AN AMERICAN THESIS

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP78-03362A000100010007-0
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 112
• Document Creation Date: November 9, 2016
• Document Release Date: November 16, 1998
• Sequence Number: 7
• Publication Date: January 1, 1956
• Content Type: BOOK

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AMERICAN THESIS
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Section
Page
I
General Introduction
Basic Documents
1
II
The Role of the Individual in America
23
III
Democracy in America
30
IV
The American Political System
38
V
The American Economy
50
VI
Freedom of Speech
59
VII
Freedom of The Press
67
VIII
Religious Freedom
75
II
The American Destiny
82
Selected Bibliography
94
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AMERICAN THESIS
Most Americans are never called upon to state their understanding
of the social, cultural, economic and political characteristics of their
country; nor do they find themselves in positions of having to explain
and justify such characteristics as are peculiar to Americans.
However, as the result of the role which the United States is play-
ing in the world today, an ever increasing number of individuals must be
able to spell out their interpretations of the American thesis. This
is particularly true of government representatives who travel, work,
and reside abroad.
The American thesis is compounded of a number of significant
elements: freedom of expression, representative government, and an
economic apparatus flexible enough to meet new challenges as they appear.
These and other elements are predicated on the supposition that the human
individual is supremely valuable. Such a belief, transmitted to the
New World by means of the civilization of Western Europe, is the ide-
ological legacy of Judean-Hellenist-Christian thought. It is the
antithesis of the concept of a collectivistic society.
Contrary to a basic tenet of totalitarian thought.. Americans hold
that the mechanism of the state exists solely for the purpose of trans-
lating the principle of the supreme value of the individual into the
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realm of practical affairs. Of necessity, therefore, men acting through
the agency of the state must determine how the principle may be preserved
and strengthened in practice.
Under the pressure of changing economic and political conditions
new challenges constantly arise in our society. Since most of these
challenges are unique and since we make no pretext of having neatly-
tailored formulas on hand for resolving them, considerable experimenrt
tation is necessary. Continuing experimentation involves, naturally
enough, the possibility of making errors. Such errors are cited by the
enemies of democracy as the marks of inefficiency; conversely, they
maintain that authoritarianism is efficient. Without adequately
examining the facts of the matter, many Americans fall into the trap
to the extent of agreeing that inefficiency is a concomitant of freedom.
Actually, the supposition that totalitarianism is relatively more ef-
ficient has not been proved by history; it only appears to be borne out
because defenders of totalitarianism advance formulas which presumably
will fit any eventuality. And one of the most attractive aspects of
totalitarian theory is that a simple, dogmatic solution seems often the
easiest way out of a complicated problem.
Because there are as many interpretations of the American thesis
as there are Americans, the expression of an American's philosophy is
not likely to be either neat or dogmatic. Since it is far more difficult
to express an individualistic interpretation than a definitive body of
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doctrine, many Americans consider themselves incapable of explaining
our characteristics and values to those who must understand America if
we are to win friends abroad in the present struggle for men's minds.
The succeeding sections are presented simply to introduce some
areas of the American thesis which have caused difficulty for Americans
travelling and working abroad. An adequate knowledge of the event's
which have marked our development and of the people who have helped
make America what it is today can be gained only by an independent
examination of the source materials of American history.
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BASIC DOCUMENTS
The Declaration of Independence and the Constitution make up
the documents essential to an understanding of the American system
of government. Since there is a tendency among Americans to take
them for granted, a periodic rereading of these documents would
make every one of us more aware of their significance.
Although conditions and the times have changed considerably
since 1776, the fundamental values inherent in the Declaration of
Independence are still our essential beliefs.
And a basic understanding of the Constitution will afford
the American citizen a key to the complicated political and
economic problems of our troubled times; such an understanding
is absolutely necessary in the formulation of an enlightened
electorate.
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The Declaration of Independence (July 4, 1776)
When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for
one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected
them with another, and to assume among the Powers of the earth,
the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and
of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions
of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which
impel them to the separation.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are
created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with
certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty
and the pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights,
Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers
from the consent of the governed, That whenever any Form of
Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right
of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new
Government, laying its foundation on such principles and
organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most
likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed,
will dictate that Governments long established should not be
changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all
experience hath shown, that mankind are more disposed to
suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves
by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when
a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the
same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute
Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off
such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future
security. -Such has been the patient sufferance of these
Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains
them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history
of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated
injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the
establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To
prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.
He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and
necessary for the public good.
He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate
and pressing importance., unless suspended in their operation
till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he
has utterly neglected to attend to them.
He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation
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of large districts of people, unless those people would relin-
quish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right
inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.
He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual,
uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their Public
Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance
with his measures.
He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for
opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the
people.
He has refused for a loag time, after such dissolutions,
to cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative Powers,
incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large
for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed
to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions
within.
He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these
States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws of Naturaliza-
tion of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their
migration hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations
of Lands.
He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing
his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary Powers.
He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the
tenure or their offices, and the amount and payment of their
salaries.
He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither
swarms of Officers to harass our People, and eat out their
substance.
He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies
without the Consent of our legislature.
He has affected to render the Military independent of and
superior to the Civil Power.
He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction
foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws;
giving his Assent to their acts of pretended Legislation:
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For quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:
For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from Punishment for
any Murders vthich they should commit on the inhabitants of these
States:
Jury:
For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended
offences:
For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a
neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary govern-
ment, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an
example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule
in these Colonies:
For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable
Laws, and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Government:
For suspending our own Legislature, and declaring themselves
invested with Power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.
He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his
Protection and waging War against us.
He has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our
towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.
He is at this time transporting large armies of foreign
mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation and
tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & perfidy
scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally
unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.
He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the
high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the
executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves
by their Hands.
He-has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, as has
endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the
For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:
For imposing taxes on us without our Consent:
For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by
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merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an
undistinguished'destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.
In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for
Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have
been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince, whose
character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant,
is unfit to be the ruler of a free People.
Nor have We been wanting in attention to our Brittish
brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by
their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over
us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration
and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice
and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our
common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which, would
inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They
too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity.
We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces
our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind,
Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.
We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of
America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the
Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions,
do, in the Name, and by the Authority of the good People of
these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these United
Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent
States; that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the
British Crown, and that all political connection between them
and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally
dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have
full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances,
establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which
Independent States may of right do. And for the support of this
Declaration, with a firm reliance on the Protection of Divine
Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our
Fortunes and our sacred Honor.
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The Constitution of the Un.ted'States
We the People of the United States, in Order to form a
more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility,
provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare,
and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity,
do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States
of America.
Art, I
Sec. 1. All legislative Powers herein granted shall be vested
in a Congress of the United States, which shall consist of a
Senate and House of Representatives.
Sec. 2. The House of Representatives shall be composed of
Members chosen every second Year by the People of the several
States, and the Electors in each State shall have the Qualifica-
tions requisite for Electors of the most numerous Branch of the
State Legislature.
No Person shall be a Representative who shall not have
attained to the Age of twenty five Years, and been seven Years
a Citizen of the United States, and who shall not, when elected,
be an Inhabitant of that State in which he shall be chosen.
Representatives and direct Taxes shall be apportioned
among the several States which may be included within this
Union, according to their respective Numbers, which shall be
determined by adding to the whole Number of free Persons,
including those bound to Service for a Term of Years, and
excluding Indians not taxed, three fifths of all other Persons.
The actual Enumeration shall be made within three Years after
the first Meeting of the Congress of the United States, and
within every subsequent Term of ten Years, in such Manner as
they shall by Law direct. The Number of Representatives shall
not exceed one for every thirty Thousand, but each State shall
have at Least one Representative; and until such enumeration
shall be made, the State of New Hampshire shall be entitled to
chuse three, Massachusetts eight, Rhode-Island and Providence
Plantations one, Connecticut five, New-York six, New Jersey
four, Pennsylvania eight, Delaware one, Maryland six, Virginia
ten, North Carolina five, South Carolina five., and Georgia three.
When vacancies happen in the Representation from any State,
the Executive Authority thereof shall issue Write of Election
to fill such Vacancies.
The House of Representatives shall chuse their Speaker
and other Officers; and shall have the sole Power of Impeach-
ment.
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Sec. 3. The Senate of the United Staten shall be composed of
two Senators from each State, chosen by the Legislature thereof,
for six Years; and each Senator shall have one Vote.
Immediately after they shall be assembled in Consequence
of the first Election, they shall be divided as equally as my
be into three Classes. The Seats of the Senators of the first
Class shall be vacated at the Expiration of the second Year,
of the second Class at the Expiration of the fourth Year, and
of the third Class at the Expiration of the sixth Year, so that
one third may be chosen every second Year- and if Vacancies
happen by Resignation, or otherwise, during the Recess of the
Legislature of any State, the Executive thereof may make
temporary appointments until the next Meeting of the Legis-
lature, which shall then fill such Vacancies.
No Person shall be a Senator who shall not have attained
to the Age of thirty Years, and been nine Years a Citizen of
the United States, and who shall not, when elected, be an
Inhabitant of that State for which he shall be chosen,
The Vice President of the United States shall be President
of the Senate, but shall have no Vote, unless they be equally
divided.
The Senate shall ohuse their other Officers, and also a
President pro tempore, in the Absence of the Vice President,
or when he shall exercise the Office of President of the United
States.
The Senate shall have the sole Power to try all Impeach-
ments. When sitting for that Purpose, they shall be on Oath
or Affirmation. When the President of the United States is
tried, the Chief Justice shall presides. And no Person shall
be convicted without the Concurrence of two thirds of the
Members present.
Judgment in Cases of Impeachment shall not extend further
than to removal from Office., and disqualification to hold and
enjoy any Office of honor., Trust or Profit under the United
Statess but the Party convicted shall nevertheless-be liable
and subject to Indictment, Trial., Judgment and Punishment,
according to Law.
Sec. 4. The Times, Places and Manner of holding Elections for
Senators and Representatives, shall be prescribed in each State
by the Legislature thereof; but the Congress may at any time
by Law make or alter such Regulations, except as to the Places
of chasing Senators.
The Congress shall assemble at least once in every Year,
and such Meeting shall be on the first Monday in December,
unless they shall by law appoint a different Day.
Sec. 5. Each House shall be the Judge of the Elections, Returns
and Qualifications of its own Members, and a Majority of each
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shall constitute a Quorum to do Business; but a smaller Number
may adjourn from day to day, and may be authorized to compel
the Attendance of absent Members, in such Manner, and under such
Penalties as each House may provide.
Each House may determine the Rules of its Proceedings,
punish its Members for disorderly Behaviour, and, with the Con-
currence of two thirds, expel a Member.
Each House shall keep a Journal of its Proceedings, and
from time to time publish the same, excepting such Parts as
may in their Judgment require Secrecy; and the leas and Nays
of the Members of either House on any question shall, at the
Desire of one fifth of those Present, be entered on the Journal.
Neither House, during the Session of Congress, shall,
without, the Consent of the other, adjourn for more than three
days, nor to any other Place than that in which the two Houses
shall be sitting.
See. 6. The Senators and Representatives shall receive a Comr-
pensation for their Services, to be ascertained by Law, and
paid out of the Treasury of the United States. They shall in
all Cases, except Treason, Felony and Breach of the Peace, be
privileged from Arrest during their Attendance at the Session
of their respective Houses, and in going to and returning from
the same; and for any Speech or Debate in either House, they
shall not be questioned in any other Place.
No Senator or Representative shall, during the Time for
which he was elected, be appointed to any civil Office under
the Authority of the United States which shall have been
created, or the Emoluments whereof shall have been encreased
during such time: and no Person holding any Office under the
United States, shall be a Member of either House during his
Continuance in Office.
Sec. 7. A11 Bills for raising Revenue shall originate in the
House of Representatives; but the Senate may propose or concur
with Amendments as on other Bills.
Every Bill which shall have passed the House of Repre-
sentatives and the Senate, shall, before it become a Law,
be presented to the President of the United States; If he
approve he shall sign it, but if not he shall return it, with
his Objections to that House in which it shall have originated,
who shall enter the Objections at large on their Journal, and
proceed to reconsider it. If after such Reconsideration two
thirds of that House shall agree to pass the Bill, it shall
be sent, together with the Objections, to the other House, by
which it shall likewise be reconsidered, and if approved by
two thirds of that House, it shall become a Law. But in all
such Cases the Votes of both Houses shall be determined by
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yeas and Nays, and the Names of the Persons voting for and
against the Bill shall be entered on the Journal of each House
respectively. If any Bill shall not be returned by the President
within ten Days (Sundays excepted) after it shall have been
presented to him, the Same shall be a law, in like Manner as
if he had signed it, unless the Congress by their Adjournment
prevent its Return, in which Case it shall not be a Law.
Every Orders, Resolution, or Vote to which the Concurrence
of the Senate and House of Representatives may be necessary
(except on a question of Adjournment) shall be presented to
the President of the United States; and before the Same shall
take Effects, shall be approved by him., or being disapproved
by him, shall be repassed by two thirds of the Senate and
House of Representatives, according to the Rules and Limitations
prescribed in the Case of a Bill,
See, 8, The Congress shall have Power To lay and collect Taxes,
Duties, Imposts and Excises., to pay the Debts and provide for
the common Defence and general Welfare of the United States;
but all Duties, Imposts and Excises shall be uniform throughout
the United States;
To borrow Money on the credit of the United States;
To regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the
several States, and with the Indian Tribes;
To establish an uniform Rule of Naturalization, and uniform
Iaws on the subject of Bankruptcies throughout the United States;
To coin Money, regulate the Value thereof, and of foreign
Coin, and fix the Standard of Weights and Measures;
To provide for the Punishment of counterfeiting the Securities
and current Coin of the United States;
To establish Post offices and post Roads--
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To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by
securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive
Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries;
To constitute Tribunals inferior to the supreme Court;
To define and punish Piracies and Felonies committed on
the high Seas, and offences against the Law of Nations;
To declare War., grant Letters of Marque and Reprisal, and
make Rules concerning Captures on Land and Water;
To raise and support Armies, but no Appropriation of Money
to that Use shall be for a longer Term than two Years;
To provide and maintain a Navy"
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To make Rules for the Government and Regulation of the land
and naval Forces;
To provide for calling forth the Militia to execute the
Laws of the Union, suppress Insurrections and repel Invasions;
To provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining, the
Militia, and for governing such Part of them as may be employed
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in the Service of the United States., reserving to the States
respectively, the Appointment of the Officers, and the Authority
of training the Militia according to the discipline prescribed
by Congress;
To exercise exclusive Legislation in all Cases whatsoever,
over such District (not exceeding ten Miles square) as may, by
Cession of Particular States,, and the Acceptance of Congress,
become the Seat of the Government of the United States, and to
exercise like Authority over all Places purchased by the Consent
of the Legislature of the State in which the Same shall be, for
the Erection of Forts, Magazines, Arsenals, dock-Yards, and
other needful Buildings;-And
To make all Laws which shall be necessary and proper for
carrying into Execution the foregoing Powers, and all other
' Powers vested by this Constitution in the Government of the
United States, or in any Department or Officer thereof,
Sec, 9. The Migration or Importation of such Persons as any
of the States now existing shall think proper to admit, shall
not be prohibited by the Congress prior to the Year one thousand
eight hundred and eight, but a Tax or duty may be imposed on
such importation, not exceeding ten dollars for each Person.
The Privilege of the Writ of Habeas Corpus shall not be
suspended, unless when in Cases of Rebellion or Invasion the
public Safety may require it.
No Bill of Attainder or ex post facto law shall be passed,
No Capitation, or other direct, Tax shall be laid, unless
in Proportion to the Census or Enumeration herein before directed
to be taken,
No Tax or Duty shall be laid on Articles exported from
any State,
No Preference shall be given by any Regulation of Commerce
or Revenue to the Ports of one State over those of anthers nor
shall Vessels bound toe or from, one State, be obliged to enter,
clear, or pay Duties in another.
No Money shall be drawn from the Treasury, but in Consequence
of Appropriations made by Law; and a regular Statement and Account
of the Receipts and Expenditures of all public Money shall be
published from time to time.
No Title of Nobility shall be granted by the United States:
And no Person holding any Office of Profit or Trust under them,
shall, without the Consent of the Congress., accept of any present,
Emolument, Office, or Title, of any kind whatever, from any King,
Prince, or foreign State,
Sec, 10. No State shall enter into any Treaty, Alliance, or
Confederation; grant Letters of Marque and Reprisal; coin Money;
emit Bills of Credit; make any Thing but gold and silver Coin
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a Tender in Payment of Debts; pass any Bill of Attainder, ex post
facto Law, or Law impairing the-Obligation of Contracts, or grant
any Title of Nobility.
No State shall, without the Consent of the Congress, lay
any Imposts or Duties or Imports or Exports, except what may be
absolutely necessary for executing Ws inspection Laws, and
the not Produce of all Duties and Imposts, laid by any State on
Imports or Exports, shall be for the Use of the Treasury of the
United States; and all such Laws shall be subject to the Revision
and Controul of the Congress.
No State shall, without the Consent of Congress, lay any
Duty of Tonnage, keep Troops, or Ships of War in time of Peace,
enter into any Agreement or Compact with another State, or with
a foreign Power, or engage in War, unless actually invaded, or
in such imminent Danger as will not admit of delay.
Art. II
Sec. 1. The Executive Power shall be vested in a President of
the United States of America. He shall hold his Office during
the Term of four Years, and, together with the Vice President,
chosen for the same Term,, be elected, as follows
Each State shall appoint, in such ! nner as the Legislature
thereof may direct, a Number of Electors, equal to the whole
Number of Senators and Representatives to which the State may
be entitled in the Congress.- but no Senator or Representative,
or Person holding an Office of Trust or Profit under the United
States, shall be appointed an Elector.
The Electors shall meet in their respective States, and
vote by Ballot for two Persons, of whom one at least shall not
be an Inhabitant of the same State with themselves. And they
shall make a List of all the Persons voted for, and of the
Number of Votes for each; which List they shall sign and certify,
and transmit sealed to the Seat of the Government of the United
States, directed to the President of the Senate. The President
of the Senate shall, in the Presence of the Senate and House of
Representatives, open all the Certificates, and the Votes shall
then be counted. The Person having the greatest Number of Votes
shall be the President, if such Number be a Majority of the
whole Number of Electors appointed; and if there be more than
one who have such Majority, and have an equal Number of Votes,
then the House of Representatives shall immediately chose by
Ballot one of them for President; and if no Person have a
Majority, then from the five highest on the List the said
House shall in like Manner chuse the President. But in chusing
the President, the Votes shall be taken by States, the Repre-
sentation from each State having one Vote; A quorum for this
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Purpose shall consist of a Member or Members from two thirds of
the States, and a Majority of all the states shall be necessary
to a Choice. In every Case., after the Choice of the President,
the Person having the greatest Number of Votes of the Electors
shall be the Vice President. But if there should remain two
or more who have equal Votes, the Senate shall chuse from them
by Ballot the Vice President.
The Congress may determine the Time of chusing the Electors,
and the Day on which they shall give their Votes; which Day
shall be the same throughout the United States.
No Person except a natural born Citizen, or a Citizen of
the United States, at the time of the Adoption of this Constitution,
shall be eligible to the Office of President; neither shall any
Person be eligible to that Office who shall not have attained to
the Age of thirty five Years, and been fourteen Years a Resident
within the United States.
In Case of the Removal of the President from Office, or of
his Death, Resignation, or Inability to discharge the Powers and
Duties of the said Office, the Same shall devolve on the Vice
President, and the Congress may by Law provide for the Case of
Removal, Death, Resignation or Inability, both of the President
and Vice President, declaring what Officer shall then act as
President, and such Officer shall act accordingly, until the
Disability be removed, or a President shall be elected.
The President shall, at stated Times, receive for his
Services, a Compensation, which shall neither be encreased nor
diminished during the Pbriod for which he shall have been elected,
and he shall not receive within that Period any other Emolument
from the United States, or any of them.
Before he enter on the Execution of his Office, he shall
take the following Oath or Affirmations- "I do solemnly swear
(or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the Office of President
of the United States, and will to the best of my Ability., preserve,
protect and defend the Constitution of the United States."
Sec. 2. The President shall be Commander in Chief of the Army
and Navy of the United States, and of the Militia of the several
States, when called into the actual Service of the United States;
he may require the Opinion, in writing, of the principal Officer
in each of the executive Departments, upon any Subject relating
to the Duties of their respective Offices, and he shall have
Power to grant Reprieves and Pardons for Offences against the
United States, except in Cases of Impeachment.
He shall have power, by and with the Advice and Consent of
the Senate, to make Treaties, provided two thirds of the Senators
present concur; and he shall nominate, and by and with the Advice
and Consent of the Senate, shall appoint Ambassadors, other public
Ministers and Consuls, Judges of the supreme, Court, and all other
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Officers of the United States, whose appointments are not herein
otherwise provided for, and which shall be established by Laws
but the Congress may by Law vest the Appointment of such inferior
Officers, as they think proper, in the President alone, in the
Courts of Law, or in the Heads of Departments.
The President shall have Power to fill up all Vacancies that
may happen during the Recess of the Senate, by granting Commissions
which shall expire at the End of their next Session.
See, 3, He shall from time to time give to the Congress Infor-
mation of the State of the Union, and recommend to their considera-
tion such Measures as he shall judge necessary and expedient; he
may, on extraordinary Occasions, convene both Houses, or either
of them, and in Case of Disagreement between them, with Respect
to the Time of Adjournment, he may adjourn them to such Time as
he shall think proper; he shall receive Ambassadors and other
public Ministers; he shall take Care that the Laws be faithfully
executed, and shall Commission all the Officers of the United
States.
Sec, 4, The President, Vice President and all civil Officers
of the United States, shall be removed from Office on Impeachment
for, and conviction of,, Treason, Bribery, or other high Crimes
and Misdemeanors.
Sec. 1, The judicial Power of the United States, shall be vested
in one supreme Court, and in such inferior Courts as the Congress
may from time to time ordain and establish. The Judges, both of
the supreme and inferior Courts, shall hold their Offices during
good Behaviour and shall, at stated Times, receive for their
Services, a Compensation, which shall not be diminished during
their Continuance in Office.
Sec. 2. The Judicial Power shall extend to all Cases, in Law
and Equity, arising under this Constitution, the Laws of the
United States, and Treaties made, or which shall be made, under
their Authority-to all Cases affecting Ambassadors, other
public Ministers and Consuls-,-to all Cases of admiralty and
maritime Jurisdiction;-to Controversies to which the United
States shall be a Party;-to Controversies between two or more
States;-between a State and Citizens of another State ;between
Citizens of different States,-.between Citizens of the same
State claiming Lands under Grants of different States, and between
a State, or the Citizens thereof, and foreign States, Citizens
or Subjects.
In all Cases affecting Ambassadors, other public Ministers
and Consuls, and those in which a State shall be Party, the
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supreme Court shall have original Jurisdictions In all the other
Cases before mentioned, the supreme Court shall have appellate
Jurisdiction, both as to law and Fact, with such Exceptions,
and under such Regulations as the Congress shall make.
The Trial of all Crimes, except in Cases of Impeachment,
shall be by Jury; and such Trial shall be held in the State
where the said Crimes shall have been committed; but when not
committed within any State, the Trial shall be at such Place
or Places as the Congress may by Law have directed.
Sec. 3. Treason against the United States, shall consist only
in levying War against them, or in adhering to their Enemies,
giving them Aid and Comfort. No person shall be convicted of
Treason unless on the Testimony of two Witnesses to the same
overt Act, or on Confession in open Court.
The Congress shall have Power to declare the Punishment of
Treason, but no Attainder of Treason shall work Corruption of
Blood, or Forfeiture except during the Life of the Person
attainted.
Sec. 1. Full Faith and Credit shall be given in each State to
the public Acts, Records, and judicial Proceedings of every
other State. And the Congress may by general Laws prescribe
the Manner in which such Acts, Records and Proceedings shall
be proved, and the Effect thereof.
Sec. 2. The Citizens of each State shall be entitled to all
Privileges and Immunities of Citizens in the several States.
A Person charged in any State with Treason, Felony, or
other Crime, who shall flee from Justice, and be found in
another State from which he fled, be delivered up, to be removed
to the State having Jurisdiction of the Crime.
No person held to Service or Labour in one State, under
the laws thereof, escaping into another, shall, in Consequence
of any Law or Regulation therein,, be discharged from such Service
or Labour, but shall be delivered up on Claim of the Party to
whom such Service or Labour may be due.
Sec. 3. New States may be admitted by the Congress into this
Union; but no new State shall be formed or erected within the
Jurisdiction of any other State; nor any State be formed by
the Junction of two or more States, or Parts of States, without
the Consent of the Legislatures of the States concerned as well
as of the Congress.
The Congress shall have Power to dispose of and make all
needful Rules and Regulations respecting the Territory or other
Property belonging to the United States; and nothing in this
Constitution shall be so construed as to Prejudice any Claims of
the United States, or of any particular State.
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Sec. 4. The United States shall guarantee to every State in
this Union a Republican Form of Government, and shall protect
each of them against Invasion; and on Application of the Legis-
lature, or of the Executive (when the Legislature cannot be
convened) against domestic Violence.
Art. V
The Congress, whenever two thirds of both Houses shall
deem it necessary, shall propose Amendments to this Constitution,
or, on the Application of the Legislatures of two thirds of the
several States, shall call a Convention for proposing Amendments,
which, in either Case, shall be valid to all Intents and Raposea,,
as Part of this Constitution, when ratified by the Legislatures
of thf?ee fourths of the several States, or by Conventions in
three fourths thereof, as the one or the other Mode of Ratifi-
cation may be proposed by the Congress; Provided that no Amend-
ment which may be made prior to the Year One thousand eight
hundred and eight shall in any Manner affect the first and
fourth Clauses in the Ninth Section of the first Article; and
that no State, without its Consent,, shall be deprived of it's
equal Suffrage in the Senate.
Art, VI
All Debts contracted and Engagements entered into, before
the Adoption of this Constitution, shall be as valid against
the United States under this Constitution,, as under the Con-
federation.
This Constitution, and the Laws of the United States
which shall be made in Pursuance thereof; and all Treaties
made, or which shall be made,, under the Authority of the United
States, shall be the supreme Law of the Land; and the Judges
in every State shall be bound thereby, any Thing in the Consti-
tution or Laws of any State to the Contrary notwithstanding.
The Senators and Representatives before mentioned, and
the Members of the several State legislatures, and all executive
and judicial Officers, both of the United States and of the
several States, shall be bound by Oath or Affirmation, to
support this Constitution; but no religious Test shall ever be
required as a Qualification to any Office or public Trust under
the United States.
Art. VII
The Ratification of the Conventions of nine States, shall
be sufficent for the Establishment of this Constitution between
the States so ratifying the Same.
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Lrticles of Amendment to the Constitution. The first ten,
known as the Bill of Rights, were adopted in 1791, to assure
individuals of the protection of their rights as against the
central government. The Eleventh was adopted in 1798, the
Twelfth in 1804,7
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of
religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging
the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the
people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government
for a redress of grievances.
A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security
of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms,
shall not be infringed.
No Soldier shall, in time of peace be quartered in any
house, without the consent of the Owner, nor in time of war,
but in a manner to be prescribed by law.
The right of the people to be secure in their persons,
houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and,
seizures, shall not be *iolated, and no Warrants shall issue,
but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and
particularly describing the place to be searched, and the
persons or things to be seized.
No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or other-
wise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of
a Grand Jury except in cases arising in the land or naval forces,
or in the Militia, when in actual service in time of War or
public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same
offence to be twice put in Jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall
be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself,
nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process
of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, with-
out just compensation.
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In all criminal prosecutions the accused shall enjoy the
right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the
State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed,
which district shall have been previously ascertained by law,
and to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation;
to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have com-
pulsory process for obtaining Witnesses in his favor, and to
have the Assistance of Counsel for his defence,
In suits at common law, where the value in controversy
shall exceed twenty dollars, the right of trial by jury shall
be preserved, and no fact tried by a jury shall be otherwise
re-examined in any Court of the United States, than according
to the rules of the common law,
Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines
imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted,
The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights,
shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by
the people.
The powers not delegated to the United States by the
Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved
to the States respectively, or to the people,
The Judicial power of the United States shall not be
construed to extend to any suit in law or equity, commieneed
or prosecuted against one of the United States by Citizens
of another State or by Citizens or Subjects of any Foreign
State.
The Electors shall meet in their respective states, and
vote by ballot for President and Vice-President, one of wham,
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at least, shall not be an inhabitant of the same state with them-
selves; they shall name in their ballots the person voted for
as President, and in distinct ballots the person voted for as
Vice-President, and they shall make distinct lists of all persons
voted for as President, and of all persons voted for as Vice-
President, and of the number of votes for each., which lists they
shall sign and certify, and transmit sealed to the seat of the
government of the United States, directed to the President of
the Senate;- The President of the Senate sha119 in the presence
of the Senate and House of Representatives, open all the certifi-
cates and the votes shall then be counted;-The person having
the greatest number of votes for President., shall be the President,
if such number be a majority of the whole number of Electors
appointed; and if no person have such majority., then from the
persons having the highest numbers not exceeding three on the
list of those voted for as President., the House of Representatives
shall choose immediately, by ballot, the President, But in
choosing the President, the votes shall be taken by states, the
representation from each state having one vote; a quorum for
this purpose shall consist of a member or members from two-thirds
of the states, and a majority of all the states shall be necessary
to a choice. And if the House of Representatives shall not choose
a President whenever the r.I.1 t of choice shall devolve upon them.,
before the fourth day of parch next following., then the Vice-
President shall act as President, as in the case of the death
or other constitutional disability of the President.-The person
having the greatest number of votes as Vice-President., shall be
the Vice-President., if such number be a majority of the whole
number of Electors appointed, and if no person have a majority,
then from the two highest numbers on the list., the Senate shell
choose the Vice-President; a quorum for the purpose shall consist
of two-thirds of the whole number of Senators, and a majority
of the whole number shall be necessary to a choice. But no person
constitutionally ineligible to the office of President shall be
eligible to that of Vice-President of the United States.
(The three Articles following,, sometimes known as the Civil W
Amendments, were adopted respectively in 1865. 1868, and 1870,j
Sec. 1. Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as
a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly
convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place
subject to their jurisdiction.
Sec. 2, Congress shall have power to enforce this article by
appropriate legislation.
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Sec. 1. All persons born or naturalized in the United States,
and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the
United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State
shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges
or iumunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any
State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without
due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction
the equal protection of the laws.
Sec. 2. Representatives shall be apportioned among the several
States according to their respective numbers, counting the whole
number of persons in each State, excluding Indians not taxed.
But when the right to vote at any election for the choice of
electors for President and Vice-President of the United States,
Representatives in Congress, the Executive and Judicial officers
of a State, or the members of the Legislature thereof, is denied
to any of the male inhabitants of such State, being twenty-one
years of age, and citizens of the United States, or in any way
abridged, except for participation in rebellion, or other crime,
the basis of representation therein shall be reduced in the pro-
portion which the number of such male citizens shall bear to
the whole number of male citizens twenty-one years of age in
such State.
Sec. 3. No person shall be a Senator or Representative in
Congress, or elector of President and Vice President, or hold
any office, civil or military, under the United States, or
under any State, who, having previously taken an oath, as a
member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States,
or as a member of any State legislature, or as an executive
or judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution
of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or
rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the
enemies thereof. But Congress may by a vote of two-thirds
of each House, remove such disability.
Sec. 4. The validity of the public debt of the United States,
authorized by law, including debts incurred for payment of
pensions and bounties for services in suppressing insurrection
or rebellion, shall not be questioned. But neither the United
States nor any State shall assume or pay any debt or obligation
incurred in aid of insurrection or rebellion against the United
States, or any claim for the loss or emancipation of any slave;
but all such debts, obligations and claims shall be held illegal
and void.
Sec. 5. The Congress shall have power to enforce, by appropriate
legislation, the provisions of this article.
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Sec, 1. The right of citizens of the United States to vote aball
not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State
on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude.
Sec. 2. The Congress shall have power to enforce this article
by appropriate legislation.
LThe six Articles following, sometimes known as the Reform
Amendments, were adopted respectively in 1913, 1913, 1919, 1920, 1933,
and 19332
The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes on
incomes from whatever source derived without apportionment among
the several States and without regard to any census or enumneration.
The Senate. of the United States shall be composed of two '
Senators from each state, elected by the people thereof, for six
years; and each Senator shall have one vote. The electors in
each state shall have the qualifications requisite for electors
of the most numerous branch of the state legislatures.
When the vacancies happen in the representation of any
state in the Senate, the executive authority of such state shall
issue writs of election to fill such vacancies: Provided, that
the legislature of any state may empower the executive thereof
to make temporary appointment until the people fill the vacancies
by election as the legislature may direct.
This amendment shall not be so construed as to affect the
election or term of any Senator chosen before it becomes valid
as part of the Constitution.
Sec. 1. After one year from the ratification of this article
the manufacture, sale, or transportation of intoxicating liquors
within, the importation thereof into, or the exportation thereof
from the United States and all territory subject to the juris-
diction thereof for beverage purposes is hereby prohibited.
Sec. 2. The Congress and the several States shall have the
concurrent power to enforce this article by appropriate legis-
lation.
Sec. 3. This article shall be inoperative unless it shall have
been ratified as an amendment to the Constitution by the
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legislatures of the several States, as provided in the Constitu-
tion, within seven years from the date of the submission hereof
to the-States by the Congress,
The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall
not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State
on account of sex.
Congress shall have power to enforce this article by
appropriate legislation.
Sec. 1. The terms of the President and Vice President shall
end at noon on the 20th day of Januarys and the terms of Senators
and Representatives at noon on the 3d day of January, of the
years in which such terms would have ended if this article had
not been ratified; and the terms of their successors shall then
begin.
Sec. 2. The Congress shall assemble at least once in every
year, and such meeting shall begin at noon on the 3d day of
January, unless they shall by law appoint a different day.
See. 3. If, at the time fixed for the beginning of the term
of the President, the President elect shall have died, the
Vice President elect shall become President. If a President
shall not have been chosen before the time fixed for the
beginning of his term, or if the President elect shall have
failed to qualify, then the Vice President elect shall act
as President until a President shall have qualified; and the
Congress may by law provide for the case wherein. neither a
President elect nor a Vice President shall have qualified,
declaring who shall then act as President, or the manner in
which one who is to act shall be selected, and such person
shall act accordingly until a President or Vice President shall
have qualified.
Sec. 4. The Congress may by law provide for the case of the
death of any of the persons from whom the House of Representa-
tives may choose a President whenever the right of choice
shall have devolved upon them, and for the case of the death
of any of the persons from whom the Senate may choose a Vice
President whenever the right of choice shall have devolved
upon them.
See. 5. Sections 1 and 2 shall take'effect on the 15th day
of October following the ratification of this article.
Sec. 6. This article shall be inoperative unless it shall
have been ratified as an amendment to the Constitution by
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the legislatures of three-fourths of the several States within
seven years from the date of its submission.
See, 1, The eighteenth article of amendment to the Constitution
of the United States hereby repealed.
Sec, 2, The transportation or importation into any State,
Territory, or possession of the United States for delivery or
use therein of intoxicating liquors, in violation of the laws
thereof, is hereby prohibited,
Sec, 3, This article shall be inoperative unless it shall have
been ratified as an amendment to the Constitution by conventions
in the several States, as provided in the Constitution., within
seven years from the date of the submission hereof to the States
by the Congress.
No person shall be elected to the office of the President
more than twice, and no person who has held the office of
President, or acted as President., for more than two years of
a term to which some other person was elected President shall
be elected to the office of the President more than once.
But this Article shall not apply to any person holding the
office of President when this Article was proposed by the Con-
gress, and shall not prevent any person who may be holding the
office of President, or acting as President, during the term
within which this Article becomes operative from holding the
office of President or acting as President during the remainder
of such term,
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THE ROLE OF THE INDIVIDUAL IN AMERICA
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THE ROLE OF THE INDIVIDUAL IN AMERICA
If there is a single postulate upon which the American
system of government is founded it is the idea that the human
individual is supremely valuable. The first ten amendments to
the Federal Constitution, the so-called Bill of Rights, explicitly
affirm individual rights which were conceived by the Founding
Fathers as inherent in every human being.
The notion of inherent or natural rights did not originate
with Madison, Jefferson and their colleagues; it had a notable
tradition in the philosophy of Western Europe, particularly in
that of Great Britain. Perhaps the best known of the British
political philosophers whose ideas were read and accepted by
the Founding Fathers was John Locke (1632-1704). Basic in Locke's
most important works, Essay Concerning Human Understanding and
Two.-Treatises of Civil Government., are the ideas that any govern-
want is but a necessary evil, and that no government which
would deprive man of his natural rights should be tolerated.
From the founding of the American Republic to the present
day there have been numerous practical denials of the concept
of the supremecy of the human individual. The perpetuation of
the system of Negro slavery for a period of three quarters of a
century after-the birth of the republic is a notable case in
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point. Yet very few contemporary Americans would insist as did
John C.'Calhoun a little over a century ago that the Negro is of
less inherent value than the white man. Despite continuing
injustices resulting from the practical neglect of the concept,
the basic premise is as real and as meaningful to contemporary
political leaders as it was to members of the First Continental
Congress. If our society ever reaches a point at which the
concept is officially denied or at which we cease to strive for
its practical realization, we will have lost sight of a
principle basic to our American way of life.
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Thomas Paine (1737-1809)
Perhaps the most effective propagandist of the American Revolution
was English-born Thomas Paine, pamphleteer par excellence. Unlike
the aristocratic Jefferson, Paine sprang directly from the common
people. As a result of his humble origins he was ideally suited
to interpret the political philosophy of John Locke and other
notable English theorists for the average Anglo-American colonist.
In The Rights of Man Paine expressed his view of the relationship
between the individual and the state.
Individuals themselves, each in his own personal and
sovereign right, entered into a compact with each other
to produce a government: and this is the only mode in
which governments have a right to arise, and the only
principle on tehich they have a right to exist. (The
Rights of Man, Part I: 1791.)
Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882)
To Ralph Waldo Emerson the popular American version of the
doctrine of the free individual was the beginning, rather than
the end, of social philosophy. As a philosopher Emerson
rejected all systems which emphasized the many; he developed
an interpretation of life which was robustly optimistic and
highly individualistic. Perhaps nowhere else in his writings
is his emphasis on individualism more clear than in his
notable essay Self-Reliance.
Let a man then know his worth, and keep things under
his feet. Let him not peep or steal, or skulk up and
down with the air of a charity-boy, a bastard, or an
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interloper in the world which exists for him. But the
man in the street, finding no worth in himself which
corresponds to the force which built a tower or
sculptured a marble god, feels poor when he looks on
these. To him a palace, a statue, or a costly book
have an alien and forbidding air, much like a gay
equipage, and seem to say like that, "Who are you,
Sir?" Yet they all are his, suitors for his notice,
petitioners to his faculties that they will come out
and take possession. The picture waits for my verdict;
it is not to command me, but I am to settle its claims
to praise. That popular fable of the sot who was
picked up dead-drunk in the street, carried to the
duke's house, washed and dressed and laid in the duke's
bed, and, on his waking, treated with all obsequious
ceremony like the duke, and assured that he had been
insane, owes its popularity to the fact that it symbolizes
so well the state of man, who is in the world a sort of
sot, but now and then wakes up, exercises his reason and
finds himself a true prince. (Self-Reliance: 1811.)
Henry David Thoreau (1817-1862)
One of the most individualistic thinkers and writers of a highly
individualistic age was Henry David Thoreau. Many of his writings
were marked by hostility toward what he deemed the unjustified
expansion of government at the expense of the individual. His
views were colored particularly by such events as the Mexican
War, a war which he felt was fought simply to enrich the slavocracy.
It was in direct opposition to the southern expansionism of the
1840's that Thoreau penned his now famous pamphlet "Resistance to
Civil Government," a resounding statement of individual rights.
Government is an expedient by which men would fain succeed
in letting one another alone; and when it is most expedient,
the governed are most let alone by it.
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The progress from an absolute to a limited monarchy, from
a limited monarchy to a democracy, is a progress toward a
true respect for the individual. Is a democracy, such as
we know it, the last improvement possible in government?
Is it not possible to take a step further toward recognizing
and organizing the rights of man? There will never be a
really free and enlightened State, until the State comes
to recognize the individual as a higher and independent
power, from which all its own power and authority are
derived, and treats him accordingly. ("Resistance to
Civil Government" in Aesthetic Papers: 1849.)
Lord Bryce (1838-1922)
About a century after the creation of the United States there was
published a comprehensive analysis of American institutions and
character by an extraordinarily perceptive Englishman. The work
was The American Commonwealth by James Bryce, historian and
diplomat. In general Lord Bryce was very favorably impressed
with America; in particular he understood individualism to be
at the basis of the American way of life.
The State governments of 1776 and the National government of
1789 started from ideas, mental habits, and administrative
practice generally similar to those of contemporary England....
Everything tended to make the United States in this respect
more English than England, for the circumstances of colonial
life, the process of settling the western wilderness, the
feelings evoked by the struggle against George III., all
went to intensify individualism, the love of enterprise,
and the pride in personal freedom. And from that day to
this, individualism, the love of enterprise, and the pride
in personal freedom, have been deemed by Americans not only
their choicest, but their peculiar and exclusive possessions.
(The Ame~ricati Commonwealth, Part V: 1888.)
Harold Laski (1893-1950)
Harold Laski, British socialist and theoretician of the Labour
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Party, was certainly no friend of laissez-faire capitalism. At
times his criticism of America rankled as deeply as had Charles
Dickens, a century earlier. Yet in his volume The American
Democracy Laski expressed admiration for the American experiment
as a whole and for American individualism in particular.
In its essence, American individualism, as Tocqueville
encountered it, was a sense of freedom born of the
knowledge that no barriers denied the citizen's right
to move forward. That sense of freedom gave him hope
and energy and that faith in ever-widening horizons
which bespeaks the capacity of adaptation to change.
No doubt the hold of this idea of equality has waxed
and waned at different periods in American history.
But the permanent reality it has thus far implied is
as evident in the letters of Crevecoeur at the beginning
of the republic's history as in the poetry of Walt
Whitman or in that remarkable speech of Franklin Roosevelt
when he accepted the office of president for the first
time. It is the affirmation that no American need
fear anything save fear itself; and the real safeguard
against fear is the principle of equality. It is surely
a significant thing that each party in the history of
the United States, the Communist Party included, has
always claimed to inherit this tradition; and it can-
not, indeed, die so long as there are Americans, men
and women alike, who seek to enforce its reality in
each successive age. (The erican Democrac
pp. 718-719: 1948.)
Thomas Vernor Smith (1890- )
Thomas Vernor Smith, American teacher of philosophy, has written
widely on the subjects of America and democracy. Perhaps his
greatest single contribution to an understanding of the American.
thesis is his ability to popularize the ideas basic to the,
democratic way of life.
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No majority will be of the democratic state of mind with
reference to minorities until it sees through the group
miasma to the individuals who make up the minorities. No
minority will be of the democratic state of mind with
reference to the majority, or indeed with reference to
other minorities, until it sees through the group miasmas
to the individuals who constitute the majority and who
make up all minority groups. It is the individual who
stands always at the heart of the entire enterprise. He
alone can invest anything with a state of mind., because he
alone has a mind. He alone can invest anybody with
tenderness, wistfulness, pathos; because he alone has a
heart. The Democratic Way 2ff Life, p. 18: 1951.)
Alfred North Whitehead (1861-1947)
Possessing one of the great seminal minds of Western philosophy,
English-born Alfred North Whitehead found time during a long
career of teaching in England and the United States to make
penetrating comments on American society. His analysis on
"The Permanence of Change" emphasizes the danger to individual
rights which may result from a sense of complacency.
My fear for humanity is that we may lose it. One of the
few places where it is still free is here in the United
States. I don't say there aren't ways in which you could
improve. I think there are regions where you would do well
to reduce your rate of murders, - but even allowing for
Chicago at its worst, in the 1920'x, before your authoriites
stepped in and put a stop to it, life in general, your life,
my life, is less subject to interference and less in danger
here than any place else on earth. It is only in certain
happy ages and lands that conditions are favorable to the
development of talent - Greece in the fifth and fourth
centuries B.C. was one; Rome in the first century was
another; and even then the range of talent elicited by
the temporarily favorable conditions is a limited one;
not nearly the whole range of potential talents or of
gifted individuals receives the needed encouragement.
And when those fortunate times do come, we don't know
how to keep them going. ("'the Permanence of Change"
in The Atlantic: April 1954.)
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A system of government within which all individuals are
treated as equals before the law is a relatively new human
experience. Although as a result of a combination of circum-
stances such a country as England was able to grow into democracy,
the attempt to found a new nation on the democratic principle
of equality before the law was unique at the time the American
Constitution was drafted. The adoption of such a constitutional
system was the result of extending the concept of the supreme
value of the individual to its logical conclusion; the adoption
of any other system would have made a mockery of that fundamental
postulate.
When Thomas Jefferson declared in the Declaration of
Independence "...that all men are created equal...," he did
not mean to imply that all men were equally endowed by nature
with intelligence, character or material goods; he meant only
that all men were equal before the law. The founding fathers
were far too practical to insist that creating a democracy
involved levelling down everyone to a prescribed standard.
So they tempered the democratic element by designing a
system in which the individual was left ample freedom to
develop so long as he did not interfere with. the activities of
his fellow citizens. Naturally interpretations of what constitutes
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interference have varied as the combination of political,
economic, and human conditions have changed. Despite these
changes democracy has remained the cornerstone upon which the
American constitutional system has developed.
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Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826)
More than any other American of his dramatic age, Thomas Jefferson
was the spokesman of liberalism and Americanism. While he was a
political philosopher of the first order, he was also pre-eminently
a successful political leader. Despite criticism from his
federalist opponents that he was hopelessly visionary, he never
failed to recognize that the development of his ideal America
was subject to practical considerations. Nothing was essentially
more practical than his espousal of democracy: it was simply the
best of a series of evils.
...And where else will ...(on]...find the origin of just
power, if not in the majority of the society? Will it be
in the minority? Or in the individual of that minority?
(Letter to Major John Cartwright: June 5, 1824.)
John Marshall (1755-1835)
Born on the Virginia frontier and possessing only a very fragmentary
formal education, John Marshall sat as Chief Justice of the United
States Supreme Court from 1801 until his death in 1835. During
this period he wrote some of the most significant legal precedents
in our history, and succeeded in raising the Supreme Court from
an ignominious position to one of power and majesty. Despite
continuing pressure from anti-democratic elements Justice Marshall
never wavered in his decision that the Constitution was an instru-
ment of, by and for the people.
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The government of the Union, then, is emphatically and truly
a government of the people. In form and in substance it
emanates from them. Its powers are granted by them, and are
to be exercised directly on them and for their benefit.
(McCulloch vs. Maryland: 1819.)
John Quincy Adams (1767-1848)
John Quincy Adams had a truly remarkable record of service to
the American Republic: member of the diplomatic corps, Secretary
of State, sixth president of the United States, and finally
Congressman from Massachusetts. Although as president he suffered
political attacks which grew more and more personal and although
he lacked the winning personality of a master politician, he
never lost his faith in democracy and constitutional government.
While dwelling with pleasing satisfaction upon the superior
excellence of our political institutions, let us not be un-
mindful that liberty is power; that the nation blessed with
the largest portion of liberty must in proportion to its
numbers be the most powerful nation upon earth, and that
the tenure of power by man is, in the moral purposes of his
Creator, upon condition that it shall be exercised to ends
of beneficence, to improve the condition of himself and his
fellowmen. (First Message to Congress: 18250
Alexis de Toequeville (1805-1859)
Alexis de Tocqueville, French liberal politician and writer,
was one of the most perceptive and sympathetic observers of the
American experiment. Reviewing in his monumental Democracy in
America the advantages and disadvantages of living in the United
States in the 1830's, he cast an eloquent affirmative vote for
democracy.
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When the rich alone govern, the interest of the poor is
always endangered; and when the poor make the laws, that
of the rich incurs very serious risks. The advantage of
democracy does not consist, therefore, as has sometimes
been asserted, in favoring the prosperity of all, but
simply in contributing to the well-being of the greatest
possible number.-ibid. ("The.Real Advantages that American
Society Derives from Democratic Government" in Democracy
in America: 1835.)
Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865)
One of Abraham Lincoln's truly great qualities was his ability
to understand the hopes and fears of the average man. No American
president has ever been more clearly aware that he was the
product of the democratic process. And he never ceased to view
his position of responsibility as a stewardship entrusted to
him by the people.
Most governments have been based, practically, on the denial
of the equal rights of men...; ours began by affirming those
rights. They said, some men are too ignorant, and vicious to
share in government. Possibly so, said we; and, by your
system, you would always keep them ignorant, and vicious. We
proposed to give all a chance; and we expected the weak to
grow stronger, the ignorant, wiser; and all better, and
happier together.
We made the experiment; and the fruit is before us. Look
at it - think of it....(Fragment from Writings: July 1, 1854?)
Walt Whitman (1819-1892)
"The Good Gray Poet," perhaps more than any other American writer,
was the spokesman for an ebunt and optimistic America. Both
in his poetry and in his prose Walt Whitman expressed confidence
in American democracy. Born in Long Island, New York, Whitman
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worked as a school teacher, a newspaper reporter, a laborer, a
government clerk, and a volunteer hospital worker is Washington
during the Civil war; obviously such a wide-range of experiences
increased his understanding of the democratic process and the
American people.
The purpose of democracy -- supplanting old belief in the
necessary absoluteness of established dynastic rulership,
temporal, ecclesiastic, and scholastic, as furnishing the
only security against chaos, crime, and ignorance -- is,
through many transmigrations, and amid endless ridicules,
arguments, and ostensible failures, to illustrate, at all
hazards, this doctrine or theory that man, properly trained
in sanest, highest freedom, may and must become a law, and
series of laws, unto himself, surrounding and providing
for, not only his own personal control, but all his relations
to other individuals, and to the State; and that, while
other theories, as in the past histories of nations, have
proved wise enough, and indispensable perhaps for their
conditions, this, as matters now stand in our civilized
world, is the only scheme worth working from, as
warranting results like those of Nature's laws, reliable,
when once establish'd to carry on themselves. (Democratic
Vistas: 1870.)
Thomas Woodrow Wilson (1856-1924)
In his first Inaugural Address Woodrow Wilson, scholar turned
political reformer, reaffirmed his philosophy of the New Freedom
which he had enunciated during the presidential campaign. Since
he had read and written extensively on the problems of the
American democracy, he was in an especially favorable position
to restore democratic practices where they seemed to be faltering.
His address on the New Freedom is one of the most notable
statements of democratic faith in our political literature.
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The hope of the United States in the present and in the
future is the same that it has always been: it is the
hope and confidence that out of unknown homes will come
men who will constitute themselves the masters of industry
and of politics. The average hopefulness, the average
welfare, the average enterprise, the average initiative,
of the United States are the only things that make it rich.
We are not rich because a few gentlemen direct our industry;
we are rich because of our own intelligence and our own
industry. America does not consist of men who get their
names into the newspapers; America does not consist
politically of the men )kho set themselves up to be political
leaders; she does not consist of the men who do most of her
talking, - they are important only so far as they speak for
that great voiceless multitude of men who constitute the
great body and the saving force of the nation. Nobody who
cannot speak the common thought, who does not move by the
common impulse, is the man to speak for America, or for any
of her future purposes. Only he is fit to speak who knows
the thoughts of the great body of citizens, the men who go
about their business every day, the men who toil from
morning till night, the men who go home tired in the evenings,
the men who are carrying on the things we are so proud of.
("Life Comes from the Soil" in The New Freed om: 1913,?)
Bernard Augustine DeVoto (1897- )
Born in Ogden, Utah Bernard Augustine DeVoto has served as a college
professor and a writer both of fiction and non-fiction. In his
capacity as a self-styled "village atheist" he has offered much
valuable criticism of our society. As editor of "The Easy Chair"
column in Harper's Magazine he has commented at length on the
American scene.
Sure the people are stupid; the human race is stupid.
Sure Congress is an inefficient instrument of government.
But the people are not stupid enough to abandon representa-
tive government for any other kind, including government by
the guy who knows. They have just had to fight their worst
war to get three such governments out of the way, and may
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have to fight another one to dispose of a fourth. And bad
as our system is, it is more effective than those governments.
Their system has been tried repeatedly since Plato (a little
liberal who understood that the people are stupid) first
proposed it and in the end it never works. They are
efficient at starting wars but not much else. I'd rather
have the efficiency at finishing them, as we have always
shown we have, and at keeping the train on the tracks, as
we have done. It may be a crude criterion but we are the
oldest form of government now operating: we have outlasted
every other political system in the world. ("The Easy Chair"
in Harper's Ua a2 e: November 1950.)
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THE AMERICAN POLITICAL SYSTEM
Essentially the American political system is a system based upon
law: the Federal Constitution and interpretations derived therefrom.
In order to avoid the authoritarian patterns so common among eighteenth
century governments of Europe, the Founding Fathers created a system
with an elaborate set of checks and balances. By means of such a de-
vice as the careful separation of executive, legislature and judiciary,
they hoped to insure against the ascendency of an authoritarian executive
or legislature. Also basic to the scheme of checks and balances was
the federal system, in which the political authority is divided among
self-governing parts and the central whole, each operating within a
specified sphere of action.
The Constitution set up a representative democraev. Unlike a
"pure" democracy, where the custom is practicable only among small units
involved with simple issues, voters in a representative democracy.wield
influence through officials selected to express and enforce their will.
Also included in the American system are the use of such forma as the
initiative, referendum and recall, which give the American citizen a
more or less direct voice in his government.
While the American constitutional framework has not been altered
significantly since 1789, governmental forms and functions have changed
greatly. Governments at all levels, particularly the federal government,
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have grown enormously: the electorate has expanded until it includes
virtually all adults, both men and women; political parties have come
to be indispensable adjuncts to government; and the presidency has
attained a commanding position, threatening at times to upset the
delicate balances painstakingly erected by the Founders of the Republic.
There are a number of reasons as to why the forms and functions
have changed so significantly. First, there has been a tremendous
growth of population, particularly since 1900. Second, America has
possessed natural resources in sufficient quantity to assure successful
large-scale industrialization. Third, the rise to a position of a
super-power has brought with it an inevitable involvement in a series
of costly world wars and depressions. These and many other factors
have marked the expansion of government in all areas.
Despite significant changes in the forms and functions of govern-
ment the Federal Constitution remains the supreme law of the land; any
step taken by a political group must be viewed against the backdrop of
the Constitution. It is the responsibility of each and every American
citizen both to understand the Constitution as it was originally
conceived and to take particular note of the developments of the last
165 years.
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John Adams (1735-1826)
Born in Boston and educated at Harvard College John Adams was truly one
of the giants of the American Revolution. There is little doubt that
during the bustling 1770's Adams earned the title of "the Atlas of
American Independence." It was he who carried the difficult fight for
the Declaration of Independence, for which neither the Congress nor the
people as a whole were entirely ready. As a political philosopher Adams
made significant contributions to the infant Republic. In his Thoughts
on Government he emphasized the value of a separation of powers in
general and an independent judiciary in particular.
The dignity and stability of government in all its branches, he
morals of the people, and every blessing of society depends L8ia
so much upon an upright and skillful administration of justice
that the judicial power ought to be distinct from both the legis-
lative and executive, and Independent from both, as both should be
checks upon that. The judges, therefore, should be always men of
learning and experience in the laws, of exemplary morals, great
patience, calmness, coolness, and attention. Their minds should
not be distracted with jarring interest; they should not be de-
pendent upon any man, or body of men. To these ends, they should
hold estates for life in their offices; or, in other words, their
commissions should be during good behavior, and their salaries
ascertained and established by law. (Thoughts on Government: 1776.)
George Washington (1732-1799)
No one during the Revolution believed in the cause of American nation-
alism more completely than George Washington. In the face of seemingly
insuperable obstacles he worked tirelessly for coordinated effort among
the thirteen colonies. Yet even after the experiences of five years of
such an effort, Washington in 1781 was not at all sure that the impulse
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toward union was stronger than it had been in 1776. In the following
letter he expressed his dissatisfaction on the matter of political
cooperation.
Certain I am that unless Congress speaks in a more decisive tone;
unless they are vested with powers by the several States competent
to the great purposes of War, or assume them as matter of right;
and they, and the states respectively, act with more energy than
they hitherto have done, that our Cause is lost. We can no longer
drudge on in the old way. By ill-timing the adoption of measures,
by delays in the execution of them, or by unwarrantable jealousies,
we incur enormous expences, and derive no benefit from them. One
state will comply with a requisition of Congress, another neglects
to do it, a third executes it by halves, and all differ either in
the manner, the matter, or so much in point of time, that we are
always working up hill, and ever shall be (while such a system as
the present one, or rather want of one prevails) unable to apply
our strength or resources to'any advantage.
This my dear Sir is plain language to a member of Congress; but it
is the language of truth and friendship. It is the result of long
thinking, close application, and strict observation. I see one
Army branching into thirteen; and instead of looking up to Congress
as the supreme controuling power of the United States, are con-
sidering themselves as dependent on their respective States. In a
word, I see the powers of Congress declining too fast for the
consequence and respect which is due to them as the grand repre-
sentative body of America, and am fearful of the consequences of it.
(Letter to Joseph Jones, a delegate from Virginia to the Continental
Congress: May 31, 1781.)
James Madison (1751-1836)
Even before the Declaration of Independence was signed a committee to
draw up articles of confederation had been appointed by the Continental
Congress. But where the political issue of independence was settled
very quickly, the formal sanction of confederation was not realized
until 1781. Then, as the deficiencies and weaknesses of the Articles
became more and more apparent, there was a growing awareness among the
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political leaders that a stronger central government was needed. In
answer to this need the constitution was framed and presented for the
approval of the several states in 1787. During the ensuing controversy
over the adoption of the Constitution, Alexander Hamilton, James Madison,
and John Jay penned a series of supporting letters, which was published
in various New York newspapers and later collected in book form as The
Federalist. Few if any other publicists applied history, political
philosophy, and logic with more effect did these three men. In Number
39 James Madison sought to explain how the proposed government would be
both federal and national in scope.
If we try the Constitution by its last relation to the authority
by which amendments are to be made, we find it neither wholly
NATIONAL nor wholly FEDERAL. Were it wholly national, the supreme
and ultimate authority would reside in the MAJORITY of the people
of the Union; and this authority would be competent at all times,
like that of a majority of every national society, to alter or
abolish its established government. Were it wholly federal, on
the other hand, the concurrence of each State in the Union would
be essential to every alteration that would be binding on all.
The mode provided by the plan of the convention is not founded on
either of these principles. In requiring more than a majority,
and particularly in computing the proportion by STATES, not by
CITIZENS, it departs from the NATIONAL and advances towards the
FEDERAL character; in rendering the concurrence of less than the
whole number of States sufficient, it loses again the FEDERAL and
partakes of the NATIONAL character.
The proposed Constitution, therefore, is, in strictness, neither a
national nor a federal Constitution, but a composition of both. In
its foundation it is federal, not national; in the sources from
which the ordinary powers of the government are drawn, it is partly
federal and partly national; in the operation of these powers, it
is national, not federal; in the extent of them, again, it is
federal, not national; and, finally, in the authoritative mode of
introducing amendments, it is neither wholly federal nor wholly
national. (Number 39 of The Federalist: 1788.)
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John Marshall (1755-1835)
Appointed Chief Justice of the'United States Supreme Court in 1801,
John Marshall repeatedly used his position to affirm the principle that
the central government was a national government. By his intellectual
force and prestige he made the judiciary an advocate of the concept of
national authority at a time when the executive and the legislature were
more inclined to emphasize national limitations than national strengths.
His decision in the case of Cohens v. Virginia was perhaps typical 7.F
his many affirmations of national power.
That the United States form, for many and for most important
purposes, a single nation, has not yet been denied. In war we are
one people. In making peace we are one people. In all commercial-
regulations we are one and the same people. In many other respects
the American people are one, and the government which is alone
capable of controlling and managing their interests in all these
respects, is the government of the Uniorf. It is their government,
and in that character they have no other. America has chosen to
be, in many respects, and to many purposes, a nation; and for all
these purposes her government is complete; to all these objects it
is competent. The people have declared that in the exercise of all
the powers given for these objects it is supreme. It can, then,
in effecting these objects, legitimately control all individuals
or governments within the American territory. The constitution
and laws of a State, so far as they are repugnant to the consti-
tution and laws of the United States, are absolutely void. These
States are constituent parts of the United States. They are members
of one great empire-for some purposes sovereign, for some purposes
subordinate. (Cohens v. Virginia: 1821.)
Andrew Jackson (1767-1845)
Fundamental in the nature of every government is the extent of its
legitimate authority. Not every American accepted Chief Justice
Marshall's interpretation of the Constitution that the national
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government could control all governments within its territory. In 1832,
as a result of a complicated set of circumstances, South Carolina assert-
ed her "right" to suspend the operation of the federal tariff. President
Andrew Jackson's answer was prompt and decisive: he warned the people
of South Carolina that they must not exercise this pretended right and
he reminded them that the statutes enacted under the Constitution were
"the supreme law of the land."
The States severally have not retained their entire sovereignty.
It has been shown that in becoming parts of a nation, not members
of a league, they surrendered many of their essential parts of
sovereignty. The right to make treaties, declare war, levy taxes,
exercise exclusive judicial and legislative powers, were all of
them functions of sovereign power. The States, then, for all these
important purposes were no longer sovereign. The allegiance of
their citizens was transferred, in the first instance, to the
Government of the United States; they became American citizens and
owed obedience to the Constitution of the United States and to
laws made in conformity with the powers it vested in Congress.
This last position has not been and can not be denied. How, then,
can that State be said to be sovereign and independent whose
citizens owe obedience to laws not made by it and whose magistrates
are sworn to disregard those laws when they come in conflict with
those passed by another? (Proclamation of President Andrew
Jackson: December 10, 1832,)
William Henry Seward (1801-1872)
As the political and economic gulf between the North and South continued
to widen, the doctrine of states rights was enunciated more and more
frequently. During the Senate debates leading u Coz l ,romise of
1850 John C. Calhoun, able and brilliant South Carolinian, restated the
Southern interpretation of the Constitution, an interpretation which
challenged the right of the Congress to appropriate territories in the
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West. During the most heated part of the controversy William Henry
Seward, Senator from New York and later Lincoln's Secretary of State,
reaffirmed the northern position that the National Government was
ultimately sovereign.
Even senators speak of the Union as if it existed only by consent,
and, as it seems to be implied,, by the assent of the legislatures
of the states. On the contrary, the union was not founded in
voluntary choice, nor does it exist by voluntary consent.
A union was proposed to the colonies by Franklin and others, in
1754; but such was their aversion to an abridgment of their on
importance, respectively, that it was rejected even under the
pressure of a disastrous invasion by France.
A union of choice was proposed to the colonies in 1775; but so
strong was their opposition, that they went through the war of
independence without having established more than a mere council
of consultation.
But with independence came enlarged interests of agriculture--
absolutely new interests of manufactures-interests of commerce,,
of fisheries, of navigation, of a common domain, of common debts,,
of common revenues and taxation, of the administration of justice,
of public defence, of public honor; in short, interests of common
nationality and sovereignty-interests which at last compelled the
adoption of a more perfect union -a National Government....
The Union, then, is, not because merely that men chose that it shall
be,, but because some government must exist here, and no other govern-?
ment than this can. If it could be dashed to atoms by the whirlwind,
the lightning, or the earthquake, today, it would rise again in all
its just and magnificent proportions tomorrow. This nation is a
lobe, still accumulating upon accumulation, not a dissolving sphere.
Extract from Speech by William H. Seward: March 11, 1850.)
Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865)
While there were a number of recognized causes for the American Civil
War, the official reason that the United States resorted to a test of
arms was the preservation of the Constitution. As a lawyer thoroughly
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familiar with the Constitution, President Lincoln insisted throughout
the course of the war that the Constitutional issue was of overriding
significance. In a letter to Horace Greeley, antislavery editor of the
New York "Tribune," Lincoln stated the purpose of the administration in
prosecuting the war:
I would save the Union. I would save it the shortest way under the
Constitution. The sooner the national authority can be restored;
the nearer the Union will be "the Union as it was."' If there be
those who would not save the Union, unless they could at the same
time save slavery, I do not agree with them. If there be those
who would not save the Union unless they could at the same time
destroy slavery, I do not agree with them. My paramount object in
this struggle is to save the Union, and is not either to save or
to destroy slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing any
slave I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing all the
slaves.. I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and
leaving others alone I would also do that. What I do about slavery,
and the colored race, I do because I believe it helps to save the
Union; and what I forbear, I forbear because I do not believe it
would help to save the Union. I shall do less whenever I shall
believe what I &m doing hurts the cause, and I shall do more when-
ever I shall believe doing more will help the cause, I shall try
to correct errors when shown to be errors; and I shall adopt new
views so fast as they shall appear to be true views.
I have here state(.,. my purpose according to my view of official duty;
and I intend no modification of my oft-expressed personal wish that
all men everywhere could be free. (Letter from Abraham Lincoln to
Horace Greeley: August 22, 1862.,)
James Bryce (1838-1922)
Despite the violent wrenches to which the American Constitution had
been subjected during and after the Civil War, by the 1880's the polit-
ical system had regained much of its lost equilibrium. While there were
people who felt that the traditional balance of power was in a constant
state of jeopardy, others considered that the republican system was
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working quite effectively. In his American Commonwealth Lord Bryce,
English historian, and diplomat, expressed the latter point of view.
The scales of power have continued to hang fairly even. The
President has not corrupted and enslaved Congress: Congress has
not paralyzed and cowed the President. The legislative may have
gained somewhat on the executive department; yet were George
Washington to return to earth, he might be as great and useful a
President as he was a century ago. Neither the legislature nor
the executive has for a moment threatened the liberties of the
people. The States have not broken up the Union, and the Union
has not absorbed the States.... Objections may be taken to partic-
ular features, and these objections point, as most American
thinkers are agreed, to practical improvements which would
preserve the excellences and remove some of the inconveniences....
("General Observations on the Frame of National Government" in
The American Commonwealth: 1888.)
Carl Brent Swisher (1897- )
One of the leading contemporary interpreters of the American Constitution,
Carl Brent Swisher is Professor of Political Science at John Hopkins
University. In his extended studies of our political history Professor
Swisher has pointed out the tremendous strength and resilience of our
constitutional system.
For those who have doubts about the survival of our constitutional
system, some reassurance may lie in the fact that the government
of the United States and its relations to persons and property have
always been in transition and that the system has survived in spite
of periodic forebodings and predictions of disaster. Members of
the Federalist party who yielded power to the Jefferson administra-
tion were buried in despair. Daniel Webster, Joseph Story, and
others lamented the evil times upon which the country had fallen
with the accession of Jacksonian democracy, Southern statesmen
preferred extinction to the prospect of national '+.i.fe dominated by
the North. Justice Stephen J. Field predicted that the monetary
heresies of the post-Civil-War period would bring ruin to the
nation. Justice James G. McReynolds declared in 1935 that the
Constitution was gone. In short, at every turning-point in
American history, reputable persons and groups have been'convinced
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that the nation faced unavoidable and irreparable disaster.
Nevertheless, the American people and the American constitutional
system have managed so to adjust themselves to the conditions pre-
vailing at different periods as to survive without major disaster.
In the light of this past experience it does not seem excessive
optimism to assume that the presence of apparently insoluble prob-
lems upon the horizon should not be taken as a dependable omen that
the days of our constitutional system are numbered. It is a
reasonable generalization, indeed, that the strength of the American
constitutional system has lain, not so much in the particular pro-
visions of the Constitution as in the adaptability of the people
and of the constitutional system to new conditions. Survival may
well depend, not so much upon what happens to the United States at
the hands of foreign nations, or of groups, individuals, or organ-
izations within the country, as upon preservation of the essentials
of our youthfulness--qualities which carry with them stamina and
flexibility to meet new conditions as they arise. (The Constitution
Today and. Tomorrow, p..t0291 1943.)
Denis William Brogan (1900-
Born in Glasgow, Scotland and educated at Glasgow, Oxford and Harvard.
Denis William Brogan is now Professor of Political Science at Cambridge.
As an occasional resident of the United States, Dr. Brogan has subjected
American institutions to much scholarly scrutiny. In The American
aracter he expressed his admiration for the practical value of the
republican system of the United States.
The framers of the American Constitution put as their first aim
the provision of the political means to "a more perfect union."
They did not aim at perfect union, at the ironing-out of all
regional differences, at the destruction of all regional inde-
pendence. One of the organizers of the movement that led to
framing the Constitution did, indeed, want complete union, did
want to abolish local autonomy. But the ideas of Alexander
Hamilton were so remote from any possibilities in the America of
1787 that they were more or less politely ignored by his colleagues,
and Hamilton left the Convention in disgust. When the Constitution
was put before the people, Hamilton was an effective fighter for
it and as the first Secretary of the Treasury he helped to get
the machine running. But he was not a maker of the Constitution
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because he thought it was not good enough, that what the United
States needed was complete union, the fusion of the thirteen states
into a unitary body politic.
Although Hamilton did not get his way, it was not necessarily a
silly way. For the weak federal government that went into operation
in 1789, like the.strong federal government in operation in 1944,
was a clumsy method of carrying on the business of the American
people if all that is to be done is to carry on that business. It
is clumsy to have the machinery of the government in forty-nine
units: the States, and the Union. It is clumsy to have the powers
of the federal government loosely defined, so that they are con-
stantly matters of controversy, so that many things are not done
because it is uncertain what organ of the government has the legal
power to do them. It is at best inconvenient that the uncontested
powers of the federal government are divided among a President, a
Senate, and a House of Representatives, and that the question what,
power is where is decided by the majority of a Supreme Court of
nine members. A government so organized must often be slow and
uncertain in its action, indeed sometimes be incapable of action
or, at any rate, incapable of action in time to meet the situation.
The existence of an irreducible minimum of power in forty-eight
states causes grave inconvenience, since it means that law and
political practice vary from state to state. And some of those
states are small in area, or in population, or in both; some are
also the results of historical accidents; some break up the
natural unity of geographical areas in a way to horrify a geo-
politician or a political realist of the type that abolishes
ancient European nations.in an editorial. It is absurd that the
empty mountain state of Nevada should be able both to make a good
thing out of its lax divorce laws and to hold the United States to
ransom to buy its other main asset, silver, at an exorbitant price.
It is absurd that the three counties that make up Delaware should
be empowered to charter corporations to do business all over the
Union on terms more profitable to the corporation's controllers
than to the body politic. It is absurd that the New York harbor
area should be under the control of two states ed the federal
government, and that the pride of Arizona should hold up, for years
at a time, the development of water-power that southern California
badly needs.
But to cure these absurdities it would be necessary to impose on
three million varied square miles a central authority strong enough
to suppress local objections. But such a government would have a
pretty free hand in deciding what local objections it decided to
suppress--and such a government would be too strong for local liber-
ties, so the American people decided in 1780 and have kept deciding
since. (The American Character, pp. 92-93: 1944.)
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SECTION V
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Over the course of almost a century and three quarters the
American economy has undergone considerable change. Since most
eighteenth century Americans were advocates of a laissez-faire theory
of economics, early interpretations of the Constitution tended to derq
the government much of a possibility of regulating the business
affairs of its citizens. Despite such devices as the protective
tariff and the national bank the federal government was conspicuous by
its absence from the business scene.
But even such an outspoken advocate of laissez faire as Thomas
Jefferson recognized that as industry gradually supplanted agriculture,
complicated economic problems would replace comparatively simple
issues. The tremendous industrial surge of the second half of the
nineteenth century made a realization of Jefferson's worst fekrs. In
a comparatively short time the United States became one of the foremost
industrial powers of the earth.. By 1900 general economic conditions
had changed significantly: with the disappearance of free fertile land
the farming frontier had come to an end; to a considerable extent
Americans had become urban dwellers, no longer self-sufficient but
dependent upon the vagaries of distant markets; political and economic
conditions throughout the world were reflected in changes in the
American economy. Instead of insisting as had their grandfathers that
the government restrict itself to matters of diplomacy and war, the
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American farmer and industrial laborer demanded that their legislators
protect their interests, even at the risk of interfering in private
enterprise.
Today the average American is subject to government regulation to
an extent that his great-grandfather would have considered an
intolerable invasion of individual rights. Yet changing economic
conditions have dictated that government assume a more positive
position, These changes have been made by means of the democratic
process, consonant with constitutional government.
Undoubtedly the greatest problem which confronts government and
industry alike is the question of where legitimate private initiative
ends and where interference in the common good begins. Since economic
conditions change very rapidly and since no two situations are
identical in all their particulars, no hard and fast rules can be made.
The best solution that a democracy can hope to achieve is to treat
each problem as it arises and to adjust its economy to meet new
demands as they appear.
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Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826)
Shortly after the Federal Constitution began to function it became
plain that Thomas Jefferson, Secretary of State, and Alexander
Hamilton, Secretary of the Treasury, held divergent views as to its
proper functions. In expounding his philosophy of economics
Hamilton subjected the Constitution to an interpretation broad enough
to allow for the implementation of his protective tariff and national
bank plans. Jefferson, on the other hand, held to a narrow-or strict
interpretation, refusing to acknowledge that implied powers might
permit the federal government to pass laws favoring American
manufactures. Regardless of their differences both men were
significantly influenced by the classical school of laissez-faire
economists. Both were in agreement that every American ought to be
left free from government regulation to pursue his livelihood.
In his first Inaugural Address Jefferson expressed this point of view
with considerable facility.
A wise and frugal government, which shall restrain men ?rom
injuring one another, which shall leave them otherwise free
to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement,
and shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has
earned. This is the sum of good government, and this is
necessary to close the circle of our felicities.
(First Inaugural Address: 1801.)
Andrew Jackson (1767-1845)
While most Americans of the first half of the nineteenth century still
held to the laissez-faire theory of economics, growing industrializa-
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tion tended to complicate the economic relationship between man and
government. There were evidences by 1830 that government was being
used as a device to extend favors to special interests at the expense
of the people as a whole. Convinced that the Second National Bank
was an instrument of the financial aristocrats and that it menaced the
people's control of their government, President Andrew Jackson vetoed
the bill which Congress had p*&eviously passed for the rechartering of
the Bank. His veto message expressed in no uncertain terms the
attitude of a chief executive who had come to political power as a
result of a combination of votes of western farmers and eastern
industrial laborers.
It is to be regretted that the rich and powerful too often bend
the acts of government to their selfish purposes. Distinctions
in society will always exist under every just government.
Equality of talents,.of education, or of wealth can not be
produced by human institutions. In the full enjoyment of the
gifts of Heaven and the fruits of superior industry, econon r,,
and virtue, every man is equally entitled to protection by law;
but when the laws undertake to add to these natural and just
advantages artificial distinctions., to grant titles, gratuities,
and exclusive privileges, to make the rich richer and the potent
more powerful, the humble members of society-the farmers,
mechanics, and laborers-who have neither the time nor the means
of securing like favors to themselves, have a right to complain
of the injustices of their Government. There are no necessary
evils in government. Its evils exist only in its abuses. If it
would confine itself to equal protection, and, as Heaven does its
rains, shower its favors alike on the high and the low, the rich
and the poor, it would be an unqualified blessing. In the act
before me there seems to be a wide and unnecessary departure from
these just principles. (Andrew Jackson's Bank Veto Message: 1832.)
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Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865)
The product of a frontier economy where every man had ample opportunity
to succeed, Abraham Lincoln reflected what was still essentially a
laissez-faire attitude toward government regulation of private enterprise.
Although as chief executive during the Civil War he was familiar with
the strengths and weaknesses of northern industry, he did not live long
enough to see the beginnings of a legislative program to prohibit the
excesses of private enterprise. Yet he knew at first hand the plight
of the northern laborer caught in the coils of a depression cycle, and
he often expressed a deep-seated sympathy for the problems of the man
who earned his bread by the sweat of his brow. His campaign speech
of 1860 at New Haven reflected his basic optimism in the strength and
resilience of the American economy.
What is the true condition of the laborer? I take it that it is
best to leave each man free to acquire property as fast as he can.
Some will get wealthy. I don't believe in a law to prevent a man
from getting rich; it would do more harm than good. So while we
don't propose asy war upon capitali we do wish to allow the When
humblest man an equal chance to get rich with anybody else.
one starts poor, as most do in the race of life, free society is
such that he knows he can better his condition; he knows that
there is no fixed condition of labor for his whole life....I want
every man to have a chance - and I believe a black man is entitled
to it - in which he can better his condition - when he may look
forward and hope to be a hired laborer this year and the next,
work for himself afterwards, and finally to hire men to work for
him. That is the true system. (Campaign Speech: 1860.)
Thomas Woodrow Wilson (1856-1924)
From a country which was predominantly agricultural in 1865 to one which
was an industrial power of the first order in 1914, the United States
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underwent a tremendous transformation in the period of a half-century.
This basic change in the American economy complicated the heretofore
relatively simple relationship of government and private industry.
Few Americans indeed, regardless of their political affiliations,
argued in 1914 that the Interstate Commerce Commission was unconstitu-
tional; regulation of the excesses of individual initiative had come
to be recognized as necessary. One of the ablest American presidents
in the realm of economic theory was Woodrow Wilson. President Wilson's
apprenticeship in the academic world gave him special preparation for
an adequate understanding of the economic problems which beset
twentieth century America.
Human freedom consists in perfect adjustments of human interests
and human activities and human energies. Now, the adjustments
necessary between individuals, between individuals and the
complex institutions amidst which they live, and between those
institutions and the government, are infinitely more intricate
today than ever before. Life has become complex; there are
marw more elements, more parts, to it than ever before. And,
therefore, it is harder to keep everything adjusted - and harder
to find out where the trouble lies when the machine gets out of
order. You know that one of the most interesting things that
Mr. Jefferson said in those early days of simplicity which marked
the beginnings of our goverment was that the best government
consisted in as little governing as possible. And there is still
a sense in which that is true. It is still intolerable for the
government to interfere with our individual activities except
where it is necessar- to interfere with them in order to free
them. But I feel confident that if Jefferson were living in our
day he would see what we see: that the individual is caught in
a great confused nexus of all sorts of complicated circumstances,
and that to let him alone is to leave him helpless as against the
obstacles with which he has to contend; and that, therefore, law
in our day must come to the assistance of the individual.
It must come to his assistance to see that he gets fair play;
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that is all, but that is much. Without the watchful interference,
the resolute interference, of the government, there can be no
fair play between individuals and such powerful institutions as
the trusts. Freedom to-day is something more than being let
alone. The program of a government of freedom must in these days
be positive, not negative merely. ("The Liberation of a People's
Vital Energies" in The New Freedom: 1913.)
Christian Gauss (1878-1951)
Manor people subjected the phenomenon of the New Deal to searching
examination. One of the most perceptive of American observers was
Christian Gauss. In A Primer for Tomorrow Professor Gauss expressed
the attitude of many respected university teachers that the New Deal
was a democratic answer to tremendous, new economic challenges.
When we turn from recent events to America's future, one thing is
certain: The only form of government to which our people will
submit must be one which recognizes a much closer connection
between economic and political rights than has ever existed in
the past. A government that is not to be overthrown by
revolutionary movements must guarantee the right to self-support.
For better or worse, it is now recognized as antecedent to the
right to liberty and to the pursuit of happiness. The Roosevelt
administration recognizes this and all succeeding administrations
will probably have to. Never again will it be possible to
explain to the citizens in a democracy that a depression and its
accompairing unemployment are the result of the working of
inexorable economic laws. For better or worse, the modern man,
with that love of freedom which our earlier culture had fostered,
will no longer accept this denial of his independence. There is
in history no reason why he should. (A Primer for.Tanorrowa
1934.)
Franklin Delano Roosevelt (1882-1945)
Accused by his political opponents of imposing a socialistic order on
the American economy, Franklin Delano Roosevelt insisted that the New
Deal was essentially an experimental device by means of which free
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enterprise in America would be preserved. In either case most Ameri-
cans felt with President Roosevelt that the economic difficulties of
1933 warranted the invasion by the federal government of a domain that
had hitherto been considered private. President Roosevelt's justifi-
cation for this invasion was as follows:
In the early days of the Republic our life was simple. There was
little need of formal arrangements, or of Government interest, or
action, to insure the social and economic well-being of the
American people. In the life of the pioneer, sympathy and kindly
help, ready co-operation in the accidents and emergencies of the
frontier life were the spontaneous manifestation of the American
spirit. Without them the conquest of a continent could never have
been made.
Today that life is gone. Its simplicity has vanished and we are
each and all of us, whether we like it or not, parts of a social
civilization which ever tends to greater complexity. And in
these later days, the imperiled well-being, the very existence of
large numbers of our people, have called for measures of organized
Government assistance which the more spontaneor and personal
promptings of a pioneer generosity could never alone have
obtained. Our country is indeed passing through a period which
is urgently in need of ardent protectors of the rights of the
common man. Mechanization of industry and mass production have
put unparalleled power in the hands of the few. No small part of
our problem today is to bring the fruits of this mechanization
and mass production to the people as a whole. (Speech:
June 10, 1936.)
Frederick Lewis Allen (18901954)
Author of a number of volumes dealing with twentieth century America,
and a former editor of the Atlantic Monthly and Harper's Magazine, the
late Frederick Lewis Allen delineated the American scene with
intelligence and optimism. Throughout his writings the idea prevailed
that we could adjust our economy continually, that we need not bind
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ourselves to a fixed and definitive body of economic theory.
Mary people argued then -- end should have gone on arguing - that
the United States ought to have a conservative party and a liberal
party (or radical party, if you wish), each with its neat, logical-
program, instead of two very similar parties each shopping for
winning ideas and compromise. Many people argued then -- and some
still argue today -- that economic reform by patchwork is
illogical and timid, and that what is needed is an uprising of
the dissatisfied to effect a total transformation of the apparatus
of business and industry. Both those ideas ran strongly for a
time and then weakened. Roosevelt's third party, the Progressive
party, made a strong bid in 1912 and then disintegrated, leaving
the other parties to take over the more popular planks of its
platform. The Socialists gained ground and then lost it, again.
For both ideas would have favored the division of the American
people into classes, and both would have run counter to their
pragmatic temper.
The idea that won out was that the existence of sharply defined
economic and social classes was to be resisted as an offense to
the American democratic ideal. That you got along much better
when people of all sorts and conditions worked together for what
seemed to them the benefit of all. That the way to deal with a
proletariat was not either to suppress and bedevil it, or to help
it to overthrow its masters, but to give it a chance at education,
opportunity, automobiles, and vacuum cleaners, with plenty of
instruction in the middle-class way of living and plenty of
incentive to want more and more of these good things; and then in
due course the proletariat might be a proletariat no more, but a
body of upstanding, self-respecting citizens who could be counted
on to help keep the nation in good running order. And that when
you found something amiss with the way things functioned you
examined what was happening and pragmatically made the necessary
changes and no more. That the people who thought the machine
would stop dead if you tinkered with it were wrong, and the
people who thought you could invent out of hand a new machine
that wouldn't knock somewhere were also wrong. The American
citizenry saw the benefits of continual, co-operative, experimen-
tal, untheoretical change.
There would be ferocious debate over every proposed reform. There
would be endless friction all along the way. There would be eras
of new experiment and eras of consolidation and re-examination.
But an America which had seemed to mart' people to be headed toward
a reign of plutocracy seemed likely to be able to remake itself,
by slow degrees, into something nearer the democratic dream, and
to do this by something approaching the common consent of free men.
(The Big Change: 1952.)
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Among other guarantees of human rights the First Amendment to the
Constitution provides that "...Congress shall make no law...abridging
the freedom of speech...."
Freedom of speech is essential to a representative democratic
government. Even under the limited representative governments of the
several American colonies such orators as Patrick Henry of Virginia and
Samuel Adams of Massachusetts deemed it their right to express opinions
which often were not held by a majority of their fellow men.
In general the intent of the freedom of speech provision, which has
since been extended to state governments, is to secure the unrestricted
discussion of public affairs.
Certainly there have been times in the history of the Republic
when the practice of free speech has been severely curtailed. During
periods when serious threats are posed to the existence of the country
there is a tendency to restrict freedom of speech. The advocacy of the
violent overthrow of the Constitution always poses a difficult question:
should free speech be allowed to destroy the principle upon which it is
based? Since it is difficult to draw a line between permissable restraint
and freedom, attempts have been made to find a satisfactory formula upon
which to base judicial decisions. Although no single formula has taken
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shape, nor perhaps should we expect or hope to find one, two schools of
thought have emerged. One school contends that utterances are illegal,
if they have a "bad tendency," while the more tolerant school insists
that the rule should be "clear and present danger." In recent years
the latter view has met with more judicial favor.
Today the principle of speech continues to offer a guarantee that
the minority point of view will be heard, even if that point of view
be unpopular to the point of being loathsome.
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Benjamin Franklin (1706-1790)
Because his brother James, owner of the New England C , had been
jailed as a libeller by the Puritan heirarchy of Massachusetts, it fell
to the lot of 16 year old Benjamin to supervise the publication of the
sole opposition newspaper in New England. The result was a series of
extraordinarily mature editorials on the general subject of the rights
of man.
Without freedom of thought there can be no such thing as wisdom;
and no such thing as public liberty without freedom of speech;
which is the right of every man as far as by it he does not hurt
or control the right of another; and this is the only check it
ought to suffer and the only bounds it ought to know....Whoever
would overthrow the liberty of a nation must begin by subduing
the freeness of speech: a thing terrible to public traitors.
('Eighth "Dogood Paper": 1722.)
John Adams W35-1826)
Originally the Constitution of Massachusetts had contained no Bill of
Rights; when it was submitted to a vote of the freemen it was over-
whelmingly defeated. John Adams, who had been the chief architect of
the original document, was responsible for the whole of the Bill of
Rights with the exception of a single article. The Massachusetts Bill
of Rights served not only as a model for other states but as a guide for
the first ten amendments to the federal Constitution.
The freedom of deliberation, speech, and debate, in either house
of the legislature, is so essential to the rights of the people,
that it cannot be the foundation of any accusation or prosecution,
action or complaint, in any other court or place whatsoever.
(Massachusetts Bill of Rights: 1780.).
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James Bryce (1838-1922)
Over half a century after the appearance of Alexis de Tocqueville'a
Democracy in America there was published a second penetrating and
comprehensive analysis of the American people and institutions by the
English observer Lord Bryce. Like do Tocqueville before him James
Bryce was a critical albeit a sympathetic viewer of freedom in action.
There exist in the American Republic sev.Qral conditions which
specially tend to create such a temper.Ltendency to passivenes&
One of these is the unbounded freedom of discussion.. Every view,
every line of policy, has its fair chance before the people. No
one can say that audience has been denied him, and comfort himself
with the hope that, when he is heard, the world will come round to
him. Under a repressive government, the sense of grievance and
injustice feeds the flame of resistance in a persecuted minority.
But in a country like this, where the freedom of the press, the
right of public meeting, and the right of association and agitation
have been legally extended and are daily exerted, more widely than
anywhere else in the world, there is nothing to awaken that sense.
He whom the multitude condemns or ignores has no further court of
appeal to look to. Rome has spoken. His cause has been heard and
judgment has gone against him. ("The Fatalism of the Multitude"
in Thp American Commonwealth: 1888.)
Edwin Lawrence Godkin (1831-1902)
As an editorial writer and a newspaper owner Edwin lawrence Godkin
was as interested in the principle of free speech as he was in the
principle of a free press. His concept that freedom of expression has
practical significance in a democracy is as significant today as when
he originated it.
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No one ever talks freely about anything without contributing some-
thing, let it be ever so little, to the unseen forces which carry
the race on to its final destiny. Even if he does not make a
positive impression, he counteracts or modifies some other impression,
or sets in motion some train of ideas in some one else, which helps
to change the face of the world....One of the functions of an edu-
cated man is to talk; and of course he should try to talk wisely.
bid. (Modern Democracy: The Duty of Criticism in a Democracy:
1896.)
Oliver Wendell Holmes (1841-1935)
The problems of interpreting the first amendment to the Constitution
here been and will continue to be perplexing ones. Perhaps the most
significant recent interpretation is that of Associate Justice Oliver
Wendell Holmes in his application of the "clear and. present danger"
ruling to the case of Abrams v. United States. Such a judgment has
served as a precedent for a number of subsequent interpretations which
have extended the principle of free speech.
But as against dangers peculiar to war, as against others, the
principle of the right to free speech is always the same. It is
only the present danger of immediate evil or an intent to bring it
about that warrants Congress in setting a limit to the expression
of opinion where private rights are not concerned. (Abrams v.
United States: 1919.)
Louis Dembitz Brandeis (1856-1941)
Along with Oliver Wendell Holmes Associate Justice Louis Brandeis has
been one of the most distinguished figures on the Supreme Court in the
twentieth century. In Whitney v. California Justice Brandeis applied
the rule of "clear and present danger," which Holmes had done so much
to advance.
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Fear of serious injury cannot alone justify suppression of free
speech and assetbly. Men feared witches and burnt women. It is
the function of speech to free men from the bondage of irrational
fears. To justify suppression of free speech there must be reason-
able ground to fear that serious evil will result if free speech
is practiced. There must be a reasonable ground to believe that
the danger apprehended is imminent. There must be reasonable
ground to believe that the evil to be prevented is a serious one.
Every denunciation of existing law tends in some measure to increase
the probability that there will be violation of it. Condonation
of a breach enhances the probability. Propagation of the criminal
state of mind by teaching syndicalism increases it. Advocacy of
law-breaking heightens it still further. But even advocacy of
violation, however reprehensible morally, is not a justification
for denying free speech where the advocacy falls short of incite-
ment and there is nothing to indicate that advocacy would be
immediately acted on. The wide difference between advocacy and
incitement, between preparation and attempt, between assembling
and conspiracy, must be borne in mind. In order to support a
finding of a clear and present danger it must be shown either
that immediate serious violence was to be expected or was advocated,
or that the past conduct furnished reason to believe that such
advocacy was then contemplated.
Those who won our independence by revolution were not cowards.
They did not fear political change. They did not exalt order at
the cost of liberty. To courageous, self-reliant men, with confi-
dence in the power of free and fearless reasoning applied through
the processes of popular government, no danger flowing from speech
can be deemed clear and present, unless the incidence of the evil
apprehended is so imminent that it may befall before there is an
opportunity for full discussion. If there be time to expose through
discussion the falsehood and fallacies to avert the evil by proc-
esses of education, the remedy to be applied is more speech, not
enforced silence. (Whitney v. California: 1927.)
Giles Patterson (1885_ )
Still another distinguished member of the American Bar sought to
interpret the practical implications of the principle of free speech.
In F1'ee Speech and a Free Press Giles Jared Patterson, well-known
American attorney, spelled out the significance of the practice of
toleration.
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It is an innate instinctive desire of man for the right of self-
expression and for the right to commune freely with his fellow
men. This desire is a natural one and hence this freedom is a
natural right. Some have described it as inalienable or impre-
scriptible, but it is better described as being primordial. It
is an essential of organized society and of progress from barbarism
to civilization. Without its existence, individuality of man is
suppressed. Without the right to acquire and impart information,
knowledge becomes static, and subsequent generations can learn
nothing from their predecessors.
Even opinions must not be suppressed, for there is always a
possibility that they may be right. The suppression of opinion
implies a recognition of the possibility that the suppressor is
wrong and tends to strengthen the convictions and opposition of
those suppressed. Opposition, if allowed, will be ineffective, if
wrong; if right, suppression of it produces a greater evil.
(Free Speech And A Free Press, p. 5: 1939.)
Walter Lippmann (1889-. )
Best known as a newspaper columnist Walter Lippmann has also had a
significant career in the field of political affairs. Trained as a
philosopher he has had a continuing interest in the enlargement and
perpetuation of our political liberties. It is Mr. Lippmann's thesis
that truth will win out in any contest of freely-circulated ideas.
This is the creative principle of freedom of speech, not that it is
a system for the tolerating of error, but that it is a system for
finding the truth. It may not produce the truth, or the whole truth
all the time, or often, or in some cases ever. But if the truth
can be found, there is no other system which will normally and
habitually find so much truth. Until we have thoroughly understood
this principle, we shall not know why we must value our liberty,
or how we can protect and develop it....
The only reason for dwelling on all this is that if we are to pre-
serve democracy we must understand its principles. And the
principle which distinguishes it from all other forms of government
is that in a democracy the opposition not only is tolerated as
constitutional but must be maintained because it is in fact in-
dispensable. ("The Indispensable Opposition" in Atlantic Monthly:
August 1939.)
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Zechariah Chafes (1885. )
Privileges cannot be separated from responsibilities in a democracy.
The importance of a sense of responsibility in maintaining the liberty
of free speech is emphasized by Zechariah Chafee, Professor of Law at
Harvard University, in his important work Free Speech in the United
States.
Now I want to speak of responsibilities of the men who wish to
talk. They are under a strong moral duty not to abuse the liberty
they possess. All I have written goes to show that the law should
lay a few restraints upon them but that makes it all the more
important for them to restrain themselves. They are enjoying a
great privilege, and the best return which they can make is to use
that privilege wisely and sincerely for what they genuinely believe
to be the best interests of the country. It is not going to be an
easy task during the next few years to maintain freedom of speech
unimpaired. There will be hard times ahead, perhaps even periods
of disaster, during which many devoted citizens will readily be-
lieve that the safety of the nation demands the suppression of all
criticism against those in authority. This tendency towards
suppression will be immensely strengthened if speakers and writers
use their privilege of free discussion carelessly or maliciously,
so as to further their own ambitions or the immediate selfish inter-
ests of their particular minority. By abusing liberty of speech,
they may easily further its abolition. I should be very slow to
lock such men up or confiscate their pamphlets, but I so say that
they owe it to the framers of the First Amendment who gave them
this privilege, they owe it to all their fellow citizens and
particularly to the few who share their own views, to think long
and hard before they express themselves, so as to be sure that they
speak fruitfully. It is hopeless for the law to draw the line
between liberty and license.. Judges and juries cannot look into
the heart of a speaker or writer and tell whether his motives are
patriotic or mean. But the man can look into his own heart and
make that decision before he speaks out. Whatever efforts of this
sort unpopular persons make will do much to maintain the vitality
of the First Amendment. (Free Speech in the United States, viii
and ix: 1948.)
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The notion that free men have the inherent right to publish the
truth regardless of the consequences did not originate in America.
The idea had been developing for some time in portions of Western
Europe, particularly in England, at the time of the settlement of the
American continent. However, the concept did come to flower in the
colonial period of American history and subsequently was written into
Article I of the Bill of Rights.
The first of a series of occurrences dealing with the principle
developed in Boston in 1722, when James Franklin was imprisoned for
printing allegedly libelous articles about Massachusetts officials.
Another of the important events in the early struggle to make the
notion a reality was the dramatic trial of the New York printer John
Peter Zenger in 1735. The resulting decision that a printer could not
be held a libeler if he could prove the truth of what he wrote, was a.
milestone in the development of the idea.
Since the time of Franklin and Zenger many important judicial
decisions affecting the printed word have been made and have been
incorporated into state constitutions. Today the average American
considers freedom of the press a right which has been irrevocably
secured. While the concept of freedom of the press is less likely to
be challenged than it was two hundred years ago, constant vigilance on
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the part of editor and reader alike is needed to assure its perpetua-
tion. Lack of interest in the principle as it is involved in present
and future disputes may result in the loss of this basic freedom.
While freedom of the press is an integral part of the American
system of rights and privileges, the duties and responsibilities of a
free press should never be lost sight of. Freedom to print the truth
carries with it a responsibility to know the truth. Since a delicate
balance between right and responsibility is continually involved, there
can be no substitute for informed public opinion. And, conversely,, an
informed public helps to assure the strength and perpetuation of a
free press.
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Benjamin Franklin (1706-1790)
Since he was apprenticed as a printer's devil to his brother James
when the latter ran afoul of the Boston magistracy, Benjamin Franklin
had an early appreciation of the need for a free press in America.
Later when he took up the profession of printing in Philadelphia..
Franklin penned one of the first appeals for a free and independent
press ever published in America.
They Lprinterj] are educated in the belief that when men differ
in opinion, both sides ought equally to have the advantage of
being heard by the public; and that when truth and error have
fair play, the former is always an overmatch for the latter.
Hence they cheerfully serve all contending writers that pay them
well, without regarding on which side they are of the question
in dispute.... If all printers were determined not to print
anything till they were sure it would offend nobody, there
would be very little printed. ("An Apology for Printers" in
The Pennsylvania Gazette: June 10, 1731.)
Andrew Hamilton (1676-1741)
Perhaps the most widely-discussed episode in the struggle for a free
colonial press was the trial of John Peter Zenger in New York. In his
charge to the jury Andrew Hamilton, Zenger'sattorney, insisted that
the printer be judged solely on the truth or falsity of what he had
published. The jury's verdict, which disregarded the charge of the
royalist judge, James DeLancey, to determine simply whether or not
Zenger had published the material, has long been considered an
important milestone on the road to freedom of the press.
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Every man who prefers freedom to a life of slavery will bless and
honor you as men who have baffled the attempt of tyrantr; and by
an impartial verdict, have laid a noble foundation for securing
to ourselves, our posterity and our neighbors, that, to which
nature and the honor of our country have given us a right - the
liberty of exposing arbitrary power by speaking and writing the
truth. (Andrew Hemilton ' s Charge to the jury t 1735.)
Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826)
As the author of the Declaration of Independence Thomas Jefferson was
continuously aware of the need for an informed public opinion. He
expressed that awareness very forcefully in a letter to Colonel Edward
Carrington the year of the adoption of the Federal Constitution.
The people are the only censors of their governors;. and even
their errors will tend to keep these to the true principles of
their institution. To punish these errors too severely would
be to suppress the only safeguard of the public liberty.
The way to prevent these irregular interpositions of the people,
is to give them full information of their affairs through the
channel of the public papers, and to contrive that those papers
should penetrate the whole mass of the people. The basis of our
government being the opinion of the people, the very first
object should be to keep that right; and were it left to me to
decide whether we should have a government without newspapers,
or newspapers without a government, I should not hesitate a
moment to prefer the latter. But I should mean that every man
should receive those papers, and be capable of reading them....
(Letter to Colonel Edward Carrington: January 16, 1787.)
Alexis de Tocqueville (1805--1859)
One of the most perceptive of nineteenth century European viewers of the
American scene was Alexis de Tocqueville.. French writer and politician.
In his monumental Democracy in America he surveyed a press which was as
yet untroubled by the problems of monopolization.
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But although the press is limited to these resources, its
influence in America is immense.. It is the power which impels the
circulation of political life through all the districts of that
vast territory. Its eye is open constantly to detect the secret
springs of political designs, and to summon the leaders of all
parties to the bar of public opinion. It rallies the interests
of the community round certain principles, and it draws up the
creed which factions adopt; for it affords a means of intercourse
between parties which hear, and which address each other without
ever having been in immediate contact. When a great number of the
organs of the press adopt the same line of ,conduct, their
influence becomes irresistible; and public opinion, when it is
perpetually assailed from the same side, eventually yields to
the attack. In the United States each separate Journal exercises
but little authority, but the power of the periodical press is
only second to that of the people. ("Liberty of the Press in the
United States" in Democracy in America: 1$35.)
William Cullen Bryant (1794-1878)
With the publication in 1831 of William Lloyd Garrison's abolitionist
newspaper, The Liberator, there was marked a decided growth of hostility
between the North and the South on the issue of slavery, Throughout
the North abolitionist societies developed apace. A series of
incidents occurred which exacerbated relations between the two sections.
One of the most dramatic of these incidents took place at Alton, Illinois,
where a mob of pro-slavery sympathizers murdered Elija Parish Lovejoy,
an abolitionist newspaper editor. The result was a wave of indignation
which swept the North. One of the most dramatic statements pointing
out the broader significance of the mob action was made by William
Cullen Bryant, prominent American poet and newspaperman,
The right to discuss freely and openly, by speech, by the pen, by
the press, all political questions, and to examine and animadvert
upon all. political institutions, is a right so clear and certain,
so interwoven with our other liberties, so necessary, in fact, to
their existence, that without it we must fall at once into despot-
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ism or anarchy. To say that he who holds unpopular opinions must
hold them at the peril of his life, and that, if he expresses them
in public, he has only himself to blame if they who disagree with
him should rise and put him to death, is to strike at all rights,
all liberties, all nrotection of law, and to justify or extenuate
all crimes. ("The Death of Lovejoy" in the New York Evening Post:
1737.)
Edwin Lawrence Godkin (1831-1902)
Edwin Lawrence Godkin was the founder of The Nation, one of the most
influential New York newspapers in the period immediately following
the Civil War. As a lifelong foe of injustice he penned many editori-
als calling for the continuation of a free and independent press.
The succeeding statement is from one of Godkin's volumes on American
democracy:
There is nothing which bad governments so much dislike and resent
as criticism, and have in past ages taken so much pains to put
down. In fact, a history of the civil liberty would consist
largely of an account of the resistance to criticism on the part
of the rulers. One of the first acts of a successful tyranny or
despotism is always the. silencing of the press or the establish-
ment of censorship. (Modern Democracy: The Duty of Criticism in
a Democracy: 1896.)
Commission on Freedom of the Press
In 1943 a Commission was set up at the University of Chicago to inquire
into the present state and future prospects of the freedom of the press.
The study which the Commission developed indicates to a considerable
degree how seriously monopoly threatens the existence of a free and
independent press and what this can mean in terms of an informed
electorate.
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The Commission set out to answer the question: Is the freedom of
the press in danger? Its answer to that question is: Yes.
It concludes that the freedom of the press is in danger for three
reasons:
First, the importance of the press to the people has greatly
increased with the development of the press as an instrument of
mass communication. At the same time the development of the
press as, an instrument of mass communication has greatly decreased
the proportion of the people who can express their opinions and
ideas through the press.
Second, the few who are able to use the machinery of the press as
an instrument of mass communication have not provided a service
adequate to the needs of the society.
Third, those who direct the machinery of the press have engaged
from time to time in practices which the society condemns and
which, if continued, it will inevitably undertake to regulate or
control.
When an instrument of prime importance to all the people is
available to a small minority of the people only, and when it is
employed by that small minority in such a way as not to supply
the people with the service they require, the freedom of the
minority in the employment of that instrument is in danger.
This danger, in the case of the freedom of the press, is in part
the consequence of the industrial organization of modern society,
and in part the result of the failure of the directors of the press
to recognize the press needs of a modern nation and to estimate
and accept the responsibilities which those needs impose upon them.
(A Free and Responsible Press, pp. 1-2: 1947.)
Contemporary Problems of Principle
1. These several factors of an ideal press freedom are to some
extent incompatible with one another.
A press which has grown to the measure of the national market and
to the full use of technical resources can hardly be free from
internal compulsions. The major part of the nation's press is
large-scale enterprise, closely interlocked with the system of
finance and industry; it will not without effort escape,,the
natural bias of what it is. Yet, if freedom is to remain secure,
this bias must be known and overcome.
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Again, the growth of the press acts together with the growth of the
nation to make more remote the ideal that every voice shall have
the hearing it deserves. Concentration of power substitutes one
controlling policy for marq independent policies, lessens the
number of major competitors, and renders less operative the
claims of potential issuers who have no press. For this clash
there is no perfect remedy. There is relief, to the extent that
the wider press, somewhat as a common carrier, assumes responsi-
bility for representing variant facets of opinion. But no
listening devices of the human mind have yet secured us from a
certain wastage of human genius as the scale of a nation's thinking
enlarges; and the contemporary arts of what is called publicity
can hardly be acquitted of aiming rather at further lens
distortion than at just and proportionate recognition of worth.
As commercial arts it is hard to see how they can make justice
their supreme object.-
2. There is an antithesis between the current conception of the
freedom of the press and the accountability of the press.
Accountability, like subjection to law, is not necessarily a net
subtraction from liberty; the affirmative factor of freedom,
freedom for, may be enhanced. But the liberty to be carefree is
gone. Charles Beard could say with accuracy that "in its origin,
freedom of the press had little or nothing to do with truth
telling.... most of the early newspapers were partisan sheets
devoted to savage attacks on party opponents.... Freedom of the
press means the right to be just or unjust, partisan or non-
partisan, true or false, in news column or editorial column."
Today, this former legal privilege wears the aspect of social
irresponsibility. The press must know that its faults and errors
have ceased to be private vagaries and have become public dangers.
Its inadequacies menace the balance of public opinion. It has
lost the common and ancient human liberty to be deficient in its
function or to offer half-truth for the whole.
The situation approaches a dilemma. The press must remain private
and free, ergo human, and fallible; but the press dare no longer
indulge in fallibility--it must supply the public need. Here,
again, there is no perfect solution. But the important thing is
that the press accept the public standard and try for it. The
legal right will stand if the moral right is realized or tolerably
approximated. There is a point beyond which failure to realize
the moral right will entail encroachment by the state upon the
existing legal right. (A Free and Responsible Press, pp. 129-
131: 1947.)
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RELIGIOUS FREEDOM
Although several of the original American colonies were founded on
the basis of an established church, as early as 1644 Roger Williams
issued his dramatic plea to the Puritan hierarchy of Massachusetts for
the separation of church and state. By the time of the American Revolu-
tion the established churches were losing ground, particularly as a
result of the examples set by such colonies as Rhode Island and Pennsyl-
vania on the matter of religious toleration.
The First Amendment to the Bill of Rights proscribed the passage
of any law respecting an establishment, thereby ruling out the
possibility of a national church. This means that Congress, and
probably the states, cannot either directly or indirectly establish a
state church or a state religion nor show partiality for any religious
sect, organization or mode of worship.
By 1833 even Massachusetts, with a long tradition of Puritan
establishment, had accepted the separation of church and state as part
of its constitution.
Today we accept the idea that the separation of church and state
is one of the best means of assuring freedom of worship. And the
concept of freedom of worship is based, in turn, on the fandamental
belief in the supreme value of the human individual.
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Roger Williams (1607-1684)
Born in Wales and educated at Cambridge University Roger Williams grew
up in a period of great theological ferment. He soon developed into a
decided opponent of the liturgies and ceremonies of the Established
Church. Migrating to Massachusetts Bay in 1631 he quickly came into
conflict with the Puritan authorities on the matter of religious
conformity. The charge brought against Williams by the General Court
had to do with his insistence on absolute liberty of conscience.
Although he was banished from Massachusetts and subsequently found
refuge in Rhode Island, he continued to expound his thesis in his
sermons and writings. His thesis, as significant today as it was
three centuries ago, was never set forth with more vigor and clarity
than in. The Bloody Tenet.
(1) God requireth not a uniformity of religion to be enacted and
enforced in any civil state; which enforced uniformity (sooner or
later) is the greatest occasion of civil war, ravishing of
conscience, persecution of Christ Jesus in his servants and of
the hypocrisy and destruction of millions of souls. (2) It is the
will and command of God, that...a permission of the most Paganish,
Jewish, Turkish, or Antichristian consciences and worships, be
granted to all men in all nations and countries: and they are only
to be fought against with that sword which is only (in soul
matters) able to conquer, to wit, the sword of God's Spirit,
the Word of God. (3) True civility and Christianity may both
flourish in a state or kingdom, notwithstanding the permission of
diverse and contrary consciences, eitJier of Jew or Gentile.
(Preface to The Bloody Tenet of Persecution for Cause of
Conscience: 161,1,.. )
Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826)
As a professed deist living in a colony which had an established church,
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Thomas Jefferson was thoroughly aware of the plight of the non-
conformist who was forced to support a church in which he did not
believe. When he had become a power in Virginia politics he submitted
a bill, subsequently enacted into law, which established religious
freedom in the newly-created Commonwealtho To Jefferson this bill
ranked with the Declaration of Independence and his fathering of the
University of Virginia as his greatest achievement, and prior to his
death he asked that it be noted on his tombstone that he was its author.
Well aware that the opinions and beliefs of men depend not on their
own will, but follow involuntarily the evidence proposed to their
minds; that Almighty God hath created the mind free, and manifested
his supreme will that free it shall remain by making it altogether
insusceptible to restraint; that all attempts to influence it by
temporal punishments, or burthens, or by civil incapacitations,
tend only to beget habits of hypocrisy and meanness, and are a
dgparture from the plan of the holy author of our religion, who
being lord both of body and mind, yet chose not'to propagate it
by coercions on either, as was his almighty power to do, but to
exalt it by influence on reason alone; that the impious presumption
of legislature and ruler, civil as well as ecclesiastical, who,
being themselves but fallible and uninspired men, have assumed
dominion over the faith of others, hath established and maintained
false religions over the greatest part of the world and through all
time: that to compel a man to furnish contributions of money for
the propagation of opinions which he disbelieves and abhors is
sinful and tyrannical; that even the forcing him to support
this or that teacher of his own religious persuasion is depriving
him of the comfortable liberty of giving his contributions to the
particular pastor whose morals he would make his pattern and
whose power he feels most persuasive to righteousness, and is
withdrawing from the ministry those temporary rewards which,
proceeding from an approbation of their personal conduct, are
an additional incitement to earnest and unremitting labors for the
instruction of mankind; that our civil rights have no dependence
on our religious opinions, any more than our opinions in physics
or geometry; and therefore the proscribing any citizen as un-
worthy the public confidence by laying upon him an incapacity of
being called to offices of trust or emolument, unless he profess
or renounce this or that religious opinion, is depriving him
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injudiciously of those privileges and advantages to which, in
common with his fellow citizers, he has a natural right; that it
tends also to corrupt the principles of that very religion it is
meant to encourage, by bribing with a monopoly of worldly honors
and emoluments those "ho will externally profess and conform to
it.... (A Bill for Establishing Religious Freedom; 1779.)
John Hughes (1797-1864)
Born in very humble circumstances in County Tyrone, Ireland, John
Hughes educated himself to the point that he was prepared for college
when his family moved to the United States in 1817. Ordained a priest
in 1826 he rose to be the fourth Roman Catholic Bishop of New York.
Throughout his adult life he was interested in relations between
church and state, and during a period of extreme anti-Catholic
criticism he stoutly maintained that in order to assure religious
toleration, church and state would have to continue as separate
entities..
I regard the Constitution of the United States as a monument of
wisdom, an instrument of liberty and right, unequaled - rivaled -
in the annals of the human race. Every separate provision of that
immortal document is stamped with the features of wisdom; and yet
among its wise provision, what I regard as the wisest of all is
the brief, simple, but comprehensive declaration that "Congress
shall make no law respecting the establishment of religion, or
prohibiting the free exercise thereof." (Speech at the Broadway
Tabernacle in New Yorks 1843.)
James Gibbons (1834-1921)
A product of Baltimore James Gibbons rose from parish priest to cardinal
in an ecclesiastical career which extended for more than sixty turbulent
years. One of the first American Catholic clergymen to concern himself
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with the growing problems of the industrial laborer, Gibbons lent his
active support to such union organizations as the Knights of Labor.
Despite his activities in the realm of secular affairs, he was consist-
ent in his affirmation that separation of church and state in America
was a blessing to Catholic and non-Catholic alike.
American Catholics rejoice in our separation of Church and State;
and I can conceive of no combination of circumstances likely to
arise which would make a union desirable either to Church or
State. We know the blessings of our present arrangement; it gives
us liberty and binds together priests and people in a union better
than that of Church and State. Other countries, other manners;
we do not believe our system adapted to all conditions; we lea"
it to Church and State in other lands to solve their problems for
their own best interests. For ourselves, we thank God we live
America, "in this happy country of ours," to quote Mr. ZTheodore
Roosevelt, where "religion and liberty are natural allies."
(Article in North American Review: 1909.)
William Ernest Hocking (1873- )
A native of Cleveland, Ohio, William Ernest Hocking, philosopher, has
pursued a career as a teacher at Andover Theological Seminary, Yale
and Harvard. His interest in both theology and philosophy has been
reflected in his voluminous writings. He has repeatedly made the point
that religion is meaningful only when freedom of conscience is the order
of the day.
It is of the essence of the religious spirit ... always to persuade,
never to compel.... Religion is never political in its nature.
It has no speech except to free spirits. Its aim is to draw men
to devotion ... and a devotion that is enforced is not sincere....
When it mistakingly uses the organs of power the very object of
religion is undermined. (Quoted in Wilber G. Katz' "The Freedom
to Believe" in Atlantic Monthly: October 1953.)
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Anson Phelps Stokes (1874,-
Born on Staten Island, New York in 1874, Anson Phelps Stokes was
educated at Yale and at the Episcopal Theological Seminary at Cambridge.
Thereafter he held a series of preferments, including both clerical and
lay positions. Along with his other duties he has contributed much
time and effort to an examination of the relationship of church and
state in contemporary America. Of particular interest is the growing
body of opinion among American churchmen that each of the churches
must take h stand on vital social issues. This and other problems are
examined at some length in Dr. Stokes' definitive Church and State in
the United States.
That religious freedom carries with it high responsibilities.
That religious freedom is one of our most precious heritages from
the past, and that it is intimately related to the other freedoms
of the Bill of Rights.
That our citizenship should be alert to prevent any attempts on
the part of any religious body to secure special favors from the
State, because the maintenance of Church-State separation,
without any loss of mutual sympathy or interest, is fundamental
if our form of democratic government is to be preserved, and is
also to the advantage of the Churches.
That our Churches should interest themselves vitally in social
welfare, and should always uphold the highest standards of
citizenship, but that they should as a general rule abstain from
party politics, and should take an active, assertive part in
political matters only when great moral issues, such as slavery,
child labor, or civic corruption, are concerned, and that even
then they should generally emphasize the fundamental principles
involved rather than the details of legislation or action.
That the State may continue in wise Constitutional ways, such as
the exemption from taxation of buildings regularly used for public
religious purposes, and the providing of chaplaincies in Congress
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and the Armor and Navy, to encourage religion as being in the
interest of the general welfare; but that it must be scrupulously
careful to treat all law-abiding religious bodies alike.
That it is a matter of vital importance that our Federal Constitu-
tion, with its Bill of Rights and other amendments, should
in the highest honor and its provisions scrupulously observed,,
because they control in the Federal field in religious-freedcin
issues, and set standards which the states must observe.
(Church and State in the United States, III, pp. 722-723: 1950.)
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THE AMERICAN DESTINY
In at least one sense the American Revolution was the practical
result of almost a century of optimism, belief that man could control
the forces of nature and make his lot on earth an essentially happy one.
In the history of Western political thought such a notion was a rela-
tively new one. The outstanding success of the American experiment did
little to dim the sense of buoyant optimism which characterized such a
theorist as Jefferson. And, despite certain differences of opinion
about the nature and capacity of man, even such a skeptic as Alexander
Hamilton did not lack a belief in the continuing progress of the
American Republic.
Certainly Walt Whitman, writing during the fifth and sixth decades
of the nineteenth century, held up a vision of the future similar to
that which Jefferson had prophesized. It was not until the cataclysmic
social and economic upheavals of the late nineteenth century that the
note of optimism became a little strained.
With the appearance of America as a principal in the arena of world
affairs the essentially optimistic notion of the American destiny became
tinged with doubt. Americans became confused by the great complexity of
issues which accompanied the new responsibilities of a world power.
These attitudinal changes over the course of some two centuries
were not peculiar to the United States; the countries of Western Europe
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experienced similar changes. Despite these changes many of our poets
and philosophers persist in expressing the hope that America in the face
of the irrational fiction of collectivism will continue to survive as a
government based upon the concept of the supreme value of the human
individual.
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Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826)
The tremendous enthusiasm with which the average American of 1800
considered the future was mirrored in the speeches of the Founding
Fathers. This anticipation of events to come was particularly well
expressed in Thomas Jeffersones first Inaugural Address as the third
president of the young Republic.
I know, indeed, that some honest men have feared that a republican
government cannot be strong; that this government is not strong
enough. But would the honest patriot, in the full tide of success-
ful experiment, abandon a government which has so far kept us free
and firm, on the theoretic and visionary fear that this government,
the world's best hope, may, by possibility, want energy to preserve
itself? I trust not. I believe this, on the contrary, the strong-
est government on earth. I believe it the only one where every
man, at the call of the law, would fly to the standard of the law;
would meet the invasions of the public order as his own personal
concern. Sometimes it is said that man cannot be trusted with the
government of himself. Can he then be trusted with the government
of others? Or have we found angels in the form of kings to govern
him? Let history answer this question.
Let us, then, pursue with courage and confidence our own Federal
and Republican principles; our attachment to union and representa-
tive government. Kindly separated by nature and a wide ocean from
the exterminating havoc of one-quarter of the globe; possessing a
chosen country, with room enough for our descendants to the
thousandth and ten thousandth generation; entertaining a due sense
of our equal right to the use of our own faculties, to the acquis-
itions of our own industry, to honor and confidence from our fellow-
citizens, resulting not from birth, but from our actions and their
sense of them; enlightened by a benign religion, professed indeed
and practiced in various forms, yet all of them inculcating honesty,
truth, temperance, gratitude, and the love of man; acknowledging
and adoring an overruling Providence, which, by all its dispensat3rns,
proves that it delights in the happiness of man here, and his greater
happiness hereafter; with all these blessings, what more is necessary
to make us a happy and a prosperous people? Still one thing more,
fellow-citizens, a wise and frugal government which shall restrain
men from injuring one another, shall leave them otherwise free to
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regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall
not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned, This is
the sum of good government; and this is necessary to choose the
circle of our felicities, ("The Sum of Good Government" from The
First Inaugural Addresses 1801,)
Ralph Waldo Emerson (18Q3.d882)
One of the truly great literary figures of nineteenth century New England
was Ralph Waldo Emerson, Born and brought up in Boston during a period
when youthful, America was flexing its muscles, Emerson?s poetry and
essays are filled with references to tI future of the great democratic
experiment, Despite his awareness of the growing hostility between
North and South, he never lost faith in the future of free society in
America,
We cannot look on the freedom of this country, in connexion with
its youth, without a presentiment that here shall laws and insti-
tutions exist on some scale of proportion to the majesty of nature.
To men legislating for the area betwix the two oceans, betwixt the
snows and the tropics, somewhat of the gravity of nature will in-
fuse itself into the code, A heterogeneous population crowding on
all ships from all corners of the world to the great gates of North
America, namely to the prairie and the mountains, and quickly
contributing their private tho?ght to the public opinion, their
toll to the treasury, and their vote to the election,