The semi-weekly messenger. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1897-1908, 1901-06-18
PROF. WILSON ON DEMOCRACY
AND IMPERIALISM.

Professor Woodrow Wilson, of
Princeton university. had a ape in
the Atlantic Monthly of a few months
ago. entitled Democracy and Eficien-
cy." We have only seen one long ex-
tract from IT. He thinks he sees a
powerful reaction against a govern
ment Of the people and for the people
and by the people. UGH we take to be
his plea There is a basis for his con-
tention no doubt People love power
and are not SO much welded to free in
stitutions as not to tolerate usurpa-
ton and destruction. What is going
on now in these United States is a
clear illustration of a willingness on
the part of voters to keep de~structives
and MASTERS in power. But for tina
fact Mckinley would not now be the
almost imperial force he is. Professor
Wilson ays and there is unfortunate
ly a strong historic foundation for his
opinion:
1T Is no longer possible to mistake
the reaction against democracy. The
nineteenth century was above all 9TH
ers a century of democracy; and yet
the world is no more convinced of
the benefits of democracy as a form
Of government at it's end than it
was at ITS beginning. The history of
closeted Switzerland has not been ac-
copied as proving the stability of dem
ocratfc Institutions; the history of the
United States has not been accepted as
establishing their tendency to make
governments just and liberal and pure.
Their eccentric influence in France,
their disastrous and revolutionary op-
D-D%so1- ~ $500 k-n4r;1o %h4i- -o--a
to intoxicate and their powerlessness
to reform,-except where the states
which use them have had in their
training and environment what Swift
erl5 nd or the colonies and common
we@lths sprung from England have
had, to strengthen and steady them
have generally been deemed to Offset
every triumph or success they a
boast. When We praise democracy,
we are still put to u proofs; when
we excuse it's errors, we are under
stood to AVE admitted it's failure"
And yet there are six millions or
more of people in the United States
among the voters who prefer a demo-
cratic government, in which the people
shall govern, to an oligarehy or a mon
archy or a hybrid thing, a half auto
cracy n a half democracy. France is
NO longer a monarchy, but it is not
an ideal republic, one of the best type,
we grant. And yet France has been a
the republican form of government is
perhaps stronger there than its was ten
or twenty years since. Lately we read
an able paper in n of the British re-
views upon the growth of the kingly
sentiment. It was highly entertaining
1t showed the chaotic condition of
nearly all the old monarches in Europe
in the first forty years of the nine
nineteenth century. 1t stated that
when Victoria came to the throne and
for some years succeeding she was not
popular, and the reverence of the peo-
pie for a monarchy was low, had been
greatly shakened by the four Georges
n William the Fourth. But while
the monarchical idea has, no doubt,
grown in Great Britain and in Germany,
in Italy and some other countries in
Europe perhaps, there has also been d
steady widening among the peoples of
the earth In other countries, of a parti-
ality for a republic, a leaning towards
a government CT liberty, by the peo-
pie. There is a reaction even in Ger
many, we apprehend. as to a strong
government. while in Russia there is an
awakening against p~aternalism, grasp
ing and inyinsible. In some sense, no
doubt. the experiments in government
have not been all that the friends of
liberty desired or sought for.
There is no doubt much to censure