Memphis daily appeal. [volume] (Memphis, Tenn.) 1847-1886, 1867-06-04


complaints Of those whom It brushes
upon its path" til /, says the Reviewer,
"a blind, cold, cruel and remorseless
despotism." To oppose its will, and still
mere to confute It's advocates By argu-
ment, is, in its eyes, a crime. From the
time Of the accession to power Of Mr..
JEFFERSON, in 1901, the minority in the
United States had only the right TO cast
useless votes and be governed by the
majority.
In 1926, New England was In the
majority; and then Mr.. EVERETT de-
elared that, from the great principle that
ali men are equal, Il flowed as a neces-
san consequence, that the will Of a
majority Of the people Is the will Of Gov
eminent: whereas there is no sach con-
sequence; and In 1915 New England,
then in the minority, utterly denied the
right of the majority to control the Gov
ernment or to rule her own destiniss.
"For, in her impassioned words, she
then groaned under "a want Of informa-
ton as well g Of feeling in the majority
and she insisted on a change in the Con-
stitution in order to impose additional
restrictions 'on the power Of the bare
majority, to repeat these expressions
Then, instead Of the VIII Of the majority,
she cried aloud for the reign Of law, and
order and justice. Then she cried aloud
against the oppression Of the weaker in
terest of the country by the stronger >
and stood up for the minority of the
Nation against the sudden and injudi-
cious decisions of bare minorities.'
"The object Of the trainers Of the Con-
stitution, u the Reviewer most truly says,
" was not to institute a democracy, or
the absolute sovereignty of the major
ity." They never dreamed of such a
thing, or that, if established, it could Of
fer a possibility Of permsneuce, or be any
thing more than a stormy, tumultEous
and bloody anarchy. Their object was,
d" so to divide the powers of government
between the one, the few and the many,
that the Constitution and the Laws them
selves might be Supreme" As they
framed the Government, the whole peo-
pie Of the United States never could,
with the vote of each mar equal to the
vote Of each other, do q single political
act. The people of the United States, as
a mere aggregation of individuals cannot
eonstitutionally do any act or enact any
law. Their united individual wills, or
/ the union Of a mere majority OF those
wills cannot in any case eoRstltutionaIly
express itself so as to govern the minor
ity Of wills. Nothing was more
dreaded by them than the absolute sover-
eighty of the majority the mad dream
of a later day, when a reckless race Of
rhetorioians and deoeiyers had risen up
to hstteF the multitude, and, preaching
their divine right to absolute rule, lei
them to their ruin. Protesting to serve,
they only csjoled the people, and, finally,
on the bloody affairs of civil war, sscri-
feed them to their own selfish ends and
passions"
1A1AAlEF MI 4AABAGkN ELAAf - mt
end of government. 1t is the end Of
civil society. It ever has been and ever
will be pursued, until it be obtained, or
until Liberty be lost in the pursuit. In a
society under the forms VI which the
stroDger faction can readily unite and
Cypress ths weaker, sparchy may be as
truly said to reign, as in a state Of nature,
when the weaker individual is not Sc
cured against the violence Of the
stronger" This state of society, says
the Reviewer, De ToCoUEvuLE saw in
America, a OF il says 'sThis state of
things is dangerous in itself and fatal for
the future" ain his view, the tyranny
Of the majority was something more
than a phrase 1t was on the contrary,
a terrible state of things" even then
big With the anarchy which has since
then burst with such boqndless fury On
the New World. Anarchy, says he,
will then be the result, but it will have
been brought about by despotism.' The
World has, as yet, scarcely begun to
comprehend the despotism from which
that Sparchy has resulted, as its legiti-
mate offspring. FoT ths world has only
looked on the surface Of things" The
dc0rld never looks any deeper. The
despetism is now that of an uncon-
trolled popular and sectional majority,
expressed through q concentrated or a
reckless and corrupt Congress. This is
the accursed dam Of that anarchy, out
OF which, to quen and sUbdpe it, is to
arise the d~espotism OF one strong will;
and the Reviewer well says that all the
Safeguards Of freedom" as they were
called by the authors of the eonstitu@ 6n,
have been, from the first to last, but
'straws to the fzesaSne blood of the ma
jority, we're paper barriers, which the
will Of that majority easily evades, or, if
it cannot do so, brushes them down and
marches on to It's fell purposes over them.
And be well remarks that the Senate,
intended to afford the minority some
shelter and protection against the tyrans
ny of tbs majority, st last proved too
feeble a barrier; and it and all the others
"'were either swept away, ar converted
into engines of oppression, by the law
less ard o~yerbesring disposition Of the
majority"
We do not agree with the Reviewer
that /" all this talk about the American
Government has, from beginning to end,
been one tremendous sham and gross
imposition on the credulity Of man
kind" These phrases are too broad. The
government established was intended
not only to protect the minority Of the
people against the majority in ma
tional affairs, but the minority Of
states against the majority, the small
States against combinations of the large
ones, and the Southern States against
the Northern. It is quite true that its
spirit and intentions began to be de-
parted from In practice in the beginning
Of the second term Of WASHINGTON, so
that while, until 1861, its material pros
perity, the number of States, its terri
tory, population, power, wealth and pre-
tensions increased at a rate heretofore
unexampled, its progress through the
transition period from Constitutional lib
erty or the absolute supremacy Of the
Constitution and the laws, to Anarchy,
and that from Anarchy to Military Des-
potism kept equal pace with that mate
rial progress which itself was making
the terrible despotism of the popular
majority omnipotent. Ali was at last
lost when the equilibrium between the
Northern and Southern States vas lost
in the Senate, and it was settled that
there should be DO more slave States.
The rest Of the road was down.hHl; the
rate and acceleration of speed towards
the abyss at the bottom depended on cir
cumstances.
The Government was created for States |
and a people that had, as Colonies, the |
old English pride of race, belief in the
superiority of the A~nglo-Saxon, and his |
exclusive fitness and capacity for Consti-
tutional Government, reverence for law.
unity OF religious faith ia essentials.
nafriofiem and love Of c~ountrg apds-