The weekly intelligencer. [volume] (Lexington, Mo.) 1891-1901, 1894-09-08
M'CAULAY ON REPUBLICANISM.

M'CAULAY ON REPUBLICANISM.
Published by request.
The following letter was written by
Lord McCaulay, thrrty-seven years
ago, to Henry S. Randall, of New
York, who was at that time writing u
biography of jefferson:
Holly Lodge, Kensington, London,
May %, 1857. Dear Sir:-You are
surprised to learn that | have not a
high opinion of Mr.. jefferson, and 1
am Il little surprised at your surprise.
| am certain that / never wrote a line,
and that | never, in Parliament, i'm
conversation, or ven on the hustings
"a place where it is the fashion to
court the pOpulace) uttered a word
indicating an opinion that the supreme
authority of the state ought 10 be
trusted to the majority of the citizens,
told by the head; in other words, to
the poorest and most ignorant part of
society. l have long been convinced
that institutions purely democratic
must sooner OF later destroy liberty or
civilization or both.
In Europe, where the population is
dense, the effect on such institutions
would be almost instantaneous. What
happened lately in France Is an
example. In 1S4S a pure democracy
was established there. During a short
time there was reason to expect a
general s%pOliatiOn, a national bank
ruptcy, Il new partition of the soil, a
maximum of prices, a ~ruinous load of
taxation laid on the rich for the pur-
pose of supporting the poor in idleness.
Such a system would IN twenty years
have made France as poor and as
barbarOus as the France of the Carlo
vingians. Happily the danger was
averted; and nov there is q desp0tIsm,
q silent tribune, and an enslaved press.
Liberty is gone, but civilization has
been saved. l have not the smallest
doubt that if we had a purely demo-
cratic government here the effect
would be the same. Either the poor
would plumber the rich and civilization
would perish, or order and property
would be saved by a strong military
government and liberty would perish.
You may think that your country enjoys
an exemption from these evils. l will
frankly own to you that l am of a very
different opinion. Your fate | believe
to be certain, though it is deferred by
a physical cause. As long as you have
q bOundless extent of fertile and
~unOccupied land, your laboring popu-
latiOn will be far more at ease than the
labOring population of the old world
and while that is the case the Jeffer-
sOnian policy may continue to exist
without causing any fatal calamity.
But the time will come when New
England will be as thickly populated
as old England. Wages will be as low
and will fluctuate as much with you AS
with us. You will have your Man
chesters and your Birminghams; and
in those Manchesters and Birminghams
hundreds of thousands Of artisans will
assuredly be sometimes out of work.
Then your institutions will be fairly
brought to the test. Distress every
where makes the laborer mutinOus and
discontinued, and inclines him to listen
with eagerness to agitators who tell
him that it is a mOnstrous iniquity that
one man should have q million while
another can not get u full meal. In
bad years there is plenty Of grumbllng
here, and sometimes a little rioting;
but it matters little, for here the suffer-
ers are not the rulers. The supreme
power is in the hands of a class,
numerous indeed, but select, of an
educated class; of a class which is, and
knows itself to be, deeply interested in
the security Of property and the main
tenance Of order. Accordingly, the
malcOntents arc firmly yet gently
restrained. The bad time Is got over
without robbing the wealthy to relieve
the INDECENT. The springs of national
prosperity soon begin to flow again;
work is plentiful, wages rise, and all is
tranquility and c~heerfulness. | have
seen England pass three or four times
through such critical seasons as ! have
described. Through such seasons the
United States will have to pass in the
course of the next century, if not in
this. How will you pass through
themp / heartily wish you a good
deliverance. But my reason and my
wishes are at war, and l can not help
forebOding the worst. 1t is quite plain
that your government will never be able
10 restrain a distressed and disconnected
majority. For with you the majority
is tho government, and has the rich,
who are always a minority, absolutely
at Its mercy. The day will come
when, IN the state of New York, a
multitude of people, none of whom has
had more than half a breakfast, OF
expects to have more than a half a
dinner, will choose a legislature. Is il
possible to doubt what sort of a legis.
lature will be chosenp On one side il
is y statesman, preaching patience,
respect for vested rights, strict OBJ.
servance of public faith. On the other
is a demagOgue ranting about the
tyranny of capitalists and usurers, and
asking why anybody should be per.
mitted to drink champagne and ride
In a carriage while thousands of honest
folks are IN want of n~ecessaries.
Which of the two candidates is likely
to be preferred by a working man who
hears his children CRY for more bread ?
I seriously %apprehend that you will, in
some such season of adversely as l have
described, do things which will pre-.
vent prosperity from returning; that
you will act like people who, in a year
Of scarcity, devour all the seed corn,
and thus make the next year not Ol
scarcity, but Of absolute famine. There
will be, | fear, spOliation. There is
nothing to stop you. Your constitution
is all sail and no anchor. As ! said
before, when a society has entered on
this downward progress, either civil
izatiOn or liberty must perish. Either
some Caesar or Napoleon will seize the
reins of government with u strong
hand, or your government will be as
fearfully plundered and laid waste by
barbarians in the twentieth century as
the Roman empire was in the fifth,
with this difference, that the Huns and
Vandals who ravaged the Roman
empire came from without, while Your
Huns and Vandals have been engen-
dered within your own country by your
own institutions.
SOME INSTANCES OF SUFFERING.
One can hardly imagine the suffering,
starvation and poverty that the recent
coal strike has caused loving wives and
innocent children In Lexington. We have