The New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1840-1920, 1851-10-28

Literary.
MRNT.

Literary.
THE NEW WORK OF JOHN G. CALHOUN on GOVERN
MKNr.
We have seen . copy of the posthumoss political
work of the late John c. Calhoun, edited by Mr..
Crale. We regret that We were allowed an oppor-
tunity only of merely skipping through the 400
pages Of the work, and can hardly be said to have
given it more than glance. The first LOT pages
are devoted to "Disquisition on Government"
and the residue to discourse the Constitution
and Government of the United States" We no
ticed that Mr.. Calhoun advocates the amendment of
the federal constitution, as has been attributed to
him in various quarters some time sinc,. The fol-
lowing is an extract from the latter part of the
work -
SHOW the constitution could best be modified so
as to effect the object, can only be authoritativsy
determined by the amending power. II may be
done in various ways. Among others, it might be
effected through re- organization of the executive
department, SO that its powers instead OF being
vested as they now are in a single officer should be
vested in two; to be so elected as that the two
should be constituted the special organs and repre-
sentatives OF the respective sections in the execu-
tive department Of the government, and requiring
each to approve all the acts of Congress before
they shall become laws One might be charged
with the administration of matters connected with
the foreign relations OF the country; and the other
of such matters connected with its domestic
institutions, the selection to be decided by lot"
We have not space to give the argument of the
great Carolinian offered to sustain this plan.
We observe that Mr.. Calhoun starts in his {" Dis
QUESTION" with the postulates that government is
of divine origin,-and that constitutions are not
The distinction and the deduction he makes there
from are supported by powerful reasoning in his
own peculiar way. He differs from Locke in many
things, although his views and principles are more
in unison with those Of that great political phio
sopher than they are with those of the radical
democrat, Algernon sydney. The writings of the
latter but revise corrected, and some think,
improved ofthe old Greek unitarian democrat, Aris
totle. By the by, we have heard that Seward claims
TO have borrowed his higher law idea from the
writings Of Sydney, and we believe there is some
thing Of the kind TO be found in them. Mr.. Cal.
houn was OF democrat-he eschewed democracy
especially agrarianis Observation-Disclosures
and all other radical tsn,s, except few of his own
He claims to be republican merely-a eonstitu-
tional republican. He fears manfestly the posi-.
biity of the long existence of the Union, without
change of the constit1 ton, interposing checks
and barriers to the encrsachments OF the federal
authority on the State governments, and to stop
the tendency OF the governments to consolidation.
| His work is eminently philosophical work, and
displays powerfully analytical mind and is pow
erful to the political writings of Stabbis,
| Sir Robert Fillmore, and Baerrine an though it
will not be popular among the masses, who will not
read it, and if they read it, many Of them will not,
perhaps, understand it, yet it will be text book
in after times for political the orists, of school
that will always have numerous disciples. Our
opinion is tina. Mr. Calhoun, who never was prac-
tca has in his book lost sight of the great prac-
teal idea that the popular wll-the yopIli--is
constitution, government, every thing in this last
half Of the nineteenth century, and will be for
to come. The old diadem despotisws OF Europe
see it-feel it and dread it. They look to the ex-
ample set by the United States with terror. We
are the beacon light that has illuminated the
world, and that has enabled the oppressed millions
of the old hemisphere to the deformities of the
sweat and toied for ages. Mr.. Calhoun's book
| will, we think have a run among the liberal and
philosophical politicians of Europe. It would be
we'll if the French political philosophers, and those
French politicians who not pliers, would
study the work intensely There is much in i. that
they could profit by.