Comme force, la majorité n'a aucun droit que celui de la force même qui ne peut être, à ce titre seul, la souverainté légitime. Comme opinion la majorité est elle infaillible? Sait-elle et veut-elle toujours la raison, la justice, qui sont la vraie loi et confèrent seules la souverainté légitime? L'expérience dépose du contraire. La majorité en tant que majorité, c'est a dire en tant que nombre, ne possède donc la souverainté légitime, ni en vertu de la force qui ne la confére jamais, ni en vertu de l'infaillibilité qu'elle n'a point.'

The majority, where it has prevailed, has ever been purely conventional, some laws requiring a greater and some a less-some unanimity-and others speaking by the voice of a few, or of one, as the family is represented by its head. In the old corporate towns a few persons represented the community. When the actions of the society are governed by the majority, in the sense of numbers, the majority may be variously understood. It may be, either a majority consisting of the more numerous of two bodies supporting respectively two contrary propositions, or of the more numerous of several bodies supporting respectively several distinct propositions. If ten propositions, or, which is the same thing, ten candidates were offered to the choice of fifty persons, that they might select one of the ten, six of the fifty persons might form the majority, and the forty-four have no voice. If there be no lawas in our electoral system there is no law-which requires more than a moiety, or any definite proportion of the entire body, to form an

* Id. p. 107.

effectual majority, the six must prevail, or there must be a power or inducement to withdraw some of the propositions or candidates, and yet the excluded candidates or points might express perfectly the sentiments of those who put them forward, an expression which will be silenced by their withdrawal. In some late borough elections it has been the practice, to prevent, as far as possible, differences of opinion from dividing interests, to subject the several candidates in the same general interest or party, to a preliminary ballot; and thus to give a more certain and perfect dominion to the positive and actual majority of numbers.*

With regard to the character of government by a numerical majority, it is useful to listen to republican statesmen. Mr. Calhoun, who occupied at different times some of the highest offices in the government of the United States, and who studied American institutions with the aid of long experience, employed his latest hours and his most elaborate efforts, in a work designed as a warning against the dangers of that absolutism which would result from committing the destinies of the country to the uncontrolled government of the numerical majority. The right of suffrage, he says, is, indeed, the indispensable and primary principle; "but it would be a great and dangerous mistake to suppose, as many do, that it is of itself sufficient to form constitutional governments."† "To this erroneous opinion,"

* See Tremenheere, Constitution of United States, p. 223. † A Disquisition on Government, and a Discourse on the Constitution and Government of the United States, by John C. Calhoun. Edited by R. C. Cralle, p. 13. Charleston, 1851.

he adds, " may be traced one of the causes why so few attempts to form constitutional governments have succeeded; and why, of the few which have, so small a number have had a durable existence. It has led not only to mistakes in the attempt to form such governments, but to their overthrow, when they have, by some good fortune, been correctly formed. So far from being of itself sufficient-however well guarded it might be, and however enlightened the people-it would, unaided by other provisions, leave the government as absolute as it would be in the hands of irresponsible rulers, and with a tendency, at least as strong, towards oppression and abuse of its powers." "The more extensive and populous the country, the more diversified the condition and pursuits of its population; and the richer, more luxurious, and dissimilar the people, the more difficult it is to equalise the action of the government, and the more easy for one portion of the com munity to pervert its powers to oppress and plunder the other." "The dominant majority for the time," he repeats, "would have the same tendency to oppression and abuse of power, which, without the right of suffrage, irresponsible rulers would have. No reason, indeed, can be assigned why the latter would abuse their power, which would not apply with equal force to the former. The dominant majority for the time would, in reality, through the right of suffrage, be the rulers — the controlling, governing, and irresponsible power, and those who make and execute the laws, would, for the time, in reality be but their representa

tives and agents." And he proceeds to show that the abuse of the power which would thus be acquired, could only be counteracted by giving to each division, or interest, through its appropriate organ, a concurrent voice. The majority which is formed by this concurrence he calls the constitutional majority, in contradistinction to that which is obtained by treating the whole community as a unit, having but one common interest. "The first and leading error," he says, "which naturally arises from overlooking the distinction referred to, is to confound the numerical majority with the people, and this so completely as to regard them as identical. This is a consequence that necessarily results from considering the numerical as the only majority. All admit, that a popular government, or democracy, is the government of the people; for the terms imply this. A perfect government of the kind would be one which would embrace the consent of every citizen, or member, of the community; but as this is impracticable, in the opinion of those who regard the numerical as the only majority, and who can perceive no other way by which the sense of the people can be taken, they are compelled to adopt this as the only true basis of popular government, in contradistinction to governments of the aristocratical or monarchical form. Being thus constrained, they are, in the next place, forced to regard the numerical majority as, in effect, the entire people; that is, the greater part as the whole; and the government of the greater part as the government of the whole."‡

* Id. p. 22.

† Id. p. 25.

Id. p. 27.

The work being adapted to a republican form of government, contains observations on a political organism, by the concurrence and veto of different bodies, which happily is, in this country, provided for by a different constitution; but all the remarks on the error of so dealing with numbers as to extinguish interests, is equally applicable to the constitution of the House of Commons. The danger of a The danger of a popular body, unbalanced by the introduction of elements other than those which have their origin in numerical force, is stated, with equal confidence, by Mr. Burke. He says, "Of this I am certain; that, in a democracy, the majority of the citizens is capable of exercising the most cruel oppressions upon the minority, whenever strong divisions prevail in that kind of polity, as they often must; and that oppression of the minority will extend to far greater numbers, and will be carried on with much greater fury, than can almost ever be apprehended from the dominion of a single sceptre."*

Those who contend that neither good government nor individual liberty is necessarily secured by a suffrage which commits the government absolutely to the numerical majority, do not, therefore, argue that there must not be a resort to arithmetic. It is impossible to suppose a popular form of government in which the votes must not be counted. The problem of constitutional organism is, in what manner the individuals composing the entire community are to be classed so that no opinions or interests shall be unheard, or extinguished, in representation.

* Reflections on the French Revolution, &c.,

p. 186.