The Burlington weekly hawk-eye. [volume] (Burlington [Iowa]) 1860-1876, 1863-01-31

for the present, and it may be that
when peaca ls restored, that we may
discover that this free trade principle is not in
iispensab,e to the we'll being of society.
LIMITED GOVERNMENT, a5tG gae
Our present experience will teach us anoth-
Or valuable lesson, to Wit THAT limited gov
ernments, or governments with written consti-
buttons, are unnatural and impracticable. p
England, is in the true and only true sense, .
limited OF constitutional. government; but there
the only limits to the power are time honored
and the checks and balances which
commons, lords, the church and the throne in
terpose to each other Hence, it has been truly
said that .'kings, lords and commons may do
anything except make man Q woman Here
Is govsrumen& ct allpoints ready to meet and
spply the proper means TO any exigencies that
may arise, and to WELD the whole unrestricted
power Of the nation to cope with any inimical
people, No one can foresee what day may
bring forth, and therefore it 10 rash and nm
wise to prescribe fixed, unbsnding rules for our
future conduct, and still more unwi-e and rash
TO prescribe such rules for the conduct Of oth-
ere. What wonld become Of child in the
jostls and struggle Of life, il at it, birth pro
gramme Of ito conduct through life, strictly
prescribing what it should and what it should
not do, we're to be the guide Of ito conduct
through life. A human being with such limit.
ed powers Of action, would not be greater
absufdity than the government Of nation
similarly limited, for the exigeneies Of ma
tionSl life are % various, complex and unfor-
seen % those Of individual life. Vets written
constitution is programme ofconduot prescrl-
bed at the birth Of nstion, for its future con-
duct throughout all time. Or st best It is On
attempt to make an organic law, which may
not be changed readily - occasions for change
may arise. ~.
ton il ike man with his hand manacled.-.
It's cspseity Tor action - cramped and dimin-
ished. g7 a -
Our Copfederacy like oil other nations and
confederacies, has an unwritten constitution,
which consists Of the sympathies, instincts,
community of interests and necessities that
brought 10 together and will hold u together.
aud in the institutions and laws which We dc.
rived from England, gradually and insensibly
modified to suit our republican society. This
unwritten constitution, like oil true constitu.
lions, has been the work Of nature and Of time,
and when closely analysed will be found to be
nothing more than that socisl status which Is
% old % man himself. ,1
On the other hand, our written constitution
10 one half mere league or treaty between
Sovereign States, and the other, statute hw,
which will require frequent change, and yet
is so awkwardly contrived that timely changes
can scarcely ever be made. We ought to have
. convention every two years to modify the
"a IN AYSOnn-
cies and emergencies. The frequent changes
of State constitutions show that they are mere
statute laws which can seldom provide for the
distant future. ~
All of our great statesmen and jurists have
been q Blind % That's on this subject, and
quite overlooked our real, natural, God given,
unwritten constitutions whilst they perplex-
cd themselves End their readers with learned
disquisitions on written constitutions which
were not. and in the nature of things never
could be, demonstrations at all. Not constitu-
lions, nor whit more like constitutions than
horse is like an alderman, The doctor who
should mistake his diet and physic which he
administers to the patient for the patients
constitution, would be deemed great block
head but precisely such blockheads are all
who mistake human regulations of society for
the consti.. ution of society. They are in truth
but it's diet and its physic, whilst real constitu
tons ere the vital principles imposed on socie-
ties and nations ct their birth. ,aa-=i -et (
Written limitations Of power are worthless
Institutional limitations are invaluable. The
Confederate government will be sufficiently
checked, limited and restrained by the institu-
ton Of the Ssnate, the House Of Representatives,
the judiciary and the executive, which will rare
" unite it in any act ofinjustice or tyranny. If
| A Al
lions clothed with the power of secession, that
ate government within proper limits of action.
Tho checks, balances and limitations of gov
ornamental powers are Ill institutions, none con.
stitutional Such il the theory and practice Of
the English Government, and such is the prac-
tice Of Ill governmental. Among civilized peo-
poole there never was pure and simple despot.
ism or monarchy, because among such people
there ere always many institutions that check,
mitigate and limit the power of the monarch. ].
The Confederate Constitution 10 mere Tub
thrown over to the whale. No intelligent man
who voted for It deemed it would be permanent;
but only considered 1t temporary expedient,
giving way, for the time to popular prejudices
. bridge or passway between mobocracy and
anarchy, and conservative repnblicanism.
We are continually assembling conventions,
clothed with sovereign power to remodel our
State institutions and to establish principles OF
universal and eternal right These conventions
are ehesen By the esmeg people Who elect our
msmbers of the lower and upper Houses Of the
Legislature, our Judiciary and our Executive
Il would be thousand times more sensible and
prudent procedure to invest cur Ordinary func-
tionaries of Government, the two Houses Of
Legislature, the Judiciary and the Governor,
with sovereign power, than to invest sovereign
~ in single body e convention(, because in
the former case We have checks and balances,
and In tho latter none. Never, in the history
Of the Caucasian race. has 20 stupid and i'm
practicable body Of men met together - the
late Virginia Convention. yet they were clothed
with sovereign power, whilst our Governor,
Senate and our House of Delegates and Jsdicia
~, with ten times their intellect and twenty
times their patriotism, were restricted in their
powers, and liable to DO removed ouneutralized
BY this contemplate convention. Delegate
sovereign power to the combined branches Of
an, Cte<A nnvosu~nnk and 30 akal mad M