CHAPTER XVII. PRESENT CONDITION OF THE AMERICAN POLITY. 1789-1890. WHILE in the empire of England, Anglo-Saxon freedom has thus been adapting itself in throes almost revolutionary to the conditions of the nineteenth century, how has it fared in America? The thirteen States of 1789 have become in one hundred years forty-four; in population, area, resources of every kind, the Union has multiplied to a wonderful degree. As to constitutional changes, what have we to note? The great federal instrument stands substantially unchanged. The few amendments, famous though some of them are, wrought out at such of the Federal Cost of blood and treasure, call for no Permanence Constitution. notice in the present discussion. The clauses of the Constitution have been regarded with a veneration ever deepening, until it has become almost superstitious; to think of meddling with its provisions is, in the general view, almost an impiety. As regards the separate commonwealths, while each one of the forty-four has its peculiarities,1 the general resemblance is close. A tendency legislatures. to greater elaborateness in the written con Distrust of 1 See Henry Hitchcock: American State Constitutions, Putnams, 1887. stitutions is to be noted, as new States have been added one by one, proceeding so far that in the more recent instruments a provision for minute details exists in strong contrast with the older documents. This circumstance is due to a growing distrust, in the States, of the legislatures; delegates in so many cases prove inefficient, corrupt, or in some way false to their trust, that the people think fit more and more to tie their hands. Undoubtedly this deepening dissatisfaction with legislatures, Congress itself as well as those of lower rank, is a circumstance full of ill omen. If the representative body is a failure, then is Anglo-Saxon freedom a failure, and the sooner we recur to the system of Strafford or Richard II, the better. The ideas of those historic figures are by no means yet obsolete among English-speaking men. Is Anglo-Saxon freedom no longer well adapted to English-speaking men? men? What can be said about the condition of the primordial cell of our body-politic? the primordial cell of an Anglo-Saxon polity, the In our human bodies, if the cellular tissue is healthy, the physician is sure all will ultimately go well. Bones may be broken, sinews Condition of sprained, a blast of malaria may have caused an ague, or improper food dyspepsia. Various kinds of deep-seated trouble popular moot. may exist, acute and even chronic; but if the pri mordial cell everywhere is sound, the patient will survive. The proper primordial cell of an AngloSaxon body-politic is local self-government by a consensus of individual freemen; in other words, the 1 See Traill Life of Strafford, 1889, p. 204, etc., and notice of the same in London "Saturday Review," November 9, 1889. popular moot, the thing back of the representative Body, the primary democracy where the individual rules, no man's voice weighing more than another's except in so far as ability and character give him weight. This primordial cell, so fundamental and needful, is it in the Union in such condition that Americans can confidently thrust the shoulder under the responsibilities which the future has in store? Examination of rural A broad division of the population of the United States may be made into those who live in cities and those who live in the country, a division quite necessary in the present discussion; America. for local self-government is a far more complicated and embarrassing matter for cities than for rural populations. In 1790, one thirtieth of the population of the United States lived in cities of eight thousand inhabitants or over. The ratio in our time of the urban to the rural population is very different, the proportion of the urban population having risen to one quarter of the total, and showing a constant increase.2 Looking first at the condition of the rural population, we shall find in the various States of the Union communities to be classed as follows: those in which prevails, first, the Town system; second, the County system; third, the Township-County or Compromise system. In the Town system, confined pretty much to New England, the population occupying a comparatively small area assemble regularly, and themselves 1 H. B. Adams: Germanic Origin of New England Towns, Johns Hopkins University Studies, 1st Series, No. II, p. 5. 2 Census Reports. 8 S. A. Galpin: Walker's Statistical Atlas of United States, II, p. 10. discuss and decide upon public matters, electing representatives to stand in their place in the legislatures of State and Union, but retaining in their own hands local government. In the County system, that of the South, the population elect officers upon whom they throw the burden of local government; there are no regular popular moots for the discussion of public affairs, citizens contenting themselves with the mere election of the county officials: the latter, if unsatisfactory, are not subject to check or guidance from any formally constituted body, but are simply dropped at the next election. In the Township-County or Compromise system, the two other systems are variously blended: this may be seen in the States of the MidIdle and the West. Local selfgovernment land. Influences the town Beginning our discussion with the Town system, let us inquire whether New Englanders have preserved it in its integrity. In the immense dilution which the old stock of New England wew Enghas undergone through the foreign human floods which have been poured upon it, its influence has of necessity been often greatly weakened and the character of town government has been modified, seldom advantageously. While which impair multitudes of the ancient strain have for- meeting. saken the granite hills, their places have been supplied by a Celtic race, energetic and prolific, whose teeming families throng city and village, threatening to outnumber the Yankee element, depleted as it has been by the emigration of so many of its most vigorous children. To these new-comers must be added now the French Canadians, who, following the track of their warlike ancestors down the river-valleys, have come by thousands into the manufacturing towns and into the woods, an industrious but unprogressive race, good hands in the mills and marvellously dexterous at wielding the axe. Whatever may be said of the virtues of these new-comers, — and, of course, a long list could be made out for them, - they have not been trained to Anglo-Saxon self-government. We have seen the origin of the folk-moot far back in Teutonic antiquity. As established in New England, it is a revival of a most ancient thing. The institution is uncongenial to any but Teutonic men; the Irishman and Frenchman are not at home in it, and cannot accustom themselves to it, until, as the new generations come forward, they take on the characteristics of the people among whom they have come to cast their lot. At present, in most old New England towns, we find an element of the population numbering hundreds, often thousands, who are sometimes quite inert, allowing others to decide all things for them; sometimes voting in droves in an unintelligent way as some whipper-in may direct; sometimes in unreasoning partisanship, following through thick and thin a cunning demagogue, quite careless how the public welfare may suffer by his coming to the front.1 Though the town-meeting of the New England of to-day rarely presents all the features of the townmeeting of the Revolution, yet wherever the population has remained tolerably pure from foreign admixture, and wherever the 66 Picture of it thirty years since. 1 I have embodied here some material from previous works, Johns Hopkins University Studies, 2d Series, IV, p. 16, etc., and also the Life of Samuel Adams, Chap. XXIII. See the latter work for a detailed sketch of the town of Boston, the most interesting of New England towns in its most interesting period. |