Evening star., 1924-06-07
Grafton Winning Grand Prize,
And One Taking Second Place

ling $50 years of colonial life. They
k-were not theorists, but men of prac-
Etical life and experience. And yet
some OF us think of the Constitution
| az 4 cold legal document. On the
other hand, II is warm and II is liv-
I ing, for these men worked with a
| kn owledge OF the character Of a ma
| teiiai with which government has to
| de;tl-that is to say, human nature,
| with its multitudes OF feelings and
impulses and passions and weak
| netSes.
| But that is;not all. These men did
not walk alone on that spring morn
| ing, into that Philadelphia conven-
| tion, There walked in with them the
thou iands upon thousands or.shadowy
na,ma less persons who had through
the CT INJURIES worked toward liberty
and OF der. There were those strug-
Cling figures who through the years
Of labd r and agony and sacrifice had
been VT ,rking out the priceless prac-
tical pr inciples of Anglo-Sauon lib
erty.
And 50 the fathers of our Consti-
tuition en- bodied in that instrument
the spirit, of the Magma Chalfa and
the petition, OF rights and the bill Of
rights and .the habeas corpus act, of
all that maze the people Of E ngiand
great principles to. American life
| through the practical working of $50
years Of American government
hese aen men. a. after e e Discussing. de- satins s
a I'D celebrating. bro ught fort n the
m. ,st finished, polished and ba ianced
rel alton between a people and! their
gov ernment that human mind h;Is ever
cone eived. In the words or William
Pitt at the time. TT will he tn ewon-
der and admiration Of all future gen.
eratioAs and the model for all future
ConStitn tons.
Our Ca,nstitution. the supr,ims, law
of the land, gave US gov ernment
with it's representatives ele cted at
certain fixed intervals. with a Hhority,
delegated to three depArtmer us-the
Legislative, tfbe executive and the ju-
dicaal But the startling fact, Tor the
first tim in the history of the world,
was that no one department W as su-
preme; afrat each department erved
and the nal supreme power W as in
-the handa OF the peopAe. In ,,ther
words, it provided that those who
made the flaws could not admin tster
them anN those who administs cred
could not Judge them, and gave nhe
supreme p1Wer to the governed.
= X
The create and nobiest purpose of
the Constitut 1on, however, is its pr o.
lection Of our individual liberty. Bui h
of the funda mental principle that
liberty is not license, but that it Isl
essentially a nsatter Of seif-contrSaL
the restraint of the impulse to do to
others what we would not have done
to US.
To quote Randolph Leigh. mo
world power of Il se present time has
q government witch reaches back
without a break as far as ours.
France, Jaran, Germ enny, RUSSIA, Aus
tria, Italy have all experienced tenn
pestuouschanees in government since
the adoption OF o,s1' Constitution.
France has made tiN, circuit from
alf-hearted represen u atfve govern
ment to mobocracy anal then to des-
rotisrn twice Germaaly has been
swept through many stages from
petty despotism and C, ,a1tralized alb
solutfsn to the chaos o.e today. Rus
sia has passed from ;sheolutism to
democracy, to sovietisLa, the most
permanent characteristic An that land
having been the bread Ina.
In other words, Europe has little
to offer but warnings in ne matter
Of government, As a whOA q Europe
is hardly as far along govef nmentai-
ly as the thirteen states wa re under
the loose Articles OF ConfA oeraf'en:
And yet, friends at this very e'ornent
theorists and yexperimenters ire de-
manding that v1e change our 1 or1n of
government. Tho governmental l fafl-
ures are tellingus we are wron g.
F4 +
I ask you, fellow citizens, shan we
listen to them; 1shau We exchA nge