The Alaska citizen., 1912-04-08
 5 jefferson and Lincoln on Courts 5 s;ss

Those Republicans and those Dem. ocrats who are most anguished at the bare thought of touching the constitution or destroying the inde- pendency of the judiciary" are also most fond of talking about Jefferson and Lincoln. It will be noticed, however, that they rarely QUOTE them. for the very reason that there is nothing in the lives of either that can be brought forward to support the claims of privilege.
 For instance. in speaking of the judges and courts. Thomas Jeffer- son said:
 Tt has long been my opinion. and l have never shrunk from it's eX- pression, that the germ of dissolu- ton of our federal government is in the judiciary. an irresponsible body working like gravity. by day and by night, gaining little today and SalHliIS llltlt iolllOl row. anu du- vancing in noiseless step over the field of jurisdiction until all shall government or all become consolid- ated in one. To this I am opposed, because when all government in little and in great things. shall be drawn to Washington as the center of all power, it will render power less the checks provided by one de partment on another, and will be come as venal and oppressive as the government from which We separ- ated."
 And these were Abraham Lincoln s views:
 q do not forget the position as sumed by some that constitutional questions are to be decided by the supreme court; nor do l deny that such decisions must be binding in any case upon the parties to the suit, as to the object of that suit, while they are also entitled to very high respect and consideration in all parallel cases by all other depart ments of the government. At the same time if the policy of the gov ernment upon vital questions affect ing the whole people is to be ire vocably fixed by decisions of the supreme court, the people wiE have ceased to be their own rulers, hay ing practically to that extent re signed their government into the hands of that eminent tribunal.
 Macaulay writing to Randall once upon a time, commented with much surprise upon this fact; that while American civilization was growing AWAY from Washington. and TO- WARD Jefferson. nevertheless Wash ington was esteemed a demi-god and Jefferson a demon.
 This is scarcely true at any point for while Washington, under the in fluence of Hamilton, held to many aristocratic and olgarchic ideas, he was, in the last analysis, as much of a Democrat and believer in the people as Jefferson himself. The movement towards democracy was toward Jefferson there is no doubt of that, but it was not AWAY from Washington. Nor, even though the aristocratic Federalists hated Jeffer- son, did they go so far as to ad judge him a demon"
 Speaking of Jefferson, few men have been so universally acclaimed and so little KNOWN. Even now, through much shouting about lief fersonian Democracy, the majority believe that Jefferson's great achieve ment was the origination of the Democratic party. As matter of fact, no one was ever less of a partisan, for he had mind singu- larly free from cant and formulas. He held to no fine-spun political theories, but gave all that was best in him to the DOING OF THE JOB IN HAND, whether it was writing a Declaration of Independence, con ducting the Louisiana purchase or running a farm.
 "JefferSOnian Democracy" as the