The Cadiz sentinel. [volume] (Cadiz, Ohio) 1864-1911, 1867-06-05


particular people, it would not be out Of
place to lake the condition Of that people
into consideration. Even the tailor or the
shoemaker looks upon it as essential to fit
his work to the proportions Of his custo-
mer; aud thus far, in the history of the
worl1, legislators who went to work to con
struct governments upon theory alone, have
been no more successful than tradesmen who
have endeavored to dispense with a perlim
mary measurement. Assuming that a ma
tional government is desirable in Mexico
not only for the sake Of its people, but fo
that of other nations, the United States in
cluded, the question is upon what terms i
is to be had To say that Mexico, with al
annual revolution and a new Constitution
made and promulgated before the ink wa
fairly dry upon the last, and this process
going on for half century; her population
in the mean time diminishing under the ct
iects of continual civil wars, her wealtl
wIsted, her improvements destroyed =
industry ohstructed, her people lapsing into
barbarisn, and anarchy every where usurp
ing tho place of order, is to say that which
has scarcely the renotest resemblance tc
truth. None Of the functions of a national
government-unlessi it oppress and plundel
II upon whom it can lay its hands is func-
tion Of national government-ha the Mex
lean Government of Mexico, within the
memory of man, performed; nor is there
any thing in the popular or the politica
condition to indicate that the experience Of
the past will not be the rule of the future
In short, il there is any lesson plainly taught
by the history of Mexico, it is that a ma
tional government constructed ont of, and
conducted by, indigenous clements, to any
good Burpose-to any but an exceedingly
bad one--is out of the question. In the
national sphere and manifestation, Mexico
has evidently parted with the faculty of
self government. She is in that most un-
fortunate dilemma of having the National
idea without the ability to realize it: state
which, in all the other ages of the world,
has been the invariable symptom, not mere
ly of institutional decay but of popular ex-
tinction There is no bit terer scourge can
fall upon people than to be afflicted with
the National idea, without the capacity to
express it in durable institutions. This is
anarchy, chronic anarchy-anarchy guaran.
teed and intensified by a pervading senti-
ment; and this is the thing to which, to all
appearance, and according to all the teach
ings alike of political science and political
history, Mexico is doomed, until her peo-
pie have worn out themselves and each 9th
er, unless some outside power, inspired
either by ambition or better motive shall
step in and put stop to the work of mutu-
al destruction
We are not, ssys the Enquirer, denying
to man the right of sefgovernment We
are not denying the capacity for self gov
ernment in man We admit, in the alb
stract all that the most inconsistent advo-
Gates for human liberty ever demanded: but
all possible political wisdom is not contain
ed i? the proposition that all men are Gre
ated equal; and we point to Mexico where
tie theory of absolute political and social
equality has been realized as no where else
upon the face of the earth it has been rcali-
zed, to show that even there it has not pro-
duced all the benign effects which theorists
have expected, and where it has more than
failed to solve the problem how to produce
a stable and useful government. Whatever
may be the theory, there is such thing as
a people--a body of inhabitant--who are
incapable of national government: and 1t is
! to he feared that there is snch a thing as a
| people who are incapable of local govern.
ment of so preserving the peace in imited
societies as to render life certain and pro-
perty secure To sucl the sacred and mali
enable rights of man, whatever they may
be, are ofno avail; and to one ftwo things
such a people must arrive: self elimination
until the clements of disorder are extin-
guished in the persons of those in whom
they inure; or pr0tect0rdte which shall, by
dominating force, keep those elements in
subsection.
The political anarchy in Mexico is the eff
feet and reflection of its social anarchy.
Mexico has body Of inhabitants, not a
people. There is no Mexican people. 1t
is collection of individuals of different ra-
ces, with no common type, and whose arti-
fetal parity in the political sphere is anto-
ganized by conflicts which, originating in
the irrevocahle laws of nature, are inextin-
guishable Those political rules and max
inns which apply to a people, and which are
infallible as applied to people, have no
application to the heterogeneous tumble of
races by which Mexico is inhabited The
political phenomena of that country is in
exact conformity with its popular condition.
A stable government based upon social
anarchy is as impossible as it is for weigh
ty edifice to rest in security upon quick
sand. Nothing but homogeneity in the ba-
sis of the State can insure political stability.
This is the primary, the Indispensable CON
dition. 1t was violation of this principle
which made Mexican anarchy; and there is
no part of the world in which similar VIC.
lation will not produce similar consequen-