The national era. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1847-1860, 1854-08-10

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the watchfnl performance by the People at critical
| moments, of the functions deyolyed upon them.
| Consider how many and various are the human
wills, which meet and concur every time a fresh
| impulse is given to the great mechanism. A
majority Of the States neglecting or refusing TO
act on any such occasion, could bring the Gov
| eminent to dead stand Consider that the Peo-
pie not only interfere on such critical occasions,
but also that they continually supplying the
| necessary force to sustain the movements of the
subordinate parts of the machine
There are two and half millions of electors,
and every one OF these is charged with the per-
formance, for the most part annually, with four
several classes of functions, in as many distinct
spheres Once, generally, in each year. the elect
ors choose mayor or supervisor aldermen or
trustees, select men, justices of the peace po-
lice officers, clerks, assessors of taxes corrmis-
| sionors of public charities, commissioners of
| streets, roads, and bridges and subalterns or
other officers of the militia, IN their respective
cities, towns, or other forms of municipalities.
Again-the electors, generally, once in each year,
choose ofheers nearly as numerous, and OF a
higher grade, to execute judicial, ministerial,
and fiscal powers, of similar nature, within
the counties, which embrace several cities, towns,
| and municipalities. Again-they elect Governors,
Lieutenant Governors, Senators and Representa-
| tives, Judges, Treasures, Ministers of Finance,
of Education, of Public Works, and of Char
tiles, In the States constituted by such counties
States sovereign in all things, except the few de-
! partments they have voluntarily assigned to the
Federal Union. Once more-the citizens choose,
once in two years, Representatives, and once in
three years, Senator's who exercise the legislative
powers of the Republic; and once in four years,
the Vice President and President of the United
States, its Chief Executive Magistrates The peace,
order, prosperity and happiness, and even the
safety OF society, rest manfestly the soundness
lAff 49, IL
electoral trusts are discharged. Reflect now, for
moment, on the perturbations of society, the de-
vices and combinations of parties, and the appli
! ances of corruption to which the electoral body
i is at all times exposed. Could these Functions
be performed with results generally suspicious
| if the People of the United States did not, rs
mass, excel other nations in intelligence, as much
as in the good fortune of inheriting such extra
ordinary institutions?
Look at the operation of this system in yet an
other aspect. Not only the Constitutions Of the
| several States, but even the Constitution of the
| Union, stands only by the voluntary consent of
the People. BY physical force, which there is no
Government force to suppress, they could subvert
| any or all of these Constitutions. Even without
force, and acting only by agreement, but in con-
| formity to certain established conditions, they
can change or subvert all these Constitutions
There is indeed no restraining power acting upon
them, from within or from without. Practically,
they do change the Constitutions of the several
States once in twenty years y ct they work
such changes generally without cornmotion and
they have never made one without replacing the
Constitution removed by better one. few of
the States inherited the jurisprudence of the civil
law, and all the others the common and statute
laws of England. Does any one deny that they
have sagaciously retained all the parts of those
excellent codes which were essential to order
and civil liberty and have modified others only
so far as was required by the changing circum-
stances of society and the ever-improving senti-
| ments of justice and humanity? Let our logical
amendments of the rules of evidence, and our
simple process of pleading and practice in courts
of justice, our deliberations of Imprisonment for
debt, and of eleemosynary laws, and of peaiten-
tiary systems, indicate the intellectual yigor and
wisdom of the American People
Modern invention, until the close of the last
century, chiefly employed in discovering new
| laws CT nature and in shaping those discoveries
into the forms of theories and maxims. Thus
far, in the present century, Invention has en-
ployed itself in applying those theories and max
inns, by various devices of mechanism, or other
wise to practical use. In Europe, those devices
are chiefly such as regard aesthetic effect In
America, on the other hand, those devices are
such as have for their object the increase Of
| power. Required to subdue nature through
broad range quickly, and to bring forth her vari-
bers inadequate and capital quite unequal to
| such labors, the American studies chiefly econ
| omy and efficiency. lie has examined every
| instrument and engine, and combination, and
| composition received from his elder transatlantic
| brother, in the light of those objects, and has
| either improved it, or devised new and better
| one. He aims at doing the most that is possible
quickly as possible; and this characteristic is
| manifested equally in his weapons of war aud
| his instruments of peace whether they are to be
| used in the field, or in the workshop, or on the
seattle fire-arm, the axe, the plough, the rail-
road, the clipper ship, the steam engine, and the
| printing press. His railroads cost less and are
less perfect than those in other countries but he
| builds ten miles where they have only three lie
| moves passengers and freights on such roads and
| in his ships with less safety, but with greater
chcapness and velocity. He prepares his news
papers, his magazines and his treatises, with less
| care, but he prints an hundred for one. If the
| European has failed to give him necessary
| principle, or to embody it i'll practical machine
| he finds out the one, constructs the ether
| promptly for himself He wanted machines for
working up his forests, and he invented the saw
| gang, and the growing and planning machines :;
for cleaning his cotton, and he invented the gin !;
! for harvesting his wheat and he invented the
reaper. He needed mechanical force to navigate
| his long rivers and broad lakes, and he converted
| the steam engine into a marine power. lie need
| ed despatch in communicating intelligence. and
| he placed his lightning-rod horizontally, and
beating it into wire converted it into writing
| telegraph.
Fifty years ago, there was 10 American Science
| and no American Literature. Now there is an
| American tenancy in every intellectual depart
ment, and none acknowledge its presence and
usefulness more freely than those whose fame has
| least to fear from competition.
1t seems to me that this intellectual develop
| ment of the United States is due chiefly to the
adoption of the great idea of universal emulation
| Our Constitutions and laws open every depart
| ment of human enterprise and ambition TO all
citizens without respect to BIRTH or class or con-
| dition, and steadily though cautiously exert
power quite effective in preventing any accidental
social inequality from becoming fixed and per-
manent.
There still remains the question, whether the
moral development is coordinate with those OF
| physical power and mind in the United States A
| Republic may be safe, even though it be weak,
| and though it be in considerable degree INTEL
lectually inactive, as is seen in Switzerland but
| a Republic cannot exist without virtue
| II will not suffice to examine the question
through the lens of traditional prejudice. In all
nations, kind of reverence is paid to antiquity.
| There is no one that does not trace its lineage
| from the gods or from those who were especially
| favored by gods. Every people has had its age
| of gold, or Augustan age, heroic age--an age,
| alas forever passed. These prejudices are not
| altogether anwholesome. Although they pro-
| duce a conviction of declining virtue, which is
| unfsyorable to generous emulation, yet People
| at once ignorant and irreverential would neces-
| sarily become hcentious. Nevertheless, such
| prejudices ought to be modified. 1t is not true,
| that in the period of nations rise from disorder
to refinement it is not able to continually surpass
4 ITSELF We see the present plainly distinctly with