Year: 1864

Never has the prospect OF an hereditary
monarchy in England been so perfect, re-
marks the Public Ledger, probably, for
thousand years, or at least since the Con-
quest. There is no dispute or question
about the succession, and the heir apparent
to the throne now has son to succeed him.
In the life and reign of George the Second,
there was grandson born and brought up
as his successor. But the Stuarts still had
powerful adherents, and the father Of George
the Third, Prince Frederick, died ten years
before his father. The English people are OF
course full OF JOY at their secure life, net
that they particularly admire the Prince CT
Wales, his younger brother being generally
preferred as a brighter man and better fell
low, but because everything that ensures
quiet stability to the Government and avoids
all possibility Of a dispute as to the sue
cession is a great blessing to nation which
has so much wealth liable to plunder, and so
much more dependent on the credit OF the
Government itself, and that would all melt
into thin air with any protracted internal
struggle.


1t is Il strange thing that people who can
feel all this so keenly when it touches them
and their Constitution, can So little under
stand the feeling OF an American about h's
Constitutional Government We elect our
President every four years and the stability OF
our Government depends upon all the re-
quiremcnts Of the Constitution being ex.
aclly complied with. The succession OF
office with US answers to the hereditary sue
cession Of monarchies. OF course this por-
ton OF our Constitution comes into play
much oftener than in Europe, aIdis therefore
a more vital point with us. Yet it has cstab-
lished sixteen distinct Presidents in the Chair,


.rj 6,.a oft - t,tsir fr sI,ppnSSIDn lJuaPn
Victoria is only the eighth Of her line since
a revolution. But Abraham Lincoln is the
twenty-frst in the succession Of cur line Of
Presidents. And when BY violence the rebels
would, BY force or fraud or compromise,
have broken in upon our succession, 1t was
because the stability OF the whole Govern
ment of the country for all coming time de-
pended upon break in the constitutional
! line being rendered impossible of success,
that the people rose as one man TO put dcwn
the rebellion at any cost.


We NAV now congratulate ourselves that
each day shows the fearful retribution falling
on the heads Of rebels leaves little or no
doubt that our Constitution will, in this
respect, become stronger than ever, and the
fate Detailing its enemies is such that few
will be disposed to try the same course again.
1t is strange, we think, that nation like the
English, who have had such bitter expert
ences Of disputed succession, and pay SO
roundly to keep up their hereditary system,
and who, in thousand years, have not had
twenty successive monarchs under any con-
stitution, should not appreciate our struggles
to preserve our succession, which has al
ready done so much for us-done 1t so
cheaply and so well. 1t is strange they
cannot sec what the cause OF the Prctende:.
was in England, that Of Jefferson Davis and
the rebels is in this country, and that the
dying cut Of the former is not more certain
as fact Of the past than that OF the rebels
is in the future. Even now princes may
, marry and heirs be born, bu; there is better
prospect that there will be twenty more
| Presidents constitutionaiy chosen inAmeriea
than twenty or ten more Of the defendants
Of Victoria sitting on an English throne.