Far the larger number have fixed upon universal suffrage as the worst element. Others, however, have attributed it rather to the frequency of elections than to the mode of election. The supposed "irrepressible conflict" between free and slave labor, has had numerous advocates, and the quadrennial convulsions of our Presidential elections have been found to be the efficient cause by not a few. Profounder thinkers have long since predicted the result-not as dependent on any single cause-but as the inevitable climax of a multiplicity of causes, such as climate, extent of territory, difference in domestic institutions, antagonism of local interests. Differing as I do from most of my own fellow-countrymen in thinking that our form of government has had nothing to do with the conflict-that it was inevitable under any form of government-my attention, in the absence of any serious employment, has been naturally directed to the consideration of the subject in its broader aspects. The study of the constitutional forms of government, and of their practical workings seemed a necessary preliminary to the formation of a reliable opinion, and the tedium of exile has been pleasantly, if not profitably, lessened by readings in that view. My acquaintance with Montesquieu, DeTocqueville, DeLolme and Jefferson was renewed. The worldly wisdom of Machiavelli was consulted. Sismondi, Mills, Brougham, Fischel and Francheville were read. In addition, the great events which have been transpiring during the last two years, were daily gleaned from the public journals, and the various comments of all factions considered and weighed. In the brief period mentioned, Poland has been almost, and Circassia entirely, exterminated, Denmark has been conquered and partitioned, an Empire has been commenced on the North American continent, a Holy Alliance of Sovereigns once more formed for the repression of struggling nationalities and free institutions, and England has abdicated her place among the nations of Europe to devote herself to the accumulation of the almighty dollar. The times have been full of incident, and afforded a rich feast for the curious thinker. My notes and memoranda would be incomplete without containing the result of my readings and observations. For this purpose, I have thrown together my notes on the three forms of government which stand as types of modern civilization-those of France, England and America. They constitute, in fact, the salient points into which political institutions are grouped under the influence of modern civilization. The difficulty of distinctly defining different forms of governVOL. III.-NO. I.—3. ment will be more apparent when we see how very diversely great writers have written even of primary divisions. "All States, all Sovereignties," writes Machiavelli, in the Prince, “which have, or which have had authority over men, have been and are either Republics or Principalities." That is, as his treatise shows, either states where the people or a class of the people have ruled, or states ruled by hereditary princes, and he distinguishes between those of the latter which have been ruled for a long time by the same family, and those recently acquired by a Prince. "There are three kinds of government," says Montesquieu, (Esprit des Lois. Liv. i. c. i), "the Republican, the Monarchical and the Despotic. In order to discover the nature of each, the idea of the least educated of men will suffice. I suppose three definitions, or rather three facts; the first, that the Republican government is that in which the people in mass, or only a part of the people, has the sovereign power; the monarchical, that where a single person governs, but by fixed and established laws; whereas, in the despotical a single person, without laws or restraint, conducts everything according to his will and his caprices." Lord Brougham's summary is most sensible: "Government," he says, "may be vested in a single person, or in a particular class different from the bulk of the community, or in the community at large. In the first case, it is a monarchy, and may be a despotism, or limited. In the second an aristocracy, which may be an oligarchy. In the third a Democracy, or Republic. In point of fact, a pure government of either form is exceptionalmost governments being more or less a mixture of the essential elements of each." Each form has existed in reality, but as civilization' advanced and population increased, other elements were introduced, until modern governments do substantially embody them all, but in different degrees. A judicious combination of these elements has been the dream of philosophers both of the ancient and themodern world. "Status esse optime constitutam rempublicam." exclaims Cicero, (Frag), "quae ex tribus generibus illis, regali, optimo, populari, modice conjusa. Aristotle and Plato, Montesquieu and Harrington have all thrown out a similar suggestion. Tacitus treats the idea as Utopian: "Cunctas nationes et urbes populus, aut priores, aut singuli regunt. Delecta ex his, et constituta reipublica forma laudari facilius, quam evenire, vel si evenit haud diuturna esse potest." (Ann. iv.) Facts, however, are more potent than words, and nothing seems impossible to nature. New combinations have been formed for which no distinctive names have yet been invented-for, as DeTocqueville suggests, men invent facts more easily than words. While theory has thus yielded to the inexorable logic of facts, there will be found an apparently singular divergence of views among doctors as to the mode and measure of the combination. It is a favorite theory of many political thinkers that the mixture of the various elements must be such as to produce antagonism as nearly equal as possible. In this way, they think, a political equilibrium, most essential to the health of the body politic, is established. DeLolme's treatise on the English Constitution is based on this theory, and the motto of his book is, "Librata suis ponderibus." Sismondi does not yield assent to this doctrine of antagonism, and insists upon a combination of the elements such as will produce, not mutual resistance, but mutual assistance, and joint action to a common object. M. De Tocqueville's views are thus expressed (Dem. in America, vol. 2, p. 144): "In order to preserve liberty it is not my opinion that many principles should be so mingled in the same government as really to oppose one another. The government which is called mixed has always seemed to me a chimera. There is not, in truth, a mixed goverment in the sense given to the phrase, because in every society we can discover a principle of action which controls all the others. The England of the last century, which has always been cited as an example of this sort of government, was a State essentially aristocratic, although great elements of democracy were embraced in its bosom; for the laws and the manners were so established, that the aristocracy would always in the end predominate, and direct public affairs according to its wishes. The error comes from this, that, seeing the interests of the nobles always in conflict with those of the people, the struggle was alone kept in view, instead of the attention being fixed upon the result of the strife, which was the important point. When a nation comes really to have a mixed government, that is to say, equally apportioned between contrary principles, it enters into revolution or becomes dissolved. I think, therefore, that a social power superior to all others must be placed somewhere; but I believe liberty to be in peril when this power finds before it no obstacle which restrains its march, and gives it time to moderate itself. Omnipotence in human hands seems to me a thing bad and dangerous.” After all, the difference between DeLolme, Sismondi and DeTocqueville upon this point, is more in words than in reality. DeTocqueville himself says, men invent or make facts easier words to represent or define those facts. Governments have existed in which the various elements were so proportioned as to ensure the stability of the state and the prosperity of the nation. Perhaps we might not be able to say of any one of those cases, that the various elements were in exact or mathematical equilibrium-nor did DeLolme, we may well suppose, have in view any such hypothetical assumption. All he meant, doubtless, was that the equilibrium should be such as to prevent any one element from entirely annulling all the others. So, also, the successful working of such a combination is not at all incompatible with the ascendency of one of those elements, as required by DeTocqueville. And, if they do work together, notwithstanding their relative superiority or inferiority, they certainly may, in Sismondi's language, be said to act harmoniously for a common object. There is a theory of a German school of theology (the Tubingen School), in relation to the history and development of the Christian church, which strikingly illustrates the subject under discussion. It is called the theory of contradiction, and aims, by tracing the antagonistic elements at work in the bosom of the Christian societies at any one era, to discover the mean or resultant of those forces as the starting point for the study of the next era. These elements may exist simultaneously, and move on together, sometimes one attaining the ascendency, and sometimes another, but never fusing into each other so as to leave one entirely in the ascendant. According to this theory, the doctrine of St. Paul as to the freedom of the new law from the ritual of the old and the sanctification of the believer by faith, is met by the adherence of St. Peter and the other disciples to the ceremonials of the Jewish law, until the mean result is worked into a church. hierarchy symbolizing the forms of the Levitical Priesthood, and the dogmas of the Catholic faith. In the same way, the antagonism between the spiritualism of Christianity and the sensuousness of Paganism results finally in the worship of images, and the canonization of saints. It is not often, in other words, that the victory in the case of conflicting powers is so complete as entirely to destroy the vanquished. The latter is apt to retain a portion of its vitality, and may in its turn become the victor. "That which is called union in a political body," says Montesquieu, (Grandeur des Romains, ix), "is often a very equivocal thing. The true union is a union of harmony, which causes all the parts, however antagonistic they may appear, to tend to the general benefit of the society, as dissonances in music concur in a general accord. There may be a union in state where one would only expect to see trouble—that is to say a harmony whence happiness results, which alone is the true peace. It is like the parts of the universe eternally bound together by the action of some and the reaction of others." In fine, the harmonious working of political elements can not be predicated by theory. The combinations in reality are of infinite variety and incalculable complication-and incessantly changing. Stability depends upon more than the mere relative preponderance of elements. All the various forms of government are substantially resolved into three-the monarchical, aristocratic, and democratic. The first may be defined to be the concentration of power into the hands of one man-whether for a term of years or for life, and whether by election or hereditary right. The second is the entrusting of power to a limited number as a permanent class, and this whether by election or right of birth. The third is the exercise of power by the people either directly, or through their representatives. In modern times these elements are all found to exist more or less, in the government of civilized nations-but in various degrees of combination. Singularly enough the ostensible form does not always represent the real form of government; or rather, to speak more accurately, the outward form often fails to indicate the really substantial element which prevails in the actual workings of the institutions of a country. The most absolute monarchy is frequently only an oligarchy-and this result is most common in that form of monarchy which may be deemed typical-the hereditary. For in an hereditary monarchy, there will always be periods when the incumbent of the throne is an infant, a feme covert, an idiot, or a roi faineant and, in such cases, the government is actually administered by a power other than that of the monarch. It has, consequently, been said of hereditary monarchies, with a point derived from the truth embodied in the words, that the King reigns, but does not govern. Even when the incumbent is not under disability, the royal power is transferred, according to the degree of respect for public opinion entertained at the palace, either to ministers of approved character, or to favorites, or to mistresses, or to eunuchs. From the liberal monarchy of Belgium to the (so-called) despotism of Constantinople, the monarchical element is existing in form, while often wanting in fact. All the advantages of unity of will, which constitutes the essence of monarchy, disappear as soon as the monarch resigns his power, whether he assist at the council or not, and whether he signs the orders of ministers or not. In the monarchy |