Year: 1864

! Never has the prospect of an hereditary
monarchy in England been SO perfect,


remarks the Public Ledger, probably, for


thousand years, or at least since the


Conquest. There is no dispute or cues.


ton about the succession, and the heir
apparent to the throne now has a son 10


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 adhe-


rents, and the fatherof George the Third


Prince Frederick, died ten years before


his father. The English people are of


course full of joy at their secure life. not


that they particularly admire the Prince


OF Wales, his younger brother being gen.


orally preferred as brighter man and


better fellow. but because everything that


ensures quite stability 10 the Govern


ment and avoids all possibility of dis


pute as to the succession is great bless
ing to a nation which has so much


more wealth liable to plunder, and so


much dependent on the credit of the
Government itself, and that would all


melt into thin air with any protracted


internal struggle.


1t Is strange thing, that a people who


can feel all this so keenly when it touch
es their succession and their Constitution,
can so little understand the feelings of
an American about his Constitutional
Government. We elect our President
every four years and the stability of
our Government depends upon all the
requirements of the, Constitution being
exactly complied with. The succession
OF office with US answers to the hereditary
succession of monarchies. OF course this
portion of our Constitution comes into
play much oftener than in Europe, and
is therefore more vital point with us.-l
Yet 1t has established sixteen distinct |
Presidents in the Chair, and FIVE of them |
twice in succession. Queen Victoria is |
only the eighth of her line since areyolu-
ton. But Abraham Lincoln is the t1entv- |
FIRST in the succession of our line of Presi- |
dents. And when by violence, the reb-
els would, by force or fraud or comprc-
mise, have broken in upon our succession,
it was because the stability of the whole |
Government of the country for all coming
time depended upon break in the con-
stitutional line being rendered impossible
OF success, that the people rose as one
man TO put down the rebellion at any
cost.


J" . may hOH COuSEdIuIdlS ourselves
that each day shows the fearful retri6u-
tion 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 a nation like the English,
who have had such bitter experience of
q 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
should not appreciate our
struggles to preserve our succession, which
has already done so much for us-done
It so cheaply and so well. 1t is strange
they cannot see that what the cause of
the Pretender was in England, that of
Jefferson Davis and the rebels in this
country, and that the dying out of the
'ormer is not more certain as a fact ofthe
past than that of the rebels is in the fu- {
ure. Even now princes may marry and
heirs be born, but there is q better pros I
,ect that there will be twenty more Pres !
dents constitutionally chosen in America |
han twenty or ten more of the descend
nts of Victors sitting on an English Z
hrone.