRATION.* From "Westminster Review," April 1855. AT the close of the last century, when the calamitous break up of all hopes in the French Republic was fresh, the eye of patriots turned to England as the type of the sole practicable public liberty. Sir James Mackintosh, mortified and heart-sick at France, believed it was reserved for England to teach all nations how to regulate their political institutions. When the star of Napoleon began visibly to set, the English Constitution seemed to beam over Europe as a beneficent sun, promising a millennium of tranquil prosperity. In France was presently substituted, in place of despotism, a temperate Royal Constitution. A still freer schedule was drawn up for Poland by the very hand (it was believed) of the amiable despot Alexander I. Spain and Sicily had each a liberally imagined and legitimately enacted system, solemnly recognised by Great Britain; that of Sicily, indeed, having been both aided and guaranteed by us, enacted by the Estates, and deliberately accepted by the King;-thus founded on unbroken law as ancient as our own Parliament. The German princes had promised to their people the full restitution. of old rights under new forms, assimilated to those of England,— a promise by which they animated them to the struggle against France. Hungary retained her ancient aristocratic legislature, as well as her county freedom; and the Austrian Court, while invading Venetia and Lombardy under the false pretence of re-occupying its own ancient dominions, professed to respect their nationality, and put forth a formula of their constitutional rights. Thus at the close of 1814 Europe was in expectation of at last ing freedom and happiness under royalty. other side of the Atlantic men were more discerning. ood, and concisely laid down, the conditions Royal Constitutionalism in the English sense of the United States of North America compared with our mour Tremenheere. London: John Murray, 1854.] A EXAMPLE OF AMERICAN ADMINISTRATION.* From "Westminster Review," April 1855. AT the close of the last century, when the calamitous break up of all hopes in the French Republic was fresh, the eye of patriots turned to England as the type of the sole practicable public liberty. Sir James Mackintosh, mortified and heart-sick at France, believed it was reserved for England to teach all nations how to regulate their political institutions. When the star of Napoleon began visibly to set, the English Constitution seemed to beam over Europe as a beneficent sun, promising a millennium of tranquil prosperity. In France was presently substituted, in place of despotism, a temperate Royal Constitution. A still freer schedule was drawn up for Poland by the very hand (it was believed) of the amiable despot Alexander I. Spain and Sicily had each a liberally imagined and legitimately enacted system, solemnly recognised by Great Britain; that of Sicily, indeed, having been both aided and guaranteed by us, enacted by the Estates, and deliberately accepted by the King;-thus founded on unbroken law as ancient as our own Parliament. The German princes had promised to their people the full restitution of old rights under new forms, assimilated to those of England,a promise by which they animated them to the struggle against France. Hungary retained her ancient aristocratic legislature, as well as her county freedom; and the Austrian Court, while invading Venetia and Lombardy under the false pretence of re-occupying its own ancient dominions, professed to respect their nationality, and put forth a formula of their constitutional rights. Thus at the close of 1814 Europe was in expectation of at last tasting freedom and happiness under royalty. At the other side of the Atlantic men were more discerning. Jefferson understood, and concisely laid down, the conditions under which alone Royal Constitutionalism in the English sense [* "Constitution of the United States of North America compared with our own," by Hugh Seymour Tremenheere. London : John Murray, 1854.] A can be permanent. Where the Executive, he argued, has but a small army under its control, there the Constitution may stand, as in insular England. But a great Continental Executive, like royal Russia, with vast frontiers to defend and vast armies necessary against the foreigner, will always be able to crush domestic liberty. Events developed the truth of this, and of more than this. The petty princes were supported against their subjects by the more powerful ones. "The Holy Alliance," indeed, enunciated the principle, and opened the eyes of Europe. In fact, the King of Naples disowned the Constitution of Sicily by secret engagement with Austria, while Austria counted on Russian support, not only in this matter, but also in her scheme to rule in Hungary without Parliaments. The King of Spain disowned the Constitution as soon as he had been received back by his nation. When at length the people constrained him to respect it, the French armies swarmed in to enforce his despotism by order of the Holy Alliance at Verona; this overwhelming combination kept England and Mr Canning quiet. The Constitutions of Germany and of Lombardo-Venetia were fraudulently withheld; that of Poland was in three years' time destroyed. Stern facts showed that in France alone could even the shadow of a constitution stand, and there only under a cautious old king, partly because foreigners did not dare again to meddle with the formidable French people. Even there the next king, Charles X., made a bold stroke for despotism and lost his throne by it in 1830. Political reasoners in all the suffering countries were driven to reflect that the failure of royal constitutionalism was no new thing, but was coeval with standing armies. Englishmen had talked conceitedly, as if their system were a merit of their own, and a panacea alike for tyranny and for disorder; whereas Spain and Germany and Bohemia and the Low Countries and Hungary and Sicily had had vigorous restraints on kingly rule while England had little weight in Europe: if they could not then keep their laws against the royal armies, why expect to fare better now? Such was the train of reflection which made it inevitable, that in the future efforts for liberty on the Continent republican aspirations should predominate. It was a fallacy to preach to them liberty in the English form. Rather, it was a mockery, similar to that of recommending a navy to a people that has no sea-coast. An English king cannot crush insurrection by his navy; a large army is not a plausible need for our defence against foreigners. The English Constitution may be an excellent thing to those who can keep it, but the nations of the Continent have found by the experience of four centuries that to them it is impossible while kings hold the armies. Henceforward it is no longer England, but the North American Republic, that has become the pole star to which from all sides the eye of struggling nations turns. One great curse, indeed, pollutes the American republic-slavery; which not only dooms three million persons of coloured race to degradation, injury, and ignorance, but keeps the white free men of those States poor, uneducated, proud, and idle; implicates them in the interests of tyranny, and at the same time deteriorates the moral tone of the central legislature and supreme executive. But this bane of America is in no respect derived from or essential to—it is, on the contrary, inconsistent with and destructive of-republican liberty. Hence, dreadful as is the mischief to America herself, it forms no reason why foreigners should the less imitate her cardinal principle. Carp as we may at weaknesses and vices of American democracy, certain great facts in it are open to the day. In the Free States the boy who is born of the poorest and lowest parents may rise into the highest posts. This is no freak of solitary accident, but is a natural result of the institutions. Without special patronage the indigent boy receives good primary education, and, if diligent and clever, invariably rises above want; is received into the best society the moment he deserves it morally and intellectually, and finds no "cold shade of aristocracy" to starve and cripple him. The township is the earliest school of political action; after this, the State legislature or its Governor's office; next the Lower House of Congress, afterwards the Senate; nor is there any insuperable bar to a post in the Supreme Government. Where every industrious man is above the anxieties of want, where every intelligent man may become educated and refined, and every man of high powers may rise into high office; in such a community there will be prosperity and content, even if the form of government be Chinese: but where to the above is added the fullest democratic liberty, there personal self-reliance and a freeman's pride are a crown on content and prosperity. England is little aware how very far she is behind the American Union in solving the greatest problems of the day. Our Constitution took its present form during the struggle against the power of the Crown: it succeeded in its effort to save the public liberties from their official guardian, but it riveted the power of the aristocracy, entailing new evils and a new |