The Arkansas advocate., 1835-12-25

any other principle than that the majority should always rule. Vor poputi, uor de' A little reflection should certainly convince them that such a doctrine IS untenabe. Not so did those wise nieT think ~iiio framed the Constitution of thls great nation. +: these ultra l;;..;ess days exceed theE ancestors in wisdom. It IS now become | fashionable to believe and assert, that there | should be restraint, no check, upon the act ings of the popular branch of the Leglsla- ture. The doctrine is warmly advocated, | that the peoples representatives always 1 speak the voice of the people, and that the | people speak through them, and therefore, should be obeyed. Is it so! If so, why ] do we see so frequently, that what one Le- gislature does, the next one annuls. 1t IS theoretically true, that the Representatives of the people stand in the place of the peo- pie. But is it always so in fact? By no means. Every popular assemblage, is va cillating, uncertain and unsettled Tn its course. To-day interest sways them one way--to-morrow personal friendship draws them another. One day the subtle orator carries one measure by his eloquence, and another day partizan fury and sectional ex- citement drive them onward trampling down all that is just, right and for the inte
 rest of the country. Show us a government any where, which has been composed of one single popular assembly, and there we will show you continual tumult, change and vacllation. A popular assembly is like the ocean after a storm. There is continual heaving and billowing of opinion--a con- tinua ebbing and flowing of passion and excitement, and change and irregularity in political measures. Every government founded on one popular assembly, has hard ly survived its formation, and the finger of Time has hardly had time to touch the walls of the fabric, before they crumbled. We have two articles in our political creed, of the correctness of which, We are every day more and more convinced. One is, that no unchecked, popular legislative assembly expresses the will of the people in more than three instances out of fiye--and anoth- CT is, that no government which rocks and sways to and fro, at every wave of popular feeling can De perpetual. fYe believe that the voice of the people should rule, but not ln such sense that portien of the people, even the majority, should have the minority totally at their mercy, delenceless, and con- stttutionattq unarmed.
 Others of those writers and disclaimers allow that there should be check, but are ] for obtaining 1t by forming districts by the number of free white males which they con- tain. These writers are still more danger ous than the former. Their doctrine has some semblance of justice and fairness and political wisdom. It is but semblance-- the shadow of shade. The Senate would only be miniature of the House--and 1t would be the same thing if the House of Representatives were to pass bill. and then adjourn to another House, call thens- selves Senate, and pass ii over again.
 The House of Representatives will con- sst of some thirty or forty agents elect. ed by the people of Arkansas to manage their concerns. The people are not willing to leave those agents wholly unchecked and they will therefore, elect another set of agents to control and check them, and to be in turn, controlled and checked by them. lteach county send proportIonally, the same number to this latter branch as t. the former, any sectional matter which is carried in one 1 House will be carried in the other, and the agents wifi be one, 10 all lntents and per- poses. Wise men, therefore, in forming government, would fix the Representative and Senatorial districts on q different hasis -one on numbers of free white males-the ether on extent of count. The weaker portions of the Territory would thus have strength for self lfprotection in one branch of the government. The minority should not be placed in situation to govern the mjaor- ity, but to obtain justice from it.
 There is yet another reason. No gov ernment has ever existed long, when the power was in the hands of an unchecked popular assembly. Athens, for example, in which every man aided personally in ma king the laws, was subjected to despotsm at the first attempt. France during the re- volution tried the plan of one popular as- semhl y-and 1t lasted a whole year. A government in which there is no other basis for representation than the free white males, would of course pass just such laws, and adopt just such measures as the popular feeling for the moment should prescribe or if not, the majority would declare them to be anti-republican. The mass of people in every country, particularly thickly settled one, is AuetuatIng in its feelngs-and Iia- ble to sudden changes and revolutions of opinion. A coordinate branch of the gov ernment is therefore needed, more stedfast and stable than the popular branch-to check and regulate the incensiderate mea- sures often adopted by such an assembly. xt-. Iz Il