Society in America. Harriet MartineauЧитать онлайн книгу.
he might buy the books for his daughters. This man is fully informed of the value of the Union, as we had reason to perceive; and it is difficult to see why he is not as fit as any other man to choose the representatives of his interests. Yet, here is a specimen of his conversation with one of the ladies of the party.
"Was the book that you wrote on natural philosophy, madam?"
"No; I know nothing about natural philosophy."
"Hum! Because one lady has done that pretty well:—hit it!—Miss Porter, you know."
"What Miss Porter?"
"She that wrote 'Thaddeus of Warsaw,' you know. She did it pretty well there."
As an antagonist case, take the wailings of a gentleman of very distinguished station in a highly aristocratic section of society;—wailings over the extent of the suffrage.
"What an enormity it is that such a man as Judge——, there, should stand on no higher level in politics than the man that grooms his horse!"
"Why should he? I suppose they have both got all they want—full representation: and they thus bear precisely the same relation to the government."
"No; the judge seldom votes, because of his office: while his groom can, perhaps, carry nineteen men to vote as he pleases. It is monstrous!"
"It seems monstrous that the judge should omit his political duty for the sake of his office; and also that nineteen men should be led by one. But limiting the suffrage would not mend the matter. Would it not do better to teach all the parties their duty?"
Let who will choose between the wagon-driver and the scholar. Each will vote according to his own views; and the event—the ultimate majority—will prove which is so far the wiser.
The vagueness of the antagonism between the two parties is for some time perplexing to the traveller in America; and he does not know whether to be most amazed or amused at the apparent triviality of the circumstances which arouse the strongest party emotions. After a while, a body comes out of the mystery, and he grasps a substantial cause of dissension. From the day when the first constitution was formed, there have been alarmists, who talk of a "crisis:" and from the day when the second began its operations, the alarm has, very naturally, taken its subject matter from the failure of the first. The first general government came to a stand through weakness. The entire nation kept itself in order till a new one was formed and set to work. As soon as the danger was over, and the nation proved, by the last possible test, duly convinced of the advantages of public order, the timid party took fright lest the general government should still not be strong enough; and this tendency, of course, set the hopeful party to watch lest it should be made too strong. The panic and antagonism were at their height in 1799.[2] A fearful collision of parties took place, which ended in the establishment of the hopeful policy, which has continued, with few interruptions, since. The executive patronage was retrenched, taxes were taken off, the people were re-assured, and all is, as yet, safe. While the leaders of the old federal party retired to their Essex junto, and elsewhere, to sigh for monarchy, and yearn towards England, the greater number threw off their fears, and joined the republican party. There are now very few left to profess the politics of the old federalists. I met with only two who openly avowed their desire for a monarchy; and not many more who prophesied one. But there still is a federal party, and there ever will be. It is as inevitable that there will be always some who will fear the too great strength of the state governments, as that there will be many who will have the same fear about the general government. Instead of seeing in this any cause for dismay, or even regret, the impartial observer will recognise in this mutual watchfulness the best security that the case admits of for the general and state governments preserving their due relation to one another. No government ever yet worked both well and indisputably. A pure despotism works (apparently) indisputably; but the bulk of its subjects will not allow that it works well, while it wrings their heads from their shoulders, or their earnings from their hands. The government of the United States is disputed at every step of its workings: but the bulk of the people declare that it works well, while every man is his own security for his life and property.
The extreme panic of the old federal party is accounted for, and almost justified, when we remember, not only that the commerce of England had penetrated every part of the country, and that great pecuniary interests were therefore everywhere supposed to be at stake; but that republicanism, like that which now exists in America, was a thing unheard of—an idea only half-developed in the minds of those who were to live under it. Wisdom may spring, full-formed and accomplished, from the head of a god, but not from the brains of men. The Americans of the Revolution looked round upon the republics of the world, tested them by the principles of human nature, found them republican in nothing but the name, and produced something, more democratic than any of them; but not democratic enough for the circumstances which were in the course of arising. They saw that in Holland the people had nothing to do with the erection of the supreme power; that in Poland (which was called a republic in their day) the people were oppressed by an incubus of monarchy and aristocracy, at once, in their most aggravated forms; and that in Venice a small body of hereditary nobles exercised a stern sway. They planned something far transcending in democracy any republic yet heard of; and they are not to be wondered at, or blamed, if, when their work was done, they feared they had gone too far. They had done much in preparing the way for the second birth of their republic in 1789, and for a third in 1801, when the republicans came into power; and from which date, free government in the United States may be said to have started on its course.
A remarkable sign of those times remains on record, which shows how different the state of feeling and opinion was then from any that could now prevail among a large and honourable body in the republic. The society of the Cincinnati, an association of officers of the revolutionary army, and other honourable persons, ordered their proceedings in a manner totally inconsistent with the first principles of republicanism; having secret correspondences, decking themselves with an order, which was to be hereditary, drawing a line of distinction between military and other citizens, and uniting in a secret bond the chiefs of the first families of the respective States. Such an association, formed on the model of some which might be more or less necessary or convenient in the monarchies of the old world, could not be allowed to exist in its feudal form in the young republic; and, accordingly, the hereditary principle, and the power of adopting honorary members, were relinquished; and the society is heard of no more. It has had its use in showing how the minds of the earlier republicans were imbued with monarchical prepossessions, and how large is the reasonable allowance which must be made for the apprehensions of men, who, having gone further in democracy than any who had preceded them, were destined to see others outstrip themselves. Adams, Hamilton, Washington! what names are these! Yet Adams in those days believed the English constitution would be perfect, if some defects and abuses were remedied. Hamilton believed it would be impracticable, if such alterations were made; and that, in its then existing state, it was the very best government that had ever been devised. Washington was absolutely republican in his principles, but did not enjoy the strong faith, the entire trust in the people, which is the attendant privilege of those principles. Such men, pressed out from among the multitude by the strong force of emergency, proved themselves worthy of their mission of national redemption; but, though we may now be unable to single out any who, in these comparatively quiet times, can be measured against them, we are not thence to conclude that society, as a whole, has not advanced; and that a policy which would have appeared dangerous to them, may not be, at present, safe and reasonable.
Advantageous, therefore, as it may be, that the present federal party should be perpetually on the watch against the encroachments of the state governments—useful as their incessant recurrence to the first practices, as well as principles, of the constitution may be—it would be for their comfort to remember, that the elasticity of their institutions is a perpetual safeguard; and, also, that the silent influence of the federal head of their republics has a sedative effect which its framers themselves did not anticipate. If they compare the fickleness and turbulence of very small republics—Rhode Island, for instance—with the tranquillity of the largest, or of the confederated number, it is obvious that the existence of a federal head keeps down