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+Project Gutenberg's 'Tis Sixty Years Since, by Charles Francis Adams
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: 'Tis Sixty Years Since
+
+Author: Charles Francis Adams
+
+Posting Date: December 10, 2011 [EBook #9996]
+Release Date: February, 2006
+First Posted: November 6, 2003
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 'TIS SIXTY YEARS SINCE ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Afra Ullah, Sjaani and PG Distributed Proofreaders
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+"TIS SIXTY YEARS SINCE"
+
+ADDRESS OF
+
+CHARLES FRANCIS ADAMS
+
+
+
+FOUNDERS' DAY, JANUARY 16, 1913
+
+
+
+"'TIS SIXTY YEARS SINCE"
+
+In the single hour self-allotted for my part in this occasion there is
+much ground to cover,--the time is short, and I have far to go. Did I
+now, therefore, submit all I had proposed to say when I accepted your
+invitation, there would remain no space for preliminaries. Yet something
+of that character is in place. I will try to make it brief.[1]
+
+As the legend or text of what I have in mind to submit, I have given the
+words "'Tis Sixty Years Since." As some here doubtless recall, this is
+the second or subordinate title of Walter Scott's first novel,
+"Waverley," which brought him fame. Given to the world in 1814,--hard on
+a century ago,--"Waverley" told of the last Stuart effort to recover the
+crown of Great Britain,--that of "The '45." It so chances that Scott's
+period of retrospect is also just now most appropriate in my case,
+inasmuch as I entered Harvard as a student in the year 1853--"sixty
+years since!" It may fairly be asserted that school life ends, and what
+may in contradistinction thereto be termed thinking and acting life
+begins, the day the young man passes the threshold of the institution of
+more advanced education. For him, life's responsibilities then begin.
+Prior to that confused, thenceforth things with him become
+consecutive,--a sequence. Insensibly he puts away childish things.
+
+[1] Owing to its length, this "Address" was compressed in delivery,
+occupying one hour only. It is here printed in the form in which it was
+prepared,--the parts omitted in delivery being included.
+
+In those days, as I presume now, the college youth harkened to inspired
+voices. Sir Walter Scott belonged to a previous generation. Having held
+the close attention of a delighted world as the most successful
+story-teller of his own or any preceding period, he had passed off the
+stage; but only a short twenty years before. Other voices no less
+inspired had followed; and, living, spoke to us. Perhaps my scheme
+to-day is best expressed by one of these.
+
+When just beginning to attract the attention of the English-speaking
+world, Alfred Tennyson gave forth his poem of "Locksley Hall,"--very
+familiar to those of my younger days. Written years before, at the time
+of publication he was thirty-three. In 1886, a man of seventy-five, he
+composed a sequel to his earlier effort,--the utterance entitled
+"Locksley Hall Sixty Years After." He then, you will remember, reviewed
+his young man's dreams,--dreams of the period when he
+
+
+" ... dip't into the future, far as human eye could see,
+Saw the Vision of the world, and all the wonder that would be,"
+
+
+--threescore years later contrasting in sombre verse an old man's stern
+realities with the bright anticipations of youth. Such is my purpose
+to-day. "Wandering back to living boyhood," to the time when I first
+simultaneously passed the Harvard threshold and the threshold of
+responsible life, I propose to compare the ideals and actualities of the
+present with the ideals, anticipations and dreams of a past now
+somewhat remote.
+
+To say that in life and in the order of life's events it is the
+unexpected which is apt to occur, is a commonplace. That it has been so
+in my own case, I shall presently show. Meanwhile, not least among the
+unexpected things is my presence here to-day. If, when I entered Harvard
+in 1853, it had been suggested that in 1913, I,--born of the New England
+Sanhedrim, a Brahmin Yankee by blood, tradition and environment--had it
+been suggested that I, being such, would sixty years later stand by
+invitation here in Columbia before the faculty and students of the
+University of South Carolina, I should under circumstances then existing
+have pronounced the suggestion as beyond reasonable credence. Here,
+however, I am; and here, from this as my rostrum, I propose to-day to
+deliver a message,--such as it is.
+
+And yet, though such a future outcome, if then foretold, would have
+seemed scarcely possible of occurrence, there, after all, were certain
+conditions which would have rendered the contingency even at that time
+not only possible, but in accordance with the everlasting fitness of
+things. For, curiously enough, personal relations of a certain character
+held with this institution would have given me, even in 1853, a sense of
+acquaintance with it such as individually I had with no other
+institution of similar character throughout the entire land. It in this
+wise came about. At that period, preceding as it did the deluge about to
+ensue, it was the hereditary custom of certain families more especially
+of South Carolina and of Louisiana,--but of South Carolina in
+particular--to send their youth to Harvard, there to receive a college
+education. It thus chanced that among my associates at Harvard were not
+a few who bore names long familiarly and honorably known to Carolinian
+records,--Barnwell and Preston, Rhett and Alston, Parkman and Eliot; and
+among these were some I knew well, and even intimately. Gone now with
+the generation and even the civilization to which they belonged, I doubt
+if any of them survive. Indeed only recently I chanced on a grimly
+suggestive mention of one who had left on me the memory of a character
+and personality singularly pure, high-toned and manly,--permeated with a
+sense of moral and personal obligation. I have always understood he died
+five years later at Sharpsburg, as you call it, or Antietam, as it was
+named by us, in face-to-face conflict with a Massachusetts regiment
+largely officered by Harvard men of his time and even class,--his own
+familiar friends. This is the record, the reference being to a marriage
+service held at St. Paul's church in Richmond, in the late autumn of
+1862: "An indefinable feeling of gloom was thrown over a most auspicious
+event when the bride's youngest sister glided through a side door just
+before the processional. Tottering to a chancel pew, she threw herself
+upon the cushions, her slight frame racked with sobs. Scarcely a year
+before, the wedding march had been played for her, and a joyous throng
+saw her wedded to gallant Breck Parkman. Before another twelvemonth
+rolled around the groom was killed at the front."[2] Samuel Breck
+Parkman was in the Harvard class following that to which I belonged.
+Graduating in 1857, fifty-five years later I next saw his name in the
+connection just given. It recorded an incident of not infrequent
+occurrence in those dark and cruel days.
+
+It was, however, in Breck Parkman and his like that I first became
+conscious of certain phases of the South Carolina character which
+subsequently I learned to bear in high respect.
+
+So far as this University of South Carolina was concerned, it also so
+chanced that, by the merest accident, I, a very young man, was thrown
+into close personal relations with one of the most eminent of your
+professors,--Francis Lieber. Few here, I suppose, now personally
+remember Francis Lieber. To most it gives indeed a certain sense of
+remoteness to meet one who, as in my case, once held close and even
+intimate relations with a German emigrant, distinguished as a publicist,
+who as a youth had lain, wounded and helpless, a Prussian recruit, on
+the field above Namur. Occurring in June, 1815, two days after Waterloo,
+the affair at Namur will soon be a century gone. Of those engaged in
+it, the last obeyed the fell sergeant's summons a half score years ago.
+It seems remote; but at the time of which I speak Waterloo was
+appreciably nearer those in active life than are Shiloh and Gettysburg
+now. The Waterloo campaign was then but thirty-eight years removed,
+whereas those last are fifty now; and, while Lieber was at Waterloo, I
+was myself at Gettysburg.
+
+[2] DeLeon, "Belles, Beaux and Brains of the Sixties," p. 158.
+
+Subsequently, later in life, it was again my privilege to hold close
+relations with another Columbian,--an alumnus of this University as it
+then was--in whom I had opportunity to study some of the strongest and
+most respect-commanding traits of the Southern character. I refer to one
+here freshly remembered,--Alexander Cheves Haskell,--soldier, jurist,
+banker and scholar, one of a septet of brothers sent into the field by a
+South Carolina mother calm and tender of heart, but in silent suffering
+unsurpassed by any recorded in the annals whether of Judea or of Rome.
+It was the fourth of the seven Haskells I knew, one typical throughout,
+in my belief, of what was best in your Carolinian development. With him,
+as I have said, I was closely and even intimately associated through
+years, and in him I had occasion to note that almost austere type
+represented in its highest development in the person and attributes of
+Calhoun. Of strongly marked descent, Haskell was, as I have always
+supposed, of a family and race in which could be observed those virile
+Scotch-Irish and Presbyterian qualities which found their
+representative types in the two Jacksons,--Andrew, and him known in
+history as "Stonewall." To Alec Haskell I shall in this discourse again
+have occasion to refer.
+
+Thus, though in 1853, and for long years subsequent thereto, it would
+not have entered my mind as among the probabilities that I should ever
+stand here, reviewing the past after the manner of Tennyson in his
+"Locksley Hall Sixty Years After," yet if there was any place in the
+South, or, I may say, in the entire country, where, as a matter of
+association, I might naturally have looked so to stand, it would have
+been where now I find myself.
+
+But I must hasten on; for, as I have said, if I am to accomplish even a
+part of my purpose, I have no time wherein to linger.
+
+Not long ago I chanced, in a country ramble, to be conversing with an
+eminent foreigner, known, and favorably known, to all Americans. In the
+course of leisurely exchange of ideas between us, he suddenly asked if I
+could suggest any explanation of the fact that not only were the
+publicists who had the greatest vogue in our college days now to a large
+extent discredited, but that almost every view and theory advanced by
+them, and which we had accepted as fixed and settled, was, where not
+actually challenged, silently ignored. Nor did the assertion admit of
+denial; for, looking back through the vista of threescore years, of the
+principles of what may be called "public polity" then advanced as
+indisputable, few to-day meet with general acceptance. To review the
+record from this point of view is curious.
+
+When in 1853 I entered Harvard, so far as this country and its polity
+were concerned certain things were matters of contention, while others
+were accepted as axiomatic,--the basic truths of our system. Among the
+former--the subjects of active contention--were the question of Slavery,
+then grimly assuming shape, and that of Nationality intertwined
+therewith. Subordinate to this was the issue of Free Trade and
+Protection, with the school of so-called American political economy
+arrayed against that of Adam Smith. Beyond these as political ideals
+were the tenets and theories of Jeffersonian Democracy. That the world
+had heretofore been governed too much was loudly acclaimed, and the
+largest possible individualism was preached, not only as a privilege but
+as a right. The area of government action was to be confined within the
+narrowest practical limits, and ample scope was to be allowed to each to
+develop in the way most natural to himself, provided only he did not
+infringe upon the rights of others. Materially, we were then reaching
+out to subdue a continent,--a doctrine of Manifest Destiny was in vogue.
+Beyond this, however, and most important now to be borne in mind,
+compared with the present the control of man over natural agencies and
+latent forces was scarcely begun. Not yet had the railroad crossed the
+Missouri; electricity, just bridled, was still unharnessed.
+
+I have now passed in rapid review what may perhaps without exaggeration
+be referred to as an array of conditions and theories, ideals and
+policies. It remains to refer to the actual results which have come
+about during these sixty years as respects them, or because of them;
+and, finally, to reach if possible conclusions as to the causes which
+have affected what may not inaptly be termed a process of general
+evolution. Having thus, so to speak, diagnosed the situation, the
+changes the situation exacts are to be measured, and a forecast
+ventured. An ambitious programme, I am well enough aware that the not
+very considerable reputation I have established for myself hardly
+warrants me in attempting it. This, I premise.
+
+Let us, in the first place, recur in somewhat greater detail to the
+various policies and ideals I have referred to as in vogue in the
+year 1853.
+
+First and foremost, overshadowing all else, was the political issue
+raised by African slavery, then ominously assuming shape. The clouds
+foreboding the coming tempest were gathering thick and heavy; and,
+moreover, they were even then illumined by electric flashes, accompanied
+by a mutter of distant thunder. Though we of the North certainly did not
+appreciate its gravity, the situation was portentous in the extreme.
+
+Involved in this problem of African slavery was the incidental issue of
+Free Trade and Protection,--apparently only economical and industrial in
+character, but in reality fundamentally crucial. And behind this lay
+the constitutional question, involving as it did not only the
+conflicting theories of a strict or liberal construction of the
+fundamental law, but nationality also,--the right of a Sovereign State
+to withdraw from the Union created in 1787, and developed through two
+generations.
+
+These may be termed concrete political issues, as opposed to basic
+truths generally accepted and theories individually entertained. The
+theories were constitutional, social, economical. Constitutionally, they
+turned upon the obligations of citizenship. There was no such thing then
+as a citizen of the United States of and by itself. The citizen of the
+United States was such simply because of his citizenship of a Sovereign
+State,--whether Massachusetts or Virginia or South Carolina; and, of
+course, an instrument based upon a divided sovereignty admitted of
+almost infinitely diverse interpretation. It is a scriptural aphorism
+that no man can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and
+love the other, or else he will hold to the one and despise the other.
+And in the fulness of time it literally with us so came about. The
+accepted economical theories of the period were to a large extent
+corollaries of the fundamental proposition, and differing material and
+social conditions. Beyond all this, and coming still under the head of
+individual theories, was the doctrine enunciated by Thomas Jefferson in
+the Declaration of Independence,--the doctrine that all men were created
+equal,--meaning, of course, equal before the law. But the theorist and
+humanitarian of the North, accepting the fundamental principle laid down
+in the Declaration, gave to it a far wider application than had been
+intended by its authors,--a breadth of application it would not bear.
+Such science as he had being of scriptural origin, he interpreted the
+word "equal" as signifying equal in the possibilities of their
+attributes,--physical, moral, intellectual; and in so doing, he of
+course ignored the first principles of ethnology. It was, I now realize,
+a somewhat wild-eyed school of philosophy, that of which I myself was a
+youthful disciple.
+
+But, on the other hand, beside these, between 1850 and 1860 a class of
+trained and more cautious thinkers, observers, scientists and
+theologians was coming to the front. Their investigations, though we did
+not then foresee it, were a generation later destined gently to subvert
+the accepted fundamentals of religious and economical thought, literary
+performance, and material existence. The work they had in hand to do was
+for the next fifteen years to be subordinate, so far as this country was
+concerned, to the solution of the terrible political problems which were
+first insistent on settlement; yet, as is now apparent, an initial
+movement was on foot which foreboded a revolution world-wide in its
+nature, and one in comparison with which the issues of slavery and
+American constitutionality became practically insignificant,--in a word,
+local and passing incidents.
+
+Finally, it remains to consider specifically the political theories
+then in vogue in their relation to the individual. In this country, it
+was the period of the equality of man and individuality in the
+development of the type. It was generally believed that the world had
+hitherto been governed too much,--that the day of caste, and even class,
+was over and gone; and finally, that America was a species of vast
+modern melting-pot of humanity, in which, within a comparatively short
+period of time, the characteristics of all branches of Indo-Aryan origin
+would resolve themselves. A new type would emerge,--the American. These
+theories were also in their consequences far-reaching. Practically, 1853
+antedates all our present industrial organizations so loudly in
+evidence,--the multifarious trades-unions which now divide the
+population of the United States into what are known as the "masses" and
+the "classes." As recently as a century ago, it used to be said of the
+French army under the Empire, that every soldier carried the baton of
+the Field-Marshal in his knapsack. And this ideal of equality and
+individuality was fixed in the American mind.
+
+Not that I for a moment mean to imply that in my belief the middle of
+the last century, or the twenty years anterior to the Civil War, was a
+species of golden age in our American annals. On the contrary, it was,
+as I remember it, a phase of development very open to criticism; and
+that in many respects. It was crude, self-conscious and self-assertive;
+provincial and formative, rather than formed. Socially and materially
+we were, compared with the present era of motors and parlor-cars, in the
+"one-hoss shay" and stove-heated railroad-coach stage. Nevertheless,
+what is now referred to as "predatory wealth" had not yet begun to
+accumulate in few hands; much greater equality of condition prevailed;
+nor was the "wage-earner" referred to as constituting a class distinct
+from the holders of property. Thus the individual was then
+encouraged,--whether in literature, in commerce, or in politics. In
+other words, there being a free field, one man was held to be in all
+respects the equal of the rest. Especially was what I have said true of
+the Northern, or so-called Free States, as contrasted with the States of
+the South, where the presence of African slavery distinctly affected
+individual theories, no matter where or to what extent entertained.
+
+Such, briefly and comprehensively stated, having been the situation in
+1853, it remains to consider the practical outcome thereof during the
+sixty years it has been my fortune to take part, either as an actor or
+as an observer, in the great process of evolution. It is curious to note
+the extent to which the unexpected has come about. In the first place,
+consider the all-absorbing mid-century political issue, that involving
+the race question, to which I first referred,--the issue which divided
+the South from the North, and which, eight years only after I had
+entered college, carried me from the walks of civil life into the
+calling of arms.
+
+And here I enter on a field of discussion both difficult and dangerous;
+and, for reasons too obvious to require statement, what I am about to
+say will be listened to with no inconsiderable apprehension as to what
+next may be forthcoming. Nevertheless, this is a necessary part of my
+theme; and I propose to say what I have in mind to say, setting forth
+with all possible frankness the more mature conclusions reached with the
+passage of years. Let it be received in the spirit in which it
+is offered.
+
+So far, then, as the institution of slavery is concerned, in its
+relations to ownership and property in those of the human species,--I
+have seen no reason whatever to revise or in any way to alter the
+theories and principles I entertained in 1853, and in the maintenance of
+which I subsequently bore arms between 1861 and 1865. Economically,
+socially, and from the point of view of abstract political justice, I
+hold that the institution of slavery, as it existed in this country
+prior to the year 1865, was in no respect either desirable or
+justifiable. That it had its good and even its elevating side, so far at
+least as the African is concerned, I am not here to deny. On the
+contrary, I see and recognize those features of the institution far more
+clearly now than I should have said would have been possible in 1853.
+That the institution in itself, under conditions then existing, tended
+to the elevation of the less advanced race, I frankly admit I did not
+then think. On the other hand, that it exercised a most pernicious
+influence upon those of the more advanced race, and especially upon
+that large majority of the more advanced race who were not themselves
+owners of slaves,--of that I have become with time ever more and more
+satisfied. The noticeable feature, however, so far as I individually am
+concerned, has been the entire change of view as respects certain of the
+fundamental propositions at the base of our whole American political and
+social edifice brought about by a more careful and intelligent
+ethnological study. I refer to the political equality of man, and to
+that race absorption to which I have alluded,--that belief that any
+foreign element introduced into the American social system and body
+politic would speedily be absorbed therein, and in a brief space
+thoroughly assimilated. In this all-important respect I do not hesitate
+to say we theorists and abstractionists of the North, throughout that
+long anti-slavery discussion which ended with the 1861 clash of arms,
+were thoroughly wrong. In utter disregard of fundamental, scientific
+facts, we theoretically believed that all men--no matter what might be
+the color of their skin, or the texture of their hair--were, if placed
+under exactly similar conditions, in essentials the same. In other
+words, we indulged in the curious and, as is now admitted, utterly
+erroneous theory that the African was, so to speak, an Anglo-Saxon, or,
+if you will, a Yankee "who had never had a chance,"--a fellow-man who
+was guilty, as we chose to express it, of a skin not colored like our
+own. In other words, though carved in ebony, he also was in the image
+of God.
+
+Following out this theory, under the lead of men to whom scientific
+analysis and observation were anathema if opposed to accepted cardinal
+political theories as enunciated in the Declaration as read by them, the
+African was not only emancipated, but so far as the letter of the law,
+as expressed in an amended Constitution, would establish the fact, the
+quondam slave was in all respects placed on an equality, political,
+legal and moral, with those of the more advanced race.
+
+I do not hesitate here,--as one who largely entertained the theoretical
+views I have expressed,--I do not hesitate here to say, as the result of
+sixty years of more careful study and scientific observation, the
+theories then entertained by us were not only fundamentally wrong, but
+they further involved a problem in the presence of which I confess
+to-day I stand appalled.
+
+It is said,--whether truthfully or not,--that when some years ago John
+Morley, the English writer and thinker, was in this country, on
+returning to England he remarked that the African race question, as now
+existing in the United States, presented a problem as nearly, to his
+mind, insoluble as any human problem well could be. I do not care
+whether Lord Morley made this statement or did not make it. I am
+prepared, however, to say that, individually, so far as my present
+judgment goes, it is a correct presentation. To us in the North, the
+African is a comparatively negligible factor. So far as Massachusetts,
+for instance, or the city of Boston more especially, are concerned, as
+a problem it is solving itself. Proportionately, the African infusion is
+becoming less--never large, it is incomparably less now than it was in
+the days of my own youth. Thus manifestly a negligible factor, it is
+also one tending to extinction. Indeed, it would be fairly open to
+question whether a single Afro-American of unmixed Ethiopian descent
+could now be found in Boston. That the problem presents itself with a
+wholly different aspect here in Carolina is manifest. The difference too
+is radical; it goes to the heart of the mystery.
+
+As I have already said, the universal "melting-pot" theory in vogue in
+my youth was that but seven, or at the most fourteen, years were
+required to convert the alien immigrant--no matter from what region or
+of what descent--into an American citizen. The educational influences
+and social environment were assumed to be not only subtle, but
+all-pervasive and powerful. That this theory was to a large and even
+dangerous extent erroneous the observation of the last fifty years has
+proved, and our Massachusetts experience is sadly demonstrating to-day.
+It was Oliver Wendell Holmes, who, years ago, when asked by an anxious
+mother at what age the education of a child ought to begin, remarked in
+reply that it should begin about one hundred and fifty years before the
+child is born. It has so proved with us; and the fact is to-day in
+evidence that this statement of Dr. Holmes should be accepted as an
+undeniable political aphorism. So far from seven or fourteen years
+making an American citizen, fully and thoroughly impregnated with
+American ideals to the exclusion of all others, our experience is that
+it requires at least three generations to eliminate what may be termed
+the "hyphen" in citizenship. Not in the first, nor in the second, and
+hardly in the third, generation, does the immigrant cease to be an
+Irish-American, or a French-American, or a German-American, or a
+Slavonic-American, or yet a Dago. Nevertheless, in process of tune,
+those of the Caucasian race do and will become Americans. Ultimately
+their descendants will be free from the traditions and ideals, so to
+speak, ground in through centuries passed under other conditions. Not so
+the Ethiopian. In his case, we find ourselves confronted with a
+situation never contemplated in that era of political dreams and
+scriptural science in which our institutions received shape. Stated
+tersely and in plain language, so far as the African is concerned--the
+cause and, so to speak, the motive of the great struggle of 1861 to
+1865--we recognize the presence in the body politic of a vast alien mass
+which does not assimilate and which cannot be absorbed. In other words,
+the melting-pot theory came in sharp contact with an ethnological fact,
+and the unexpected occurred. The problem of African servitude was solved
+after a fashion; but in place of it a race issue of most uncompromising
+character evolved itself.
+
+A survivor of the generation which read "Uncle Tom's Cabin" as it week
+by week appeared,--fresh to-day from Massachusetts with its Lawrence
+race issues of a different character, I feel a sense of satisfaction in
+discussing here in South Carolina this question and issue in a spirit
+the reverse of dogmatic, a spirit purely scientific, observant and
+sympathetic. And in this connection let me say I well remember
+repeatedly discussing it with your fellow-citizen and my friend, Colonel
+Alexander Haskell, to whom I have already made reference. Rarely have I
+been more impressed by a conclusion reached and fixed in the mind of one
+who to the study of a problem had obviously given much and kindly
+thought. As those who knew him do not need to be told, Alexander Cheves
+Haskell was a man of character, pure and just and thoughtful. He felt
+towards the African as only a Southerner who had himself never been the
+owner of slaves can feel. He regarded him as of a less advanced race
+than his own, but one who was entitled not only to just and kindly
+treatment but to sympathetic consideration. When, however, the question
+of the future of the Afro-American was raised, as matter for abstract
+discussion, it was suggestive as well as curious to observe the fixed,
+hard expression which immediately came over Haskell's face, as with
+stern lips, from which all suggestion of a smile had faded away, he
+pronounced the words:--"Sir, it is a dying race!" To express the thought
+more fully, Colonel Haskell maintained, as I doubt not many who now
+listen to me will maintain, that the nominal Afro-American increase, as
+shown in the figures of the national census, is deceptive,--that in
+point of fact, the Ethiop in America is incurring the doom which has
+ever befallen those of an inferior and less advanced race when brought
+in direct and immediate contact, necessarily and inevitably competitive,
+with the more advanced, the more masterful, and intellectually the more
+gifted. In other words, those of the less advanced race have a fatal
+aptitude for contracting the vices, both moral and physical, of the
+superior race, in the end leading to destruction; while the capacity for
+assimilating the elevating qualities and attributes which constitute a
+saving grace is denied them. Elimination, therefore, became in Haskell's
+belief a question of time only,--the law of the survival of the fittest
+would assert itself. The time required may be long,--numbered by
+centuries; but, however remotely, it nevertheless would come. God's mill
+grinds slowly, but it grinds uncommon small; and, I will add, its
+grinding is apt to be merciless.
+
+The solution thus most pronouncedly laid down by Colonel Haskell may or
+may not prove in this case correct and final. It certainly is not for
+me, coming from the North, to undertake dogmatically to pass upon it. I
+recur to it here as a plausible suggestion only, in connection with my
+theme. As such, it unquestionably merits consideration. I am by no means
+prepared to go the length of an English authority in recently saying
+that "emancipation on two continents sacrificed the real welfare of the
+slave and his intrinsic worth as a person, to the impatient vanity of
+an immediate and theatrical triumph."[3] This length I say, I cannot go;
+but so far as the present occasion is concerned, with such means of
+observation as are within my reach, I find the conclusion difficult to
+resist that the success of the abolitionists in effecting the
+emancipation of the Afro-American, as unexpected and sweeping as it was
+sudden, has led to phases of the race problem quite unanticipated at
+least. For instance, as respects segregation. Instead of assimilating,
+with a tendency to ultimate absorption, the movement in the opposite
+direction since 1865 is pronounced. It has, moreover, received the final
+stamp of scientific approval. This implies much; for in the old days of
+the "peculiar institution" there is no question the relations between
+the two races were far more intimate, kindly, and even absorptive than
+they now are.
+
+That African slavery, as it existed in the United States anterior to the
+year 1862, presented a mild form of servitude, as servitude then existed
+and immemorially had almost everywhere existed, was, moreover,
+incontrovertibly proven in the course of the Civil War. Before 1862, it
+was confidently believed that any severe social agitation within, or
+disturbance from without, would inevitably lead to a Southern servile
+insurrection. In Europe this result was assumed as of course; and,
+immediately after it was issued, the Emancipation Proclamation of President
+[3] Bussell's (Dr. F.W.) "Christian Theology and Social Progress."
+Bampton Lectures, 1905. Lincoln was denounced in unmeasured terms by
+the entire London press. Not a voice was raised in its defence. It was
+regarded as a measure unwarranted in civilized warfare, and a sure and
+intentional incitement to the horrors which had attended the servile
+insurrections of Haiti and San Domingo; and, more recently, the
+unspeakable Sepoy incidents of the Indian mutiny. What actually occurred
+is now historic. The confident anticipations of our English brethren
+were, not for the first time, negatived; nor is there any page in our
+American record more creditable to those concerned than the attitude
+held by the African during the fierce internecine struggle which
+prevailed between April, 1861, and April, 1865. In it there is scarcely
+a trace, if indeed there is any trace at all, of such a condition of
+affairs as had developed in the Antilles and in Hindustan. The attitude
+of the African towards his Confederate owner was submissive and kindly.
+Although the armed and masterful domestic protector was at the front and
+engaged in deadly, all-absorbing conflict, yet the women and children of
+the Southern plantation slept with unbarred doors,--free from
+apprehension, much more from molestation.
+
+Moreover, as you here well know, during the old days of slavery there
+was hardly a child born, of either sex, who grew up in a Southern
+household of substantial wealth without holding immediate and most
+affectionate relations with those of the other race. Every typical
+Southern man had what he called his "daddy" and his "mammy," his
+"uncle" and his "aunty," by him familiarly addressed as such, and who
+were to him even closer than are blood relations to most. They had cared
+for him in his cradle; he followed them to their graves. Is it needful
+for me to ask to what extent such relations still exist? Of those born
+thirty years after emancipation, and therefore belonging distinctly to a
+later generation, how many thus have their kindly, if humble, kin of the
+African blood? I fancy I would be safe in saying not one in twenty.
+
+Here, then, as the outcome of the first great issue I have suggested as
+occupying the thought and exciting the passions of that earlier period,
+is a problem wholly unanticipated,--a problem which, merely stating,
+I dismiss.
+
+Passing rapidly on, I come to the next political issue which presented
+itself in my youth,--the constitutional issue,--that of State
+Sovereignty, as opposed to the ideal, Nationality. And, whether for
+better or worse, this issue, I very confidently submit, has been
+settled. We now, also, looking at it in more observant mood, in a spirit
+at once philosophical and historical, see that it involved a process of
+natural evolution which, under the conditions prevailing, could hardly
+result in any other settlement than that which came about. We now have
+come to a recognition of the fact that Anglo-Saxon nationality on this
+continent was a problem of crystallization, the working out of which
+occupied a little over two centuries. It was in New England the process
+first set in, when, in 1643, the scattered English-speaking settlements
+under the hegemony of the colony of Massachusetts Bay united in a
+confederation. It was the initial step. I have no time in which to
+enumerate successive steps, each representing a stage in advance of what
+went before. The War of Independence,--mistakenly denominated the
+Revolutionary War, but a struggle distinctly conservative in character,
+and in no way revolutionary,--the War of Independence gave great impetus
+to the process, resulting in what was known as Federation. Then came the
+Constitution of 1787 and the formation of the, so called, United States
+as a distinct nationality. The United States next passed through two
+definite processes of further crystallization,--one in 1812-1814, when
+the second war with Great Britain, and more especially our naval
+victories, kindled, especially in the North, the fire of patriotism and
+the conception of nationality; the other, half a century later,
+presented the stern issue in a concrete form, and at last the complete
+unification of a community--whether for better or for worse is no
+matter--was hammered by iron and cemented in blood. It is there now; an
+established fact. Secession is a lost cause; and, whether for good or
+for ill, the United States exists, and will continue to exist, a unified
+World Power. Sovereignty now rests at Washington, and neither in
+Columbia for South Carolina nor in Boston for Massachusetts. The State
+exists only as an integral portion of the United States. That issue has
+been fought out. The result stands beyond controversy; brought about by
+a generation now passed on, but to which I belonged.
+
+Meanwhile, the ancient adage, the rose is not without its thorn,
+receives new illustration; for even this great result has not been
+wrought without giving rise to considerations suggestive of thought.
+Speaking tersely and concentrating what is in my mind into the fewest
+possible words, I may say that in our national growth up to the year
+1830 the play of the centrifugal forces predominated,--that is, the
+necessity for greater cohesion made itself continually felt. A period of
+quiescence then followed, lasting until, we will say, 1865. Since 1865,
+it is not unsafe to say, the centripetal, or gravitating, force has
+predominated to an extent ever more suggestive of increasing political
+uneasiness. It is now, as is notorious, more in evidence than ever
+before. The tendency to concentrate at Washington, the demand that the
+central government, assuming one function after another, shall become
+imperial, the cry for the national enactment of laws, whether relating
+to marital divorce or to industrial combinations,--all impinge on the
+fundamental principle of local self-government, which assumed its
+highest and most pronounced form in the claim of State Sovereignty. I am
+now merely stating problems. I am not discussing the political ills or
+social benefits which possibly may result from action. Nevertheless,
+all, I think, must admit that the tendency to gravitation and
+attraction is to-day as pronounced and as dangerous, especially in the
+industrial communities of the North, as was the tendency to separation
+and segregation pronounced and dangerous seventy years ago in the South.
+
+To this I shall later return. I now merely point out what I apprehend to
+be a tendency to extremes--an excess in the swinging of our
+political pendulum.
+
+We next come to that industrial factor which I have referred to as the
+issue between the Free Trade of Adam Smith and Protection, as inculcated
+by the so-called American school of political economists. The phases
+which this issue has assumed are, I submit, well calculated to excite
+the attention of the observant and thoughtful. I merely allude to them
+now; but, in so far as it is in my power to make it so, my allusion will
+be specific. I frankly acknowledge myself a Free-Trader. A Free-Trader
+in theory, were it in my power I would be a Free-Trader in national
+practice. There has been, so far as I know, but one example of absolute
+free trade on the largest scale in world history. That one example,
+moreover, has been a success as unqualified as undeniable. I refer to
+this American Union of ours. We have here a country consisting of fifty
+local communities, stretching from the Atlantic to the Pacific, from
+tropical Porto Rico to glacial Alaska, representing every conceivable
+phase of soil, climate and material conditions, with diverse industrial
+systems. With a Union established on the principle of absolutely
+unrestricted commercial intercourse, you here in South Carolina, and
+more especially in Columbia, are to-day making it, so to speak,
+uncomfortable for the cotton manufacturer in New England; and I am glad
+of it! A sharp competition is a healthy incentive to effort and
+ingenuity, and the brutal injunction, "Root hog or die!" is one from
+which I in no way ask to have New England exempt. When Massachusetts is
+no longer able to hold its own industrially in a free field, the time
+will, in my judgment, have come for Massachusetts to go down. With
+communities as with children, paternalism reads arrested development.
+One of the great products of Massachusetts has been what is generically
+known as "footwear." Yet I am told that under the operation of absolute
+Free Trade, St. Louis possesses the largest boot and shoe factory in its
+output in the entire world. That is, the law of industrial development,
+as natural conditions warrant and demand, has worked out its results;
+and those results are satisfactory. I am aware that the farmer of
+Massachusetts has become practically extinct; he cannot face the
+competition of the great West: but the Massachusetts consumer is greatly
+advantaged thereby. So far as agricultural products are concerned,
+Massachusetts is to-day reduced to what is known as dairy products and
+garden truck; and it is well! Summer vegetables manufactured under glass
+in winter prove profitable. So, turning his industrial efforts to that
+which he can do best, even the Massachusetts agriculturalist has
+prospered. On the other hand, wherever in this country protection has
+been most completely applied, I insist that if its results are analyzed
+in an unprejudiced spirit, it will be pronounced to have worked
+unmitigated evil,--an unhealthy, because artificially stimulated and too
+rapid, growth. Let Lawrence, in Massachusetts, serve as an example. Look
+at the industrial system there introduced in the name of Protection
+against the Pauper Labor of Europe! No growth is so dangerous as a too
+rapid growth; and I confidently submit that politically, socially,
+economically and industrially, America to-day, on the issues agitating
+us, presents an almost appalling example of the results of hot-house
+stimulation.
+
+Nor is this all, nor the worst. There is another article, and far more
+damaging, in the indictment. Through Protection, and because of it,
+Paternalism has crept in; and, like a huge cancerous growth, is eating
+steadily into the vitals of the political system. Instead of supporting
+a government economically administered by money contributed by the
+People, a majority of the People to-day are looking to the government
+for support, either directly through pension payments or indirectly
+through some form of industrial paternalism. Incidentally, a profuse
+public expenditure is condoned where not actually encouraged.
+Jeffersonian simplicity is preached; extravagance is practised. As the
+New York showman long since shrewdly observed: "The American people
+love to be fooled!"
+
+But I must pass on; I still have far to go. As respects legislation, I
+have said that sixty years ago, when my memories begin, the American
+ideal was the individual, and individuality. This, implied adherence to
+the Jeffersonian theory that heretofore the world had been governed too
+much. The great secret of true national prosperity, happiness and
+success was, we were taught, to allow to each individual the fullest
+possible play, provided only he did not infringe on the rights of
+others. How is it to-day? America is the most governed and legislated
+country in the world! With one national law-making machine perpetually
+at work grinding out edicts, we have some fifty provincial mills engaged
+in the same interesting and, to my mind, pernicious work. No one who has
+given the slightest consideration to the subject will dispute the
+proposition that, taking America as a whole, we now have twenty acts of
+legislation annually promulgated, and with which we are at our peril
+supposed to be familiar, where one would more than suffice. Then we
+wonder that respect for the law shows a sensible decrease! The better
+occasion for wonder is that it survives at all. We are both legislated
+and litigated out of all reason.
+
+Passing to the other proposition of individuality, there has been, as
+all men know and no one will dispute, a most perceptible tendency of
+late years towards what is known as the array of one portion of the
+community--the preponderating, voting portion--against another--the more
+ostentatious property-holding portion. It is the natural result, I may
+say the necessary as well as logical outcome, of a period of too rapid
+growth,--production apportioned by no rule or system other or higher
+than greed and individual aptitude for acquisition. I will put the
+resulting case in the most brutal, and consequently the clearest, shape
+of which I am capable. Working on the combined theories of individualism
+controlled and regulated by competition, it has been one grand game of
+grab,--a process in which the whole tendency of our legislation,
+national or state, has during the last twenty years been, first, to
+create monopolies of capital and, later, to bring into existence a
+counter, but no less privileged, class, known as the "wage-earner."
+
+Of the first class it is needless to speak, for, as a class, it is
+sufficiently pilloried by the press and from the hustings. Much in
+evidence, those prominent in it are known as the possessors of
+"predatory wealth"; "unjailed malefactors," they are subjects of
+continuous "grilling" in the congressional and legislative committee
+rooms. The effort to make them "disgorge" is as continual as it is
+noisy, and, as a rule, futile. It constitutes a curious and in some
+respects instructive exhibition of misdirected popular feeling and
+legislative incompetence. None the less, the existence of a monopolist
+class calls for no proof at the bar of public opinion. Not so the other
+and even more privileged class,--the so-called "wage-earner"; for,
+disguise it as the trades-unionist will, angrily deny it as he does, the
+fact remains that to-day under the operation of our jury system and of
+our laws, the Wage-earner and the member of the Trades-Union has become,
+as respects the rest of the community, himself a monopolist and,
+moreover, privileged as such. Practically, crimes urged and even
+perpetrated in behalf of so-called "labor" receive at the hands of
+juries, and also not infrequently of courts, an altogether excessive
+degree of merciful consideration. At the same time, both here and in
+Europe Organized Labor is instant in its demand that immunity, denied
+to ordinary citizens, and those whom it terms "the classes," shall by
+special exemption be conferred upon the Labor Union and upon the
+Wage-earner. The tendency on both sides and at each extreme to
+inequality in the legislature and before the law is thus manifest.
+
+Viewing conditions face to face and as they now are, no thoughtful
+observer can, in my judgment, avoid the conviction that, whether for
+good or ill, for better or for worse, this country as a community has,
+within the last thirty years--that is, we will say, since our centennial
+year, 1876--cast loose from its original moorings. It has drifted, and
+is drifting, into unknown seas. Nor is this true of English-speaking
+America alone. I have already quoted Lord Morley in another connection.
+Lord Morley, however, only the other day delivered, as Chancellor of
+Manchester University, a most interesting and highly suggestive
+address, in which, referring to conservative Great Britain, he thus
+pictured a phase of current belief: "Political power is described as
+lying in the hands of a vast and mobile electorate, with scanty regard
+for tradition or history. Democracy, they say, is going to write its own
+programme. The structure of executive organs and machinery is undergoing
+half-hidden, but serious alterations. Men discover a change of attitude
+towards law as law; a decline in reverence for institutions as
+institutions."
+
+While, however, the influences at work are thus general and the
+manifestations whether on the other side of the Atlantic or here bear a
+strong resemblance, yet difference of conditions and detail
+--constitutional peculiarities, so to speak--must not be
+disregarded. One form of treatment may not be prescribed for all. In our
+case, therefore, it remains to consider how best to adapt this country
+and ourselves to the unforeseeable,--the navigation of uncharted waters;
+and this adaptation cannot be considered hi any correct and helpful,
+because scientific, spirit, unless the cause of change is located.
+Surface manifestations are, in and of themselves, merely deceptive. A
+physician, diagnosing the chances of a patient, must first correctly
+ascertain, or at least ascertain with approximate correctness, the seat
+of the trouble under which the patient is suffering. So, we.
+
+And here I must frankly confess to small respect for the
+politician,--the man whose voice is continually heard, whether from the
+Senate Chamber or the Hustings. There is in those of his class a
+continual and most noticeable tendency to what may best be described as
+the _post ergo propter_ dispensation. With them, the eye is fixed on the
+immediate manifestation. Because one event preceded another, the first
+event is obviously and indisputably the cause of the later event. For
+instance, in the present case, the cause or seat of our existing and
+very manifest social, political and financial disturbances is attributed
+as of course to some peculiarity of legislation, either a subtreasury
+bill passed in the administration of General Jackson, or a tariff bill
+passed in the administration of Mr. Taft, or the demonetization of
+silver in the Hayes period,--that "Crime of the Century," the
+Crucifixion of Labor on the Cross of Gold! Once for all, let me say, I
+contemplate this school of politicians and so-called "thinkers" with
+sentiments the reverse of respectful. In plain language, I class them
+with those known in professional parlance as quacks and charlatans. Not
+always, not even in the majority of cases, does that which preceded bear
+to that which follows the relation of cause and effect. A marked example
+of this false attribution is afforded in more recent political history
+by the everlasting recurrence of the statement that American prosperity
+is the result of an American protective system. Yet in the Protectionist
+dispensation, this has become an article of faith. To my mind, it is
+undeserving of even respectful consideration.
+
+If I were asked the cause of that change, little short of
+revolutionary, if indeed in any respect short of it, which has occurred
+in the material condition of the American people, and consequently in
+all its theories and ideals, within the last thirty years, I should
+attribute it to a wholly different cause. Mr. Lecky some years ago, in
+his book entitled "Liberty and Democracy," made the following statement,
+in no way original, but, as he put it, sufficiently striking: "The
+produce of the American mines [incident to the discoveries made by
+Columbus] created, in the most extreme form ever known in Europe, the
+change which beyond all others affects most deeply and universally the
+material well-being of men: it revolutionized the value of the precious
+metals, and, in consequence, the price of all articles, the effects of
+all contracts, the burden of all debts."
+
+In other words, referring to the first half of the sixteenth
+century,--the sixty years, we will say, following the land-fall of
+Columbus,--the historian attributed the great change which then occurred
+and which stands forth so markedly in history, to the increased
+New-World production of the precious metals, combined with the impetus
+given to trade and industry as a consequence of that discovery, and of
+the mastery of man over additional globe areas. Now, dismissing from
+consideration the so-called American protective system, likewise our
+currency issues and, generally, the patchwork, so to speak, of
+crazy-quilt legislation to which so much is attributed during the last
+thirty years, I confidently submit that in the production of the results
+under discussion, they are quantities and factors hardly worthy of
+consideration. The cause of the change which has taken place lies far
+deeper and must be sought in influences of a wholly different nature,
+influences developed into an increased and still ever increasing
+activity, over which legislation has absolutely no control. I refer, of
+course, to man's mastery over the latent forces of Nature. Of these
+Steam and Electricity are the great examples, which, because always
+apparent, at once strike the imagination. These, as tools, it is to be
+remembered, date practically from within one hundred years back. It may,
+indeed, safely be asserted that up to 1815, the end of the Wars of
+Napoleon and the time of your Professor Lieber, steam even had not as
+yet practically affected the operations of man, while electricity, when
+not a terror, was as yet but a toy. Commerce was still exclusively
+carried on by the sailing ship and canal-boat. The years from the fall
+of Napoleon to our own War of Secession--from Waterloo to
+Gettysburg--were practically those of early and partial development. Not
+until well after Appomattox, that is, since the year 1870,--a period
+covering but little more than the life of a generation,--did what is
+known to you here as the Applied Sciences cover a range difficult to
+specialize. As factors in development, it is safe to say that those
+three tremendous agencies--Steam, Electricity, Chemistry--have, so to
+speak, worked all their noticeable results within the lifetime of the
+generation born since we celebrated the Centennial of Independence. The
+manifestations now resulting and apparent to all are the natural outcome
+of the use of these modern appliances, become in our case everyday
+working tools in the hands of the most resourceful, adaptive, ingenious
+and energetic of communities, developing a virgin continent of
+undreamed-of wealth. Naturally, under such conditions, the advance has
+been not only general and continuous, but one of ever increasing
+celerity. So Protection and the Currency become flies on the fast
+revolving wheel!
+
+But what has otherwise resulted?--An unrest, social, economical,
+political. Not contentment, but a lamentation and an ancient tale of
+wrong! We hear it in the continual cry over what is known as the
+increased cost of living, and feel its pressure in the higher standard
+of living. What was considered wealth by our ancestors is to-day hardly
+competence. What sufficed for luxury in our childhood barely now
+supplies what are known as the comforts of life. Take, for instance, the
+motor,--the automobile. I speak within bounds, I think, when I say there
+are many fold more motors to-day racing over the streets, the highways
+and the byways of America than there were one-horse wagons thirty-five
+years ago. Six hundred, I am told, are to be found within the immediate
+neighborhood of Columbia; and, since I have been here I have seen in
+your streets just one man on horse-back! These figures and that
+statement tell the tale. A few years only back, every Carolinian rode
+to town, and the motor was unknown. A single illustrative example, this
+could be duplicated in innumerable ways everywhere and in all walks
+of life.
+
+The result is obvious, and was inevitable. Entered on a new phase of
+existence, the world is not as it was in the days of Columbus, when a
+single new continent was discovered containing in it what we would now
+regard as a limited accumulation of the precious metals. It is, on the
+contrary, as if, in the language of Dr. Johnson, "the potentiality of
+wealth" had been revealed "beyond the dreams of avarice"; together with
+not one or two, but a dozen continents, the existence and secrets of
+which are suddenly laid bare. The Applied Sciences have been the
+magicians,--not Protection or the Currency.
+
+And still scientists are continually dinning in our ears the question
+whether this state of affairs is going to continue,--whether the era of
+disturbance has reached its limit! I hold such a question to be little
+short of childish. That era has not reached its limits, nor has it even
+approximated those limits. On the contrary, we have just entered on the
+uncharted sea. We know what the last thirty years have brought about as
+the result of the agencies at work; but as yet we can only dimly dream
+of what the next sixty years are destined to see brought about.
+Imagination staggers at the suggestion.
+
+What, then, has been of this the inevitable consequence,--the
+consequence which even the blindest should have foreseen? It has
+resulted in all those far-reaching changes suggested in the earlier part
+of what I have said to-day, as respects our ideals, our political
+theories, our social conditions. In other words, the old era is ended;
+what is implied when we say a new era is entered upon?
+
+To attempt a partial answer to the query implies no claim to a prophetic
+faculty. Whether we like to face the fact or not, far-reaching changes
+in our economical theories and social conditions are imminent, involving
+corresponding readjustments in our constitutional arrangements and
+political machinery. Tennyson foreshadowed it all in his "Locksley Hall"
+seventy years ago:--"The individual withers, and the world is more and
+more." The day of individualism as it existed in the American ideal of
+sixty years since is over; that of collectivism and possibly socialism
+has opened. The day of social equality is relegated to what may be
+considered a somewhat patriarchal past,--that patriarchal past having
+come to a close during the memory of those still in active life.
+
+And yet, though all this can now be studied in the political discussion
+endlessly dragging on, strangely and sadly enough that discussion
+carries in it hardly a note of encouragement. It is, in a word,
+unspeakably shallow. And here, having sufficiently for my present
+purpose though in hurried manner, diagnosed the situation,--located the
+seat of disturbance,--we come to the question of treatment. Involving,
+as it necessarily does, problems of the fundamental law, and a
+rearrangement and different allocation of the functions of government,
+this challenges the closest thought of the publicist. That the problem
+is here crying aloud for solution is apparent. The publications which
+cumber the counters of our book-stores, those for which the greatest
+popular call to-day exists--treatises relating to trade interests, to
+collectivism, to socialism, even to anarchism--tell the tale in part; in
+part it is elsewhere and otherwise told. Only recently, in once Puritan
+Massachusetts, processions paraded the streets carrying banners marked
+with this device, more suggestive than strange:--"No master and no God!"
+
+What are the remedies popularly proposed? In that important branch of
+polity known as Political Ethics, or, as he termed them, Hermeneutics,
+which your Professor Lieber sixty years ago endeavored to treat of, what
+advance has since his time been effected?--Nay! what advance has been
+effected since the time, over two thousand years, of his great
+predecessor, Aristotle? I confidently submit that what progress is now
+being made in this most erudite of sciences is in the nature of that of
+the crab--backwards! In the discussions of Aristotle, the problem in
+view was, how to bring about government by the wisest,--that is, the
+most observant and expert. In other words, government, the object of
+politics, was by Aristotle treated in a scientific spirit. And this is
+as it should be. Take, for example, any problem,--I do not care whether
+it is legal or medical or one of engineering: How successfully dispose
+of it? Uniformly, in one way. Those problems are successfully solved, if
+at all, only when their solution is placed in the hands of the most
+proficient. Judged by the discussions of to-day, what advance has in
+politics been effected? Do the _Outlook_ and the _Commoner_ imply
+progress since the Stagirite? Not to any noticeable extent. We are, on
+the contrary, fumbling and wallowing about where the Greek pondered and
+philosophized.
+
+Democracy, as it is called, is to-day the great panacea,--the political
+nostrum; as such it is confidently advocated by statesmen and professors
+and even by the presidents of our institutions of the advanced
+education. "Trust the People" is the shibboleth! "Let the People rule!"
+"The cure for too much Liberty is more Liberty!" To Democracy plain and
+simple--Composite Wisdom--I frankly confess I feel no call,--no call
+greater than, for instance, towards Autocracy or Aristocracy or
+Plutocracy. Taken simply, and applied as hitherto applied, all and each
+lead to but one result,--failure! And that result, let me here predict,
+will, in the future, be the same in the case of pure Democracy that, in
+the past, it was in the case of the pure Autocracy of the Caesars, or
+the case of the pure Aristocracy of Rome or of the so-called Republics
+of the Middle Ages. A political edifice on shifting sands.
+
+Yet, to-day what do we see and hear in America? Tell it not in Gath;
+publish it not in the streets of Askalon I Two thousand years after the
+time of Aristotle, we see a prevailing school working directly back to
+the condition of affairs which existed in the Athenian agora under the
+disapproving eyes of the father of political philosophy. Panaceas,
+universal cure-alls, and quack remedies--the Initiative, the Referendum,
+and the Recall are paraded as if these--nostrums of the mountebanks of
+the county fair--would surely remedy the perplexing ills of new and
+hitherto unheard-of social, economical, and political conditions.
+Democracy! What is Democracy? Democracy, as it is generally understood,
+I submit, is nothing but the reaching of political conclusions through
+the frequent counting of noses; or, as Macaulay two generations ago
+better phrased it, "the majority of citizens told by the head";--the
+only question at just this juncture being whether, in order to the
+arriving at more acceptable results, both sexes shall be "told," instead
+of one sex only. Moreover, I with equal confidence make bold to suggest
+that while conceded, and while men have even persuaded themselves that
+they have faith in it, and really do believe in this "telling" of noses
+as the best and fairest attainable means of reaching correct results,
+yet in so doing and so professing they simply, as men are prone to do,
+deceive themselves. In other words, victims of their own cant, they
+preach a panacea in which they really do not believe. Nor of this is
+proof far to seek. _Vox populi, vox Dei_! If you extend the application
+of this principle by a single step, its loudest advocates draw back in
+alarm from the inevitable. They seek refuge in the assertion--"Oh! That
+is different!" For instance, take a concrete case; so best can we
+illustrate.
+
+One of the greatest scientific triumphs reached in modern times--perhaps
+I might fairly say the greatest--is the discovery of the cause of yellow
+fever, and its consequent control. As a result of the studies, the
+patient experimentation and self-sacrifice of the wisest,--that is, the
+most observant and expert,--the amazing conclusion was reached that not
+only the yellow fever but the innumerable ills of the flesh known under
+the caption of "malarial," were due to causes hitherto unsuspected,
+though obvious when revealed,--to the existence in the atmosphere of a
+venomous insect, in comparison with the work of which the ravages on
+mankind of the entire carnivorous and reptile creation were of
+comparatively small account. The mosquito flew disclosed, the
+atmospheric viper,--a viper most venomous and deadly. How was the
+disclosure brought about? What was the remedy applied? Was the discovery
+effected through universal suffrage? Was the remedy sought for and
+decided upon by the Initiative, or through a Referendum at an election
+held on the Tuesday succeeding the first Monday of a certain month and
+year? Had recourse in this case been had to the panacea now in greatest
+political vogue, we all know perfectly well what would have followed.
+History tells us. The quarantine, as it is called, would have been
+decreed, and a day of fasting, humiliation and prayer appointed. The
+mosquito, quite ignored, would then have gone on in his deadly work. We
+all equally well know that the man, even the politician or the
+statesman, who had suggested a solution of that problem by a count of
+noses would have been effaced with ridicule. Even the most simple minded
+would have rejected that method of reaching a result. Yet the ilia of
+the body politic, too, are complicated. Indeed, far more intricate in
+their processes and more deceitful in their aspects, they more deeply
+affect the general well-being and happiness than any ill or epidemic
+which torments the physical being, even the mosquito malaria. Yet the
+ills of the body politic, the complications which surround us on every
+side,--for these the unfailing panacea is said to lie in universal
+suffrage, that remedy which is immediately and of course laughed out of
+court if suggested in case of the simpler ills of the flesh.
+
+This, I submit, is demonstration. The true remedy is not to be sought in
+that direction in the one case any more than the other.
+
+There is a considerable element of truth, though possibly a not
+inconsiderable one of exaggeration, in this statement from a paper I
+recently chanced upon in the issue of the sober and classical _Edinburgh
+Review_ for October last,--a paper entitled "Democracy and
+Liberalism":--"History testifies unmistakably and unanimously to the
+passion of democracies for incompetence. There is nothing democracy
+dislikes and suspects so heartily as technical efficiency, particularly
+when it is independent of the popular vote." But to-day, what is
+politically proposed by our senatorial charlatans and the mountebanks of
+the market-place? The Referendum, the constant and easy Recall, the
+everlasting Initiative are dinned into our ears as the cure-alls of
+every ill of the body politic. On the contrary, I submit that, while in
+the absence of any better method as yet devised and accepted, the
+process of reaching results by a count of the "majority told by the
+head" of the citizens then present and voting has certain political
+advantages, yet, for all this, as a final, scientific, political
+process, it is unworthy of consideration. A passing expedient, it in no
+degree reflects credit on twentieth-century intelligence.
+
+And now I come to the crux of my discussion. Thus rejecting results
+reached by the ballot as now in practical use, a query is already in the
+minds of those who listen. At once suggesting itself and flung in my
+face, it is asked as a political poser, and not without a sneer,--What
+else or better have I to propose? Would I advise a return to old and
+discarded methods,--Heredity, Caste, Autocracy, Plutocracy? I
+respectfully submit this is a question no one has a right to put, and
+one I am not called upon to answer. Again, let me take a concrete case.
+Once more I appeal to the yellow fever precedent. The first step towards
+a solution of a medical, as of a political, problem is a correct
+diagnosis. Then necessarily follows a long period devoted to
+observation, to investigation and experiment. If, in the case of the
+yellow fever, a score of years only ago an observer had pointed out the
+nature of the disease and the manifest inadequacy of current theories
+and prevailing methods of prevention and treatment, do you think others
+would have had a right to turn upon him and demand that he instantly
+prescribe a remedy which should be not only complete, but at once
+recognized as such and so accepted? In the present case, as I have
+already observed, from the days of Aristotle down through two and twenty
+centuries, men had been experimenting in all, to them, conceivable ways,
+on the government of the body politic, exactly as they experimented on
+the disorders of the physical body. But only yesterday was the source of
+the yellow fever, for instance, diagnosed and located, and the proper
+means of prevention applied. The cancer and tuberculosis are to-day
+unsolved problems. By analogy, they are inviting subjects for an
+Initiative and a Referendum! Yet would any person who to-day, standing
+where I stand, expressed a disbelief, at once total and contemptuous, of
+such a procedure as respects them, be met by a demand for some other
+panacea of immediate and guaranteed efficiency? And so with the body
+politic. I here to-day am merely attempting a diagnosis, pointing out
+the disorders, and exposing as best I can the utter crudeness and
+insufficiency of the market-place remedies proposed. Have you a right,
+then, to turn on me, and call for some other prescription, warranted to
+cure, in place of the nostrums so loudly advertised by the sciolists and
+the dabblers of the day, and by me so contemptuously set aside? I
+confess I am unable to respond, or even to attempt a response to any
+such demand. I am not altogether a quack, nor is this a county fair.
+
+"Paracelsus," so denominated, was one of Robert Browning's earlier
+poems. In it he causes the fifteenth-century alchemist and forerunner of
+all modern pharmaceutical chemistry, to declare that as the result of
+long travel and much research
+
+
+"I possess
+Two sorts of knowledge: one,--vast, shadowy,
+Hints of the unbounded aim....
+The other consists of many secrets, caught
+While bent on nobler prize,--perhaps a few
+Prime principles which may conduct to much:
+These last I offer."
+
+
+So, _longo intervallo_, I have a few suggestions,--the result of an
+observation extending, as I said at the beginning, over the lives of two
+generations and a connection with many great events in which I have
+borne a part,--a part not prominent indeed, and more generally, I
+acknowledge, mistaken than correct. My errors, however, have at least
+made me cautious and doubtful of my own conclusions. I submit them for
+what they are worth. Not much, I fear.
+
+What, then, would I do, were it in my power to prescribe alterations and
+curatives for the ills of our American body politic, of which I have
+spoken; or, more correctly, the far-reaching disturbances manifestly due
+to the agencies at work, to which I have made reference? Let us come at
+once to the point, taking the existing Constitution of the United States
+as a concrete example, and recognizing the necessity for its revision
+and readjustment to meet radically changed conditions,--conditions
+social, material, geographical, changed and still changing.
+
+It was Mr. Gladstone who, years ago, made the often-quoted assertion
+that the Constitution of the United States was "the most wonderful work
+ever struck off at a given time by the brain and purpose of man." I do
+not think he was far wrong; though we, of course, realize that the
+Federal Constitution was a growth and in no degree an inspiration. That
+Constitution has through a century and a quarter stood the test of time
+and stress of war, during a period of almost unlimited growth of the
+community for which it was devised. It has outlasted many nationalities
+and most of the dynasties in existence at the time of its adoption; and
+that, too, under conditions sufficiently trying. I, therefore, regard it
+with profound respect; and, so regarding it, I would treat it with a
+cautious and tender hand. Not lightly pronouncing it antiquated, what
+changes would I make in it if to-morrow it were given me to prescribe
+alterations adapting it to the altered conditions which confront us? I
+do not hesitate to say, and I am glad to say, the changes I would
+suggest would be limited; yet, I fancy, far-reaching.
+
+And, in the first place, let us have a clear conception of the end in
+view. That end is, I submit, exactly the same to-day which Aristotle had
+in view more than twenty centuries ago. It is, not to solve all
+political problems, but to put political problems as they arise in the
+hands of those whom he termed the "best,"--but whom we know as the most
+intelligent, observant and expert,--to be, through their agency, in the
+way of ultimate solution. If, adopting every ill-considered and
+half-fledged measure of so-called reform which might be the fancy of the
+day, we incorporated them in our fundamental law, but one thing could
+result therefrom,--ultimate confusion. The Constitution is neither a
+legislative crazy-quilt nor a receptacle of fads. To make it such is in
+every respect the reverse of scientific. The work immediately in hand,
+therefore, is to devise such changes in the fundamental law as will tend
+most effectually to bring about the solution of issues as they may
+arise, by the most expert, observant and reliable. This accomplished, if
+its accomplishment were only practicable, all possible would have been
+done; and the necessary and inevitable readjustment of things would, in
+politics as in medicine and in science, be left to solve itself as
+occasion arose. Provision cannot be made against every contingency.
+
+This premised, the Constitution of the United States is an instrument
+through which powers are delegated by several local communities to a
+central government. The instrument, it was originally held, should be
+strictly construed and the powers delegated limited; and in this
+respect, with certain alterations made obviously necessary to meet
+changed conditions, I would return to the fundamental idea of
+the framers.
+
+In saying this I feel confidence also that here in South Carolina at
+least I shall meet with an earnest response. The time is not yet remote
+when local self-government worked salvation for South Carolina, as for
+her sister States of the Confederacy. You here will never forget what
+immediately followed the close of our Civil War. As an historic fact,
+the Constitution was then suspended. It was suspended by act of an
+irresponsible Congress, exercising revolutionary but unlimited powers
+over a large section of the common country. You then had an
+illustration, not soon to be forgotten, of concentration of legislative
+power. An episode at once painful and discreditable, it is not necessary
+here to refer to it in detail. Appeal, however, was made to the
+principle of local self-government,--it was, so to speak, a recurrence
+to the theory of State Sovereignty. The appeal struck a responsive,
+because traditional, chord; and it was through a recurrence to State
+Sovereignty as the agency of local self-government that loyalty and
+contentment were restored, and, I may add, that I am here to-day.
+Ceasing to be a Military Department, South Carolina once more became a
+State. Not improbably the demand will in a not remote future be heard
+that State lines and local autonomy be practically obliterated. In that
+event, I feel a confident assurance that, recurring in memory to the
+evil days which followed 1865, the spirit of enlightened conservatism
+will assert itself here and in the sister States of what was once the
+Confederacy; and again it will prevail. In the future, as in the past,
+you in South Carolina at least will cling to what in 1876 proved the ark
+of your social and political salvation.
+
+Taking another step in the discussion of changes, the Constitution is
+founded on that well-known distribution and allocation of powers first
+theoretically suggested by Montesquieu. There is a division, accompanied
+by a mutual limitation of authority, through the Judiciary, the
+Executive, and the Legislative. As respects this allocation, how would I
+modify that instrument? I freely say that the tendency of my thought,
+based on observation, is to conservatism. I have never yet in a single
+instance found that when the people of this or any other country
+accustomed to parliamentary government desired a thing, they failed to
+obtain it within a reasonable limit of time. Hasty changes are wisely
+deprecated; but I think I speak within limitation when I say that
+neither in the history of Great Britain,--the mother of Parliaments--nor
+in the history of the United States, has any modification which the
+people, on sober second thought, have considered to be for the best,
+long been deferred. Action, revolutionary in character, has not, as a
+rule, been needful, or, when taken, proved salutary. This is a record
+and result that no careful student of our history will, I take it, deny.
+
+Such being the case, so far as our Judiciary is concerned, I do not
+hesitate to say I would adhere to older, and, as I think, better
+principles, or revert to them where they have been experimentally
+abandoned. It took the Anglo-Saxon race two centuries of incessant
+conflict to wrest from a despotic executive, practically an autocracy,
+judicial independence. That was effected through what is known as a
+tenure during good behavior, as opposed to a tenure at the will of the
+monarch. This, then, for two centuries, was accepted as a fundamental
+principle of constitutional government. Of late, a new theory has been
+propounded, and by those chafing at all restraint--constitutionally
+lawless in disposition--it is said the Recall should also be applied to
+the Judiciary. Having, therefore, wrested the independence of the
+Judiciary from the hand of the Autocrat, we now propose to place it, in
+all trustfulness, in the hands of the Democrat. To me the proposition
+does not commend itself. It is founded on no correct principle, for the
+irresponsible democratic majority is even more liable to ill-considered
+and vacillating action than is the responsible autocrat. In that matter
+I would not trust myself; why, then, should I trust the composite
+Democrat? In the case of the Judiciary, therefore, I would so far as the
+fundamental law is concerned abide by the older and better considered
+principles of the framers.
+
+Next, the Executive. Again, we hear the demand of Democracy,--the
+Recall! Once more I revert to the record. This Republic has now been in
+working operation, and, taken altogether, most successful operation,
+for a century and a quarter. During that century and a quarter we have
+had, we will say, some five and twenty different chief magistrates.
+There is an ancient and somewhat vulgar adage to the effect that the
+proof of a certain dietary article is in its eating. Apply that homely
+adage to the matter under consideration. What is the lesson taught? It
+is simply this,--during a whole century and a quarter of existence there
+has not been one single chief executive of the United States to whom the
+arbitrary Recall could have been applied with what would now be agreed
+upon as a fortunate result. In the Andrew Johnson impeachment case was
+it not better that things were as they were? On the other hand, every
+one of the seven independent, self-respecting Senators who then by a
+display of high moral courage saved the country from serious prejudice
+would have been recalled out-of-hand had the Recall now demanded been in
+existence. Its working would have received prompt exemplification; as it
+was, the recall was effected in time, and after due deliberation. The
+delay occasioned no public detriment. In this life, experience is
+undeniably worth something; and the experience here referred to is
+fairly entitled to consideration. No political system possible to devise
+is wholly above criticism,--not open to exceptional contingencies or to
+dangers possible to conjure up. Such have from time to time arisen in
+the past; in the future such will inevitably arise. This consideration
+must, however, be balanced against a general average of successful
+working; and I confidently submit that, weighing thus the proved
+advantage of the system we have against the possibilities of danger
+which hereafter may occur, but which never yet have occurred, the scale
+on which are the considerations in favor of change kicks the beam.
+
+In view, however, of the growth of the country, the vastly increased
+complexity of interests involved, the intricacy and the cost of the
+election processes to which recourse is necessarily had, I would
+substitute for the present brief tenure of the presidential office--a
+tenure well enough perhaps in the comparatively simple days which
+preceded our Civil War--a tenure sufficiently long to enable the
+occupant of the presidential chair to have a policy and to accomplish at
+least something towards its adoption. As the case stands to-day, a
+President for the first time elected has during his term of four years,
+one year, and one year only, in which really to apply himself to the
+accomplishment of results. The first year of his term is necessarily
+devoted to the work of acquiring a familiarity with the machinery of the
+government, and the shaping of a policy. The second year may be devoted
+to a more or less strenuous effort at the adoption of the policy thus
+formulated. As experience shows, the action of the third and fourth
+years is gravely affected--if not altogether perverted from the work in
+hand--by what are known as the political exigencies incident to a
+succession. Manifestly, this calls for correction. The remedy, however,
+to my mind, is obvious and suggests itself. As the presidency is the
+one office under our Constitution national in character, and in no way
+locally representative, I would extend the term to seven years, and
+render the occupant of the office thereafter ineligible for reëlection.
+Seven years is, I am aware, under our political system, an unusual term;
+and here my ears will, I know, be assailed by the great "mandate"
+cackle. The count of noses being complete, the mind of the composite
+Democrat is held to be made up. It only remains to formulate the
+consequent decree; and, with least possible delay, put it in way of
+practical enforcement. Again, I, as a publicist, demur. It is the old
+issue, that between instant action and action on second thought,
+presented once more. Briefly, the experience of sixty years strongly
+inclines me to a preference of matured and considerate action over that
+immediate action which notoriously is in nine cases out of ten as
+ill-advised as it is precipitate. Only in the field of politics is the
+expediency of the latter assumed as of course; yet, as in science and
+literature and art so in politics, final, because satisfactory, results
+are at best but slowly thrashed out. As respects wisdom, the modern
+statute book does not loom, monumental. Its contemplation would indeed
+perhaps even lead to a surmise that reasonable delay in formulating his
+"mandate" might, in the case of the composite Democrat as in that of the
+individual Autocrat, prove a not altogether unmixed, and so in the end
+an intolerable, evil.
+
+Thus while a change of the Executive and Legislative branches of the
+government might not be always simultaneously effected, by selecting
+seven years as the presidential term the election would be brought
+about, as frequently as might be, by itself, uncomplicated by local
+issues connected with the fortunes or political fate of individual
+candidates for office, whether State, Congressional, or Senatorial; and
+during the seven years of tenure, four, at least, it might reasonably be
+anticipated, would be devoted to the promotion of a definite policy, in
+place of one year in a term of four, as now. If also ineligible for
+reelection, there is at least a fair presumption that the occupant of
+the position might from start to finish apply himself to its duties and
+obligations, without being distracted therefrom by ulterior personal
+ends as constantly as humanly held in view.
+
+Having thus disposed of the Judiciary and the Executive, we come to the
+Legislative. And here I submit is the weak point in our American
+system,--manifestly the weak point, and to those who, like myself, have
+had occasion to know, undeniably so. I am here as a publicist; not as a
+writer of memoirs: so, on this head, I do not now propose to dilate or
+bear witness. I will only briefly say that having at one period, and for
+more than the lifetime of a generation, been in charge of large
+corporate and financial interests, I have had much occasion to deal with
+legislative bodies, National, State and Municipal. That page of my
+experiences is the one I care least to recall, and would most gladly
+forget. I am not going to specify, or give names of either localities or
+persons; but, knowing what I know, it is useless to approach me on this
+topic with the usual good-natured and optimistic, if somewhat unctuous
+and conventional, commonplaces on general uprightness and the tendency
+to improved conditions and a higher standard. I know better! I have seen
+legislators bought like bullocks--they selling themselves. I have
+watched them cover their tracks with a cunning more than vulpine. I have
+myself been black-mailed and sandbagged, while whole legislative bodies
+watched the process, fully cognizant at every step of what was going on.
+This, I am glad to say, was years ago. The legislative conditions were
+then bad, scandalously bad; nor have I any reason to believe in a
+regeneration since. The stream will never rise higher than its source;
+but it generally indicates the level thereof. In this case, I can only
+hope that in my experience it failed so to do. Running at a low level,
+the waters of that stream were deplorably dirty.
+
+That the legislative branch of our government has fallen so markedly in
+public estimation is not, I think, open to denial. To my mind, under the
+conditions I have referred to, such could not fail to be the case. It
+has, consequently, lost public confidence. Hence this popular demand for
+immediate legislation by the People,--this twentieth-century appeal to
+the Agora and Forum methods which antedate the era of Christ. It is true
+the world outgrew them two thousand years ago, and they were discarded;
+but, living in a progressive and not a reactionary period, all that, we
+are assured, is changed! The heart is no longer on the right-hand side
+of the body. To secure desired results it is only necessary to start
+quite fresh, as a mere preliminary discarding all lessons of experience.
+
+Such reasoning does not commend itself to my judgment. On the contrary,
+the failure of the American legislative to command an increasing public
+confidence, while both natural and obvious, is, if my observation guides
+me to conclusions in any degree correct, traceable to two reasons. So
+far as government is concerned, the law-making branch is assumed to be
+made up of the wisest and the most expert. Meanwhile, it is as a matter
+of fact chosen by the process I have not over-respectfully referred to
+as the counting of noses; and, moreover, by an unwritten law more
+binding than any in the Statute Book, that counting of noses is with us
+localized. In other words, when it comes to the choice of our
+law-makers, reducing provincialism to a system we make the local
+numerical majority supreme, and any one is considered competent to
+legislate. He can do that, even if by common knowledge he is incompetent
+or untrustworthy in every other capacity. Localization thus becomes the
+stronghold of mediocrity, the sure avenue to office of the second-and
+third-rate man,--he who wishes always to enjoy his share of a little
+brief authority, to have, he also, a taste of public life. In this
+respect our American system is, I submit, manifestly and incomparably
+inferior to the system of parliamentary election existing in Great
+Britain, itself open to grave criticism. In Great Britain the public man
+seeks the constituency wherever he can find it; or the constituency
+seeks its representative wherever it recognizes him. The present Prime
+Minister of Great Britain, for instance, represents a small Scotch
+constituency in which he never resided, but by which he was elected more
+than twenty years ago, and through which he has since consecutively
+remained in public life. On the other hand, look at the waste and
+extravagance of the system now and traditionally in use with us. To get
+into public life a man must not only be in sympathy with the majority of
+the citizens of the locality in which he lives, but he must continue to
+be in sympathy with that majority; or, at any election, like Mr. Cannon
+in the election just held, where for any passing cause a majority of his
+neighbors in the locality in which he lives may fail to support him, he
+must go into retirement. I cannot here enlarge on this topic, vital as I
+see it; I have neither space nor time, and must, therefore, needs
+content myself with the "hints" of Paracelsus. I will merely say that as
+an outcome this localized majority system practically disfranchises the
+more intelligent and the more disinterested, the more individual and
+independent of every constituency. It reduces their influence, and
+negatives their action. It operates in like fashion everywhere. My
+field of observation has been at home, here in America; but it has been
+the same in France. For instance, while preparing this address I came
+across the following in that most respectable sheet, the London
+_Athenaum_. A very competent Frenchman was there criticising a recent
+book entitled "Idealism in France." Reference was by him made to what,
+in France, is known as the "_scrutin d'arrondissement,"_ or, in other
+words, the district representative system. The critic declares that this
+system has there "created a party machine which has brought the country
+under the sway of a sort of Radical-Socialist Tammany, and bound
+together the voter and the deputy by a tie of mutual corruption, the
+candidate promising Government favors to the elector in return for his
+vote, and the elector supporting the candidate who promises most. Hence
+a policy in which ideas and ideals are forgotten for personal and local
+interests, as each candidate strives to outbid his rivals in the bribes
+that he offers to his constituents. Hence, finally, a general lowering
+in the tone of French home politics, every question being made
+subservient by the deputies to that of their reëlection."
+
+I would respectfully inquire if the above does not apply word for word
+to the condition of affairs with which we are familiar in America.
+
+But let me here again cite a concrete case, still fresh in memory;
+nothing in abstract discussion tells so much. Take the late Carl
+Schurz. If there was one man in our public life since 1865 who showed a
+genius for the parliamentary career, and who in six short years in the
+United States Senate--a single term--displayed there constructive
+legislating qualities of the highest order, it was Carl Schurz. Yet at
+the end of that single senatorial term, for local and temporary reasons
+he failed to obtain the support of a majority, or the support of
+anything approaching a majority, of those composing the constituency
+upon which he depended. Consequently he was retired from that
+parliamentary position necessary for the accomplishment, through him, of
+best public results. Yet at that very time there was no man in the
+United States who commanded so large and so personal a constituency as
+Carl Schurz; for he represented the entire Germanic element in the
+United States. Distributed as that element was, however, with its vote
+localized under our law, unwritten as well as statutory, there was no
+possibility of any constituency so concentrating itself that Carl Schurz
+could be kept in the position where he could continue to render services
+of the greatest possible value to the country. I, therefore, confidently
+here submit a doubt whether human ingenuity could devise any system
+calculated to lead to a greater waste of parliamentary ability, or more
+effectually keep from the front and position of influence that
+legislative superiority which was the arm of Aristotle to secure.
+"Cant-patriotism," as your Francis Lieber termed it; and, on this
+score, he waxed eloquent. "Do we not live in a world of cant," he wrote
+from Columbia here to a friend at the North seventy-five years ago,
+"that cant-patriotism which plumes itself in selecting men from within
+the State confines only. The truer a nation is, the more essentially it
+is elevated, the more it disregards petty considerations, and takes the
+true and the good from whatever quarter it may come. Look at history and
+you find the proof. Look around you, where you are, and you find it
+now." And, were Lieber living to-day, he would find a striking
+exemplification of the consequences of a total and systematic disregard
+of this elementary proposition in studying the United States Senate from
+and through its reporters' gallery. The decline in the standards of that
+body, whether of aspect, intelligence, education or character, under the
+operation of the local primary has been not less pronounced than
+startling. The outcome and ripe result of "cant-patriotism," it affords
+to the curious observer an impressive object-lesson,--provincialism
+reduced to a political system; what a witty and incisive French writer
+has recently termed the "Cult of Incompetence." Speaking of conditions
+prevailing not here but in France, this observer says:--"Democracy in
+its modern form chooses its' delegates in its own image.... What ought
+the character of the legislator to be? The very opposite, it seems to
+me, of the democratic legislator, for he ought to be well-informed and
+entirely devoid of prejudice." Taken as a whole, and a few striking
+individual exceptions apart, are those composing the Senate of the
+United States conspicuous in these respects? They certainly do not so
+impress the casual observer. That, as a body, they increasingly fail to
+command confidence and attention is matter of common remark. Nor is the
+reason far to seek. It would be the same as respects literature, science
+and art, were their representatives chosen and results reached through a
+count of noses localized, with selection severely confined to
+home talent.
+
+I am well aware of the criticism which will at once be passed on what I
+now advance. Local representation through choice by numerical majorities
+within given confines, geographically and mathematically fixed, is a
+system so rooted and intrenched in the convictions and traditions of the
+American community that even to question its wisdom evinces a lack of
+political common-sense. It in fact resembles nothing so much as the
+attempt to whistle down a strongly prevailing October wind from the
+West. The attempt so to do is not practical politics! In reply, however,
+I would suggest that such a criticism is wholly irrelevant. The
+publicist has nothing to do with practical politics. It is as if it were
+objected to a physician who prescribed sanitation against epidemics that
+the community in question was by custom and tradition wedded to filth
+and surface-drainage, and could not possibly be induced to abandon them
+in favor of any new-fangled theories of soap-and-water cleanliness. So
+why waste time in prescribing such? Better be common-sensed and
+practical, taking things as they are. In the case suggested, and
+confronted with such criticism, the medical adviser simply shrugs his
+shoulders, and is silent; the alternative he knows is inescapable. After
+a sufficiency of sound scourgings the objecting community will probably
+know better, and may listen to reason; in a way, conforming thereto. So,
+also, the body politic. If Ephraim is indeed thus joined to idols, the
+publicist simply shrugs his shoulders, and passes on; possibly, after
+Ephraim has been sufficiently scourged, he may in that indefinite future
+popularly known as "one of these days" be more clear sighted and wiser.
+
+None the less, so far as our national parliamentary system is concerned,
+could I have my way in a revision of the Constitution, I would increase
+the senatorial term to ten years, and I would, were such a thing within
+the range of possibility, break down the system of the necessary
+senatorial selection by a State of an inhabitant of the State. If I
+could, I would introduce the British system. For example, though I never
+voted for Mr. Bryan and have not been in general sympathy with Mr.
+Roosevelt, yet few things would give me greater political satisfaction
+than to see Mr. Bryan, we will say, elected a Senator from Arizona or
+Oregon, Mr. Roosevelt elected from Illinois or Pennsylvania, President
+Taft from Utah or Vermont. They apparently best represent existing
+feelings and the ideals prevailing in those communities; why, then,
+should they not voice those feelings and ideals in our highest
+parliamentary chamber?
+
+As respects our House of Representatives, it would in principle be the
+same. I do not care to go into the rationale of what is known as
+proportional representation, nor have I time so to do; but, were it in
+my power, I would prescribe to-morrow that hereafter the national House
+of Representatives should be constituted on the proportional basis,--the
+choice of representatives to be by States, but, as respects the
+nomination of candidates, irrespective of district lines. Like many
+others, I am very weary of provincial nobodies, "good men" locally known
+to be such!
+
+As I have already said, in parliamentary government all depends in the
+end on the truly representative character of the legislative body. If
+that is as it should be, the rest surely follows. The objective of
+Aristotle is attained.
+
+Exceeding the limits assigned to it, my discussion has, however,
+extended too far. I must close. One word before so doing. Why am I here?
+I am here,--a man considerably exceeding in age the allotted threescore
+and ten--to deliver a message, be the value of the same greater or less.
+I greatly fear it is less. I would, however, impart the lessons of an
+experience stretching over sixty years,--the results of such observation
+as my intelligence has enabled me to exercise. I do so, addressing
+myself to a local institution of the advanced education. Why? Because,
+looking over the country, diagnosing its conditions as well as my
+capacity enables me, observing the evolution of the past and
+forecasting, in as far as I may, the outcome, I am persuaded that the
+future of the country rests more largely in the hands of such
+institutions as this than in those of any other agency or activity. Do
+not say I flatter; for, while I can hope for no advancement, I think I
+have not overstated the case; I certainly have not overstated my
+conviction. There has been no man who has influenced the course of
+modern thought more deeply and profoundly than Adam Smith, a Professor
+in a Scotch University of the second class. So here in Columbia seventy
+years ago, Francis Lieber prepared and published his "Manual of
+Political Ethics." Adam Smith and Francis Lieber were but
+prototypes--examples of what I have in mind. The days were when the
+Senate of the United States afforded a rostrum from which thinkers and
+teachers first formulated, and then advanced, great policies. Those
+days, and I say it regretfully, are past. Unless I am greatly mistaken,
+however, a new political force is now asserting itself. I have recently,
+at a meeting of historical and scientific associations in Boston, had my
+attention forcibly called to this aspect of the situation now shaping
+itself. I there met young men, many, and not the least noticeable of
+whom, came from this section. They inspired me with a renewed confidence
+in our political future. Essentially teachers,--I might add, they were
+publicists as well as professors. Observers and students, they actively
+followed the course of developing thought in Europe as in this country.
+Exact in their processes, philosophical and scientific in their methods,
+unselfish in their devotion, they were broad of view. It is for them to
+realize in a future not remote the University ideal pictured, and
+correctly pictured, from this stage by one who here preceded me a short
+six months ago. They, constituting the University, are the "hope of the
+State in the direction of its practical affairs; in teaching the lawyer
+the better standards of his profession, his duty to place character
+above money making; in teaching the legislator the philosophy of
+legislation, and that the constructive forces of legislation carefully
+considered should precede every effort to change an existing status; in
+teaching those in official life, executive and judicial, that demagogy,
+and theories of life uncontrolled by true principles, do not make for
+success, when final success is considered, but that, if they did lead to
+success, they should be avoided for their inherent imperfection.... The
+province of the University is to educate citizenship in the abstract."
+
+It is the presence of this class, to those composing which I bow as
+distinctly of a period superior to mine, that you owe my presence
+to-day,--whatever that presence may be worth. I regard their existence
+and their coming forward in such institutions as this University of
+South Carolina, as the arc of the bow of promise spanning the political
+horizon of our future.
+
+Through you, to them my message is addressed.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's 'Tis Sixty Years Since, by Charles Francis Adams
+
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+Project Gutenberg's 'Tis Sixty Years Since, by Charles Francis Adams
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
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+
+Title: 'Tis Sixty Years Since
+
+Author: Charles Francis Adams
+
+Posting Date: December 10, 2011 [EBook #9996]
+Release Date: February, 2006
+First Posted: November 6, 2003
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 'TIS SIXTY YEARS SINCE ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Afra Ullah, Sjaani and PG Distributed Proofreaders
+
+
+
+
+
+</pre>
+
+
+<table width="80%" border="0" align="center">
+ <tr>
+ <td>
+ <h1 align="center">&quot;'TIS SIXTY YEARS SINCE&quot;</h1>
+ <h3 align="center">ADDRESS OF <br />
+ CHARLES FRANCIS ADAMS </h3>
+ <div align="center">* * * * * </div>
+ <h4 align="center">FOUNDERS' DAY, JANUARY 16, 1913</h4>
+ </td>
+ </tr>
+</table>
+<br />
+<hr align="center" width="40%" />
+
+<table width="80%" border="0" align="center">
+ <tr>
+ <td>
+ <h1 align="center">&quot;'TIS SIXTY YEARS SINCE&quot;</h1>
+
+
+<p>In the single hour self-allotted for my part in this
+occasion there is much ground to cover,--the time is
+short, and I have far to go. Did I now, therefore, submit
+all I had proposed to say when I accepted your
+invitation, there would remain no space for preliminaries.
+Yet something of that character is in place.
+I will try to make it brief.<a href="#one"><sup>[1]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p>As the legend or text of what I have in mind to submit,
+I have given the words &quot;'Tis Sixty Years Since.&quot;
+As some here doubtless recall, this is the second or subordinate
+title of Walter Scott's first novel, &quot;Waverley,&quot;
+which brought him fame. Given to the world in 1814,--hard
+on a century ago,--&quot;Waverley&quot; told of the last
+Stuart effort to recover the crown of Great Britain,--that
+of &quot;The '45.&quot; It so chances that Scott's period of
+retrospect is also just now most appropriate in my case,
+inasmuch as I entered Harvard as a student in the year
+1853--&quot;sixty years since!&quot; It may fairly be asserted
+that school life ends, and what may in contradistinction
+thereto be termed thinking and acting life begins, the
+day the young man passes the threshold of the institution
+of more advanced education. For him, life's
+responsibilities then begin. Prior to that confused,
+thenceforth things with him become consecutive,--a
+sequence. Insensibly he puts away childish things.</p>
+
+<p><a name="one"></a>[1] Owing to its length, this &quot;Address&quot; was compressed in delivery,
+occupying one hour only. It is here printed in the form in which it was
+prepared,--the parts omitted in delivery being included.</p>
+
+<p>In those days, as I presume now, the college youth
+harkened to inspired voices. Sir Walter Scott belonged to
+a previous generation. Having held the close attention
+of a delighted world as the most successful story-teller
+of his own or any preceding period, he had passed off the
+stage; but only a short twenty years before. Other voices
+no less inspired had followed; and, living, spoke to us.
+Perhaps my scheme to-day is best expressed by one of
+these.</p>
+
+<p>When just beginning to attract the attention of the
+English-speaking world, Alfred Tennyson gave forth
+his poem of &quot;Locksley Hall,&quot;--very familiar to those
+of my younger days. Written years before, at the time
+of publication he was thirty-three. In 1886, a man of
+seventy-five, he composed a sequel to his earlier effort,--the
+utterance entitled &quot;Locksley Hall Sixty Years
+After.&quot; He then, you will remember, reviewed his
+young man's dreams,--dreams of the period when he</p>
+
+<p>&quot; ... dip't into the future, far as human eye could see,
+Saw the Vision of the world, and all the wonder that would be,&quot;</p>
+
+<p>--threescore years later contrasting in sombre verse
+an old man's stern realities with the bright anticipations
+of youth. Such is my purpose to-day. &quot;Wandering
+back to living boyhood,&quot; to the time when I first
+simultaneously passed the Harvard threshold and the
+threshold of responsible life, I propose to compare the
+ideals and actualities of the present with the ideals,
+anticipations and dreams of a past now somewhat remote.</p>
+
+<p>To say that in life and in the order of life's events it
+is the unexpected which is apt to occur, is a commonplace.
+That it has been so in my own case, I shall presently
+show. Meanwhile, not least among the unexpected
+things is my presence here to-day. If, when I entered
+Harvard in 1853, it had been suggested that in 1913, I,--born
+of the New England Sanhedrim, a Brahmin Yankee
+by blood, tradition and environment--had it been suggested
+that I, being such, would sixty years later stand
+by invitation here in Columbia before the faculty and
+students of the University of South Carolina, I should
+under circumstances then existing have pronounced the
+suggestion as beyond reasonable credence. Here, however,
+I am; and here, from this as my rostrum, I propose
+to-day to deliver a message,--such as it is.</p>
+
+<p>And yet, though such a future outcome, if then foretold,
+would have seemed scarcely possible of occurrence,
+there, after all, were certain conditions which would
+have rendered the contingency even at that time not only
+possible, but in accordance with the everlasting fitness of
+things. For, curiously enough, personal relations of a
+certain character held with this institution would have
+given me, even in 1853, a sense of acquaintance with it
+such as individually I had with no other institution of
+similar character throughout the entire land. It in this
+wise came about. At that period, preceding as it did the
+deluge about to ensue, it was the hereditary custom of
+certain families more especially of South Carolina and of
+Louisiana,--but of South Carolina in particular--to
+send their youth to Harvard, there to receive a college
+education. It thus chanced that among my associates
+at Harvard were not a few who bore names long familiarly
+and honorably known to Carolinian records,--Barnwell
+and Preston, Rhett and Alston, Parkman and
+Eliot; and among these were some I knew well, and even
+intimately. Gone now with the generation and even
+the civilization to which they belonged, I doubt if any of
+them survive. Indeed only recently I chanced on a grimly
+suggestive mention of one who had left on me the memory
+of a character and personality singularly pure, high-toned
+and manly,--permeated with a sense of moral
+and personal obligation. I have always understood he
+died five years later at Sharpsburg, as you call it, or
+Antietam, as it was named by us, in face-to-face conflict
+with a Massachusetts regiment largely officered by Harvard
+men of his time and even class,--his own familiar
+friends. This is the record, the reference being to a marriage
+service held at St. Paul's church in Richmond,
+in the late autumn of 1862: &quot;An indefinable feeling
+of gloom was thrown over a most auspicious event when
+the bride's youngest sister glided through a side door
+just before the processional. Tottering to a chancel pew,
+she threw herself upon the cushions, her slight frame
+racked with sobs. Scarcely a year before, the wedding
+march had been played for her, and a joyous throng
+saw her wedded to gallant Breck Parkman. Before
+another twelvemonth rolled around the groom was killed
+at the front.&quot;<a href="#two"><sup>[2]</sup></a> Samuel Breck Parkman was in the
+Harvard class following that to which I belonged. Graduating
+in 1857, fifty-five years later I next saw his name
+in the connection just given. It recorded an incident of
+not infrequent occurrence in those dark and cruel days.</p>
+
+<p>It was, however, in Breck Parkman and his like that
+I first became conscious of certain phases of the South
+Carolina character which subsequently I learned to bear
+in high respect.</p>
+
+<p>So far as this University of South Carolina was concerned,
+it also so chanced that, by the merest accident,
+I, a very young man, was thrown into close personal
+relations with one of the most eminent of your professors,--Francis
+Lieber. Few here, I suppose, now personally
+remember Francis Lieber. To most it gives indeed
+a certain sense of remoteness to meet one who, as in my
+case, once held close and even intimate relations with a
+German emigrant, distinguished as a publicist, who as a
+youth had lain, wounded and helpless, a Prussian recruit,
+on the field above Namur. Occurring in June, 1815,
+two days after Waterloo, the affair at Namur will soon
+be a century gone. Of those engaged in it, the last
+obeyed the fell sergeant's summons a half score years
+ago. It seems remote; but at the time of which I speak
+Waterloo was appreciably nearer those in active life than
+are Shiloh and Gettysburg now. The Waterloo campaign
+was then but thirty-eight years removed, whereas those
+last are fifty now; and, while Lieber was at Waterloo, I
+was myself at Gettysburg.</p>
+
+<p><a name="two"></a>[2] DeLeon, &quot;Belles, Beaux and Brains of the Sixties,&quot; p. 158.</p>
+<p>
+Subsequently, later in life, it was again my privilege
+to hold close relations with another Columbian,--an
+alumnus of this University as it then was--in whom I
+had opportunity to study some of the strongest and most
+respect-commanding traits of the Southern character.
+I refer to one here freshly remembered,--Alexander
+Cheves Haskell,--soldier, jurist, banker and scholar,
+one of a septet of brothers sent into the field by a South
+Carolina mother calm and tender of heart, but in silent
+suffering unsurpassed by any recorded in the annals
+whether of Judea or of Rome. It was the fourth of the
+seven Haskells I knew, one typical throughout, in my
+belief, of what was best in your Carolinian development.
+With him, as I have said, I was closely and even intimately
+associated through years, and in him I had occasion to
+note that almost austere type represented in its highest
+development in the person and attributes of Calhoun.
+Of strongly marked descent, Haskell was, as I have always
+supposed, of a family and race in which could be observed
+those virile Scotch-Irish and Presbyterian qualities
+which found their representative types in the two
+Jacksons,--Andrew, and him known in history as &quot;Stonewall.&quot;
+To Alec Haskell I shall in this discourse again
+have occasion to refer.</p>
+
+<p>Thus, though in 1853, and for long years subsequent
+thereto, it would not have entered my mind as among the
+probabilities that I should ever stand here, reviewing the
+past after the manner of Tennyson in his &quot;Locksley Hall
+Sixty Years After,&quot; yet if there was any place in the
+South, or, I may say, in the entire country, where, as a
+matter of association, I might naturally have looked so
+to stand, it would have been where now I find myself.</p>
+
+<p>But I must hasten on; for, as I have said, if I am to
+accomplish even a part of my purpose, I have no time
+wherein to linger.</p>
+
+<p>Not long ago I chanced, in a country ramble, to be
+conversing with an eminent foreigner, known, and favorably
+known, to all Americans. In the course of leisurely
+exchange of ideas between us, he suddenly asked if I
+could suggest any explanation of the fact that not only
+were the publicists who had the greatest vogue in our
+college days now to a large extent discredited, but that
+almost every view and theory advanced by them, and
+which we had accepted as fixed and settled, was, where
+not actually challenged, silently ignored. Nor did the
+assertion admit of denial; for, looking back through the
+vista of threescore years, of the principles of what may
+be called &quot;public polity&quot; then advanced as indisputable,
+few to-day meet with general acceptance. To review
+the record from this point of view is curious.</p>
+
+<p>When in 1853 I entered Harvard, so far as this country
+and its polity were concerned certain things were matters
+of contention, while others were accepted as axiomatic,--the
+basic truths of our system. Among the former--the
+subjects of active contention--were the question
+of Slavery, then grimly assuming shape, and that of
+Nationality intertwined therewith. Subordinate to this
+was the issue of Free Trade and Protection, with the school
+of so-called American political economy arrayed against
+that of Adam Smith. Beyond these as political ideals
+were the tenets and theories of Jeffersonian Democracy.
+That the world had heretofore been governed too much
+was loudly acclaimed, and the largest possible individualism
+was preached, not only as a privilege but as a right.
+The area of government action was to be confined within
+the narrowest practical limits, and ample scope was to
+be allowed to each to develop in the way most natural
+to himself, provided only he did not infringe upon the
+rights of others. Materially, we were then reaching
+out to subdue a continent,--a doctrine of Manifest
+Destiny was in vogue. Beyond this, however, and most
+important now to be borne in mind, compared with the
+present the control of man over natural agencies and latent
+forces was scarcely begun. Not yet had the railroad
+crossed the Missouri; electricity, just bridled, was still
+unharnessed.</p>
+
+<p>I have now passed in rapid review what may perhaps
+without exaggeration be referred to as an array of conditions
+and theories, ideals and policies. It remains to
+refer to the actual results which have come about during
+these sixty years as respects them, or because of them;
+and, finally, to reach if possible conclusions as to the
+causes which have affected what may not inaptly be
+termed a process of general evolution. Having thus, so
+to speak, diagnosed the situation, the changes the situation
+exacts are to be measured, and a forecast ventured. An
+ambitious programme, I am well enough aware that the not
+very considerable reputation I have established for myself
+hardly warrants me in attempting it. This, I
+premise.</p>
+
+<p>Let us, in the first place, recur in somewhat greater
+detail to the various policies and ideals I have referred
+to as in vogue in the year 1853.</p>
+
+<p>First and foremost, overshadowing all else, was the
+political issue raised by African slavery, then ominously
+assuming shape. The clouds foreboding the coming tempest
+were gathering thick and heavy; and, moreover, they
+were even then illumined by electric flashes, accompanied
+by a mutter of distant thunder. Though we of the North
+certainly did not appreciate its gravity, the situation
+was portentous in the extreme.</p>
+
+<p>Involved in this problem of African slavery was the
+incidental issue of Free Trade and Protection,--apparently
+only economical and industrial in character, but
+in reality fundamentally crucial. And behind this lay
+the constitutional question, involving as it did not only
+the conflicting theories of a strict or liberal construction
+of the fundamental law, but nationality also,--the right
+of a Sovereign State to withdraw from the Union created
+in 1787, and developed through two generations.</p>
+
+<p>These may be termed concrete political issues, as opposed
+to basic truths generally accepted and theories
+individually entertained. The theories were constitutional,
+social, economical. Constitutionally, they turned
+upon the obligations of citizenship. There was no such
+thing then as a citizen of the United States of and by itself.
+The citizen of the United States was such simply
+because of his citizenship of a Sovereign State,--whether
+Massachusetts or Virginia or South Carolina; and, of
+course, an instrument based upon a divided sovereignty
+admitted of almost infinitely diverse interpretation.
+It is a scriptural aphorism that no man can serve two
+masters; for either he will hate the one and love the
+other, or else he will hold to the one and despise the
+other. And in the fulness of time it literally with us
+so came about. The accepted economical theories of
+the period were to a large extent corollaries of the
+fundamental proposition, and differing material and
+social conditions. Beyond all this, and coming still
+under the head of individual theories, was the doctrine
+enunciated by Thomas Jefferson in the Declaration
+of Independence,--the doctrine that all men were created
+equal,--meaning, of course, equal before the law. But
+the theorist and humanitarian of the North, accepting
+the fundamental principle laid down in the Declaration,
+gave to it a far wider application than had been intended
+by its authors,--a breadth of application it would not
+bear. Such science as he had being of scriptural origin,
+he interpreted the word &quot;equal&quot; as signifying equal in
+the possibilities of their attributes,--physical, moral,
+intellectual; and in so doing, he of course ignored the
+first principles of ethnology. It was, I now realize, a
+somewhat wild-eyed school of philosophy, that of which I
+myself was a youthful disciple.</p>
+
+<p>But, on the other hand, beside these, between 1850
+and 1860 a class of trained and more cautious thinkers,
+observers, scientists and theologians was coming to the
+front. Their investigations, though we did not then
+foresee it, were a generation later destined gently to subvert
+the accepted fundamentals of religious and economical
+thought, literary performance, and material existence.
+The work they had in hand to do was for the next fifteen
+years to be subordinate, so far as this country was concerned,
+to the solution of the terrible political problems
+which were first insistent on settlement; yet, as is now
+apparent, an initial movement was on foot which foreboded
+a revolution world-wide in its nature, and one in
+comparison with which the issues of slavery and American
+constitutionality became practically insignificant,--in
+a word, local and passing incidents.</p>
+
+<p>Finally, it remains to consider specifically the political
+theories then in vogue in their relation to the individual.
+In this country, it was the period of the equality of man
+and individuality in the development of the type. It
+was generally believed that the world had hitherto been
+governed too much,--that the day of caste, and even
+class, was over and gone; and finally, that America was
+a species of vast modern melting-pot of humanity, in
+which, within a comparatively short period of time, the
+characteristics of all branches of Indo-Aryan origin would
+resolve themselves. A new type would emerge,--the
+American. These theories were also in their consequences
+far-reaching. Practically, 1853 antedates all our present
+industrial organizations so loudly in evidence,--the
+multifarious trades-unions which now divide the population
+of the United States into what are known as the
+&quot;masses&quot; and the &quot;classes.&quot; As recently as a century
+ago, it used to be said of the French army under the Empire,
+that every soldier carried the baton of the Field-Marshal
+in his knapsack. And this ideal of equality and
+individuality was fixed in the American mind.</p>
+
+<p>Not that I for a moment mean to imply that in my
+belief the middle of the last century, or the twenty years
+anterior to the Civil War, was a species of golden age in
+our American annals. On the contrary, it was, as I
+remember it, a phase of development very open to criticism;
+and that in many respects. It was crude, self-conscious
+and self-assertive; provincial and formative,
+rather than formed. Socially and materially we were,
+compared with the present era of motors and parlor-cars,
+in the &quot;one-hoss shay&quot; and stove-heated railroad-coach
+stage. Nevertheless, what is now referred to as &quot;predatory
+wealth&quot; had not yet begun to accumulate in few
+hands; much greater equality of condition prevailed;
+nor was the &quot;wage-earner&quot; referred to as constituting
+a class distinct from the holders of property. Thus the
+individual was then encouraged,--whether in literature,
+in commerce, or in politics. In other words, there being
+a free field, one man was held to be in all respects the
+equal of the rest. Especially was what I have said true
+of the Northern, or so-called Free States, as contrasted
+with the States of the South, where the presence of
+African slavery distinctly affected individual theories, no
+matter where or to what extent entertained.</p>
+
+<p>Such, briefly and comprehensively stated, having been
+the situation in 1853, it remains to consider the practical
+outcome thereof during the sixty years it has been my
+fortune to take part, either as an actor or as an observer,
+in the great process of evolution. It is curious to note
+the extent to which the unexpected has come about. In
+the first place, consider the all-absorbing mid-century
+political issue, that involving the race question, to which I
+first referred,--the issue which divided the South from
+the North, and which, eight years only after I had entered
+college, carried me from the walks of civil life into the
+calling of arms.</p>
+
+<p>And here I enter on a field of discussion both difficult
+and dangerous; and, for reasons too obvious to require
+statement, what I am about to say will be listened to with
+no inconsiderable apprehension as to what next may be
+forthcoming. Nevertheless, this is a necessary part of
+my theme; and I propose to say what I have in mind to
+say, setting forth with all possible frankness the more
+mature conclusions reached with the passage of years.
+Let it be received in the spirit in which it is offered.</p>
+
+<p>So far, then, as the institution of slavery is concerned,
+in its relations to ownership and property in those of the
+human species,--I have seen no reason whatever to revise
+or in any way to alter the theories and principles I
+entertained in 1853, and in the maintenance of which I
+subsequently bore arms between 1861 and 1865. Economically,
+socially, and from the point of view of abstract
+political justice, I hold that the institution of slavery,
+as it existed in this country prior to the year 1865, was
+in no respect either desirable or justifiable. That it had
+its good and even its elevating side, so far at least as the
+African is concerned, I am not here to deny. On the contrary,
+I see and recognize those features of the institution
+far more clearly now than I should have said would have
+been possible in 1853. That the institution in itself,
+under conditions then existing, tended to the elevation
+of the less advanced race, I frankly admit I did not then
+think. On the other hand, that it exercised a most pernicious
+influence upon those of the more advanced race,
+and especially upon that large majority of the more advanced
+race who were not themselves owners of slaves,--of
+that I have become with time ever more and more
+satisfied. The noticeable feature, however, so far as I
+individually am concerned, has been the entire change
+of view as respects certain of the fundamental propositions
+at the base of our whole American political and
+social edifice brought about by a more careful and intelligent
+ethnological study. I refer to the political equality
+of man, and to that race absorption to which I have alluded,--that belief that any foreign element introduced
+into the American social system and body politic would
+speedily be absorbed therein, and in a brief space thoroughly
+assimilated. In this all-important respect I do
+not hesitate to say we theorists and abstractionists of the
+North, throughout that long anti-slavery discussion which
+ended with the 1861 clash of arms, were thoroughly
+wrong. In utter disregard of fundamental, scientific facts,
+we theoretically believed that all men--no matter what
+might be the color of their skin, or the texture of their
+hair--were, if placed under exactly similar conditions,
+in essentials the same. In other words, we indulged in
+the curious and, as is now admitted, utterly erroneous
+theory that the African was, so to speak, an Anglo-Saxon,
+or, if you will, a Yankee &quot;who had never had a chance,&quot;--a
+fellow-man who was guilty, as we chose to express it,
+of a skin not colored like our own. In other words, though
+carved in ebony, he also was in the image of God.</p>
+
+<p>Following out this theory, under the lead of men to
+whom scientific analysis and observation were anathema
+if opposed to accepted cardinal political theories as enunciated
+in the Declaration as read by them, the African
+was not only emancipated, but so far as the letter of the
+law, as expressed in an amended Constitution, would
+establish the fact, the quondam slave was in all respects
+placed on an equality, political, legal and moral, with those
+of the more advanced race.</p>
+
+<p>I do not hesitate here,--as one who largely entertained
+the theoretical views I have expressed,--I do not hesitate
+here to say, as the result of sixty years of more careful
+study and scientific observation, the theories then entertained
+by us were not only fundamentally wrong, but
+they further involved a problem in the presence of which
+I confess to-day I stand appalled.</p>
+
+<p>It is said,--whether truthfully or not,--that when
+some years ago John Morley, the English writer and
+thinker, was in this country, on returning to England he
+remarked that the African race question, as now existing
+in the United States, presented a problem as nearly, to
+his mind, insoluble as any human problem well could be.
+I do not care whether Lord Morley made this statement
+or did not make it. I am prepared, however, to say
+that, individually, so far as my present judgment goes,
+it is a correct presentation. To us in the North, the
+African is a comparatively negligible factor. So far as
+Massachusetts, for instance, or the city of Boston more
+especially, are concerned, as a problem it is solving itself.
+Proportionately, the African infusion is becoming less--never
+large, it is incomparably less now than it was in
+the days of my own youth. Thus manifestly a negligible
+factor, it is also one tending to extinction. Indeed, it
+would be fairly open to question whether a single Afro-American
+of unmixed Ethiopian descent could now be
+found in Boston. That the problem presents itself with
+a wholly different aspect here in Carolina is manifest.
+The difference too is radical; it goes to the heart of the
+mystery.</p>
+
+<p>As I have already said, the universal &quot;melting-pot&quot;
+theory in vogue in my youth was that but seven, or at
+the most fourteen, years were required to convert the
+alien immigrant--no matter from what region or of what
+descent--into an American citizen. The educational influences
+and social environment were assumed to be not only
+subtle, but all-pervasive and powerful. That this theory
+was to a large and even dangerous extent erroneous the observation
+of the last fifty years has proved, and our Massachusetts
+experience is sadly demonstrating to-day. It was
+Oliver Wendell Holmes, who, years ago, when asked by an
+anxious mother at what age the education of a child ought
+to begin, remarked in reply that it should begin about one
+hundred and fifty years before the child is born. It has so
+proved with us; and the fact is to-day in evidence that this
+statement of Dr. Holmes should be accepted as an undeniable
+political aphorism. So far from seven or fourteen years
+making an American citizen, fully and thoroughly impregnated
+with American ideals to the exclusion of all others,
+our experience is that it requires at least three generations
+to eliminate what may be termed the &quot;hyphen&quot; in citizenship.
+Not in the first, nor in the second, and hardly
+in the third, generation, does the immigrant cease to be
+an Irish-American, or a French-American, or a German-American,
+or a Slavonic-American, or yet a Dago.
+Nevertheless, in process of tune, those of the Caucasian
+race do and will become Americans. Ultimately their
+descendants will be free from the traditions and ideals, so
+to speak, ground in through centuries passed under other
+conditions. Not so the Ethiopian. In his case, we find
+ourselves confronted with a situation never contemplated
+in that era of political dreams and scriptural science in
+which our institutions received shape. Stated tersely
+and in plain language, so far as the African is concerned--the
+cause and, so to speak, the motive of the great
+struggle of 1861 to 1865--we recognize the presence in
+the body politic of a vast alien mass which does not
+assimilate and which cannot be absorbed. In other
+words, the melting-pot theory came in sharp contact
+with an ethnological fact, and the unexpected occurred.
+The problem of African servitude was solved after a
+fashion; but in place of it a race issue of most uncompromising
+character evolved itself.</p>
+
+<p>A survivor of the generation which read &quot;Uncle Tom's
+Cabin&quot; as it week by week appeared,--fresh to-day from
+Massachusetts with its Lawrence race issues of a different
+character, I feel a sense of satisfaction in discussing here
+in South Carolina this question and issue in a spirit the
+reverse of dogmatic, a spirit purely scientific, observant
+and sympathetic. And in this connection let me say I
+well remember repeatedly discussing it with your fellow-citizen
+and my friend, Colonel Alexander Haskell, to
+whom I have already made reference. Rarely have I
+been more impressed by a conclusion reached and fixed
+in the mind of one who to the study of a problem had
+obviously given much and kindly thought. As those
+who knew him do not need to be told, Alexander Cheves
+Haskell was a man of character, pure and just and
+thoughtful. He felt towards the African as only a Southerner
+who had himself never been the owner of slaves
+can feel. He regarded him as of a less advanced race than
+his own, but one who was entitled not only to just and
+kindly treatment but to sympathetic consideration.
+When, however, the question of the future of the Afro-American
+was raised, as matter for abstract discussion,
+it was suggestive as well as curious to observe the fixed,
+hard expression which immediately came over Haskell's
+face, as with stern lips, from which all suggestion of a
+smile had faded away, he pronounced the words:--&quot;Sir,
+it is a dying race!&quot; To express the thought more fully,
+Colonel Haskell maintained, as I doubt not many who
+now listen to me will maintain, that the nominal Afro-American
+increase, as shown in the figures of the national
+census, is deceptive,--that in point of fact, the
+Ethiop in America is incurring the doom which has ever
+befallen those of an inferior and less advanced race when
+brought in direct and immediate contact, necessarily and
+inevitably competitive, with the more advanced, the
+more masterful, and intellectually the more gifted. In
+other words, those of the less advanced race have a fatal
+aptitude for contracting the vices, both moral and physical,
+of the superior race, in the end leading to destruction;
+while the capacity for assimilating the elevating qualities
+and attributes which constitute a saving grace is denied
+them. Elimination, therefore, became in Haskell's belief
+a question of time only,--the law of the survival
+of the fittest would assert itself. The time required
+may be long,--numbered by centuries; but, however
+remotely, it nevertheless would come. God's mill grinds
+slowly, but it grinds uncommon small; and, I will add,
+its grinding is apt to be merciless.</p>
+
+<p>The solution thus most pronouncedly laid down by
+Colonel Haskell may or may not prove in this case correct
+and final. It certainly is not for me, coming from the
+North, to undertake dogmatically to pass upon it. I
+recur to it here as a plausible suggestion only, in connection
+with my theme. As such, it unquestionably merits
+consideration. I am by no means prepared to go the
+length of an English authority in recently saying that
+&quot;emancipation on two continents sacrificed the real welfare
+of the slave and his intrinsic worth as a person, to
+the impatient vanity of an immediate and theatrical
+triumph.&quot;><sup><a href="#three">[3</a>]</sup> This length I say, I cannot go; but so far
+as the present occasion is concerned, with such means of
+observation as are within my reach, I find the conclusion
+difficult to resist that the success of the abolitionists in
+effecting the emancipation of the Afro-American, as unexpected
+and sweeping as it was sudden, has led to phases
+of the race problem quite unanticipated at least. For
+instance, as respects segregation. Instead of assimilating,
+with a tendency to ultimate absorption, the movement
+in the opposite direction since 1865 is pronounced. It
+has, moreover, received the final stamp of scientific
+approval. This implies much; for in the old days of
+the &quot;peculiar institution&quot; there is no question the relations
+between the two races were far more intimate,
+kindly, and even absorptive than they now are.</p>
+
+<p><a name="three"></a>[3]Bussell's (Dr. F.W.) &quot;Christian Theology and Social Progress.&quot;
+Bampton Lectures, 1905.</p>
+
+
+<p>That African slavery, as it existed in the United States
+anterior to the year 1862, presented a mild form of servitude,
+as servitude then existed and immemorially had almost
+everywhere existed, was, moreover, incontrovertibly proven
+in the course of the Civil War. Before 1862, it was confidently
+believed that any severe social agitation within,
+or disturbance from without, would inevitably lead to a
+Southern servile insurrection. In Europe this result was
+assumed as of course; and, immediately after it was
+issued, the Emancipation Proclamation of President
+Lincoln was denounced in unmeasured terms by the entire
+London press. Not a voice was raised in its defence.
+It was regarded as a measure unwarranted in civilized
+warfare, and a sure and intentional incitement to the
+horrors which had attended the servile insurrections of
+Haiti and San Domingo; and, more recently, the unspeakable
+Sepoy incidents of the Indian mutiny. What
+actually occurred is now historic. The confident anticipations
+of our English brethren were, not for the first
+time, negatived; nor is there any page in our American
+record more creditable to those concerned than the attitude
+held by the African during the fierce internecine
+struggle which prevailed between April, 1861, and April,
+1865. In it there is scarcely a trace, if indeed there is
+any trace at all, of such a condition of affairs as had
+developed in the Antilles and in Hindustan. The attitude
+of the African towards his Confederate owner was
+submissive and kindly. Although the armed and masterful
+domestic protector was at the front and engaged
+in deadly, all-absorbing conflict, yet the women and
+children of the Southern plantation slept with unbarred
+doors,--free from apprehension, much more from molestation.</p>
+
+<p>Moreover, as you here well know, during the old days
+of slavery there was hardly a child born, of either sex,
+who grew up in a Southern household of substantial
+wealth without holding immediate and most affectionate
+relations with those of the other race. Every typical
+Southern man had what he called his &quot;daddy&quot; and his
+&quot;mammy,&quot; his &quot;uncle&quot; and his &quot;aunty,&quot; by him familiarly
+addressed as such, and who were to him even closer
+than are blood relations to most. They had cared for
+him in his cradle; he followed them to their graves. Is
+it needful for me to ask to what extent such relations
+still exist? Of those born thirty years after emancipation,
+and therefore belonging distinctly to a later generation,
+how many thus have their kindly, if humble, kin of
+the African blood? I fancy I would be safe in saying
+not one in twenty.</p>
+
+<p>Here, then, as the outcome of the first great issue I
+have suggested as occupying the thought and exciting
+the passions of that earlier period, is a problem wholly
+unanticipated,--a problem which, merely stating, I
+dismiss.</p>
+
+<p>Passing rapidly on, I come to the next political issue
+which presented itself in my youth,--the constitutional
+issue,--that of State Sovereignty, as opposed to the
+ideal, Nationality. And, whether for better or worse,
+this issue, I very confidently submit, has been settled.
+We now, also, looking at it in more observant mood, in
+a spirit at once philosophical and historical, see that it
+involved a process of natural evolution which, under the
+conditions prevailing, could hardly result in any other
+settlement than that which came about. We now have
+come to a recognition of the fact that Anglo-Saxon nationality
+on this continent was a problem of crystallization,
+the working out of which occupied a little over two centuries.
+It was in New England the process first set in,
+when, in 1643, the scattered English-speaking settlements
+under the hegemony of the colony of Massachusetts
+Bay united in a confederation. It was the initial step.
+I have no time in which to enumerate successive steps,
+each representing a stage in advance of what went
+before. The War of Independence,--mistakenly denominated
+the Revolutionary War, but a struggle distinctly
+conservative in character, and in no way revolutionary,--the
+War of Independence gave great impetus
+to the process, resulting in what was known as Federation.
+Then came the Constitution of 1787 and the formation
+of the, so called, United States as a distinct nationality.
+The United States next passed through two definite processes
+of further crystallization,--one in 1812-1814, when
+the second war with Great Britain, and more especially
+our naval victories, kindled, especially in the North,
+the fire of patriotism and the conception of nationality;
+the other, half a century later, presented the stern issue
+in a concrete form, and at last the complete unification
+of a community--whether for better or for worse is no
+matter--was hammered by iron and cemented in blood.
+It is there now; an established fact. Secession is a lost
+cause; and, whether for good or for ill, the United States
+exists, and will continue to exist, a unified World Power.
+Sovereignty now rests at Washington, and neither in
+Columbia for South Carolina nor in Boston for Massachusetts.
+The State exists only as an integral portion of the
+United States. That issue has been fought out. The
+result stands beyond controversy; brought about by a
+generation now passed on, but to which I belonged.</p>
+
+<p>Meanwhile, the ancient adage, the rose is not without
+its thorn, receives new illustration; for even this great
+result has not been wrought without giving rise to considerations
+suggestive of thought. Speaking tersely and
+concentrating what is in my mind into the fewest possible
+words, I may say that in our national growth up to the
+year 1830 the play of the centrifugal forces predominated,--that
+is, the necessity for greater cohesion made itself
+continually felt. A period of quiescence then followed,
+lasting until, we will say, 1865. Since 1865, it is not
+unsafe to say, the centripetal, or gravitating, force has
+predominated to an extent ever more suggestive of increasing
+political uneasiness. It is now, as is notorious,
+more in evidence than ever before. The tendency to
+concentrate at Washington, the demand that the central
+government, assuming one function after another, shall
+become imperial, the cry for the national enactment of
+laws, whether relating to marital divorce or to industrial
+combinations,--all impinge on the fundamental principle
+of local self-government, which assumed its highest
+and most pronounced form in the claim of State Sovereignty.
+I am now merely stating problems. I am not
+discussing the political ills or social benefits which possibly
+may result from action. Nevertheless, all, I think, must
+admit that the tendency to gravitation and attraction
+is to-day as pronounced and as dangerous, especially
+in the industrial communities of the North, as was the
+tendency to separation and segregation pronounced and
+dangerous seventy years ago in the South.</p>
+
+<p>To this I shall later return. I now merely point out
+what I apprehend to be a tendency to extremes--an
+excess in the swinging of our political pendulum.</p>
+
+<p>We next come to that industrial factor which I have
+referred to as the issue between the Free Trade of Adam
+Smith and Protection, as inculcated by the so-called
+American school of political economists. The phases
+which this issue has assumed are, I submit, well calculated
+to excite the attention of the observant and thoughtful.
+I merely allude to them now; but, in so far as it is in my
+power to make it so, my allusion will be specific. I
+frankly acknowledge myself a Free-Trader. A Free-Trader
+in theory, were it in my power I would be a
+Free-Trader in national practice. There has been, so
+far as I know, but one example of absolute free trade on
+the largest scale in world history. That one example,
+moreover, has been a success as unqualified as undeniable.
+I refer to this American Union of ours. We have
+here a country consisting of fifty local communities,
+stretching from the Atlantic to the Pacific, from
+tropical Porto Rico to glacial Alaska, representing every
+conceivable phase of soil, climate and material conditions,
+with diverse industrial systems. With a Union
+established on the principle of absolutely unrestricted
+commercial intercourse, you here in South Carolina, and
+more especially in Columbia, are to-day making it, so to
+speak, uncomfortable for the cotton manufacturer in
+New England; and I am glad of it! A sharp competition
+is a healthy incentive to effort and ingenuity, and the
+brutal injunction, &quot;Root hog or die!&quot; is one from which
+I in no way ask to have New England exempt. When
+Massachusetts is no longer able to hold its own industrially
+in a free field, the time will, in my judgment,
+have come for Massachusetts to go down. With communities
+as with children, paternalism reads arrested
+development. One of the great products of Massachusetts
+has been what is generically known as &quot;footwear.&quot;
+Yet I am told that under the operation of absolute
+Free Trade, St. Louis possesses the largest boot
+and shoe factory in its output in the entire world. That
+is, the law of industrial development, as natural
+conditions warrant and demand, has worked out its
+results; and those results are satisfactory. I am aware
+that the farmer of Massachusetts has become practically
+extinct; he cannot face the competition of the great
+West: but the Massachusetts consumer is greatly advantaged
+thereby. So far as agricultural products are
+concerned, Massachusetts is to-day reduced to what is
+known as dairy products and garden truck; and it is
+well! Summer vegetables manufactured under glass in
+winter prove profitable. So, turning his industrial
+efforts to that which he can do best, even the Massachusetts
+agriculturalist has prospered. On the other
+hand, wherever in this country protection has been most
+completely applied, I insist that if its results are analyzed
+in an unprejudiced spirit, it will be pronounced to have
+worked unmitigated evil,--an unhealthy, because artificially
+stimulated and too rapid, growth. Let Lawrence,
+in Massachusetts, serve as an example. Look at the industrial
+system there introduced in the name of Protection
+against the Pauper Labor of Europe! No growth is so
+dangerous as a too rapid growth; and I confidently
+submit that politically, socially, economically and industrially,
+America to-day, on the issues agitating us, presents
+an almost appalling example of the results of hot-house
+stimulation.</p>
+
+<p>Nor is this all, nor the worst. There is another article,
+and far more damaging, in the indictment. Through
+Protection, and because of it, Paternalism has crept in;
+and, like a huge cancerous growth, is eating steadily into
+the vitals of the political system. Instead of supporting
+a government economically administered by money contributed
+by the People, a majority of the People to-day
+are looking to the government for support, either
+directly through pension payments or indirectly through
+some form of industrial paternalism. Incidentally, a profuse
+public expenditure is condoned where not actually
+encouraged. Jeffersonian simplicity is preached; extravagance
+is practised. As the New York showman long
+since shrewdly observed: &quot;The American people love to
+be fooled!&quot;</p>
+
+<p>But I must pass on; I still have far to go. As respects
+legislation, I have said that sixty years ago, when my
+memories begin, the American ideal was the individual,
+and individuality. This, implied adherence to the Jeffersonian
+theory that heretofore the world had been
+governed too much. The great secret of true national
+prosperity, happiness and success was, we were taught,
+to allow to each individual the fullest possible play, provided
+only he did not infringe on the rights of others.
+How is it to-day? America is the most governed and
+legislated country in the world! With one national law-making
+machine perpetually at work grinding out edicts,
+we have some fifty provincial mills engaged in the same
+interesting and, to my mind, pernicious work. No one
+who has given the slightest consideration to the subject
+will dispute the proposition that, taking America as a
+whole, we now have twenty acts of legislation annually
+promulgated, and with which we are at our peril supposed
+to be familiar, where one would more than suffice. Then
+we wonder that respect for the law shows a sensible decrease!
+The better occasion for wonder is that it survives
+at all. We are both legislated and litigated out of
+all reason.</p>
+
+<p>Passing to the other proposition of individuality, there
+has been, as all men know and no one will dispute, a
+most perceptible tendency of late years towards what is
+known as the array of one portion of the community--the
+preponderating, voting portion--against another--the
+more ostentatious property-holding portion. It is
+the natural result, I may say the necessary as well as
+logical outcome, of a period of too rapid growth,--production
+apportioned by no rule or system other or higher
+than greed and individual aptitude for acquisition. I
+will put the resulting case in the most brutal, and consequently
+the clearest, shape of which I am capable. Working
+on the combined theories of individualism controlled
+and regulated by competition, it has been one grand game
+of grab,--a process in which the whole tendency of our
+legislation, national or state, has during the last twenty
+years been, first, to create monopolies of capital and,
+later, to bring into existence a counter, but no less privileged,
+class, known as the &quot;wage-earner.&quot;</p>
+
+<p>Of the first class it is needless to speak, for, as a class,
+it is sufficiently pilloried by the press and from the hustings.
+Much in evidence, those prominent in it are known
+as the possessors of &quot;predatory wealth&quot;; &quot;unjailed malefactors,&quot;
+they are subjects of continuous &quot;grilling&quot; in
+the congressional and legislative committee rooms. The
+effort to make them &quot;disgorge&quot; is as continual as it is
+noisy, and, as a rule, futile. It constitutes a curious and
+in some respects instructive exhibition of misdirected
+popular feeling and legislative incompetence. None the
+less, the existence of a monopolist class calls for no proof
+at the bar of public opinion. Not so the other and even
+more privileged class,--the so-called &quot;wage-earner&quot;;
+for, disguise it as the trades-unionist will, angrily deny it
+as he does, the fact remains that to-day under the operation
+of our jury system and of our laws, the Wage-earner
+and the member of the Trades-Union has become, as
+respects the rest of the community, himself a monopolist
+and, moreover, privileged as such. Practically, crimes
+urged and even perpetrated in behalf of so-called &quot;labor&quot;
+receive at the hands of juries, and also not infrequently
+of courts, an altogether excessive degree of merciful consideration.
+At the same time, both here and in Europe,
+Organized Labor is instant in its demand that immunity,
+denied to ordinary citizens, and those whom it terms
+&quot;the classes,&quot; shall by special exemption be conferred
+upon the Labor Union and upon the Wage-earner. The
+tendency on both sides and at each extreme to inequality
+in the legislature and before the law is thus manifest.</p>
+
+<p>Viewing conditions face to face and as they now are,
+no thoughtful observer can, in my judgment, avoid the
+conviction that, whether for good or ill, for better or for
+worse, this country as a community has, within the last
+thirty years--that is, we will say, since our centennial
+year, 1876--cast loose from its original moorings. It
+has drifted, and is drifting, into unknown seas. Nor is
+this true of English-speaking America alone. I have
+already quoted Lord Morley in another connection.
+Lord Morley, however, only the other day delivered, as
+Chancellor of Manchester University, a most interesting
+and highly suggestive address, in which, referring to conservative
+Great Britain, he thus pictured a phase of
+current belief: &quot;Political power is described as lying
+in the hands of a vast and mobile electorate, with scanty
+regard for tradition or history. Democracy, they say,
+is going to write its own programme. The structure of
+executive organs and machinery is undergoing half-hidden
+but serious alterations. Men discover a change of attitude
+towards law as law; a decline in reverence for institutions
+as institutions.&quot;</p>
+
+<p>While, however, the influences at work are thus general
+and the manifestations whether on the other side of the
+Atlantic or here bear a strong resemblance, yet difference
+of conditions and detail--constitutional peculiarities,
+so to speak--must not be disregarded. One form
+of treatment may not be prescribed for all. In our case,
+therefore, it remains to consider how best to adapt this
+country and ourselves to the unforeseeable,--the navigation
+of uncharted waters; and this adaptation cannot
+be considered hi any correct and helpful, because scientific,
+spirit, unless the cause of change is located. Surface
+manifestations are, in and of themselves, merely deceptive.
+A physician, diagnosing the chances of a patient,
+must first correctly ascertain, or at least ascertain with
+approximate correctness, the seat of the trouble under
+which the patient is suffering. So, we.</p>
+
+<p>And here I must frankly confess to small respect for
+the politician,--the man whose voice is continually
+heard, whether from the Senate Chamber or the Hustings.
+There is in those of his class a continual and most noticeable
+tendency to what may best be described as the <i>post
+ergo propter</i> dispensation. With them, the eye is fixed on
+the immediate manifestation. Because one event preceded
+another, the first event is obviously and indisputably
+the cause of the later event. For instance, in the present
+case, the cause or seat of our existing and very manifest
+social, political and financial disturbances is attributed
+as of course to some peculiarity of legislation, either a
+subtreasury bill passed in the administration of General
+Jackson, or a tariff bill passed in the administration of
+Mr. Taft, or the demonetization of silver in the Hayes
+period,--that &quot;Crime of the Century,&quot; the Crucifixion
+of Labor on the Cross of Gold! Once for all, let me say,
+I contemplate this school of politicians and so-called
+&quot;thinkers&quot; with sentiments the reverse of respectful.
+In plain language, I class them with those known in professional
+parlance as quacks and charlatans. Not always,
+not even in the majority of cases, does that which preceded
+bear to that which follows the relation of cause and
+effect. A marked example of this false attribution is
+afforded in more recent political history by the everlasting
+recurrence of the statement that American prosperity
+is the result of an American protective system. Yet in
+the Protectionist dispensation, this has become an article
+of faith. To my mind, it is undeserving of even respectful
+consideration.</p>
+
+<p>If I were asked the cause of that change, little short of
+revolutionary, if indeed in any respect short of it, which
+has occurred in the material condition of the American
+people, and consequently in all its theories and ideals,
+within the last thirty years, I should attribute it to a
+wholly different cause. Mr. Lecky some years ago, in
+his book entitled &quot;Liberty and Democracy,&quot; made the
+following statement, in no way original, but, as he put it,
+sufficiently striking: &quot;The produce of the American
+mines [incident to the discoveries made by Columbus]
+created, in the most extreme form ever known in Europe,
+the change which beyond all others affects most deeply
+and universally the material well-being of men: it revolutionized
+the value of the precious metals, and, in consequence,
+the price of all articles, the effects of all contracts,
+the burden of all debts.&quot;</p>
+
+<p>In other words, referring to the first half of the sixteenth
+century,--the sixty years, we will say, following the land-fall
+of Columbus,--the historian attributed the great
+change which then occurred and which stands forth so
+markedly in history, to the increased New-World production
+of the precious metals, combined with the impetus
+given to trade and industry as a consequence of that discovery,
+and of the mastery of man over additional globe
+areas. Now, dismissing from consideration the so-called
+American protective system, likewise our currency issues
+and, generally, the patchwork, so to speak, of crazy-quilt
+legislation to which so much is attributed during the
+last thirty years, I confidently submit that in the production
+of the results under discussion, they are quantities
+and factors hardly worthy of consideration. The
+cause of the change which has taken place lies far deeper
+and must be sought in influences of a wholly different
+nature, influences developed into an increased and still
+ever increasing activity, over which legislation has absolutely
+no control. I refer, of course, to man's mastery
+over the latent forces of Nature. Of these Steam and
+Electricity are the great examples, which, because always
+apparent, at once strike the imagination. These, as
+tools, it is to be remembered, date practically from within
+one hundred years back. It may, indeed, safely be asserted
+that up to 1815, the end of the Wars of Napoleon
+and the time of your Professor Lieber, steam even had
+not as yet practically affected the operations of man,
+while electricity, when not a terror, was as yet but a toy.
+Commerce was still exclusively carried on by the sailing
+ship and canal-boat. The years from the fall of Napoleon
+to our own War of Secession--from Waterloo to Gettysburg--were
+practically those of early and partial development.
+Not until well after Appomattox, that is, since
+the year 1870,--a period covering but little more than
+the life of a generation,--did what is known to you here
+as the Applied Sciences cover a range difficult to specialize.
+As factors in development, it is safe to say that those
+three tremendous agencies--Steam, Electricity, Chemistry--have,
+so to speak, worked all their noticeable
+results within the lifetime of the generation born since
+we celebrated the Centennial of Independence. The
+manifestations now resulting and apparent to all are the
+natural outcome of the use of these modern appliances,
+become in our case everyday working tools in the hands
+of the most resourceful, adaptive, ingenious and energetic
+of communities, developing a virgin continent of undreamed-of
+wealth. Naturally, under such conditions,
+the advance has been not only general and continuous,
+but one of ever increasing celerity. So Protection and
+the Currency become flies on the fast revolving wheel!</p>
+
+<p>But what has otherwise resulted?--An unrest, social,
+economical, political. Not contentment, but a lamentation
+and an ancient tale of wrong! We hear it in the
+continual cry over what is known as the increased cost
+of living, and feel its pressure in the higher standard of
+living. What was considered wealth by our ancestors
+is to-day hardly competence. What sufficed for luxury
+in our childhood barely now supplies what are known as
+the comforts of life. Take, for instance, the motor,--the
+automobile. I speak within bounds, I think, when I
+say there are many fold more motors to-day racing over
+the streets, the highways and the byways of America
+than there were one-horse wagons thirty-five years ago.
+Six hundred, I am told, are to be found within the immediate
+neighborhood of Columbia; and, since I have
+been here I have seen in your streets just one man on
+horse-back! These figures and that statement tell the
+tale. A few years only back, every Carolinian rode to
+town, and the motor was unknown. A single illustrative
+example, this could be duplicated in innumerable ways
+everywhere and in all walks of life.</p>
+
+<p>The result is obvious, and was inevitable. Entered
+on a new phase of existence, the world is not as it was in
+the days of Columbus, when a single new continent was
+discovered containing in it what we would now regard as
+a limited accumulation of the precious metals. It is,
+on the contrary, as if, in the language of Dr. Johnson, &quot;the
+potentiality of wealth&quot; had been revealed &quot;beyond the
+dreams of avarice&quot;; together with not one or two, but a
+dozen continents, the existence and secrets of which are
+suddenly laid bare. The Applied Sciences have been the
+magicians,--not Protection or the Currency.</p>
+
+<p>And still scientists are continually dinning in our ears
+the question whether this state of affairs is going to continue,--whether
+the era of disturbance has reached its
+limit! I hold such a question to be little short of childish.
+That era has not reached its limits, nor has it even approximated
+those limits. On the contrary, we have just entered
+on the uncharted sea. We know what the last thirty
+years have brought about as the result of the agencies
+at work; but as yet we can only dimly dream of what the
+next sixty years are destined to see brought about.
+Imagination staggers at the suggestion.</p>
+
+<p>What, then, has been of this the inevitable consequence,--the
+consequence which even the blindest should have
+foreseen? It has resulted in all those far-reaching changes
+suggested in the earlier part of what I have said to-day,
+as respects our ideals, our political theories, our social
+conditions. In other words, the old era is ended; what
+is implied when we say a new era is entered upon?</p>
+
+<p>To attempt a partial answer to the query implies no
+claim to a prophetic faculty. Whether we like to face
+the fact or not, far-reaching changes in our economical
+theories and social conditions are imminent, involving
+corresponding readjustments in our constitutional arrangements
+and political machinery. Tennyson foreshadowed
+it all in his &quot;Locksley Hall&quot; seventy years ago:--&quot;The
+individual withers, and the world is more and more.&quot;
+The day of individualism as it existed in the American
+ideal of sixty years since is over; that of collectivism
+and possibly socialism has opened. The day of social
+equality is relegated to what may be considered a somewhat
+patriarchal past,--that patriarchal past having
+come to a close during the memory of those still in active
+life.</p>
+
+<p>And yet, though all this can now be studied in the
+political discussion endlessly dragging on, strangely and
+sadly enough that discussion carries in it hardly a note
+of encouragement. It is, in a word, unspeakably shallow.
+And here, having sufficiently for my present purpose
+though in hurried manner, diagnosed the situation,--located
+the seat of disturbance,--we come to the question
+of treatment. Involving, as it necessarily does, problems
+of the fundamental law, and a rearrangement and different
+allocation of the functions of government, this challenges
+the closest thought of the publicist. That the problem
+is here crying aloud for solution is apparent. The publications
+which cumber the counters of our book-stores,
+those for which the greatest popular call to-day exists--treatises
+relating to trade interests, to collectivism, to
+socialism, even to anarchism--tell the tale in part; in
+part it is elsewhere and otherwise told. Only recently,
+in once Puritan Massachusetts, processions paraded the
+streets carrying banners marked with this device, more
+suggestive than strange:--&quot;No master and no God!&quot;</p>
+
+<p>What are the remedies popularly proposed? In that
+important branch of polity known as Political Ethics,
+or, as he termed them, Hermeneutics, which your Professor
+Lieber sixty years ago endeavored to treat of, what advance
+has since his time been effected?--Nay! what
+advance has been effected since the time, over two thousand
+years, of his great predecessor, Aristotle? I confidently
+submit that what progress is now being made in
+this most erudite of sciences is in the nature of that of
+the crab--backwards! In the discussions of Aristotle,
+the problem in view was, how to bring about government
+by the wisest,--that is, the most observant and expert.
+In other words, government, the object of politics, was
+by Aristotle treated in a scientific spirit. And this is as
+it should be. Take, for example, any problem,--I do
+not care whether it is legal or medical or one of engineering: How
+successfully dispose of it? Uniformly, in
+one way. Those problems are successfully solved, if at
+all, only when their solution is placed in the hands of the
+most proficient. Judged by the discussions of to-day,
+what advance has in politics been effected? Do the
+<i>Outlook</i> and the <i>Commoner</i> imply progress since the
+Stagirite? Not to any noticeable extent. We are,
+on the contrary, fumbling and wallowing about where
+the Greek pondered and philosophized.</p>
+
+<p>Democracy, as it is called, is to-day the great panacea,--the
+political nostrum; as such it is confidently advocated
+by statesmen and professors and even by the presidents
+of our institutions of the advanced education. &quot;Trust
+the People&quot; is the shibboleth! &quot;Let the People rule!&quot;
+&quot;The cure for too much Liberty is more Liberty!&quot; To
+Democracy plain and simple--Composite Wisdom--I
+frankly confess I feel no call,--no call greater than, for
+instance, towards Autocracy or Aristocracy or Plutocracy.
+Taken simply, and applied as hitherto applied, all and
+each lead to but one result,--failure! And that result,
+let me here predict, will, in the future, be the same in the
+case of pure Democracy that, in the past, it was in the
+case of the pure Autocracy of the Caesars, or the case of
+the pure Aristocracy of Rome or of the so-called Republics
+of the Middle Ages. A political edifice on shifting sands.</p>
+
+<p>Yet, to-day what do we see and hear in America? Tell
+it not in Gath; publish it not in the streets of Askalon I
+Two thousand years after the time of Aristotle, we see a
+prevailing school working directly back to the condition
+of affairs which existed in the Athenian agora under the
+disapproving eyes of the father of political philosophy.
+Panaceas, universal cure-alls, and quack remedies--the
+Initiative, the Referendum, and the Recall are paraded
+as if these--nostrums of the mountebanks of the county
+fair--would surely remedy the perplexing ills of new and
+hitherto unheard-of social, economical, and political conditions.
+Democracy! What is Democracy? Democracy,
+as it is generally understood, I submit, is nothing
+but the reaching of political conclusions through the frequent
+counting of noses; or, as Macaulay two generations
+ago better phrased it, &quot;the majority of citizens told by
+the head&quot;;--the only question at just this juncture
+being whether, in order to the arriving at more acceptable
+results, both sexes shall be &quot;told,&quot; instead of one
+sex only. Moreover, I with equal confidence make bold
+to suggest that while conceded, and while men have even
+persuaded themselves that they have faith in it, and
+really do believe in this &quot;telling&quot; of noses as the best
+and fairest attainable means of reaching correct results,
+yet in so doing and so professing they simply, as men are
+prone to do, deceive themselves. In other words, victims
+of their own cant, they preach a panacea in which they
+really do not believe. Nor of this is proof far to seek.
+<i>Vox populi, vox Dei</i>! If you extend the application of
+this principle by a single step, its loudest advocates draw
+back in alarm from the inevitable. They seek refuge
+in the assertion--&quot;Oh! That is different!&quot; For instance,
+take a concrete case; so best can we illustrate.</p>
+
+<p>One of the greatest scientific triumphs reached in modern
+times--perhaps I might fairly say the greatest--is
+the discovery of the cause of yellow fever, and its consequent
+control. As a result of the studies, the patient
+experimentation and self-sacrifice of the wisest,--that
+is, the most observant and expert,--the amazing conclusion
+was reached that not only the yellow fever but the
+innumerable ills of the flesh known under the caption of
+&quot;malarial,&quot; were due to causes hitherto unsuspected,
+though obvious when revealed,--to the existence in the
+atmosphere of a venomous insect, in comparison with the
+work of which the ravages on mankind of the entire carnivorous
+and reptile creation were of comparatively small
+account. The mosquito flew disclosed, the atmospheric
+viper,--a viper most venomous and deadly. How was
+the disclosure brought about? What was the remedy
+applied? Was the discovery effected through universal
+suffrage? Was the remedy sought for and decided upon
+by the Initiative, or through a Referendum at an election
+held on the Tuesday succeeding the first Monday of a
+certain month and year? Had recourse in this case been
+had to the panacea now in greatest political vogue, we
+all know perfectly well what would have followed. History
+tells us. The quarantine, as it is called, would have
+been decreed, and a day of fasting, humiliation and prayer
+appointed. The mosquito, quite ignored, would then
+have gone on in his deadly work. We all equally well
+know that the man, even the politician or the statesman,
+who had suggested a solution of that problem by a count
+of noses would have been effaced with ridicule. Even
+the most simple minded would have rejected that method
+of reaching a result. Yet the ilia of the body politic,
+too, are complicated. Indeed, far more intricate in their
+processes and more deceitful in their aspects, they more
+deeply affect the general well-being and happiness than
+any ill or epidemic which torments the physical being,
+even the mosquito malaria. Yet the ills of the body
+politic, the complications which surround us on every
+side,--for these the unfailing panacea is said to lie in
+universal suffrage, that remedy which is immediately
+and of course laughed out of court if suggested in case of
+the simpler ills of the flesh.</p>
+
+<p>This, I submit, is demonstration. The true remedy is
+not to be sought in that direction in the one case any
+more than the other.</p>
+
+<p>There is a considerable element of truth, though possibly
+a not inconsiderable one of exaggeration, in this
+statement from a paper I recently chanced upon in the
+issue of the sober and classical <i>Edinburgh Review</i> for
+October last,--a paper entitled &quot;Democracy and Liberalism&quot;:--&quot;History
+testifies unmistakably and unanimously
+to the passion of democracies for incompetence. There
+is nothing democracy dislikes and suspects so heartily as
+technical efficiency, particularly when it is independent
+of the popular vote.&quot; But to-day, what is politically proposed
+by our senatorial charlatans and the mountebanks
+of the market-place? The Referendum, the constant and
+easy Recall, the everlasting Initiative are dinned into
+our ears as the cure-alls of every ill of the body politic.
+On the contrary, I submit that, while in the absence of
+any better method as yet devised and accepted, the process
+of reaching results by a count of the &quot;majority told
+by the head&quot; of the citizens then present and voting has
+certain political advantages, yet, for all this, as a final,
+scientific, political process, it is unworthy of consideration.
+A passing expedient, it in no degree reflects credit
+on twentieth-century intelligence.</p>
+
+<p>And now I come to the crux of my discussion. Thus
+rejecting results reached by the ballot as now in practical
+use, a query is already in the minds of those who listen.
+At once suggesting itself and flung in my face, it is asked
+as a political poser, and not without a sneer,--What else
+or better have I to propose? Would I advise a return
+to old and discarded methods,--Heredity, Caste, Autocracy,
+Plutocracy? I respectfully submit this is a question
+no one has a right to put, and one I am not called
+upon to answer. Again, let me take a concrete case.
+Once more I appeal to the yellow fever precedent. The
+first step towards a solution of a medical, as of a political,
+problem is a correct diagnosis. Then necessarily follows
+a long period devoted to observation, to investigation
+and experiment. If, in the case of the yellow fever,
+a score of years only ago an observer had pointed out the
+nature of the disease and the manifest inadequacy of
+current theories and prevailing methods of prevention
+and treatment, do you think others would have had a
+right to turn upon him and demand that he instantly
+prescribe a remedy which should be not only complete,
+but at once recognized as such and so accepted? In the
+present case, as I have already observed, from the days
+of Aristotle down through two and twenty centuries, men
+had been experimenting in all, to them, conceivable ways,
+on the government of the body politic, exactly as they
+experimented on the disorders of the physical body. But
+only yesterday was the source of the yellow fever, for
+instance, diagnosed and located, and the proper means
+of prevention applied. The cancer and tuberculosis are
+to-day unsolved problems. By analogy, they are inviting
+subjects for an Initiative and a Referendum!
+Yet would any person who to-day, standing where I stand,
+expressed a disbelief, at once total and contemptuous,
+of such a procedure as respects them, be met by a demand
+for some other panacea of immediate and guaranteed
+efficiency? And so with the body politic. I here to-day
+am merely attempting a diagnosis, pointing out the disorders,
+and exposing as best I can the utter crudeness and
+insufficiency of the market-place remedies proposed.
+Have you a right, then, to turn on me, and call for some
+other prescription, warranted to cure, in place of the
+nostrums so loudly advertised by the sciolists and the
+dabblers of the day, and by me so contemptuously set
+aside? I confess I am unable to respond, or even to
+attempt a response to any such demand. I am not altogether
+a quack, nor is this a county fair.</p>
+
+<p>&quot;Paracelsus,&quot; so denominated, was one of Robert
+Browning's earlier poems. In it he causes the fifteenth-century
+alchemist and forerunner of all modern pharmaceutical
+chemistry, to declare that as the result of
+long travel and much research</p>
+
+&quot;I possess<br />
+Two sorts of knowledge: one,--vast, shadowy,<br />
+Hints of the unbounded aim....<br />
+The other consists of many secrets, caught<br />
+While bent on nobler prize,--perhaps a few<br />
+Prime principles which may conduct to much:<br />
+These last I offer.&quot;<br />
+
+<p>So, <i>longo intervallo</i>, I have a few suggestions,--the
+result of an observation extending, as I said at the beginning,
+over the lives of two generations and a connection
+with many great events in which I have borne a part,--a
+part not prominent indeed, and more generally, I acknowledge,
+mistaken than correct. My errors, however,
+have at least made me cautious and doubtful of my own
+conclusions. I submit them for what they are worth.
+Not much, I fear.</p>
+
+<p>What, then, would I do, were it in my power to prescribe
+alterations and curatives for the ills of our American
+body politic, of which I have spoken; or, more
+correctly, the far-reaching disturbances manifestly due
+to the agencies at work, to which I have made reference?
+Let us come at once to the point, taking the existing
+Constitution of the United States as a concrete example,
+and recognizing the necessity for its revision and readjustment
+to meet radically changed conditions,--conditions
+social, material, geographical, changed and still
+changing.</p>
+
+<p>It was Mr. Gladstone who, years ago, made the often-quoted
+assertion that the Constitution of the United States
+was &quot;the most wonderful work ever struck off at a given
+time by the brain and purpose of man.&quot; I do not think
+he was far wrong; though we, of course, realize that the
+Federal Constitution was a growth and in no degree an inspiration.
+That Constitution has through a century and
+a quarter stood the test of time and stress of war, during
+a period of almost unlimited growth of the community
+for which it was devised. It has outlasted many nationalities
+and most of the dynasties in existence at the time of
+its adoption; and that, too, under conditions sufficiently
+trying. I, therefore, regard it with profound respect;
+and, so regarding it, I would treat it with a cautious and
+tender hand. Not lightly pronouncing it antiquated,
+what changes would I make in it if to-morrow it were
+given me to prescribe alterations adapting it to the
+altered conditions which confront us? I do not hesitate
+to say, and I am glad to say, the changes I would suggest
+would be limited; yet, I fancy, far-reaching.</p>
+
+<p>And, in the first place, let us have a clear conception
+of the end in view. That end is, I submit, exactly the
+same to-day which Aristotle had in view more than twenty
+centuries ago. It is, not to solve all political problems,
+but to put political problems as they arise in the hands
+of those whom he termed the &quot;best,&quot;--but whom we
+know as the most intelligent, observant and expert,--to
+be, through their agency, in the way of ultimate solution.
+If, adopting every ill-considered and half-fledged
+measure of so-called reform which might be the fancy of
+the day, we incorporated them in our fundamental law,
+but one thing could result therefrom,--ultimate confusion.
+The Constitution is neither a legislative crazy-quilt
+nor a receptacle of fads. To make it such is in every
+respect the reverse of scientific. The work immediately
+in hand, therefore, is to devise such changes in the fundamental
+law as will tend most effectually to bring about
+the solution of issues as they may arise, by the most expert,
+observant and reliable. This accomplished, if
+its accomplishment were only practicable, all possible
+would have been done; and the necessary and inevitable
+readjustment of things would, in politics as in medicine
+and in science, be left to solve itself as occasion arose.
+Provision cannot be made against every contingency.</p>
+
+<p>This premised, the Constitution of the United States
+is an instrument through which powers are delegated by
+several local communities to a central government. The
+instrument, it was originally held, should be strictly construed
+and the powers delegated limited; and in this respect,
+with certain alterations made obviously necessary
+to meet changed conditions, I would return to the fundamental
+idea of the framers.</p>
+
+<p>In saying this I feel confidence also that here in South
+Carolina at least I shall meet with an earnest response.
+The time is not yet remote when local self-government
+worked salvation for South Carolina, as for her sister
+States of the Confederacy. You here will never forget
+what immediately followed the close of our Civil War.
+As an historic fact, the Constitution was then suspended.
+It was suspended by act of an irresponsible Congress,
+exercising revolutionary but unlimited powers over a
+large section of the common country. You then had an
+illustration, not soon to be forgotten, of concentration
+of legislative power. An episode at once painful and discreditable,
+it is not necessary here to refer to it in detail.
+Appeal, however, was made to the principle of local self-government,--it
+was, so to speak, a recurrence to the
+theory of State Sovereignty. The appeal struck a responsive,
+because traditional, chord; and it was through
+a recurrence to State Sovereignty as the agency of local
+self-government that loyalty and contentment were restored,
+and, I may add, that I am here to-day. Ceasing
+to be a Military Department, South Carolina once more
+became a State. Not improbably the demand will in a not
+remote future be heard that State lines and local autonomy
+be practically obliterated. In that event, I feel
+a confident assurance that, recurring in memory to the
+evil days which followed 1865, the spirit of enlightened
+conservatism will assert itself here and in the sister States
+of what was once the Confederacy; and again it will
+prevail. In the future, as in the past, you in South Carolina
+at least will cling to what in 1876 proved the ark of
+your social and political salvation.</p>
+
+<p>Taking another step in the discussion of changes, the
+Constitution is founded on that well-known distribution
+and allocation of powers first theoretically suggested by
+Montesquieu. There is a division, accompanied by a
+mutual limitation of authority, through the Judiciary,
+the Executive, and the Legislative. As respects this allocation,
+how would I modify that instrument? I freely
+say that the tendency of my thought, based on observation,
+is to conservatism. I have never yet in a single instance
+found that when the people of this or any other
+country accustomed to parliamentary government desired
+a thing, they failed to obtain it within a reasonable
+limit of time. Hasty changes are wisely deprecated; but
+I think I speak within limitation when I say that neither in
+the history of Great Britain,--the mother of Parliaments--nor
+in the history of the United States, has any modification
+which the people, on sober second thought, have considered
+to be for the best, long been deferred. Action, revolutionary
+in character, has not, as a rule, been needful, or,
+when taken, proved salutary. This is a record and result
+that no careful student of our history will, I take it, deny.</p>
+
+<p>Such being the case, so far as our Judiciary is concerned,
+I do not hesitate to say I would adhere to older, and, as
+I think, better principles, or revert to them where they
+have been experimentally abandoned. It took the Anglo-Saxon
+race two centuries of incessant conflict to wrest
+from a despotic executive, practically an autocracy, judicial
+independence. That was effected through what is
+known as a tenure during good behavior, as opposed to a
+tenure at the will of the monarch. This, then, for two
+centuries, was accepted as a fundamental principle of
+constitutional government. Of late, a new theory has
+been propounded, and by those chafing at all restraint--constitutionally
+lawless in disposition--it is said the
+Recall should also be applied to the Judiciary. Having,
+therefore, wrested the independence of the Judiciary from
+the hand of the Autocrat, we now propose to place it,
+in all trustfulness, in the hands of the Democrat. To me
+the proposition does not commend itself. It is founded
+on no correct principle, for the irresponsible democratic
+majority is even more liable to ill-considered and vacillating
+action than is the responsible autocrat. In that matter
+I would not trust myself; why, then, should I trust
+the composite Democrat? In the case of the Judiciary,
+therefore, I would so far as the fundamental law is concerned
+abide by the older and better considered principles
+of the framers.</p>
+
+<p>Next, the Executive. Again, we hear the demand of
+Democracy,--the Recall! Once more I revert to the
+record. This Republic has now been in working operation,
+and, taken altogether, most successful operation, for a
+century and a quarter. During that century and a quarter
+we have had, we will say, some five and twenty different
+chief magistrates. There is an ancient and somewhat
+vulgar adage to the effect that the proof of a certain
+dietary article is in its eating. Apply that homely adage to
+the matter under consideration. What is the lesson taught?
+It is simply this,--during a whole century and a quarter
+of existence there has not been one single chief executive
+of the United States to whom the arbitrary Recall could
+have been applied with what would now be agreed upon
+as a fortunate result. In the Andrew Johnson impeachment
+case was it not better that things were as they were?
+On the other hand, every one of the seven independent,
+self-respecting Senators who then by a display of high
+moral courage saved the country from serious prejudice
+would have been recalled out-of-hand had the Recall now
+demanded been in existence. Its working would have
+received prompt exemplification; as it was, the recall was
+effected in time, and after due deliberation. The delay
+occasioned no public detriment. In this life, experience
+is undeniably worth something; and the experience here
+referred to is fairly entitled to consideration. No political
+system possible to devise is wholly above criticism,--not
+open to exceptional contingencies or to dangers possible
+to conjure up. Such have from time to time arisen in the
+past; in the future such will inevitably arise. This consideration
+must, however, be balanced against a general
+average of successful working; and I confidently submit
+that, weighing thus the proved advantage of the system we
+have against the possibilities of danger which hereafter may
+occur, but which never yet have occurred, the scale on which
+are the considerations in favor of change kicks the beam.</p>
+
+<p>In view, however, of the growth of the country, the
+vastly increased complexity of interests involved, the
+intricacy and the cost of the election processes to which
+recourse is necessarily had, I would substitute for the present
+brief tenure of the presidential office--a tenure well
+enough perhaps in the comparatively simple days which
+preceded our Civil War--a tenure sufficiently long to enable
+the occupant of the presidential chair to have a policy
+and to accomplish at least something towards its adoption.
+As the case stands to-day, a President for the first time
+elected has during his term of four years, one year, and one
+year only, in which really to apply himself to the accomplishment
+of results. The first year of his term is necessarily
+devoted to the work of acquiring a familiarity with
+the machinery of the government, and the shaping of a
+policy. The second year may be devoted to a more or
+less strenuous effort at the adoption of the policy thus
+formulated. As experience shows, the action of the third
+and fourth years is gravely affected--if not altogether
+perverted from the work in hand--by what are known as
+the political exigencies incident to a succession. Manifestly,
+this calls for correction. The remedy, however,
+to my mind, is obvious and suggests itself. As the presidency
+is the one office under our Constitution national in
+character, and in no way locally representative, I would
+extend the term to seven years, and render the occupant
+of the office thereafter ineligible for re&euml;lection.
+Seven years is, I am aware, under our political system,
+an unusual term; and here my ears will, I know, be assailed
+by the great &quot;mandate&quot; cackle. The count of
+noses being complete, the mind of the composite Democrat
+is held to be made up. It only remains to formulate
+the consequent decree; and, with least possible delay,
+put it in way of practical enforcement. Again, I, as a
+publicist, demur. It is the old issue, that between
+instant action and action on second thought, presented
+once more. Briefly, the experience of sixty years
+strongly inclines me to a preference of matured and
+considerate action over that immediate action which
+notoriously is in nine cases out of ten as ill-advised as it
+is precipitate. Only in the field of politics is the expediency
+of the latter assumed as of course; yet, as in
+science and literature and art so in politics, final, because
+satisfactory, results are at best but slowly thrashed out.
+As respects wisdom, the modern statute book does not
+loom, monumental. Its contemplation would indeed
+perhaps even lead to a surmise that reasonable delay in
+formulating his &quot;mandate&quot; might, in the case of the
+composite Democrat as in that of the individual Autocrat,
+prove a not altogether unmixed, and so in the end
+an intolerable, evil.</p>
+
+<p>Thus while a change of the Executive and Legislative
+branches of the government might not be always simultaneously
+effected, by selecting seven years as the presidential
+term the election would be brought about, as frequently
+as might be, by itself, uncomplicated by local
+issues connected with the fortunes or political fate of
+individual candidates for office, whether State, Congressional,
+or Senatorial; and during the seven years
+of tenure, four, at least, it might reasonably be anticipated,
+would be devoted to the promotion of a definite policy,
+in place of one year in a term of four, as now. If also
+ineligible for reelection, there is at least a fair presumption
+that the occupant of the position might from start to
+finish apply himself to its duties and obligations, without
+being distracted therefrom by ulterior personal ends
+as constantly as humanly held in view.</p>
+
+<p>Having thus disposed of the Judiciary and the Executive,
+we come to the Legislative. And here I submit is
+the weak point in our American system,--manifestly
+the weak point, and to those who, like myself, have had
+occasion to know, undeniably so. I am here as a publicist;
+not as a writer of memoirs: so, on this head, I do not now
+propose to dilate or bear witness. I will only briefly
+say that having at one period, and for more than the lifetime
+of a generation, been in charge of large corporate
+and financial interests, I have had much occasion to deal
+with legislative bodies, National, State and Municipal.
+That page of my experiences is the one I care least to recall,
+and would most gladly forget. I am not going to
+specify, or give names of either localities or persons; but,
+knowing what I know, it is useless to approach me on this
+topic with the usual good-natured and optimistic, if
+somewhat unctuous and conventional, commonplaces on
+general uprightness and the tendency to improved conditions
+and a higher standard. I know better! I have
+seen legislators bought like bullocks--they selling themselves.
+I have watched them cover their tracks with a
+cunning more than vulpine. I have myself been black-mailed
+and sandbagged, while whole legislative bodies
+watched the process, fully cognizant at every step of what
+was going on. This, I am glad to say, was years ago.
+The legislative conditions were then bad, scandalously
+bad; nor have I any reason to believe in a regeneration
+since. The stream will never rise higher than its source;
+but it generally indicates the level thereof. In this case,
+I can only hope that in my experience it failed so to do.
+Running at a low level, the waters of that stream were
+deplorably dirty.</p>
+
+<p>That the legislative branch of our government has fallen
+so markedly in public estimation is not, I think, open to
+denial. To my mind, under the conditions I have referred
+to, such could not fail to be the case. It has, consequently,
+lost public confidence. Hence this popular
+demand for immediate legislation by the People,--this
+twentieth-century appeal to the Agora and Forum methods
+which antedate the era of Christ. It is true the world
+outgrew them two thousand years ago, and they were
+discarded; but, living in a progressive and not a reactionary
+period, all that, we are assured, is changed!
+The heart is no longer on the right-hand side of the body.
+To secure desired results it is only necessary to start quite
+fresh, as a mere preliminary discarding all lessons of experience.</p>
+
+<p>Such reasoning does not commend itself to my judgment.
+On the contrary, the failure of the American
+legislative to command an increasing public confidence,
+while both natural and obvious, is, if my observation
+guides me to conclusions in any degree correct, traceable
+to two reasons. So far as government is concerned, the
+law-making branch is assumed to be made up of the wisest
+and the most expert. Meanwhile, it is as a matter of
+fact chosen by the process I have not over-respectfully
+referred to as the counting of noses; and, moreover,
+by an unwritten law more binding than any in the Statute
+Book, that counting of noses is with us localized. In
+other words, when it comes to the choice of our law-makers,
+reducing provincialism to a system we make the
+local numerical majority supreme, and any one is considered
+competent to legislate. He can do that, even
+if by common knowledge he is incompetent or untrustworthy
+in every other capacity. Localization thus becomes
+the stronghold of mediocrity, the sure avenue to
+office of the second-and third-rate man,--he who wishes
+always to enjoy his share of a little brief authority,
+to have, he also, a taste of public life. In this respect our
+American system is, I submit, manifestly and incomparably
+inferior to the system of parliamentary election
+existing in Great Britain, itself open to grave criticism.
+In Great Britain the public man seeks the constituency
+wherever he can find it; or the constituency seeks its
+representative wherever it recognizes him. The present
+Prime Minister of Great Britain, for instance, represents
+a small Scotch constituency in which he never resided,
+but by which he was elected more than twenty years ago,
+and through which he has since consecutively remained
+in public life. On the other hand, look at the waste and
+extravagance of the system now and traditionally in use
+with us. To get into public life a man must not only
+be in sympathy with the majority of the citizens of the
+locality in which he lives, but he must continue to be in
+sympathy with that majority; or, at any election, like
+Mr. Cannon in the election just held, where for any
+passing cause a majority of his neighbors in the locality
+in which he lives may fail to support him, he must
+go into retirement. I cannot here enlarge on this topic,
+vital as I see it; I have neither space nor time, and must,
+therefore, needs content myself with the &quot;hints&quot; of
+Paracelsus. I will merely say that as an outcome this
+localized majority system practically disfranchises the
+more intelligent and the more disinterested, the more
+individual and independent of every constituency. It
+reduces their influence, and negatives their action. It
+operates in like fashion everywhere. My field of
+observation has been at home, here in America; but it
+has been the same in France. For instance, while preparing
+this address I came across the following in that
+most respectable sheet, the London <i>Athenaum</i>. A very
+competent Frenchman was there criticising a recent book
+entitled &quot;Idealism in France.&quot; Reference was by him
+made to what, in France, is known as the &quot;<i>scrutin
+d'arrondissement,&quot;</i> or, in other words, the district representative
+system. The critic declares that this system
+has there &quot;created a party machine which has brought
+the country under the sway of a sort of Radical-Socialist
+Tammany, and bound together the voter and the deputy
+by a tie of mutual corruption, the candidate promising
+Government favors to the elector in return for his vote,
+and the elector supporting the candidate who promises
+most. Hence a policy in which ideas and ideals are
+forgotten for personal and local interests, as each candidate
+strives to outbid his rivals in the bribes that he
+offers to his constituents. Hence, finally, a general
+lowering in the tone of French home politics, every question
+being made subservient by the deputies to that of
+their re&euml;lection.&quot;</p>
+
+<p>I would respectfully inquire if the above does not apply
+word for word to the condition of affairs with which we
+are familiar in America.</p>
+
+<p>But let me here again cite a concrete case, still fresh
+in memory; nothing in abstract discussion tells so
+much. Take the late Carl Schurz. If there was one
+man in our public life since 1865 who showed a genius
+for the parliamentary career, and who in six short years
+in the United States Senate--a single term--displayed
+there constructive legislating qualities of the highest
+order, it was Carl Schurz. Yet at the end of that
+single senatorial term, for local and temporary reasons
+he failed to obtain the support of a majority, or the
+support of anything approaching a majority, of those
+composing the constituency upon which he depended.
+Consequently he was retired from that parliamentary position
+necessary for the accomplishment, through him, of
+best public results. Yet at that very time there was no
+man in the United States who commanded so large and
+so personal a constituency as Carl Schurz; for he represented
+the entire Germanic element in the United States.
+Distributed as that element was, however, with its vote
+localized under our law, unwritten as well as statutory,
+there was no possibility of any constituency so concentrating
+itself that Carl Schurz could be kept in the position
+where he could continue to render services of the
+greatest possible value to the country. I, therefore,
+confidently here submit a doubt whether human ingenuity
+could devise any system calculated to lead to a greater
+waste of parliamentary ability, or more effectually keep
+from the front and position of influence that legislative
+superiority which was the arm of Aristotle to secure.
+&quot;Cant-patriotism,&quot; as your Francis Lieber termed it;
+and, on this score, he waxed eloquent. &quot;Do we not live
+in a world of cant,&quot; he wrote from Columbia here to a
+friend at the North seventy-five years ago, &quot;that cant-patriotism
+which plumes itself in selecting men from
+within the State confines only. The truer a nation is, the
+more essentially it is elevated, the more it disregards
+petty considerations, and takes the true and the good
+from whatever quarter it may come. Look at history
+and you find the proof. Look around you, where you
+are, and you find it now.&quot; And, were Lieber living to-day,
+he would find a striking exemplification of the consequences
+of a total and systematic disregard of this elementary
+proposition in studying the United States Senate
+from and through its reporters' gallery. The decline in
+the standards of that body, whether of aspect, intelligence,
+education or character, under the operation of the
+local primary has been not less pronounced than startling.
+The outcome and ripe result of &quot;cant-patriotism,&quot; it
+affords to the curious observer an impressive object-lesson,--provincialism
+reduced to a political system; what a
+witty and incisive French writer has recently termed the
+&quot;Cult of Incompetence.&quot; Speaking of conditions prevailing
+not here but in France, this observer says:--&quot;Democracy
+in its modern form chooses its' delegates in
+its own image.... What ought the character of the
+legislator to be? The very opposite, it seems to me, of
+the democratic legislator, for he ought to be well-informed
+and entirely devoid of prejudice.&quot; Taken as a whole,
+and a few striking individual exceptions apart, are those
+composing the Senate of the United States conspicuous
+in these respects? They certainly do not so impress the
+casual observer. That, as a body, they increasingly
+fail to command confidence and attention is matter of
+common remark. Nor is the reason far to seek. It
+would be the same as respects literature, science and art,
+were their representatives chosen and results reached
+through a count of noses localized, with selection severely
+confined to home talent.</p>
+
+<p>I am well aware of the criticism which will at once be
+passed on what I now advance. Local representation
+through choice by numerical majorities within given confines,
+geographically and mathematically fixed, is a system
+so rooted and intrenched in the convictions and traditions
+of the American community that even to question
+its wisdom evinces a lack of political common-sense.
+It in fact resembles nothing so much as the attempt
+to whistle down a strongly prevailing October wind
+from the West. The attempt so to do is not practical
+politics! In reply, however, I would suggest that
+such a criticism is wholly irrelevant. The publicist has
+nothing to do with practical politics. It is as if it were
+objected to a physician who prescribed sanitation against
+epidemics that the community in question was by custom
+and tradition wedded to filth and surface-drainage, and
+could not possibly be induced to abandon them in favor
+of any new-fangled theories of soap-and-water cleanliness.
+So why waste time in prescribing such? Better
+be common-sensed and practical, taking things as
+they are. In the case suggested, and confronted with
+such criticism, the medical adviser simply shrugs his
+shoulders, and is silent; the alternative he knows is
+inescapable. After a sufficiency of sound scourgings
+the objecting community will probably know better, and
+may listen to reason; in a way, conforming thereto. So,
+also, the body politic. If Ephraim is indeed thus joined to
+idols, the publicist simply shrugs his shoulders, and passes
+on; possibly, after Ephraim has been sufficiently scourged,
+he may in that indefinite future popularly known as &quot;one
+of these days&quot; be more clear sighted and wiser.</p>
+
+<p>None the less, so far as our national parliamentary
+system is concerned, could I have my way in a revision
+of the Constitution, I would increase the senatorial term
+to ten years, and I would, were such a thing within the
+range of possibility, break down the system of the necessary
+senatorial selection by a State of an inhabitant of the
+State. If I could, I would introduce the British system.
+For example, though I never voted for Mr. Bryan and
+have not been in general sympathy with Mr. Roosevelt,
+yet few things would give me greater political satisfaction
+than to see Mr. Bryan, we will say, elected a Senator
+from Arizona or Oregon, Mr. Roosevelt elected from
+Illinois or Pennsylvania, President Taft from Utah or
+Vermont. They apparently best represent existing feelings
+and the ideals prevailing in those communities;
+why, then, should they not voice those feelings and ideals
+in our highest parliamentary chamber?</p>
+
+<p>As respects our House of Representatives, it would
+in principle be the same. I do not care to go into the
+rationale of what is known as proportional representation,
+nor have I time so to do; but, were it in my power, I
+would prescribe to-morrow that hereafter the national
+House of Representatives should be constituted on the
+proportional basis,--the choice of representatives to be
+by States, but, as respects the nomination of candidates,
+irrespective of district lines. Like many others, I am very
+weary of provincial nobodies, &quot;good men&quot; locally known
+to be such!</p>
+
+<p>As I have already said, in parliamentary government all
+depends in the end on the truly representative character of
+the legislative body. If that is as it should be, the rest
+surely follows. The objective of Aristotle is attained.</p>
+
+<p>Exceeding the limits assigned to it, my discussion has,
+however, extended too far. I must close. One word
+before so doing. Why am I here? I am here,--a man
+considerably exceeding in age the allotted threescore and
+ten--to deliver a message, be the value of the same
+greater or less. I greatly fear it is less. I would, however,
+impart the lessons of an experience stretching over sixty
+years,--the results of such observation as my intelligence
+has enabled me to exercise. I do so, addressing
+myself to a local institution of the advanced education.
+Why? Because, looking over the country, diagnosing
+its conditions as well as my capacity enables me, observing
+the evolution of the past and forecasting, in as far
+as I may, the outcome, I am persuaded that the future
+of the country rests more largely in the hands of such
+institutions as this than in those of any other agency or
+activity. Do not say I flatter; for, while I can hope for
+no advancement, I think I have not overstated the case;
+I certainly have not overstated my conviction. There
+has been no man who has influenced the course of modern
+thought more deeply and profoundly than Adam Smith,
+a Professor in a Scotch University of the second class.
+So here in Columbia seventy years ago, Francis Lieber
+prepared and published his &quot;Manual of Political Ethics.&quot;
+Adam Smith and Francis Lieber were but prototypes--examples
+of what I have in mind. The days were
+when the Senate of the United States afforded a rostrum
+from which thinkers and teachers first formulated, and
+then advanced, great policies. Those days, and I say
+it regretfully, are past. Unless I am greatly mistaken,
+however, a new political force is now asserting itself. I
+have recently, at a meeting of historical and scientific associations
+in Boston, had my attention forcibly called
+to this aspect of the situation now shaping itself. I there
+met young men, many, and not the least noticeable of
+whom, came from this section. They inspired me with
+a renewed confidence in our political future. Essentially
+teachers,--I might add, they were publicists as well as
+professors. Observers and students, they actively followed
+the course of developing thought in Europe as in this country.
+Exact in their processes, philosophical and scientific in
+their methods, unselfish in their devotion, they were broad
+of view. It is for them to realize in a future not remote
+the University ideal pictured, and correctly pictured, from
+this stage by one who here preceded me a short six months
+ago. They, constituting the University, are the &quot;hope
+of the State in the direction of its practical affairs; in
+teaching the lawyer the better standards of his profession,
+his duty to place character above money making;
+in teaching the legislator the philosophy of legislation,
+and that the constructive forces of legislation carefully
+considered should precede every effort to change an
+existing status; in teaching those in official life, executive
+and judicial, that demagogy, and theories of life
+uncontrolled by true principles, do not make for success,
+when final success is considered, but that, if they did
+lead to success, they should be avoided for their inherent
+imperfection.... The province of the University is
+to educate citizenship in the abstract.&quot;</p>
+
+<p>It is the presence of this class, to those composing which
+I bow as distinctly of a period superior to mine, that you
+owe my presence to-day,--whatever that presence
+may be worth. I regard their existence and their coming
+forward in such institutions as this University of South
+Carolina, as the arc of the bow of promise spanning the
+political horizon of our future.</p>
+
+<p>Through you, to them my message is addressed.</p>
+</td></tr></table>
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+<pre>
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's 'Tis Sixty Years Since, by Charles Francis Adams
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+Project Gutenberg's 'Tis Sixty Years Since, by Charles Francis Adams
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: 'Tis Sixty Years Since
+
+Author: Charles Francis Adams
+
+Posting Date: December 10, 2011 [EBook #9996]
+Release Date: February, 2006
+First Posted: November 6, 2003
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 'TIS SIXTY YEARS SINCE ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Afra Ullah, Sjaani and PG Distributed Proofreaders
+
+
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+
+
+"TIS SIXTY YEARS SINCE"
+
+ADDRESS OF
+
+CHARLES FRANCIS ADAMS
+
+
+
+FOUNDERS' DAY, JANUARY 16, 1913
+
+
+
+"'TIS SIXTY YEARS SINCE"
+
+In the single hour self-allotted for my part in this occasion there is
+much ground to cover,--the time is short, and I have far to go. Did I
+now, therefore, submit all I had proposed to say when I accepted your
+invitation, there would remain no space for preliminaries. Yet something
+of that character is in place. I will try to make it brief.[1]
+
+As the legend or text of what I have in mind to submit, I have given the
+words "'Tis Sixty Years Since." As some here doubtless recall, this is
+the second or subordinate title of Walter Scott's first novel,
+"Waverley," which brought him fame. Given to the world in 1814,--hard on
+a century ago,--"Waverley" told of the last Stuart effort to recover the
+crown of Great Britain,--that of "The '45." It so chances that Scott's
+period of retrospect is also just now most appropriate in my case,
+inasmuch as I entered Harvard as a student in the year 1853--"sixty
+years since!" It may fairly be asserted that school life ends, and what
+may in contradistinction thereto be termed thinking and acting life
+begins, the day the young man passes the threshold of the institution of
+more advanced education. For him, life's responsibilities then begin.
+Prior to that confused, thenceforth things with him become
+consecutive,--a sequence. Insensibly he puts away childish things.
+
+[1] Owing to its length, this "Address" was compressed in delivery,
+occupying one hour only. It is here printed in the form in which it was
+prepared,--the parts omitted in delivery being included.
+
+In those days, as I presume now, the college youth harkened to inspired
+voices. Sir Walter Scott belonged to a previous generation. Having held
+the close attention of a delighted world as the most successful
+story-teller of his own or any preceding period, he had passed off the
+stage; but only a short twenty years before. Other voices no less
+inspired had followed; and, living, spoke to us. Perhaps my scheme
+to-day is best expressed by one of these.
+
+When just beginning to attract the attention of the English-speaking
+world, Alfred Tennyson gave forth his poem of "Locksley Hall,"--very
+familiar to those of my younger days. Written years before, at the time
+of publication he was thirty-three. In 1886, a man of seventy-five, he
+composed a sequel to his earlier effort,--the utterance entitled
+"Locksley Hall Sixty Years After." He then, you will remember, reviewed
+his young man's dreams,--dreams of the period when he
+
+
+" ... dip't into the future, far as human eye could see,
+Saw the Vision of the world, and all the wonder that would be,"
+
+
+--threescore years later contrasting in sombre verse an old man's stern
+realities with the bright anticipations of youth. Such is my purpose
+to-day. "Wandering back to living boyhood," to the time when I first
+simultaneously passed the Harvard threshold and the threshold of
+responsible life, I propose to compare the ideals and actualities of the
+present with the ideals, anticipations and dreams of a past now
+somewhat remote.
+
+To say that in life and in the order of life's events it is the
+unexpected which is apt to occur, is a commonplace. That it has been so
+in my own case, I shall presently show. Meanwhile, not least among the
+unexpected things is my presence here to-day. If, when I entered Harvard
+in 1853, it had been suggested that in 1913, I,--born of the New England
+Sanhedrim, a Brahmin Yankee by blood, tradition and environment--had it
+been suggested that I, being such, would sixty years later stand by
+invitation here in Columbia before the faculty and students of the
+University of South Carolina, I should under circumstances then existing
+have pronounced the suggestion as beyond reasonable credence. Here,
+however, I am; and here, from this as my rostrum, I propose to-day to
+deliver a message,--such as it is.
+
+And yet, though such a future outcome, if then foretold, would have
+seemed scarcely possible of occurrence, there, after all, were certain
+conditions which would have rendered the contingency even at that time
+not only possible, but in accordance with the everlasting fitness of
+things. For, curiously enough, personal relations of a certain character
+held with this institution would have given me, even in 1853, a sense of
+acquaintance with it such as individually I had with no other
+institution of similar character throughout the entire land. It in this
+wise came about. At that period, preceding as it did the deluge about to
+ensue, it was the hereditary custom of certain families more especially
+of South Carolina and of Louisiana,--but of South Carolina in
+particular--to send their youth to Harvard, there to receive a college
+education. It thus chanced that among my associates at Harvard were not
+a few who bore names long familiarly and honorably known to Carolinian
+records,--Barnwell and Preston, Rhett and Alston, Parkman and Eliot; and
+among these were some I knew well, and even intimately. Gone now with
+the generation and even the civilization to which they belonged, I doubt
+if any of them survive. Indeed only recently I chanced on a grimly
+suggestive mention of one who had left on me the memory of a character
+and personality singularly pure, high-toned and manly,--permeated with a
+sense of moral and personal obligation. I have always understood he died
+five years later at Sharpsburg, as you call it, or Antietam, as it was
+named by us, in face-to-face conflict with a Massachusetts regiment
+largely officered by Harvard men of his time and even class,--his own
+familiar friends. This is the record, the reference being to a marriage
+service held at St. Paul's church in Richmond, in the late autumn of
+1862: "An indefinable feeling of gloom was thrown over a most auspicious
+event when the bride's youngest sister glided through a side door just
+before the processional. Tottering to a chancel pew, she threw herself
+upon the cushions, her slight frame racked with sobs. Scarcely a year
+before, the wedding march had been played for her, and a joyous throng
+saw her wedded to gallant Breck Parkman. Before another twelvemonth
+rolled around the groom was killed at the front."[2] Samuel Breck
+Parkman was in the Harvard class following that to which I belonged.
+Graduating in 1857, fifty-five years later I next saw his name in the
+connection just given. It recorded an incident of not infrequent
+occurrence in those dark and cruel days.
+
+It was, however, in Breck Parkman and his like that I first became
+conscious of certain phases of the South Carolina character which
+subsequently I learned to bear in high respect.
+
+So far as this University of South Carolina was concerned, it also so
+chanced that, by the merest accident, I, a very young man, was thrown
+into close personal relations with one of the most eminent of your
+professors,--Francis Lieber. Few here, I suppose, now personally
+remember Francis Lieber. To most it gives indeed a certain sense of
+remoteness to meet one who, as in my case, once held close and even
+intimate relations with a German emigrant, distinguished as a publicist,
+who as a youth had lain, wounded and helpless, a Prussian recruit, on
+the field above Namur. Occurring in June, 1815, two days after Waterloo,
+the affair at Namur will soon be a century gone. Of those engaged in
+it, the last obeyed the fell sergeant's summons a half score years ago.
+It seems remote; but at the time of which I speak Waterloo was
+appreciably nearer those in active life than are Shiloh and Gettysburg
+now. The Waterloo campaign was then but thirty-eight years removed,
+whereas those last are fifty now; and, while Lieber was at Waterloo, I
+was myself at Gettysburg.
+
+[2] DeLeon, "Belles, Beaux and Brains of the Sixties," p. 158.
+
+Subsequently, later in life, it was again my privilege to hold close
+relations with another Columbian,--an alumnus of this University as it
+then was--in whom I had opportunity to study some of the strongest and
+most respect-commanding traits of the Southern character. I refer to one
+here freshly remembered,--Alexander Cheves Haskell,--soldier, jurist,
+banker and scholar, one of a septet of brothers sent into the field by a
+South Carolina mother calm and tender of heart, but in silent suffering
+unsurpassed by any recorded in the annals whether of Judea or of Rome.
+It was the fourth of the seven Haskells I knew, one typical throughout,
+in my belief, of what was best in your Carolinian development. With him,
+as I have said, I was closely and even intimately associated through
+years, and in him I had occasion to note that almost austere type
+represented in its highest development in the person and attributes of
+Calhoun. Of strongly marked descent, Haskell was, as I have always
+supposed, of a family and race in which could be observed those virile
+Scotch-Irish and Presbyterian qualities which found their
+representative types in the two Jacksons,--Andrew, and him known in
+history as "Stonewall." To Alec Haskell I shall in this discourse again
+have occasion to refer.
+
+Thus, though in 1853, and for long years subsequent thereto, it would
+not have entered my mind as among the probabilities that I should ever
+stand here, reviewing the past after the manner of Tennyson in his
+"Locksley Hall Sixty Years After," yet if there was any place in the
+South, or, I may say, in the entire country, where, as a matter of
+association, I might naturally have looked so to stand, it would have
+been where now I find myself.
+
+But I must hasten on; for, as I have said, if I am to accomplish even a
+part of my purpose, I have no time wherein to linger.
+
+Not long ago I chanced, in a country ramble, to be conversing with an
+eminent foreigner, known, and favorably known, to all Americans. In the
+course of leisurely exchange of ideas between us, he suddenly asked if I
+could suggest any explanation of the fact that not only were the
+publicists who had the greatest vogue in our college days now to a large
+extent discredited, but that almost every view and theory advanced by
+them, and which we had accepted as fixed and settled, was, where not
+actually challenged, silently ignored. Nor did the assertion admit of
+denial; for, looking back through the vista of threescore years, of the
+principles of what may be called "public polity" then advanced as
+indisputable, few to-day meet with general acceptance. To review the
+record from this point of view is curious.
+
+When in 1853 I entered Harvard, so far as this country and its polity
+were concerned certain things were matters of contention, while others
+were accepted as axiomatic,--the basic truths of our system. Among the
+former--the subjects of active contention--were the question of Slavery,
+then grimly assuming shape, and that of Nationality intertwined
+therewith. Subordinate to this was the issue of Free Trade and
+Protection, with the school of so-called American political economy
+arrayed against that of Adam Smith. Beyond these as political ideals
+were the tenets and theories of Jeffersonian Democracy. That the world
+had heretofore been governed too much was loudly acclaimed, and the
+largest possible individualism was preached, not only as a privilege but
+as a right. The area of government action was to be confined within the
+narrowest practical limits, and ample scope was to be allowed to each to
+develop in the way most natural to himself, provided only he did not
+infringe upon the rights of others. Materially, we were then reaching
+out to subdue a continent,--a doctrine of Manifest Destiny was in vogue.
+Beyond this, however, and most important now to be borne in mind,
+compared with the present the control of man over natural agencies and
+latent forces was scarcely begun. Not yet had the railroad crossed the
+Missouri; electricity, just bridled, was still unharnessed.
+
+I have now passed in rapid review what may perhaps without exaggeration
+be referred to as an array of conditions and theories, ideals and
+policies. It remains to refer to the actual results which have come
+about during these sixty years as respects them, or because of them;
+and, finally, to reach if possible conclusions as to the causes which
+have affected what may not inaptly be termed a process of general
+evolution. Having thus, so to speak, diagnosed the situation, the
+changes the situation exacts are to be measured, and a forecast
+ventured. An ambitious programme, I am well enough aware that the not
+very considerable reputation I have established for myself hardly
+warrants me in attempting it. This, I premise.
+
+Let us, in the first place, recur in somewhat greater detail to the
+various policies and ideals I have referred to as in vogue in the
+year 1853.
+
+First and foremost, overshadowing all else, was the political issue
+raised by African slavery, then ominously assuming shape. The clouds
+foreboding the coming tempest were gathering thick and heavy; and,
+moreover, they were even then illumined by electric flashes, accompanied
+by a mutter of distant thunder. Though we of the North certainly did not
+appreciate its gravity, the situation was portentous in the extreme.
+
+Involved in this problem of African slavery was the incidental issue of
+Free Trade and Protection,--apparently only economical and industrial in
+character, but in reality fundamentally crucial. And behind this lay
+the constitutional question, involving as it did not only the
+conflicting theories of a strict or liberal construction of the
+fundamental law, but nationality also,--the right of a Sovereign State
+to withdraw from the Union created in 1787, and developed through two
+generations.
+
+These may be termed concrete political issues, as opposed to basic
+truths generally accepted and theories individually entertained. The
+theories were constitutional, social, economical. Constitutionally, they
+turned upon the obligations of citizenship. There was no such thing then
+as a citizen of the United States of and by itself. The citizen of the
+United States was such simply because of his citizenship of a Sovereign
+State,--whether Massachusetts or Virginia or South Carolina; and, of
+course, an instrument based upon a divided sovereignty admitted of
+almost infinitely diverse interpretation. It is a scriptural aphorism
+that no man can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and
+love the other, or else he will hold to the one and despise the other.
+And in the fulness of time it literally with us so came about. The
+accepted economical theories of the period were to a large extent
+corollaries of the fundamental proposition, and differing material and
+social conditions. Beyond all this, and coming still under the head of
+individual theories, was the doctrine enunciated by Thomas Jefferson in
+the Declaration of Independence,--the doctrine that all men were created
+equal,--meaning, of course, equal before the law. But the theorist and
+humanitarian of the North, accepting the fundamental principle laid down
+in the Declaration, gave to it a far wider application than had been
+intended by its authors,--a breadth of application it would not bear.
+Such science as he had being of scriptural origin, he interpreted the
+word "equal" as signifying equal in the possibilities of their
+attributes,--physical, moral, intellectual; and in so doing, he of
+course ignored the first principles of ethnology. It was, I now realize,
+a somewhat wild-eyed school of philosophy, that of which I myself was a
+youthful disciple.
+
+But, on the other hand, beside these, between 1850 and 1860 a class of
+trained and more cautious thinkers, observers, scientists and
+theologians was coming to the front. Their investigations, though we did
+not then foresee it, were a generation later destined gently to subvert
+the accepted fundamentals of religious and economical thought, literary
+performance, and material existence. The work they had in hand to do was
+for the next fifteen years to be subordinate, so far as this country was
+concerned, to the solution of the terrible political problems which were
+first insistent on settlement; yet, as is now apparent, an initial
+movement was on foot which foreboded a revolution world-wide in its
+nature, and one in comparison with which the issues of slavery and
+American constitutionality became practically insignificant,--in a word,
+local and passing incidents.
+
+Finally, it remains to consider specifically the political theories
+then in vogue in their relation to the individual. In this country, it
+was the period of the equality of man and individuality in the
+development of the type. It was generally believed that the world had
+hitherto been governed too much,--that the day of caste, and even class,
+was over and gone; and finally, that America was a species of vast
+modern melting-pot of humanity, in which, within a comparatively short
+period of time, the characteristics of all branches of Indo-Aryan origin
+would resolve themselves. A new type would emerge,--the American. These
+theories were also in their consequences far-reaching. Practically, 1853
+antedates all our present industrial organizations so loudly in
+evidence,--the multifarious trades-unions which now divide the
+population of the United States into what are known as the "masses" and
+the "classes." As recently as a century ago, it used to be said of the
+French army under the Empire, that every soldier carried the baton of
+the Field-Marshal in his knapsack. And this ideal of equality and
+individuality was fixed in the American mind.
+
+Not that I for a moment mean to imply that in my belief the middle of
+the last century, or the twenty years anterior to the Civil War, was a
+species of golden age in our American annals. On the contrary, it was,
+as I remember it, a phase of development very open to criticism; and
+that in many respects. It was crude, self-conscious and self-assertive;
+provincial and formative, rather than formed. Socially and materially
+we were, compared with the present era of motors and parlor-cars, in the
+"one-hoss shay" and stove-heated railroad-coach stage. Nevertheless,
+what is now referred to as "predatory wealth" had not yet begun to
+accumulate in few hands; much greater equality of condition prevailed;
+nor was the "wage-earner" referred to as constituting a class distinct
+from the holders of property. Thus the individual was then
+encouraged,--whether in literature, in commerce, or in politics. In
+other words, there being a free field, one man was held to be in all
+respects the equal of the rest. Especially was what I have said true of
+the Northern, or so-called Free States, as contrasted with the States of
+the South, where the presence of African slavery distinctly affected
+individual theories, no matter where or to what extent entertained.
+
+Such, briefly and comprehensively stated, having been the situation in
+1853, it remains to consider the practical outcome thereof during the
+sixty years it has been my fortune to take part, either as an actor or
+as an observer, in the great process of evolution. It is curious to note
+the extent to which the unexpected has come about. In the first place,
+consider the all-absorbing mid-century political issue, that involving
+the race question, to which I first referred,--the issue which divided
+the South from the North, and which, eight years only after I had
+entered college, carried me from the walks of civil life into the
+calling of arms.
+
+And here I enter on a field of discussion both difficult and dangerous;
+and, for reasons too obvious to require statement, what I am about to
+say will be listened to with no inconsiderable apprehension as to what
+next may be forthcoming. Nevertheless, this is a necessary part of my
+theme; and I propose to say what I have in mind to say, setting forth
+with all possible frankness the more mature conclusions reached with the
+passage of years. Let it be received in the spirit in which it
+is offered.
+
+So far, then, as the institution of slavery is concerned, in its
+relations to ownership and property in those of the human species,--I
+have seen no reason whatever to revise or in any way to alter the
+theories and principles I entertained in 1853, and in the maintenance of
+which I subsequently bore arms between 1861 and 1865. Economically,
+socially, and from the point of view of abstract political justice, I
+hold that the institution of slavery, as it existed in this country
+prior to the year 1865, was in no respect either desirable or
+justifiable. That it had its good and even its elevating side, so far at
+least as the African is concerned, I am not here to deny. On the
+contrary, I see and recognize those features of the institution far more
+clearly now than I should have said would have been possible in 1853.
+That the institution in itself, under conditions then existing, tended
+to the elevation of the less advanced race, I frankly admit I did not
+then think. On the other hand, that it exercised a most pernicious
+influence upon those of the more advanced race, and especially upon
+that large majority of the more advanced race who were not themselves
+owners of slaves,--of that I have become with time ever more and more
+satisfied. The noticeable feature, however, so far as I individually am
+concerned, has been the entire change of view as respects certain of the
+fundamental propositions at the base of our whole American political and
+social edifice brought about by a more careful and intelligent
+ethnological study. I refer to the political equality of man, and to
+that race absorption to which I have alluded,--that belief that any
+foreign element introduced into the American social system and body
+politic would speedily be absorbed therein, and in a brief space
+thoroughly assimilated. In this all-important respect I do not hesitate
+to say we theorists and abstractionists of the North, throughout that
+long anti-slavery discussion which ended with the 1861 clash of arms,
+were thoroughly wrong. In utter disregard of fundamental, scientific
+facts, we theoretically believed that all men--no matter what might be
+the color of their skin, or the texture of their hair--were, if placed
+under exactly similar conditions, in essentials the same. In other
+words, we indulged in the curious and, as is now admitted, utterly
+erroneous theory that the African was, so to speak, an Anglo-Saxon, or,
+if you will, a Yankee "who had never had a chance,"--a fellow-man who
+was guilty, as we chose to express it, of a skin not colored like our
+own. In other words, though carved in ebony, he also was in the image
+of God.
+
+Following out this theory, under the lead of men to whom scientific
+analysis and observation were anathema if opposed to accepted cardinal
+political theories as enunciated in the Declaration as read by them, the
+African was not only emancipated, but so far as the letter of the law,
+as expressed in an amended Constitution, would establish the fact, the
+quondam slave was in all respects placed on an equality, political,
+legal and moral, with those of the more advanced race.
+
+I do not hesitate here,--as one who largely entertained the theoretical
+views I have expressed,--I do not hesitate here to say, as the result of
+sixty years of more careful study and scientific observation, the
+theories then entertained by us were not only fundamentally wrong, but
+they further involved a problem in the presence of which I confess
+to-day I stand appalled.
+
+It is said,--whether truthfully or not,--that when some years ago John
+Morley, the English writer and thinker, was in this country, on
+returning to England he remarked that the African race question, as now
+existing in the United States, presented a problem as nearly, to his
+mind, insoluble as any human problem well could be. I do not care
+whether Lord Morley made this statement or did not make it. I am
+prepared, however, to say that, individually, so far as my present
+judgment goes, it is a correct presentation. To us in the North, the
+African is a comparatively negligible factor. So far as Massachusetts,
+for instance, or the city of Boston more especially, are concerned, as
+a problem it is solving itself. Proportionately, the African infusion is
+becoming less--never large, it is incomparably less now than it was in
+the days of my own youth. Thus manifestly a negligible factor, it is
+also one tending to extinction. Indeed, it would be fairly open to
+question whether a single Afro-American of unmixed Ethiopian descent
+could now be found in Boston. That the problem presents itself with a
+wholly different aspect here in Carolina is manifest. The difference too
+is radical; it goes to the heart of the mystery.
+
+As I have already said, the universal "melting-pot" theory in vogue in
+my youth was that but seven, or at the most fourteen, years were
+required to convert the alien immigrant--no matter from what region or
+of what descent--into an American citizen. The educational influences
+and social environment were assumed to be not only subtle, but
+all-pervasive and powerful. That this theory was to a large and even
+dangerous extent erroneous the observation of the last fifty years has
+proved, and our Massachusetts experience is sadly demonstrating to-day.
+It was Oliver Wendell Holmes, who, years ago, when asked by an anxious
+mother at what age the education of a child ought to begin, remarked in
+reply that it should begin about one hundred and fifty years before the
+child is born. It has so proved with us; and the fact is to-day in
+evidence that this statement of Dr. Holmes should be accepted as an
+undeniable political aphorism. So far from seven or fourteen years
+making an American citizen, fully and thoroughly impregnated with
+American ideals to the exclusion of all others, our experience is that
+it requires at least three generations to eliminate what may be termed
+the "hyphen" in citizenship. Not in the first, nor in the second, and
+hardly in the third, generation, does the immigrant cease to be an
+Irish-American, or a French-American, or a German-American, or a
+Slavonic-American, or yet a Dago. Nevertheless, in process of tune,
+those of the Caucasian race do and will become Americans. Ultimately
+their descendants will be free from the traditions and ideals, so to
+speak, ground in through centuries passed under other conditions. Not so
+the Ethiopian. In his case, we find ourselves confronted with a
+situation never contemplated in that era of political dreams and
+scriptural science in which our institutions received shape. Stated
+tersely and in plain language, so far as the African is concerned--the
+cause and, so to speak, the motive of the great struggle of 1861 to
+1865--we recognize the presence in the body politic of a vast alien mass
+which does not assimilate and which cannot be absorbed. In other words,
+the melting-pot theory came in sharp contact with an ethnological fact,
+and the unexpected occurred. The problem of African servitude was solved
+after a fashion; but in place of it a race issue of most uncompromising
+character evolved itself.
+
+A survivor of the generation which read "Uncle Tom's Cabin" as it week
+by week appeared,--fresh to-day from Massachusetts with its Lawrence
+race issues of a different character, I feel a sense of satisfaction in
+discussing here in South Carolina this question and issue in a spirit
+the reverse of dogmatic, a spirit purely scientific, observant and
+sympathetic. And in this connection let me say I well remember
+repeatedly discussing it with your fellow-citizen and my friend, Colonel
+Alexander Haskell, to whom I have already made reference. Rarely have I
+been more impressed by a conclusion reached and fixed in the mind of one
+who to the study of a problem had obviously given much and kindly
+thought. As those who knew him do not need to be told, Alexander Cheves
+Haskell was a man of character, pure and just and thoughtful. He felt
+towards the African as only a Southerner who had himself never been the
+owner of slaves can feel. He regarded him as of a less advanced race
+than his own, but one who was entitled not only to just and kindly
+treatment but to sympathetic consideration. When, however, the question
+of the future of the Afro-American was raised, as matter for abstract
+discussion, it was suggestive as well as curious to observe the fixed,
+hard expression which immediately came over Haskell's face, as with
+stern lips, from which all suggestion of a smile had faded away, he
+pronounced the words:--"Sir, it is a dying race!" To express the thought
+more fully, Colonel Haskell maintained, as I doubt not many who now
+listen to me will maintain, that the nominal Afro-American increase, as
+shown in the figures of the national census, is deceptive,--that in
+point of fact, the Ethiop in America is incurring the doom which has
+ever befallen those of an inferior and less advanced race when brought
+in direct and immediate contact, necessarily and inevitably competitive,
+with the more advanced, the more masterful, and intellectually the more
+gifted. In other words, those of the less advanced race have a fatal
+aptitude for contracting the vices, both moral and physical, of the
+superior race, in the end leading to destruction; while the capacity for
+assimilating the elevating qualities and attributes which constitute a
+saving grace is denied them. Elimination, therefore, became in Haskell's
+belief a question of time only,--the law of the survival of the fittest
+would assert itself. The time required may be long,--numbered by
+centuries; but, however remotely, it nevertheless would come. God's mill
+grinds slowly, but it grinds uncommon small; and, I will add, its
+grinding is apt to be merciless.
+
+The solution thus most pronouncedly laid down by Colonel Haskell may or
+may not prove in this case correct and final. It certainly is not for
+me, coming from the North, to undertake dogmatically to pass upon it. I
+recur to it here as a plausible suggestion only, in connection with my
+theme. As such, it unquestionably merits consideration. I am by no means
+prepared to go the length of an English authority in recently saying
+that "emancipation on two continents sacrificed the real welfare of the
+slave and his intrinsic worth as a person, to the impatient vanity of
+an immediate and theatrical triumph."[3] This length I say, I cannot go;
+but so far as the present occasion is concerned, with such means of
+observation as are within my reach, I find the conclusion difficult to
+resist that the success of the abolitionists in effecting the
+emancipation of the Afro-American, as unexpected and sweeping as it was
+sudden, has led to phases of the race problem quite unanticipated at
+least. For instance, as respects segregation. Instead of assimilating,
+with a tendency to ultimate absorption, the movement in the opposite
+direction since 1865 is pronounced. It has, moreover, received the final
+stamp of scientific approval. This implies much; for in the old days of
+the "peculiar institution" there is no question the relations between
+the two races were far more intimate, kindly, and even absorptive than
+they now are.
+
+That African slavery, as it existed in the United States anterior to the
+year 1862, presented a mild form of servitude, as servitude then existed
+and immemorially had almost everywhere existed, was, moreover,
+incontrovertibly proven in the course of the Civil War. Before 1862, it
+was confidently believed that any severe social agitation within, or
+disturbance from without, would inevitably lead to a Southern servile
+insurrection. In Europe this result was assumed as of course; and,
+immediately after it was issued, the Emancipation Proclamation of President
+[3] Bussell's (Dr. F.W.) "Christian Theology and Social Progress."
+Bampton Lectures, 1905. Lincoln was denounced in unmeasured terms by
+the entire London press. Not a voice was raised in its defence. It was
+regarded as a measure unwarranted in civilized warfare, and a sure and
+intentional incitement to the horrors which had attended the servile
+insurrections of Haiti and San Domingo; and, more recently, the
+unspeakable Sepoy incidents of the Indian mutiny. What actually occurred
+is now historic. The confident anticipations of our English brethren
+were, not for the first time, negatived; nor is there any page in our
+American record more creditable to those concerned than the attitude
+held by the African during the fierce internecine struggle which
+prevailed between April, 1861, and April, 1865. In it there is scarcely
+a trace, if indeed there is any trace at all, of such a condition of
+affairs as had developed in the Antilles and in Hindustan. The attitude
+of the African towards his Confederate owner was submissive and kindly.
+Although the armed and masterful domestic protector was at the front and
+engaged in deadly, all-absorbing conflict, yet the women and children of
+the Southern plantation slept with unbarred doors,--free from
+apprehension, much more from molestation.
+
+Moreover, as you here well know, during the old days of slavery there
+was hardly a child born, of either sex, who grew up in a Southern
+household of substantial wealth without holding immediate and most
+affectionate relations with those of the other race. Every typical
+Southern man had what he called his "daddy" and his "mammy," his
+"uncle" and his "aunty," by him familiarly addressed as such, and who
+were to him even closer than are blood relations to most. They had cared
+for him in his cradle; he followed them to their graves. Is it needful
+for me to ask to what extent such relations still exist? Of those born
+thirty years after emancipation, and therefore belonging distinctly to a
+later generation, how many thus have their kindly, if humble, kin of the
+African blood? I fancy I would be safe in saying not one in twenty.
+
+Here, then, as the outcome of the first great issue I have suggested as
+occupying the thought and exciting the passions of that earlier period,
+is a problem wholly unanticipated,--a problem which, merely stating,
+I dismiss.
+
+Passing rapidly on, I come to the next political issue which presented
+itself in my youth,--the constitutional issue,--that of State
+Sovereignty, as opposed to the ideal, Nationality. And, whether for
+better or worse, this issue, I very confidently submit, has been
+settled. We now, also, looking at it in more observant mood, in a spirit
+at once philosophical and historical, see that it involved a process of
+natural evolution which, under the conditions prevailing, could hardly
+result in any other settlement than that which came about. We now have
+come to a recognition of the fact that Anglo-Saxon nationality on this
+continent was a problem of crystallization, the working out of which
+occupied a little over two centuries. It was in New England the process
+first set in, when, in 1643, the scattered English-speaking settlements
+under the hegemony of the colony of Massachusetts Bay united in a
+confederation. It was the initial step. I have no time in which to
+enumerate successive steps, each representing a stage in advance of what
+went before. The War of Independence,--mistakenly denominated the
+Revolutionary War, but a struggle distinctly conservative in character,
+and in no way revolutionary,--the War of Independence gave great impetus
+to the process, resulting in what was known as Federation. Then came the
+Constitution of 1787 and the formation of the, so called, United States
+as a distinct nationality. The United States next passed through two
+definite processes of further crystallization,--one in 1812-1814, when
+the second war with Great Britain, and more especially our naval
+victories, kindled, especially in the North, the fire of patriotism and
+the conception of nationality; the other, half a century later,
+presented the stern issue in a concrete form, and at last the complete
+unification of a community--whether for better or for worse is no
+matter--was hammered by iron and cemented in blood. It is there now; an
+established fact. Secession is a lost cause; and, whether for good or
+for ill, the United States exists, and will continue to exist, a unified
+World Power. Sovereignty now rests at Washington, and neither in
+Columbia for South Carolina nor in Boston for Massachusetts. The State
+exists only as an integral portion of the United States. That issue has
+been fought out. The result stands beyond controversy; brought about by
+a generation now passed on, but to which I belonged.
+
+Meanwhile, the ancient adage, the rose is not without its thorn,
+receives new illustration; for even this great result has not been
+wrought without giving rise to considerations suggestive of thought.
+Speaking tersely and concentrating what is in my mind into the fewest
+possible words, I may say that in our national growth up to the year
+1830 the play of the centrifugal forces predominated,--that is, the
+necessity for greater cohesion made itself continually felt. A period of
+quiescence then followed, lasting until, we will say, 1865. Since 1865,
+it is not unsafe to say, the centripetal, or gravitating, force has
+predominated to an extent ever more suggestive of increasing political
+uneasiness. It is now, as is notorious, more in evidence than ever
+before. The tendency to concentrate at Washington, the demand that the
+central government, assuming one function after another, shall become
+imperial, the cry for the national enactment of laws, whether relating
+to marital divorce or to industrial combinations,--all impinge on the
+fundamental principle of local self-government, which assumed its
+highest and most pronounced form in the claim of State Sovereignty. I am
+now merely stating problems. I am not discussing the political ills or
+social benefits which possibly may result from action. Nevertheless,
+all, I think, must admit that the tendency to gravitation and
+attraction is to-day as pronounced and as dangerous, especially in the
+industrial communities of the North, as was the tendency to separation
+and segregation pronounced and dangerous seventy years ago in the South.
+
+To this I shall later return. I now merely point out what I apprehend to
+be a tendency to extremes--an excess in the swinging of our
+political pendulum.
+
+We next come to that industrial factor which I have referred to as the
+issue between the Free Trade of Adam Smith and Protection, as inculcated
+by the so-called American school of political economists. The phases
+which this issue has assumed are, I submit, well calculated to excite
+the attention of the observant and thoughtful. I merely allude to them
+now; but, in so far as it is in my power to make it so, my allusion will
+be specific. I frankly acknowledge myself a Free-Trader. A Free-Trader
+in theory, were it in my power I would be a Free-Trader in national
+practice. There has been, so far as I know, but one example of absolute
+free trade on the largest scale in world history. That one example,
+moreover, has been a success as unqualified as undeniable. I refer to
+this American Union of ours. We have here a country consisting of fifty
+local communities, stretching from the Atlantic to the Pacific, from
+tropical Porto Rico to glacial Alaska, representing every conceivable
+phase of soil, climate and material conditions, with diverse industrial
+systems. With a Union established on the principle of absolutely
+unrestricted commercial intercourse, you here in South Carolina, and
+more especially in Columbia, are to-day making it, so to speak,
+uncomfortable for the cotton manufacturer in New England; and I am glad
+of it! A sharp competition is a healthy incentive to effort and
+ingenuity, and the brutal injunction, "Root hog or die!" is one from
+which I in no way ask to have New England exempt. When Massachusetts is
+no longer able to hold its own industrially in a free field, the time
+will, in my judgment, have come for Massachusetts to go down. With
+communities as with children, paternalism reads arrested development.
+One of the great products of Massachusetts has been what is generically
+known as "footwear." Yet I am told that under the operation of absolute
+Free Trade, St. Louis possesses the largest boot and shoe factory in its
+output in the entire world. That is, the law of industrial development,
+as natural conditions warrant and demand, has worked out its results;
+and those results are satisfactory. I am aware that the farmer of
+Massachusetts has become practically extinct; he cannot face the
+competition of the great West: but the Massachusetts consumer is greatly
+advantaged thereby. So far as agricultural products are concerned,
+Massachusetts is to-day reduced to what is known as dairy products and
+garden truck; and it is well! Summer vegetables manufactured under glass
+in winter prove profitable. So, turning his industrial efforts to that
+which he can do best, even the Massachusetts agriculturalist has
+prospered. On the other hand, wherever in this country protection has
+been most completely applied, I insist that if its results are analyzed
+in an unprejudiced spirit, it will be pronounced to have worked
+unmitigated evil,--an unhealthy, because artificially stimulated and too
+rapid, growth. Let Lawrence, in Massachusetts, serve as an example. Look
+at the industrial system there introduced in the name of Protection
+against the Pauper Labor of Europe! No growth is so dangerous as a too
+rapid growth; and I confidently submit that politically, socially,
+economically and industrially, America to-day, on the issues agitating
+us, presents an almost appalling example of the results of hot-house
+stimulation.
+
+Nor is this all, nor the worst. There is another article, and far more
+damaging, in the indictment. Through Protection, and because of it,
+Paternalism has crept in; and, like a huge cancerous growth, is eating
+steadily into the vitals of the political system. Instead of supporting
+a government economically administered by money contributed by the
+People, a majority of the People to-day are looking to the government
+for support, either directly through pension payments or indirectly
+through some form of industrial paternalism. Incidentally, a profuse
+public expenditure is condoned where not actually encouraged.
+Jeffersonian simplicity is preached; extravagance is practised. As the
+New York showman long since shrewdly observed: "The American people
+love to be fooled!"
+
+But I must pass on; I still have far to go. As respects legislation, I
+have said that sixty years ago, when my memories begin, the American
+ideal was the individual, and individuality. This, implied adherence to
+the Jeffersonian theory that heretofore the world had been governed too
+much. The great secret of true national prosperity, happiness and
+success was, we were taught, to allow to each individual the fullest
+possible play, provided only he did not infringe on the rights of
+others. How is it to-day? America is the most governed and legislated
+country in the world! With one national law-making machine perpetually
+at work grinding out edicts, we have some fifty provincial mills engaged
+in the same interesting and, to my mind, pernicious work. No one who has
+given the slightest consideration to the subject will dispute the
+proposition that, taking America as a whole, we now have twenty acts of
+legislation annually promulgated, and with which we are at our peril
+supposed to be familiar, where one would more than suffice. Then we
+wonder that respect for the law shows a sensible decrease! The better
+occasion for wonder is that it survives at all. We are both legislated
+and litigated out of all reason.
+
+Passing to the other proposition of individuality, there has been, as
+all men know and no one will dispute, a most perceptible tendency of
+late years towards what is known as the array of one portion of the
+community--the preponderating, voting portion--against another--the more
+ostentatious property-holding portion. It is the natural result, I may
+say the necessary as well as logical outcome, of a period of too rapid
+growth,--production apportioned by no rule or system other or higher
+than greed and individual aptitude for acquisition. I will put the
+resulting case in the most brutal, and consequently the clearest, shape
+of which I am capable. Working on the combined theories of individualism
+controlled and regulated by competition, it has been one grand game of
+grab,--a process in which the whole tendency of our legislation,
+national or state, has during the last twenty years been, first, to
+create monopolies of capital and, later, to bring into existence a
+counter, but no less privileged, class, known as the "wage-earner."
+
+Of the first class it is needless to speak, for, as a class, it is
+sufficiently pilloried by the press and from the hustings. Much in
+evidence, those prominent in it are known as the possessors of
+"predatory wealth"; "unjailed malefactors," they are subjects of
+continuous "grilling" in the congressional and legislative committee
+rooms. The effort to make them "disgorge" is as continual as it is
+noisy, and, as a rule, futile. It constitutes a curious and in some
+respects instructive exhibition of misdirected popular feeling and
+legislative incompetence. None the less, the existence of a monopolist
+class calls for no proof at the bar of public opinion. Not so the other
+and even more privileged class,--the so-called "wage-earner"; for,
+disguise it as the trades-unionist will, angrily deny it as he does, the
+fact remains that to-day under the operation of our jury system and of
+our laws, the Wage-earner and the member of the Trades-Union has become,
+as respects the rest of the community, himself a monopolist and,
+moreover, privileged as such. Practically, crimes urged and even
+perpetrated in behalf of so-called "labor" receive at the hands of
+juries, and also not infrequently of courts, an altogether excessive
+degree of merciful consideration. At the same time, both here and in
+Europe Organized Labor is instant in its demand that immunity, denied
+to ordinary citizens, and those whom it terms "the classes," shall by
+special exemption be conferred upon the Labor Union and upon the
+Wage-earner. The tendency on both sides and at each extreme to
+inequality in the legislature and before the law is thus manifest.
+
+Viewing conditions face to face and as they now are, no thoughtful
+observer can, in my judgment, avoid the conviction that, whether for
+good or ill, for better or for worse, this country as a community has,
+within the last thirty years--that is, we will say, since our centennial
+year, 1876--cast loose from its original moorings. It has drifted, and
+is drifting, into unknown seas. Nor is this true of English-speaking
+America alone. I have already quoted Lord Morley in another connection.
+Lord Morley, however, only the other day delivered, as Chancellor of
+Manchester University, a most interesting and highly suggestive
+address, in which, referring to conservative Great Britain, he thus
+pictured a phase of current belief: "Political power is described as
+lying in the hands of a vast and mobile electorate, with scanty regard
+for tradition or history. Democracy, they say, is going to write its own
+programme. The structure of executive organs and machinery is undergoing
+half-hidden, but serious alterations. Men discover a change of attitude
+towards law as law; a decline in reverence for institutions as
+institutions."
+
+While, however, the influences at work are thus general and the
+manifestations whether on the other side of the Atlantic or here bear a
+strong resemblance, yet difference of conditions and detail
+--constitutional peculiarities, so to speak--must not be
+disregarded. One form of treatment may not be prescribed for all. In our
+case, therefore, it remains to consider how best to adapt this country
+and ourselves to the unforeseeable,--the navigation of uncharted waters;
+and this adaptation cannot be considered hi any correct and helpful,
+because scientific, spirit, unless the cause of change is located.
+Surface manifestations are, in and of themselves, merely deceptive. A
+physician, diagnosing the chances of a patient, must first correctly
+ascertain, or at least ascertain with approximate correctness, the seat
+of the trouble under which the patient is suffering. So, we.
+
+And here I must frankly confess to small respect for the
+politician,--the man whose voice is continually heard, whether from the
+Senate Chamber or the Hustings. There is in those of his class a
+continual and most noticeable tendency to what may best be described as
+the _post ergo propter_ dispensation. With them, the eye is fixed on the
+immediate manifestation. Because one event preceded another, the first
+event is obviously and indisputably the cause of the later event. For
+instance, in the present case, the cause or seat of our existing and
+very manifest social, political and financial disturbances is attributed
+as of course to some peculiarity of legislation, either a subtreasury
+bill passed in the administration of General Jackson, or a tariff bill
+passed in the administration of Mr. Taft, or the demonetization of
+silver in the Hayes period,--that "Crime of the Century," the
+Crucifixion of Labor on the Cross of Gold! Once for all, let me say, I
+contemplate this school of politicians and so-called "thinkers" with
+sentiments the reverse of respectful. In plain language, I class them
+with those known in professional parlance as quacks and charlatans. Not
+always, not even in the majority of cases, does that which preceded bear
+to that which follows the relation of cause and effect. A marked example
+of this false attribution is afforded in more recent political history
+by the everlasting recurrence of the statement that American prosperity
+is the result of an American protective system. Yet in the Protectionist
+dispensation, this has become an article of faith. To my mind, it is
+undeserving of even respectful consideration.
+
+If I were asked the cause of that change, little short of
+revolutionary, if indeed in any respect short of it, which has occurred
+in the material condition of the American people, and consequently in
+all its theories and ideals, within the last thirty years, I should
+attribute it to a wholly different cause. Mr. Lecky some years ago, in
+his book entitled "Liberty and Democracy," made the following statement,
+in no way original, but, as he put it, sufficiently striking: "The
+produce of the American mines [incident to the discoveries made by
+Columbus] created, in the most extreme form ever known in Europe, the
+change which beyond all others affects most deeply and universally the
+material well-being of men: it revolutionized the value of the precious
+metals, and, in consequence, the price of all articles, the effects of
+all contracts, the burden of all debts."
+
+In other words, referring to the first half of the sixteenth
+century,--the sixty years, we will say, following the land-fall of
+Columbus,--the historian attributed the great change which then occurred
+and which stands forth so markedly in history, to the increased
+New-World production of the precious metals, combined with the impetus
+given to trade and industry as a consequence of that discovery, and of
+the mastery of man over additional globe areas. Now, dismissing from
+consideration the so-called American protective system, likewise our
+currency issues and, generally, the patchwork, so to speak, of
+crazy-quilt legislation to which so much is attributed during the last
+thirty years, I confidently submit that in the production of the results
+under discussion, they are quantities and factors hardly worthy of
+consideration. The cause of the change which has taken place lies far
+deeper and must be sought in influences of a wholly different nature,
+influences developed into an increased and still ever increasing
+activity, over which legislation has absolutely no control. I refer, of
+course, to man's mastery over the latent forces of Nature. Of these
+Steam and Electricity are the great examples, which, because always
+apparent, at once strike the imagination. These, as tools, it is to be
+remembered, date practically from within one hundred years back. It may,
+indeed, safely be asserted that up to 1815, the end of the Wars of
+Napoleon and the time of your Professor Lieber, steam even had not as
+yet practically affected the operations of man, while electricity, when
+not a terror, was as yet but a toy. Commerce was still exclusively
+carried on by the sailing ship and canal-boat. The years from the fall
+of Napoleon to our own War of Secession--from Waterloo to
+Gettysburg--were practically those of early and partial development. Not
+until well after Appomattox, that is, since the year 1870,--a period
+covering but little more than the life of a generation,--did what is
+known to you here as the Applied Sciences cover a range difficult to
+specialize. As factors in development, it is safe to say that those
+three tremendous agencies--Steam, Electricity, Chemistry--have, so to
+speak, worked all their noticeable results within the lifetime of the
+generation born since we celebrated the Centennial of Independence. The
+manifestations now resulting and apparent to all are the natural outcome
+of the use of these modern appliances, become in our case everyday
+working tools in the hands of the most resourceful, adaptive, ingenious
+and energetic of communities, developing a virgin continent of
+undreamed-of wealth. Naturally, under such conditions, the advance has
+been not only general and continuous, but one of ever increasing
+celerity. So Protection and the Currency become flies on the fast
+revolving wheel!
+
+But what has otherwise resulted?--An unrest, social, economical,
+political. Not contentment, but a lamentation and an ancient tale of
+wrong! We hear it in the continual cry over what is known as the
+increased cost of living, and feel its pressure in the higher standard
+of living. What was considered wealth by our ancestors is to-day hardly
+competence. What sufficed for luxury in our childhood barely now
+supplies what are known as the comforts of life. Take, for instance, the
+motor,--the automobile. I speak within bounds, I think, when I say there
+are many fold more motors to-day racing over the streets, the highways
+and the byways of America than there were one-horse wagons thirty-five
+years ago. Six hundred, I am told, are to be found within the immediate
+neighborhood of Columbia; and, since I have been here I have seen in
+your streets just one man on horse-back! These figures and that
+statement tell the tale. A few years only back, every Carolinian rode
+to town, and the motor was unknown. A single illustrative example, this
+could be duplicated in innumerable ways everywhere and in all walks
+of life.
+
+The result is obvious, and was inevitable. Entered on a new phase of
+existence, the world is not as it was in the days of Columbus, when a
+single new continent was discovered containing in it what we would now
+regard as a limited accumulation of the precious metals. It is, on the
+contrary, as if, in the language of Dr. Johnson, "the potentiality of
+wealth" had been revealed "beyond the dreams of avarice"; together with
+not one or two, but a dozen continents, the existence and secrets of
+which are suddenly laid bare. The Applied Sciences have been the
+magicians,--not Protection or the Currency.
+
+And still scientists are continually dinning in our ears the question
+whether this state of affairs is going to continue,--whether the era of
+disturbance has reached its limit! I hold such a question to be little
+short of childish. That era has not reached its limits, nor has it even
+approximated those limits. On the contrary, we have just entered on the
+uncharted sea. We know what the last thirty years have brought about as
+the result of the agencies at work; but as yet we can only dimly dream
+of what the next sixty years are destined to see brought about.
+Imagination staggers at the suggestion.
+
+What, then, has been of this the inevitable consequence,--the
+consequence which even the blindest should have foreseen? It has
+resulted in all those far-reaching changes suggested in the earlier part
+of what I have said to-day, as respects our ideals, our political
+theories, our social conditions. In other words, the old era is ended;
+what is implied when we say a new era is entered upon?
+
+To attempt a partial answer to the query implies no claim to a prophetic
+faculty. Whether we like to face the fact or not, far-reaching changes
+in our economical theories and social conditions are imminent, involving
+corresponding readjustments in our constitutional arrangements and
+political machinery. Tennyson foreshadowed it all in his "Locksley Hall"
+seventy years ago:--"The individual withers, and the world is more and
+more." The day of individualism as it existed in the American ideal of
+sixty years since is over; that of collectivism and possibly socialism
+has opened. The day of social equality is relegated to what may be
+considered a somewhat patriarchal past,--that patriarchal past having
+come to a close during the memory of those still in active life.
+
+And yet, though all this can now be studied in the political discussion
+endlessly dragging on, strangely and sadly enough that discussion
+carries in it hardly a note of encouragement. It is, in a word,
+unspeakably shallow. And here, having sufficiently for my present
+purpose though in hurried manner, diagnosed the situation,--located the
+seat of disturbance,--we come to the question of treatment. Involving,
+as it necessarily does, problems of the fundamental law, and a
+rearrangement and different allocation of the functions of government,
+this challenges the closest thought of the publicist. That the problem
+is here crying aloud for solution is apparent. The publications which
+cumber the counters of our book-stores, those for which the greatest
+popular call to-day exists--treatises relating to trade interests, to
+collectivism, to socialism, even to anarchism--tell the tale in part; in
+part it is elsewhere and otherwise told. Only recently, in once Puritan
+Massachusetts, processions paraded the streets carrying banners marked
+with this device, more suggestive than strange:--"No master and no God!"
+
+What are the remedies popularly proposed? In that important branch of
+polity known as Political Ethics, or, as he termed them, Hermeneutics,
+which your Professor Lieber sixty years ago endeavored to treat of, what
+advance has since his time been effected?--Nay! what advance has been
+effected since the time, over two thousand years, of his great
+predecessor, Aristotle? I confidently submit that what progress is now
+being made in this most erudite of sciences is in the nature of that of
+the crab--backwards! In the discussions of Aristotle, the problem in
+view was, how to bring about government by the wisest,--that is, the
+most observant and expert. In other words, government, the object of
+politics, was by Aristotle treated in a scientific spirit. And this is
+as it should be. Take, for example, any problem,--I do not care whether
+it is legal or medical or one of engineering: How successfully dispose
+of it? Uniformly, in one way. Those problems are successfully solved, if
+at all, only when their solution is placed in the hands of the most
+proficient. Judged by the discussions of to-day, what advance has in
+politics been effected? Do the _Outlook_ and the _Commoner_ imply
+progress since the Stagirite? Not to any noticeable extent. We are, on
+the contrary, fumbling and wallowing about where the Greek pondered and
+philosophized.
+
+Democracy, as it is called, is to-day the great panacea,--the political
+nostrum; as such it is confidently advocated by statesmen and professors
+and even by the presidents of our institutions of the advanced
+education. "Trust the People" is the shibboleth! "Let the People rule!"
+"The cure for too much Liberty is more Liberty!" To Democracy plain and
+simple--Composite Wisdom--I frankly confess I feel no call,--no call
+greater than, for instance, towards Autocracy or Aristocracy or
+Plutocracy. Taken simply, and applied as hitherto applied, all and each
+lead to but one result,--failure! And that result, let me here predict,
+will, in the future, be the same in the case of pure Democracy that, in
+the past, it was in the case of the pure Autocracy of the Caesars, or
+the case of the pure Aristocracy of Rome or of the so-called Republics
+of the Middle Ages. A political edifice on shifting sands.
+
+Yet, to-day what do we see and hear in America? Tell it not in Gath;
+publish it not in the streets of Askalon I Two thousand years after the
+time of Aristotle, we see a prevailing school working directly back to
+the condition of affairs which existed in the Athenian agora under the
+disapproving eyes of the father of political philosophy. Panaceas,
+universal cure-alls, and quack remedies--the Initiative, the Referendum,
+and the Recall are paraded as if these--nostrums of the mountebanks of
+the county fair--would surely remedy the perplexing ills of new and
+hitherto unheard-of social, economical, and political conditions.
+Democracy! What is Democracy? Democracy, as it is generally understood,
+I submit, is nothing but the reaching of political conclusions through
+the frequent counting of noses; or, as Macaulay two generations ago
+better phrased it, "the majority of citizens told by the head";--the
+only question at just this juncture being whether, in order to the
+arriving at more acceptable results, both sexes shall be "told," instead
+of one sex only. Moreover, I with equal confidence make bold to suggest
+that while conceded, and while men have even persuaded themselves that
+they have faith in it, and really do believe in this "telling" of noses
+as the best and fairest attainable means of reaching correct results,
+yet in so doing and so professing they simply, as men are prone to do,
+deceive themselves. In other words, victims of their own cant, they
+preach a panacea in which they really do not believe. Nor of this is
+proof far to seek. _Vox populi, vox Dei_! If you extend the application
+of this principle by a single step, its loudest advocates draw back in
+alarm from the inevitable. They seek refuge in the assertion--"Oh! That
+is different!" For instance, take a concrete case; so best can we
+illustrate.
+
+One of the greatest scientific triumphs reached in modern times--perhaps
+I might fairly say the greatest--is the discovery of the cause of yellow
+fever, and its consequent control. As a result of the studies, the
+patient experimentation and self-sacrifice of the wisest,--that is, the
+most observant and expert,--the amazing conclusion was reached that not
+only the yellow fever but the innumerable ills of the flesh known under
+the caption of "malarial," were due to causes hitherto unsuspected,
+though obvious when revealed,--to the existence in the atmosphere of a
+venomous insect, in comparison with the work of which the ravages on
+mankind of the entire carnivorous and reptile creation were of
+comparatively small account. The mosquito flew disclosed, the
+atmospheric viper,--a viper most venomous and deadly. How was the
+disclosure brought about? What was the remedy applied? Was the discovery
+effected through universal suffrage? Was the remedy sought for and
+decided upon by the Initiative, or through a Referendum at an election
+held on the Tuesday succeeding the first Monday of a certain month and
+year? Had recourse in this case been had to the panacea now in greatest
+political vogue, we all know perfectly well what would have followed.
+History tells us. The quarantine, as it is called, would have been
+decreed, and a day of fasting, humiliation and prayer appointed. The
+mosquito, quite ignored, would then have gone on in his deadly work. We
+all equally well know that the man, even the politician or the
+statesman, who had suggested a solution of that problem by a count of
+noses would have been effaced with ridicule. Even the most simple minded
+would have rejected that method of reaching a result. Yet the ilia of
+the body politic, too, are complicated. Indeed, far more intricate in
+their processes and more deceitful in their aspects, they more deeply
+affect the general well-being and happiness than any ill or epidemic
+which torments the physical being, even the mosquito malaria. Yet the
+ills of the body politic, the complications which surround us on every
+side,--for these the unfailing panacea is said to lie in universal
+suffrage, that remedy which is immediately and of course laughed out of
+court if suggested in case of the simpler ills of the flesh.
+
+This, I submit, is demonstration. The true remedy is not to be sought in
+that direction in the one case any more than the other.
+
+There is a considerable element of truth, though possibly a not
+inconsiderable one of exaggeration, in this statement from a paper I
+recently chanced upon in the issue of the sober and classical _Edinburgh
+Review_ for October last,--a paper entitled "Democracy and
+Liberalism":--"History testifies unmistakably and unanimously to the
+passion of democracies for incompetence. There is nothing democracy
+dislikes and suspects so heartily as technical efficiency, particularly
+when it is independent of the popular vote." But to-day, what is
+politically proposed by our senatorial charlatans and the mountebanks of
+the market-place? The Referendum, the constant and easy Recall, the
+everlasting Initiative are dinned into our ears as the cure-alls of
+every ill of the body politic. On the contrary, I submit that, while in
+the absence of any better method as yet devised and accepted, the
+process of reaching results by a count of the "majority told by the
+head" of the citizens then present and voting has certain political
+advantages, yet, for all this, as a final, scientific, political
+process, it is unworthy of consideration. A passing expedient, it in no
+degree reflects credit on twentieth-century intelligence.
+
+And now I come to the crux of my discussion. Thus rejecting results
+reached by the ballot as now in practical use, a query is already in the
+minds of those who listen. At once suggesting itself and flung in my
+face, it is asked as a political poser, and not without a sneer,--What
+else or better have I to propose? Would I advise a return to old and
+discarded methods,--Heredity, Caste, Autocracy, Plutocracy? I
+respectfully submit this is a question no one has a right to put, and
+one I am not called upon to answer. Again, let me take a concrete case.
+Once more I appeal to the yellow fever precedent. The first step towards
+a solution of a medical, as of a political, problem is a correct
+diagnosis. Then necessarily follows a long period devoted to
+observation, to investigation and experiment. If, in the case of the
+yellow fever, a score of years only ago an observer had pointed out the
+nature of the disease and the manifest inadequacy of current theories
+and prevailing methods of prevention and treatment, do you think others
+would have had a right to turn upon him and demand that he instantly
+prescribe a remedy which should be not only complete, but at once
+recognized as such and so accepted? In the present case, as I have
+already observed, from the days of Aristotle down through two and twenty
+centuries, men had been experimenting in all, to them, conceivable ways,
+on the government of the body politic, exactly as they experimented on
+the disorders of the physical body. But only yesterday was the source of
+the yellow fever, for instance, diagnosed and located, and the proper
+means of prevention applied. The cancer and tuberculosis are to-day
+unsolved problems. By analogy, they are inviting subjects for an
+Initiative and a Referendum! Yet would any person who to-day, standing
+where I stand, expressed a disbelief, at once total and contemptuous, of
+such a procedure as respects them, be met by a demand for some other
+panacea of immediate and guaranteed efficiency? And so with the body
+politic. I here to-day am merely attempting a diagnosis, pointing out
+the disorders, and exposing as best I can the utter crudeness and
+insufficiency of the market-place remedies proposed. Have you a right,
+then, to turn on me, and call for some other prescription, warranted to
+cure, in place of the nostrums so loudly advertised by the sciolists and
+the dabblers of the day, and by me so contemptuously set aside? I
+confess I am unable to respond, or even to attempt a response to any
+such demand. I am not altogether a quack, nor is this a county fair.
+
+"Paracelsus," so denominated, was one of Robert Browning's earlier
+poems. In it he causes the fifteenth-century alchemist and forerunner of
+all modern pharmaceutical chemistry, to declare that as the result of
+long travel and much research
+
+
+"I possess
+Two sorts of knowledge: one,--vast, shadowy,
+Hints of the unbounded aim....
+The other consists of many secrets, caught
+While bent on nobler prize,--perhaps a few
+Prime principles which may conduct to much:
+These last I offer."
+
+
+So, _longo intervallo_, I have a few suggestions,--the result of an
+observation extending, as I said at the beginning, over the lives of two
+generations and a connection with many great events in which I have
+borne a part,--a part not prominent indeed, and more generally, I
+acknowledge, mistaken than correct. My errors, however, have at least
+made me cautious and doubtful of my own conclusions. I submit them for
+what they are worth. Not much, I fear.
+
+What, then, would I do, were it in my power to prescribe alterations and
+curatives for the ills of our American body politic, of which I have
+spoken; or, more correctly, the far-reaching disturbances manifestly due
+to the agencies at work, to which I have made reference? Let us come at
+once to the point, taking the existing Constitution of the United States
+as a concrete example, and recognizing the necessity for its revision
+and readjustment to meet radically changed conditions,--conditions
+social, material, geographical, changed and still changing.
+
+It was Mr. Gladstone who, years ago, made the often-quoted assertion
+that the Constitution of the United States was "the most wonderful work
+ever struck off at a given time by the brain and purpose of man." I do
+not think he was far wrong; though we, of course, realize that the
+Federal Constitution was a growth and in no degree an inspiration. That
+Constitution has through a century and a quarter stood the test of time
+and stress of war, during a period of almost unlimited growth of the
+community for which it was devised. It has outlasted many nationalities
+and most of the dynasties in existence at the time of its adoption; and
+that, too, under conditions sufficiently trying. I, therefore, regard it
+with profound respect; and, so regarding it, I would treat it with a
+cautious and tender hand. Not lightly pronouncing it antiquated, what
+changes would I make in it if to-morrow it were given me to prescribe
+alterations adapting it to the altered conditions which confront us? I
+do not hesitate to say, and I am glad to say, the changes I would
+suggest would be limited; yet, I fancy, far-reaching.
+
+And, in the first place, let us have a clear conception of the end in
+view. That end is, I submit, exactly the same to-day which Aristotle had
+in view more than twenty centuries ago. It is, not to solve all
+political problems, but to put political problems as they arise in the
+hands of those whom he termed the "best,"--but whom we know as the most
+intelligent, observant and expert,--to be, through their agency, in the
+way of ultimate solution. If, adopting every ill-considered and
+half-fledged measure of so-called reform which might be the fancy of the
+day, we incorporated them in our fundamental law, but one thing could
+result therefrom,--ultimate confusion. The Constitution is neither a
+legislative crazy-quilt nor a receptacle of fads. To make it such is in
+every respect the reverse of scientific. The work immediately in hand,
+therefore, is to devise such changes in the fundamental law as will tend
+most effectually to bring about the solution of issues as they may
+arise, by the most expert, observant and reliable. This accomplished, if
+its accomplishment were only practicable, all possible would have been
+done; and the necessary and inevitable readjustment of things would, in
+politics as in medicine and in science, be left to solve itself as
+occasion arose. Provision cannot be made against every contingency.
+
+This premised, the Constitution of the United States is an instrument
+through which powers are delegated by several local communities to a
+central government. The instrument, it was originally held, should be
+strictly construed and the powers delegated limited; and in this
+respect, with certain alterations made obviously necessary to meet
+changed conditions, I would return to the fundamental idea of
+the framers.
+
+In saying this I feel confidence also that here in South Carolina at
+least I shall meet with an earnest response. The time is not yet remote
+when local self-government worked salvation for South Carolina, as for
+her sister States of the Confederacy. You here will never forget what
+immediately followed the close of our Civil War. As an historic fact,
+the Constitution was then suspended. It was suspended by act of an
+irresponsible Congress, exercising revolutionary but unlimited powers
+over a large section of the common country. You then had an
+illustration, not soon to be forgotten, of concentration of legislative
+power. An episode at once painful and discreditable, it is not necessary
+here to refer to it in detail. Appeal, however, was made to the
+principle of local self-government,--it was, so to speak, a recurrence
+to the theory of State Sovereignty. The appeal struck a responsive,
+because traditional, chord; and it was through a recurrence to State
+Sovereignty as the agency of local self-government that loyalty and
+contentment were restored, and, I may add, that I am here to-day.
+Ceasing to be a Military Department, South Carolina once more became a
+State. Not improbably the demand will in a not remote future be heard
+that State lines and local autonomy be practically obliterated. In that
+event, I feel a confident assurance that, recurring in memory to the
+evil days which followed 1865, the spirit of enlightened conservatism
+will assert itself here and in the sister States of what was once the
+Confederacy; and again it will prevail. In the future, as in the past,
+you in South Carolina at least will cling to what in 1876 proved the ark
+of your social and political salvation.
+
+Taking another step in the discussion of changes, the Constitution is
+founded on that well-known distribution and allocation of powers first
+theoretically suggested by Montesquieu. There is a division, accompanied
+by a mutual limitation of authority, through the Judiciary, the
+Executive, and the Legislative. As respects this allocation, how would I
+modify that instrument? I freely say that the tendency of my thought,
+based on observation, is to conservatism. I have never yet in a single
+instance found that when the people of this or any other country
+accustomed to parliamentary government desired a thing, they failed to
+obtain it within a reasonable limit of time. Hasty changes are wisely
+deprecated; but I think I speak within limitation when I say that
+neither in the history of Great Britain,--the mother of Parliaments--nor
+in the history of the United States, has any modification which the
+people, on sober second thought, have considered to be for the best,
+long been deferred. Action, revolutionary in character, has not, as a
+rule, been needful, or, when taken, proved salutary. This is a record
+and result that no careful student of our history will, I take it, deny.
+
+Such being the case, so far as our Judiciary is concerned, I do not
+hesitate to say I would adhere to older, and, as I think, better
+principles, or revert to them where they have been experimentally
+abandoned. It took the Anglo-Saxon race two centuries of incessant
+conflict to wrest from a despotic executive, practically an autocracy,
+judicial independence. That was effected through what is known as a
+tenure during good behavior, as opposed to a tenure at the will of the
+monarch. This, then, for two centuries, was accepted as a fundamental
+principle of constitutional government. Of late, a new theory has been
+propounded, and by those chafing at all restraint--constitutionally
+lawless in disposition--it is said the Recall should also be applied to
+the Judiciary. Having, therefore, wrested the independence of the
+Judiciary from the hand of the Autocrat, we now propose to place it, in
+all trustfulness, in the hands of the Democrat. To me the proposition
+does not commend itself. It is founded on no correct principle, for the
+irresponsible democratic majority is even more liable to ill-considered
+and vacillating action than is the responsible autocrat. In that matter
+I would not trust myself; why, then, should I trust the composite
+Democrat? In the case of the Judiciary, therefore, I would so far as the
+fundamental law is concerned abide by the older and better considered
+principles of the framers.
+
+Next, the Executive. Again, we hear the demand of Democracy,--the
+Recall! Once more I revert to the record. This Republic has now been in
+working operation, and, taken altogether, most successful operation,
+for a century and a quarter. During that century and a quarter we have
+had, we will say, some five and twenty different chief magistrates.
+There is an ancient and somewhat vulgar adage to the effect that the
+proof of a certain dietary article is in its eating. Apply that homely
+adage to the matter under consideration. What is the lesson taught? It
+is simply this,--during a whole century and a quarter of existence there
+has not been one single chief executive of the United States to whom the
+arbitrary Recall could have been applied with what would now be agreed
+upon as a fortunate result. In the Andrew Johnson impeachment case was
+it not better that things were as they were? On the other hand, every
+one of the seven independent, self-respecting Senators who then by a
+display of high moral courage saved the country from serious prejudice
+would have been recalled out-of-hand had the Recall now demanded been in
+existence. Its working would have received prompt exemplification; as it
+was, the recall was effected in time, and after due deliberation. The
+delay occasioned no public detriment. In this life, experience is
+undeniably worth something; and the experience here referred to is
+fairly entitled to consideration. No political system possible to devise
+is wholly above criticism,--not open to exceptional contingencies or to
+dangers possible to conjure up. Such have from time to time arisen in
+the past; in the future such will inevitably arise. This consideration
+must, however, be balanced against a general average of successful
+working; and I confidently submit that, weighing thus the proved
+advantage of the system we have against the possibilities of danger
+which hereafter may occur, but which never yet have occurred, the scale
+on which are the considerations in favor of change kicks the beam.
+
+In view, however, of the growth of the country, the vastly increased
+complexity of interests involved, the intricacy and the cost of the
+election processes to which recourse is necessarily had, I would
+substitute for the present brief tenure of the presidential office--a
+tenure well enough perhaps in the comparatively simple days which
+preceded our Civil War--a tenure sufficiently long to enable the
+occupant of the presidential chair to have a policy and to accomplish at
+least something towards its adoption. As the case stands to-day, a
+President for the first time elected has during his term of four years,
+one year, and one year only, in which really to apply himself to the
+accomplishment of results. The first year of his term is necessarily
+devoted to the work of acquiring a familiarity with the machinery of the
+government, and the shaping of a policy. The second year may be devoted
+to a more or less strenuous effort at the adoption of the policy thus
+formulated. As experience shows, the action of the third and fourth
+years is gravely affected--if not altogether perverted from the work in
+hand--by what are known as the political exigencies incident to a
+succession. Manifestly, this calls for correction. The remedy, however,
+to my mind, is obvious and suggests itself. As the presidency is the
+one office under our Constitution national in character, and in no way
+locally representative, I would extend the term to seven years, and
+render the occupant of the office thereafter ineligible for reelection.
+Seven years is, I am aware, under our political system, an unusual term;
+and here my ears will, I know, be assailed by the great "mandate"
+cackle. The count of noses being complete, the mind of the composite
+Democrat is held to be made up. It only remains to formulate the
+consequent decree; and, with least possible delay, put it in way of
+practical enforcement. Again, I, as a publicist, demur. It is the old
+issue, that between instant action and action on second thought,
+presented once more. Briefly, the experience of sixty years strongly
+inclines me to a preference of matured and considerate action over that
+immediate action which notoriously is in nine cases out of ten as
+ill-advised as it is precipitate. Only in the field of politics is the
+expediency of the latter assumed as of course; yet, as in science and
+literature and art so in politics, final, because satisfactory, results
+are at best but slowly thrashed out. As respects wisdom, the modern
+statute book does not loom, monumental. Its contemplation would indeed
+perhaps even lead to a surmise that reasonable delay in formulating his
+"mandate" might, in the case of the composite Democrat as in that of the
+individual Autocrat, prove a not altogether unmixed, and so in the end
+an intolerable, evil.
+
+Thus while a change of the Executive and Legislative branches of the
+government might not be always simultaneously effected, by selecting
+seven years as the presidential term the election would be brought
+about, as frequently as might be, by itself, uncomplicated by local
+issues connected with the fortunes or political fate of individual
+candidates for office, whether State, Congressional, or Senatorial; and
+during the seven years of tenure, four, at least, it might reasonably be
+anticipated, would be devoted to the promotion of a definite policy, in
+place of one year in a term of four, as now. If also ineligible for
+reelection, there is at least a fair presumption that the occupant of
+the position might from start to finish apply himself to its duties and
+obligations, without being distracted therefrom by ulterior personal
+ends as constantly as humanly held in view.
+
+Having thus disposed of the Judiciary and the Executive, we come to the
+Legislative. And here I submit is the weak point in our American
+system,--manifestly the weak point, and to those who, like myself, have
+had occasion to know, undeniably so. I am here as a publicist; not as a
+writer of memoirs: so, on this head, I do not now propose to dilate or
+bear witness. I will only briefly say that having at one period, and for
+more than the lifetime of a generation, been in charge of large
+corporate and financial interests, I have had much occasion to deal with
+legislative bodies, National, State and Municipal. That page of my
+experiences is the one I care least to recall, and would most gladly
+forget. I am not going to specify, or give names of either localities or
+persons; but, knowing what I know, it is useless to approach me on this
+topic with the usual good-natured and optimistic, if somewhat unctuous
+and conventional, commonplaces on general uprightness and the tendency
+to improved conditions and a higher standard. I know better! I have seen
+legislators bought like bullocks--they selling themselves. I have
+watched them cover their tracks with a cunning more than vulpine. I have
+myself been black-mailed and sandbagged, while whole legislative bodies
+watched the process, fully cognizant at every step of what was going on.
+This, I am glad to say, was years ago. The legislative conditions were
+then bad, scandalously bad; nor have I any reason to believe in a
+regeneration since. The stream will never rise higher than its source;
+but it generally indicates the level thereof. In this case, I can only
+hope that in my experience it failed so to do. Running at a low level,
+the waters of that stream were deplorably dirty.
+
+That the legislative branch of our government has fallen so markedly in
+public estimation is not, I think, open to denial. To my mind, under the
+conditions I have referred to, such could not fail to be the case. It
+has, consequently, lost public confidence. Hence this popular demand for
+immediate legislation by the People,--this twentieth-century appeal to
+the Agora and Forum methods which antedate the era of Christ. It is true
+the world outgrew them two thousand years ago, and they were discarded;
+but, living in a progressive and not a reactionary period, all that, we
+are assured, is changed! The heart is no longer on the right-hand side
+of the body. To secure desired results it is only necessary to start
+quite fresh, as a mere preliminary discarding all lessons of experience.
+
+Such reasoning does not commend itself to my judgment. On the contrary,
+the failure of the American legislative to command an increasing public
+confidence, while both natural and obvious, is, if my observation guides
+me to conclusions in any degree correct, traceable to two reasons. So
+far as government is concerned, the law-making branch is assumed to be
+made up of the wisest and the most expert. Meanwhile, it is as a matter
+of fact chosen by the process I have not over-respectfully referred to
+as the counting of noses; and, moreover, by an unwritten law more
+binding than any in the Statute Book, that counting of noses is with us
+localized. In other words, when it comes to the choice of our
+law-makers, reducing provincialism to a system we make the local
+numerical majority supreme, and any one is considered competent to
+legislate. He can do that, even if by common knowledge he is incompetent
+or untrustworthy in every other capacity. Localization thus becomes the
+stronghold of mediocrity, the sure avenue to office of the second-and
+third-rate man,--he who wishes always to enjoy his share of a little
+brief authority, to have, he also, a taste of public life. In this
+respect our American system is, I submit, manifestly and incomparably
+inferior to the system of parliamentary election existing in Great
+Britain, itself open to grave criticism. In Great Britain the public man
+seeks the constituency wherever he can find it; or the constituency
+seeks its representative wherever it recognizes him. The present Prime
+Minister of Great Britain, for instance, represents a small Scotch
+constituency in which he never resided, but by which he was elected more
+than twenty years ago, and through which he has since consecutively
+remained in public life. On the other hand, look at the waste and
+extravagance of the system now and traditionally in use with us. To get
+into public life a man must not only be in sympathy with the majority of
+the citizens of the locality in which he lives, but he must continue to
+be in sympathy with that majority; or, at any election, like Mr. Cannon
+in the election just held, where for any passing cause a majority of his
+neighbors in the locality in which he lives may fail to support him, he
+must go into retirement. I cannot here enlarge on this topic, vital as I
+see it; I have neither space nor time, and must, therefore, needs
+content myself with the "hints" of Paracelsus. I will merely say that as
+an outcome this localized majority system practically disfranchises the
+more intelligent and the more disinterested, the more individual and
+independent of every constituency. It reduces their influence, and
+negatives their action. It operates in like fashion everywhere. My
+field of observation has been at home, here in America; but it has been
+the same in France. For instance, while preparing this address I came
+across the following in that most respectable sheet, the London
+_Athenaum_. A very competent Frenchman was there criticising a recent
+book entitled "Idealism in France." Reference was by him made to what,
+in France, is known as the "_scrutin d'arrondissement,"_ or, in other
+words, the district representative system. The critic declares that this
+system has there "created a party machine which has brought the country
+under the sway of a sort of Radical-Socialist Tammany, and bound
+together the voter and the deputy by a tie of mutual corruption, the
+candidate promising Government favors to the elector in return for his
+vote, and the elector supporting the candidate who promises most. Hence
+a policy in which ideas and ideals are forgotten for personal and local
+interests, as each candidate strives to outbid his rivals in the bribes
+that he offers to his constituents. Hence, finally, a general lowering
+in the tone of French home politics, every question being made
+subservient by the deputies to that of their reelection."
+
+I would respectfully inquire if the above does not apply word for word
+to the condition of affairs with which we are familiar in America.
+
+But let me here again cite a concrete case, still fresh in memory;
+nothing in abstract discussion tells so much. Take the late Carl
+Schurz. If there was one man in our public life since 1865 who showed a
+genius for the parliamentary career, and who in six short years in the
+United States Senate--a single term--displayed there constructive
+legislating qualities of the highest order, it was Carl Schurz. Yet at
+the end of that single senatorial term, for local and temporary reasons
+he failed to obtain the support of a majority, or the support of
+anything approaching a majority, of those composing the constituency
+upon which he depended. Consequently he was retired from that
+parliamentary position necessary for the accomplishment, through him, of
+best public results. Yet at that very time there was no man in the
+United States who commanded so large and so personal a constituency as
+Carl Schurz; for he represented the entire Germanic element in the
+United States. Distributed as that element was, however, with its vote
+localized under our law, unwritten as well as statutory, there was no
+possibility of any constituency so concentrating itself that Carl Schurz
+could be kept in the position where he could continue to render services
+of the greatest possible value to the country. I, therefore, confidently
+here submit a doubt whether human ingenuity could devise any system
+calculated to lead to a greater waste of parliamentary ability, or more
+effectually keep from the front and position of influence that
+legislative superiority which was the arm of Aristotle to secure.
+"Cant-patriotism," as your Francis Lieber termed it; and, on this
+score, he waxed eloquent. "Do we not live in a world of cant," he wrote
+from Columbia here to a friend at the North seventy-five years ago,
+"that cant-patriotism which plumes itself in selecting men from within
+the State confines only. The truer a nation is, the more essentially it
+is elevated, the more it disregards petty considerations, and takes the
+true and the good from whatever quarter it may come. Look at history and
+you find the proof. Look around you, where you are, and you find it
+now." And, were Lieber living to-day, he would find a striking
+exemplification of the consequences of a total and systematic disregard
+of this elementary proposition in studying the United States Senate from
+and through its reporters' gallery. The decline in the standards of that
+body, whether of aspect, intelligence, education or character, under the
+operation of the local primary has been not less pronounced than
+startling. The outcome and ripe result of "cant-patriotism," it affords
+to the curious observer an impressive object-lesson,--provincialism
+reduced to a political system; what a witty and incisive French writer
+has recently termed the "Cult of Incompetence." Speaking of conditions
+prevailing not here but in France, this observer says:--"Democracy in
+its modern form chooses its' delegates in its own image.... What ought
+the character of the legislator to be? The very opposite, it seems to
+me, of the democratic legislator, for he ought to be well-informed and
+entirely devoid of prejudice." Taken as a whole, and a few striking
+individual exceptions apart, are those composing the Senate of the
+United States conspicuous in these respects? They certainly do not so
+impress the casual observer. That, as a body, they increasingly fail to
+command confidence and attention is matter of common remark. Nor is the
+reason far to seek. It would be the same as respects literature, science
+and art, were their representatives chosen and results reached through a
+count of noses localized, with selection severely confined to
+home talent.
+
+I am well aware of the criticism which will at once be passed on what I
+now advance. Local representation through choice by numerical majorities
+within given confines, geographically and mathematically fixed, is a
+system so rooted and intrenched in the convictions and traditions of the
+American community that even to question its wisdom evinces a lack of
+political common-sense. It in fact resembles nothing so much as the
+attempt to whistle down a strongly prevailing October wind from the
+West. The attempt so to do is not practical politics! In reply, however,
+I would suggest that such a criticism is wholly irrelevant. The
+publicist has nothing to do with practical politics. It is as if it were
+objected to a physician who prescribed sanitation against epidemics that
+the community in question was by custom and tradition wedded to filth
+and surface-drainage, and could not possibly be induced to abandon them
+in favor of any new-fangled theories of soap-and-water cleanliness. So
+why waste time in prescribing such? Better be common-sensed and
+practical, taking things as they are. In the case suggested, and
+confronted with such criticism, the medical adviser simply shrugs his
+shoulders, and is silent; the alternative he knows is inescapable. After
+a sufficiency of sound scourgings the objecting community will probably
+know better, and may listen to reason; in a way, conforming thereto. So,
+also, the body politic. If Ephraim is indeed thus joined to idols, the
+publicist simply shrugs his shoulders, and passes on; possibly, after
+Ephraim has been sufficiently scourged, he may in that indefinite future
+popularly known as "one of these days" be more clear sighted and wiser.
+
+None the less, so far as our national parliamentary system is concerned,
+could I have my way in a revision of the Constitution, I would increase
+the senatorial term to ten years, and I would, were such a thing within
+the range of possibility, break down the system of the necessary
+senatorial selection by a State of an inhabitant of the State. If I
+could, I would introduce the British system. For example, though I never
+voted for Mr. Bryan and have not been in general sympathy with Mr.
+Roosevelt, yet few things would give me greater political satisfaction
+than to see Mr. Bryan, we will say, elected a Senator from Arizona or
+Oregon, Mr. Roosevelt elected from Illinois or Pennsylvania, President
+Taft from Utah or Vermont. They apparently best represent existing
+feelings and the ideals prevailing in those communities; why, then,
+should they not voice those feelings and ideals in our highest
+parliamentary chamber?
+
+As respects our House of Representatives, it would in principle be the
+same. I do not care to go into the rationale of what is known as
+proportional representation, nor have I time so to do; but, were it in
+my power, I would prescribe to-morrow that hereafter the national House
+of Representatives should be constituted on the proportional basis,--the
+choice of representatives to be by States, but, as respects the
+nomination of candidates, irrespective of district lines. Like many
+others, I am very weary of provincial nobodies, "good men" locally known
+to be such!
+
+As I have already said, in parliamentary government all depends in the
+end on the truly representative character of the legislative body. If
+that is as it should be, the rest surely follows. The objective of
+Aristotle is attained.
+
+Exceeding the limits assigned to it, my discussion has, however,
+extended too far. I must close. One word before so doing. Why am I here?
+I am here,--a man considerably exceeding in age the allotted threescore
+and ten--to deliver a message, be the value of the same greater or less.
+I greatly fear it is less. I would, however, impart the lessons of an
+experience stretching over sixty years,--the results of such observation
+as my intelligence has enabled me to exercise. I do so, addressing
+myself to a local institution of the advanced education. Why? Because,
+looking over the country, diagnosing its conditions as well as my
+capacity enables me, observing the evolution of the past and
+forecasting, in as far as I may, the outcome, I am persuaded that the
+future of the country rests more largely in the hands of such
+institutions as this than in those of any other agency or activity. Do
+not say I flatter; for, while I can hope for no advancement, I think I
+have not overstated the case; I certainly have not overstated my
+conviction. There has been no man who has influenced the course of
+modern thought more deeply and profoundly than Adam Smith, a Professor
+in a Scotch University of the second class. So here in Columbia seventy
+years ago, Francis Lieber prepared and published his "Manual of
+Political Ethics." Adam Smith and Francis Lieber were but
+prototypes--examples of what I have in mind. The days were when the
+Senate of the United States afforded a rostrum from which thinkers and
+teachers first formulated, and then advanced, great policies. Those
+days, and I say it regretfully, are past. Unless I am greatly mistaken,
+however, a new political force is now asserting itself. I have recently,
+at a meeting of historical and scientific associations in Boston, had my
+attention forcibly called to this aspect of the situation now shaping
+itself. I there met young men, many, and not the least noticeable of
+whom, came from this section. They inspired me with a renewed confidence
+in our political future. Essentially teachers,--I might add, they were
+publicists as well as professors. Observers and students, they actively
+followed the course of developing thought in Europe as in this country.
+Exact in their processes, philosophical and scientific in their methods,
+unselfish in their devotion, they were broad of view. It is for them to
+realize in a future not remote the University ideal pictured, and
+correctly pictured, from this stage by one who here preceded me a short
+six months ago. They, constituting the University, are the "hope of the
+State in the direction of its practical affairs; in teaching the lawyer
+the better standards of his profession, his duty to place character
+above money making; in teaching the legislator the philosophy of
+legislation, and that the constructive forces of legislation carefully
+considered should precede every effort to change an existing status; in
+teaching those in official life, executive and judicial, that demagogy,
+and theories of life uncontrolled by true principles, do not make for
+success, when final success is considered, but that, if they did lead to
+success, they should be avoided for their inherent imperfection.... The
+province of the University is to educate citizenship in the abstract."
+
+It is the presence of this class, to those composing which I bow as
+distinctly of a period superior to mine, that you owe my presence
+to-day,--whatever that presence may be worth. I regard their existence
+and their coming forward in such institutions as this University of
+South Carolina, as the arc of the bow of promise spanning the political
+horizon of our future.
+
+Through you, to them my message is addressed.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's 'Tis Sixty Years Since, by Charles Francis Adams
+
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+Project Gutenberg's 'Tis Sixty Years Since, by Charles Francis Adams
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+Title: 'Tis Sixty Years Since
+
+Author: Charles Francis Adams
+
+Release Date: February, 2006 [EBook #9996]
+[Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule]
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+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 'TIS SIXTY YEARS SINCE ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Afra Ullah, Sjaani and PG Distributed Proofreaders
+
+
+
+
+"TIS SIXTY YEARS SINCE"
+
+ADDRESS OF
+
+CHARLES FRANCIS ADAMS
+
+
+
+FOUNDERS' DAY, JANUARY 16, 1913
+
+
+
+"'TIS SIXTY YEARS SINCE"
+
+In the single hour self-allotted for my part in this occasion there is
+much ground to cover,--the time is short, and I have far to go. Did I
+now, therefore, submit all I had proposed to say when I accepted your
+invitation, there would remain no space for preliminaries. Yet something
+of that character is in place. I will try to make it brief.[1]
+
+As the legend or text of what I have in mind to submit, I have given the
+words "'Tis Sixty Years Since." As some here doubtless recall, this is
+the second or subordinate title of Walter Scott's first novel,
+"Waverley," which brought him fame. Given to the world in 1814,--hard on
+a century ago,--"Waverley" told of the last Stuart effort to recover the
+crown of Great Britain,--that of "The '45." It so chances that Scott's
+period of retrospect is also just now most appropriate in my case,
+inasmuch as I entered Harvard as a student in the year 1853--"sixty
+years since!" It may fairly be asserted that school life ends, and what
+may in contradistinction thereto be termed thinking and acting life
+begins, the day the young man passes the threshold of the institution of
+more advanced education. For him, life's responsibilities then begin.
+Prior to that confused, thenceforth things with him become
+consecutive,--a sequence. Insensibly he puts away childish things.
+
+[1] Owing to its length, this "Address" was compressed in delivery,
+occupying one hour only. It is here printed in the form in which it was
+prepared,--the parts omitted in delivery being included.
+
+In those days, as I presume now, the college youth harkened to inspired
+voices. Sir Walter Scott belonged to a previous generation. Having held
+the close attention of a delighted world as the most successful
+story-teller of his own or any preceding period, he had passed off the
+stage; but only a short twenty years before. Other voices no less
+inspired had followed; and, living, spoke to us. Perhaps my scheme
+to-day is best expressed by one of these.
+
+When just beginning to attract the attention of the English-speaking
+world, Alfred Tennyson gave forth his poem of "Locksley Hall,"--very
+familiar to those of my younger days. Written years before, at the time
+of publication he was thirty-three. In 1886, a man of seventy-five, he
+composed a sequel to his earlier effort,--the utterance entitled
+"Locksley Hall Sixty Years After." He then, you will remember, reviewed
+his young man's dreams,--dreams of the period when he
+
+
+" ... dip't into the future, far as human eye could see,
+Saw the Vision of the world, and all the wonder that would be,"
+
+
+--threescore years later contrasting in sombre verse an old man's stern
+realities with the bright anticipations of youth. Such is my purpose
+to-day. "Wandering back to living boyhood," to the time when I first
+simultaneously passed the Harvard threshold and the threshold of
+responsible life, I propose to compare the ideals and actualities of the
+present with the ideals, anticipations and dreams of a past now
+somewhat remote.
+
+To say that in life and in the order of life's events it is the
+unexpected which is apt to occur, is a commonplace. That it has been so
+in my own case, I shall presently show. Meanwhile, not least among the
+unexpected things is my presence here to-day. If, when I entered Harvard
+in 1853, it had been suggested that in 1913, I,--born of the New England
+Sanhedrim, a Brahmin Yankee by blood, tradition and environment--had it
+been suggested that I, being such, would sixty years later stand by
+invitation here in Columbia before the faculty and students of the
+University of South Carolina, I should under circumstances then existing
+have pronounced the suggestion as beyond reasonable credence. Here,
+however, I am; and here, from this as my rostrum, I propose to-day to
+deliver a message,--such as it is.
+
+And yet, though such a future outcome, if then foretold, would have
+seemed scarcely possible of occurrence, there, after all, were certain
+conditions which would have rendered the contingency even at that time
+not only possible, but in accordance with the everlasting fitness of
+things. For, curiously enough, personal relations of a certain character
+held with this institution would have given me, even in 1853, a sense of
+acquaintance with it such as individually I had with no other
+institution of similar character throughout the entire land. It in this
+wise came about. At that period, preceding as it did the deluge about to
+ensue, it was the hereditary custom of certain families more especially
+of South Carolina and of Louisiana,--but of South Carolina in
+particular--to send their youth to Harvard, there to receive a college
+education. It thus chanced that among my associates at Harvard were not
+a few who bore names long familiarly and honorably known to Carolinian
+records,--Barnwell and Preston, Rhett and Alston, Parkman and Eliot; and
+among these were some I knew well, and even intimately. Gone now with
+the generation and even the civilization to which they belonged, I doubt
+if any of them survive. Indeed only recently I chanced on a grimly
+suggestive mention of one who had left on me the memory of a character
+and personality singularly pure, high-toned and manly,--permeated with a
+sense of moral and personal obligation. I have always understood he died
+five years later at Sharpsburg, as you call it, or Antietam, as it was
+named by us, in face-to-face conflict with a Massachusetts regiment
+largely officered by Harvard men of his time and even class,--his own
+familiar friends. This is the record, the reference being to a marriage
+service held at St. Paul's church in Richmond, in the late autumn of
+1862: "An indefinable feeling of gloom was thrown over a most auspicious
+event when the bride's youngest sister glided through a side door just
+before the processional. Tottering to a chancel pew, she threw herself
+upon the cushions, her slight frame racked with sobs. Scarcely a year
+before, the wedding march had been played for her, and a joyous throng
+saw her wedded to gallant Breck Parkman. Before another twelvemonth
+rolled around the groom was killed at the front."[2] Samuel Breck
+Parkman was in the Harvard class following that to which I belonged.
+Graduating in 1857, fifty-five years later I next saw his name in the
+connection just given. It recorded an incident of not infrequent
+occurrence in those dark and cruel days.
+
+It was, however, in Breck Parkman and his like that I first became
+conscious of certain phases of the South Carolina character which
+subsequently I learned to bear in high respect.
+
+So far as this University of South Carolina was concerned, it also so
+chanced that, by the merest accident, I, a very young man, was thrown
+into close personal relations with one of the most eminent of your
+professors,--Francis Lieber. Few here, I suppose, now personally
+remember Francis Lieber. To most it gives indeed a certain sense of
+remoteness to meet one who, as in my case, once held close and even
+intimate relations with a German emigrant, distinguished as a publicist,
+who as a youth had lain, wounded and helpless, a Prussian recruit, on
+the field above Namur. Occurring in June, 1815, two days after Waterloo,
+the affair at Namur will soon be a century gone. Of those engaged in
+it, the last obeyed the fell sergeant's summons a half score years ago.
+It seems remote; but at the time of which I speak Waterloo was
+appreciably nearer those in active life than are Shiloh and Gettysburg
+now. The Waterloo campaign was then but thirty-eight years removed,
+whereas those last are fifty now; and, while Lieber was at Waterloo, I
+was myself at Gettysburg.
+
+[2] DeLeon, "Belles, Beaux and Brains of the Sixties," p. 158.
+
+Subsequently, later in life, it was again my privilege to hold close
+relations with another Columbian,--an alumnus of this University as it
+then was--in whom I had opportunity to study some of the strongest and
+most respect-commanding traits of the Southern character. I refer to one
+here freshly remembered,--Alexander Cheves Haskell,--soldier, jurist,
+banker and scholar, one of a septet of brothers sent into the field by a
+South Carolina mother calm and tender of heart, but in silent suffering
+unsurpassed by any recorded in the annals whether of Judea or of Rome.
+It was the fourth of the seven Haskells I knew, one typical throughout,
+in my belief, of what was best in your Carolinian development. With him,
+as I have said, I was closely and even intimately associated through
+years, and in him I had occasion to note that almost austere type
+represented in its highest development in the person and attributes of
+Calhoun. Of strongly marked descent, Haskell was, as I have always
+supposed, of a family and race in which could be observed those virile
+Scotch-Irish and Presbyterian qualities which found their
+representative types in the two Jacksons,--Andrew, and him known in
+history as "Stonewall." To Alec Haskell I shall in this discourse again
+have occasion to refer.
+
+Thus, though in 1853, and for long years subsequent thereto, it would
+not have entered my mind as among the probabilities that I should ever
+stand here, reviewing the past after the manner of Tennyson in his
+"Locksley Hall Sixty Years After," yet if there was any place in the
+South, or, I may say, in the entire country, where, as a matter of
+association, I might naturally have looked so to stand, it would have
+been where now I find myself.
+
+But I must hasten on; for, as I have said, if I am to accomplish even a
+part of my purpose, I have no time wherein to linger.
+
+Not long ago I chanced, in a country ramble, to be conversing with an
+eminent foreigner, known, and favorably known, to all Americans. In the
+course of leisurely exchange of ideas between us, he suddenly asked if I
+could suggest any explanation of the fact that not only were the
+publicists who had the greatest vogue in our college days now to a large
+extent discredited, but that almost every view and theory advanced by
+them, and which we had accepted as fixed and settled, was, where not
+actually challenged, silently ignored. Nor did the assertion admit of
+denial; for, looking back through the vista of threescore years, of the
+principles of what may be called "public polity" then advanced as
+indisputable, few to-day meet with general acceptance. To review the
+record from this point of view is curious.
+
+When in 1853 I entered Harvard, so far as this country and its polity
+were concerned certain things were matters of contention, while others
+were accepted as axiomatic,--the basic truths of our system. Among the
+former--the subjects of active contention--were the question of Slavery,
+then grimly assuming shape, and that of Nationality intertwined
+therewith. Subordinate to this was the issue of Free Trade and
+Protection, with the school of so-called American political economy
+arrayed against that of Adam Smith. Beyond these as political ideals
+were the tenets and theories of Jeffersonian Democracy. That the world
+had heretofore been governed too much was loudly acclaimed, and the
+largest possible individualism was preached, not only as a privilege but
+as a right. The area of government action was to be confined within the
+narrowest practical limits, and ample scope was to be allowed to each to
+develop in the way most natural to himself, provided only he did not
+infringe upon the rights of others. Materially, we were then reaching
+out to subdue a continent,--a doctrine of Manifest Destiny was in vogue.
+Beyond this, however, and most important now to be borne in mind,
+compared with the present the control of man over natural agencies and
+latent forces was scarcely begun. Not yet had the railroad crossed the
+Missouri; electricity, just bridled, was still unharnessed.
+
+I have now passed in rapid review what may perhaps without exaggeration
+be referred to as an array of conditions and theories, ideals and
+policies. It remains to refer to the actual results which have come
+about during these sixty years as respects them, or because of them;
+and, finally, to reach if possible conclusions as to the causes which
+have affected what may not inaptly be termed a process of general
+evolution. Having thus, so to speak, diagnosed the situation, the
+changes the situation exacts are to be measured, and a forecast
+ventured. An ambitious programme, I am well enough aware that the not
+very considerable reputation I have established for myself hardly
+warrants me in attempting it. This, I premise.
+
+Let us, in the first place, recur in somewhat greater detail to the
+various policies and ideals I have referred to as in vogue in the
+year 1853.
+
+First and foremost, overshadowing all else, was the political issue
+raised by African slavery, then ominously assuming shape. The clouds
+foreboding the coming tempest were gathering thick and heavy; and,
+moreover, they were even then illumined by electric flashes, accompanied
+by a mutter of distant thunder. Though we of the North certainly did not
+appreciate its gravity, the situation was portentous in the extreme.
+
+Involved in this problem of African slavery was the incidental issue of
+Free Trade and Protection,--apparently only economical and industrial in
+character, but in reality fundamentally crucial. And behind this lay
+the constitutional question, involving as it did not only the
+conflicting theories of a strict or liberal construction of the
+fundamental law, but nationality also,--the right of a Sovereign State
+to withdraw from the Union created in 1787, and developed through two
+generations.
+
+These may be termed concrete political issues, as opposed to basic
+truths generally accepted and theories individually entertained. The
+theories were constitutional, social, economical. Constitutionally, they
+turned upon the obligations of citizenship. There was no such thing then
+as a citizen of the United States of and by itself. The citizen of the
+United States was such simply because of his citizenship of a Sovereign
+State,--whether Massachusetts or Virginia or South Carolina; and, of
+course, an instrument based upon a divided sovereignty admitted of
+almost infinitely diverse interpretation. It is a scriptural aphorism
+that no man can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and
+love the other, or else he will hold to the one and despise the other.
+And in the fulness of time it literally with us so came about. The
+accepted economical theories of the period were to a large extent
+corollaries of the fundamental proposition, and differing material and
+social conditions. Beyond all this, and coming still under the head of
+individual theories, was the doctrine enunciated by Thomas Jefferson in
+the Declaration of Independence,--the doctrine that all men were created
+equal,--meaning, of course, equal before the law. But the theorist and
+humanitarian of the North, accepting the fundamental principle laid down
+in the Declaration, gave to it a far wider application than had been
+intended by its authors,--a breadth of application it would not bear.
+Such science as he had being of scriptural origin, he interpreted the
+word "equal" as signifying equal in the possibilities of their
+attributes,--physical, moral, intellectual; and in so doing, he of
+course ignored the first principles of ethnology. It was, I now realize,
+a somewhat wild-eyed school of philosophy, that of which I myself was a
+youthful disciple.
+
+But, on the other hand, beside these, between 1850 and 1860 a class of
+trained and more cautious thinkers, observers, scientists and
+theologians was coming to the front. Their investigations, though we did
+not then foresee it, were a generation later destined gently to subvert
+the accepted fundamentals of religious and economical thought, literary
+performance, and material existence. The work they had in hand to do was
+for the next fifteen years to be subordinate, so far as this country was
+concerned, to the solution of the terrible political problems which were
+first insistent on settlement; yet, as is now apparent, an initial
+movement was on foot which foreboded a revolution world-wide in its
+nature, and one in comparison with which the issues of slavery and
+American constitutionality became practically insignificant,--in a word,
+local and passing incidents.
+
+Finally, it remains to consider specifically the political theories
+then in vogue in their relation to the individual. In this country, it
+was the period of the equality of man and individuality in the
+development of the type. It was generally believed that the world had
+hitherto been governed too much,--that the day of caste, and even class,
+was over and gone; and finally, that America was a species of vast
+modern melting-pot of humanity, in which, within a comparatively short
+period of time, the characteristics of all branches of Indo-Aryan origin
+would resolve themselves. A new type would emerge,--the American. These
+theories were also in their consequences far-reaching. Practically, 1853
+antedates all our present industrial organizations so loudly in
+evidence,--the multifarious trades-unions which now divide the
+population of the United States into what are known as the "masses" and
+the "classes." As recently as a century ago, it used to be said of the
+French army under the Empire, that every soldier carried the baton of
+the Field-Marshal in his knapsack. And this ideal of equality and
+individuality was fixed in the American mind.
+
+Not that I for a moment mean to imply that in my belief the middle of
+the last century, or the twenty years anterior to the Civil War, was a
+species of golden age in our American annals. On the contrary, it was,
+as I remember it, a phase of development very open to criticism; and
+that in many respects. It was crude, self-conscious and self-assertive;
+provincial and formative, rather than formed. Socially and materially
+we were, compared with the present era of motors and parlor-cars, in the
+"one-hoss shay" and stove-heated railroad-coach stage. Nevertheless,
+what is now referred to as "predatory wealth" had not yet begun to
+accumulate in few hands; much greater equality of condition prevailed;
+nor was the "wage-earner" referred to as constituting a class distinct
+from the holders of property. Thus the individual was then
+encouraged,--whether in literature, in commerce, or in politics. In
+other words, there being a free field, one man was held to be in all
+respects the equal of the rest. Especially was what I have said true of
+the Northern, or so-called Free States, as contrasted with the States of
+the South, where the presence of African slavery distinctly affected
+individual theories, no matter where or to what extent entertained.
+
+Such, briefly and comprehensively stated, having been the situation in
+1853, it remains to consider the practical outcome thereof during the
+sixty years it has been my fortune to take part, either as an actor or
+as an observer, in the great process of evolution. It is curious to note
+the extent to which the unexpected has come about. In the first place,
+consider the all-absorbing mid-century political issue, that involving
+the race question, to which I first referred,--the issue which divided
+the South from the North, and which, eight years only after I had
+entered college, carried me from the walks of civil life into the
+calling of arms.
+
+And here I enter on a field of discussion both difficult and dangerous;
+and, for reasons too obvious to require statement, what I am about to
+say will be listened to with no inconsiderable apprehension as to what
+next may be forthcoming. Nevertheless, this is a necessary part of my
+theme; and I propose to say what I have in mind to say, setting forth
+with all possible frankness the more mature conclusions reached with the
+passage of years. Let it be received in the spirit in which it
+is offered.
+
+So far, then, as the institution of slavery is concerned, in its
+relations to ownership and property in those of the human species,--I
+have seen no reason whatever to revise or in any way to alter the
+theories and principles I entertained in 1853, and in the maintenance of
+which I subsequently bore arms between 1861 and 1865. Economically,
+socially, and from the point of view of abstract political justice, I
+hold that the institution of slavery, as it existed in this country
+prior to the year 1865, was in no respect either desirable or
+justifiable. That it had its good and even its elevating side, so far at
+least as the African is concerned, I am not here to deny. On the
+contrary, I see and recognize those features of the institution far more
+clearly now than I should have said would have been possible in 1853.
+That the institution in itself, under conditions then existing, tended
+to the elevation of the less advanced race, I frankly admit I did not
+then think. On the other hand, that it exercised a most pernicious
+influence upon those of the more advanced race, and especially upon
+that large majority of the more advanced race who were not themselves
+owners of slaves,--of that I have become with time ever more and more
+satisfied. The noticeable feature, however, so far as I individually am
+concerned, has been the entire change of view as respects certain of the
+fundamental propositions at the base of our whole American political and
+social edifice brought about by a more careful and intelligent
+ethnological study. I refer to the political equality of man, and to
+that race absorption to which I have alluded,--that belief that any
+foreign element introduced into the American social system and body
+politic would speedily be absorbed therein, and in a brief space
+thoroughly assimilated. In this all-important respect I do not hesitate
+to say we theorists and abstractionists of the North, throughout that
+long anti-slavery discussion which ended with the 1861 clash of arms,
+were thoroughly wrong. In utter disregard of fundamental, scientific
+facts, we theoretically believed that all men--no matter what might be
+the color of their skin, or the texture of their hair--were, if placed
+under exactly similar conditions, in essentials the same. In other
+words, we indulged in the curious and, as is now admitted, utterly
+erroneous theory that the African was, so to speak, an Anglo-Saxon, or,
+if you will, a Yankee "who had never had a chance,"--a fellow-man who
+was guilty, as we chose to express it, of a skin not colored like our
+own. In other words, though carved in ebony, he also was in the image
+of God.
+
+Following out this theory, under the lead of men to whom scientific
+analysis and observation were anathema if opposed to accepted cardinal
+political theories as enunciated in the Declaration as read by them, the
+African was not only emancipated, but so far as the letter of the law,
+as expressed in an amended Constitution, would establish the fact, the
+quondam slave was in all respects placed on an equality, political,
+legal and moral, with those of the more advanced race.
+
+I do not hesitate here,--as one who largely entertained the theoretical
+views I have expressed,--I do not hesitate here to say, as the result of
+sixty years of more careful study and scientific observation, the
+theories then entertained by us were not only fundamentally wrong, but
+they further involved a problem in the presence of which I confess
+to-day I stand appalled.
+
+It is said,--whether truthfully or not,--that when some years ago John
+Morley, the English writer and thinker, was in this country, on
+returning to England he remarked that the African race question, as now
+existing in the United States, presented a problem as nearly, to his
+mind, insoluble as any human problem well could be. I do not care
+whether Lord Morley made this statement or did not make it. I am
+prepared, however, to say that, individually, so far as my present
+judgment goes, it is a correct presentation. To us in the North, the
+African is a comparatively negligible factor. So far as Massachusetts,
+for instance, or the city of Boston more especially, are concerned, as
+a problem it is solving itself. Proportionately, the African infusion is
+becoming less--never large, it is incomparably less now than it was in
+the days of my own youth. Thus manifestly a negligible factor, it is
+also one tending to extinction. Indeed, it would be fairly open to
+question whether a single Afro-American of unmixed Ethiopian descent
+could now be found in Boston. That the problem presents itself with a
+wholly different aspect here in Carolina is manifest. The difference too
+is radical; it goes to the heart of the mystery.
+
+As I have already said, the universal "melting-pot" theory in vogue in
+my youth was that but seven, or at the most fourteen, years were
+required to convert the alien immigrant--no matter from what region or
+of what descent--into an American citizen. The educational influences
+and social environment were assumed to be not only subtle, but
+all-pervasive and powerful. That this theory was to a large and even
+dangerous extent erroneous the observation of the last fifty years has
+proved, and our Massachusetts experience is sadly demonstrating to-day.
+It was Oliver Wendell Holmes, who, years ago, when asked by an anxious
+mother at what age the education of a child ought to begin, remarked in
+reply that it should begin about one hundred and fifty years before the
+child is born. It has so proved with us; and the fact is to-day in
+evidence that this statement of Dr. Holmes should be accepted as an
+undeniable political aphorism. So far from seven or fourteen years
+making an American citizen, fully and thoroughly impregnated with
+American ideals to the exclusion of all others, our experience is that
+it requires at least three generations to eliminate what may be termed
+the "hyphen" in citizenship. Not in the first, nor in the second, and
+hardly in the third, generation, does the immigrant cease to be an
+Irish-American, or a French-American, or a German-American, or a
+Slavonic-American, or yet a Dago. Nevertheless, in process of tune,
+those of the Caucasian race do and will become Americans. Ultimately
+their descendants will be free from the traditions and ideals, so to
+speak, ground in through centuries passed under other conditions. Not so
+the Ethiopian. In his case, we find ourselves confronted with a
+situation never contemplated in that era of political dreams and
+scriptural science in which our institutions received shape. Stated
+tersely and in plain language, so far as the African is concerned--the
+cause and, so to speak, the motive of the great struggle of 1861 to
+1865--we recognize the presence in the body politic of a vast alien mass
+which does not assimilate and which cannot be absorbed. In other words,
+the melting-pot theory came in sharp contact with an ethnological fact,
+and the unexpected occurred. The problem of African servitude was solved
+after a fashion; but in place of it a race issue of most uncompromising
+character evolved itself.
+
+A survivor of the generation which read "Uncle Tom's Cabin" as it week
+by week appeared,--fresh to-day from Massachusetts with its Lawrence
+race issues of a different character, I feel a sense of satisfaction in
+discussing here in South Carolina this question and issue in a spirit
+the reverse of dogmatic, a spirit purely scientific, observant and
+sympathetic. And in this connection let me say I well remember
+repeatedly discussing it with your fellow-citizen and my friend, Colonel
+Alexander Haskell, to whom I have already made reference. Rarely have I
+been more impressed by a conclusion reached and fixed in the mind of one
+who to the study of a problem had obviously given much and kindly
+thought. As those who knew him do not need to be told, Alexander Cheves
+Haskell was a man of character, pure and just and thoughtful. He felt
+towards the African as only a Southerner who had himself never been the
+owner of slaves can feel. He regarded him as of a less advanced race
+than his own, but one who was entitled not only to just and kindly
+treatment but to sympathetic consideration. When, however, the question
+of the future of the Afro-American was raised, as matter for abstract
+discussion, it was suggestive as well as curious to observe the fixed,
+hard expression which immediately came over Haskell's face, as with
+stern lips, from which all suggestion of a smile had faded away, he
+pronounced the words:--"Sir, it is a dying race!" To express the thought
+more fully, Colonel Haskell maintained, as I doubt not many who now
+listen to me will maintain, that the nominal Afro-American increase, as
+shown in the figures of the national census, is deceptive,--that in
+point of fact, the Ethiop in America is incurring the doom which has
+ever befallen those of an inferior and less advanced race when brought
+in direct and immediate contact, necessarily and inevitably competitive,
+with the more advanced, the more masterful, and intellectually the more
+gifted. In other words, those of the less advanced race have a fatal
+aptitude for contracting the vices, both moral and physical, of the
+superior race, in the end leading to destruction; while the capacity for
+assimilating the elevating qualities and attributes which constitute a
+saving grace is denied them. Elimination, therefore, became in Haskell's
+belief a question of time only,--the law of the survival of the fittest
+would assert itself. The time required may be long,--numbered by
+centuries; but, however remotely, it nevertheless would come. God's mill
+grinds slowly, but it grinds uncommon small; and, I will add, its
+grinding is apt to be merciless.
+
+The solution thus most pronouncedly laid down by Colonel Haskell may or
+may not prove in this case correct and final. It certainly is not for
+me, coming from the North, to undertake dogmatically to pass upon it. I
+recur to it here as a plausible suggestion only, in connection with my
+theme. As such, it unquestionably merits consideration. I am by no means
+prepared to go the length of an English authority in recently saying
+that "emancipation on two continents sacrificed the real welfare of the
+slave and his intrinsic worth as a person, to the impatient vanity of
+an immediate and theatrical triumph."[3] This length I say, I cannot go;
+but so far as the present occasion is concerned, with such means of
+observation as are within my reach, I find the conclusion difficult to
+resist that the success of the abolitionists in effecting the
+emancipation of the Afro-American, as unexpected and sweeping as it was
+sudden, has led to phases of the race problem quite unanticipated at
+least. For instance, as respects segregation. Instead of assimilating,
+with a tendency to ultimate absorption, the movement in the opposite
+direction since 1865 is pronounced. It has, moreover, received the final
+stamp of scientific approval. This implies much; for in the old days of
+the "peculiar institution" there is no question the relations between
+the two races were far more intimate, kindly, and even absorptive than
+they now are.
+
+That African slavery, as it existed in the United States anterior to the
+year 1862, presented a mild form of servitude, as servitude then existed
+and immemorially had almost everywhere existed, was, moreover,
+incontrovertibly proven in the course of the Civil War. Before 1862, it
+was confidently believed that any severe social agitation within, or
+disturbance from without, would inevitably lead to a Southern servile
+insurrection. In Europe this result was assumed as of course; and,
+immediately after it was issued, the Emancipation Proclamation of President
+[3] Bussell's (Dr. F.W.) "Christian Theology and Social Progress."
+Bampton Lectures, 1905. Lincoln was denounced in unmeasured terms by
+the entire London press. Not a voice was raised in its defence. It was
+regarded as a measure unwarranted in civilized warfare, and a sure and
+intentional incitement to the horrors which had attended the servile
+insurrections of Haiti and San Domingo; and, more recently, the
+unspeakable Sepoy incidents of the Indian mutiny. What actually occurred
+is now historic. The confident anticipations of our English brethren
+were, not for the first time, negatived; nor is there any page in our
+American record more creditable to those concerned than the attitude
+held by the African during the fierce internecine struggle which
+prevailed between April, 1861, and April, 1865. In it there is scarcely
+a trace, if indeed there is any trace at all, of such a condition of
+affairs as had developed in the Antilles and in Hindustan. The attitude
+of the African towards his Confederate owner was submissive and kindly.
+Although the armed and masterful domestic protector was at the front and
+engaged in deadly, all-absorbing conflict, yet the women and children of
+the Southern plantation slept with unbarred doors,--free from
+apprehension, much more from molestation.
+
+Moreover, as you here well know, during the old days of slavery there
+was hardly a child born, of either sex, who grew up in a Southern
+household of substantial wealth without holding immediate and most
+affectionate relations with those of the other race. Every typical
+Southern man had what he called his "daddy" and his "mammy," his
+"uncle" and his "aunty," by him familiarly addressed as such, and who
+were to him even closer than are blood relations to most. They had cared
+for him in his cradle; he followed them to their graves. Is it needful
+for me to ask to what extent such relations still exist? Of those born
+thirty years after emancipation, and therefore belonging distinctly to a
+later generation, how many thus have their kindly, if humble, kin of the
+African blood? I fancy I would be safe in saying not one in twenty.
+
+Here, then, as the outcome of the first great issue I have suggested as
+occupying the thought and exciting the passions of that earlier period,
+is a problem wholly unanticipated,--a problem which, merely stating,
+I dismiss.
+
+Passing rapidly on, I come to the next political issue which presented
+itself in my youth,--the constitutional issue,--that of State
+Sovereignty, as opposed to the ideal, Nationality. And, whether for
+better or worse, this issue, I very confidently submit, has been
+settled. We now, also, looking at it in more observant mood, in a spirit
+at once philosophical and historical, see that it involved a process of
+natural evolution which, under the conditions prevailing, could hardly
+result in any other settlement than that which came about. We now have
+come to a recognition of the fact that Anglo-Saxon nationality on this
+continent was a problem of crystallization, the working out of which
+occupied a little over two centuries. It was in New England the process
+first set in, when, in 1643, the scattered English-speaking settlements
+under the hegemony of the colony of Massachusetts Bay united in a
+confederation. It was the initial step. I have no time in which to
+enumerate successive steps, each representing a stage in advance of what
+went before. The War of Independence,--mistakenly denominated the
+Revolutionary War, but a struggle distinctly conservative in character,
+and in no way revolutionary,--the War of Independence gave great impetus
+to the process, resulting in what was known as Federation. Then came the
+Constitution of 1787 and the formation of the, so called, United States
+as a distinct nationality. The United States next passed through two
+definite processes of further crystallization,--one in 1812-1814, when
+the second war with Great Britain, and more especially our naval
+victories, kindled, especially in the North, the fire of patriotism and
+the conception of nationality; the other, half a century later,
+presented the stern issue in a concrete form, and at last the complete
+unification of a community--whether for better or for worse is no
+matter--was hammered by iron and cemented in blood. It is there now; an
+established fact. Secession is a lost cause; and, whether for good or
+for ill, the United States exists, and will continue to exist, a unified
+World Power. Sovereignty now rests at Washington, and neither in
+Columbia for South Carolina nor in Boston for Massachusetts. The State
+exists only as an integral portion of the United States. That issue has
+been fought out. The result stands beyond controversy; brought about by
+a generation now passed on, but to which I belonged.
+
+Meanwhile, the ancient adage, the rose is not without its thorn,
+receives new illustration; for even this great result has not been
+wrought without giving rise to considerations suggestive of thought.
+Speaking tersely and concentrating what is in my mind into the fewest
+possible words, I may say that in our national growth up to the year
+1830 the play of the centrifugal forces predominated,--that is, the
+necessity for greater cohesion made itself continually felt. A period of
+quiescence then followed, lasting until, we will say, 1865. Since 1865,
+it is not unsafe to say, the centripetal, or gravitating, force has
+predominated to an extent ever more suggestive of increasing political
+uneasiness. It is now, as is notorious, more in evidence than ever
+before. The tendency to concentrate at Washington, the demand that the
+central government, assuming one function after another, shall become
+imperial, the cry for the national enactment of laws, whether relating
+to marital divorce or to industrial combinations,--all impinge on the
+fundamental principle of local self-government, which assumed its
+highest and most pronounced form in the claim of State Sovereignty. I am
+now merely stating problems. I am not discussing the political ills or
+social benefits which possibly may result from action. Nevertheless,
+all, I think, must admit that the tendency to gravitation and
+attraction is to-day as pronounced and as dangerous, especially in the
+industrial communities of the North, as was the tendency to separation
+and segregation pronounced and dangerous seventy years ago in the South.
+
+To this I shall later return. I now merely point out what I apprehend to
+be a tendency to extremes--an excess in the swinging of our
+political pendulum.
+
+We next come to that industrial factor which I have referred to as the
+issue between the Free Trade of Adam Smith and Protection, as inculcated
+by the so-called American school of political economists. The phases
+which this issue has assumed are, I submit, well calculated to excite
+the attention of the observant and thoughtful. I merely allude to them
+now; but, in so far as it is in my power to make it so, my allusion will
+be specific. I frankly acknowledge myself a Free-Trader. A Free-Trader
+in theory, were it in my power I would be a Free-Trader in national
+practice. There has been, so far as I know, but one example of absolute
+free trade on the largest scale in world history. That one example,
+moreover, has been a success as unqualified as undeniable. I refer to
+this American Union of ours. We have here a country consisting of fifty
+local communities, stretching from the Atlantic to the Pacific, from
+tropical Porto Rico to glacial Alaska, representing every conceivable
+phase of soil, climate and material conditions, with diverse industrial
+systems. With a Union established on the principle of absolutely
+unrestricted commercial intercourse, you here in South Carolina, and
+more especially in Columbia, are to-day making it, so to speak,
+uncomfortable for the cotton manufacturer in New England; and I am glad
+of it! A sharp competition is a healthy incentive to effort and
+ingenuity, and the brutal injunction, "Root hog or die!" is one from
+which I in no way ask to have New England exempt. When Massachusetts is
+no longer able to hold its own industrially in a free field, the time
+will, in my judgment, have come for Massachusetts to go down. With
+communities as with children, paternalism reads arrested development.
+One of the great products of Massachusetts has been what is generically
+known as "footwear." Yet I am told that under the operation of absolute
+Free Trade, St. Louis possesses the largest boot and shoe factory in its
+output in the entire world. That is, the law of industrial development,
+as natural conditions warrant and demand, has worked out its results;
+and those results are satisfactory. I am aware that the farmer of
+Massachusetts has become practically extinct; he cannot face the
+competition of the great West: but the Massachusetts consumer is greatly
+advantaged thereby. So far as agricultural products are concerned,
+Massachusetts is to-day reduced to what is known as dairy products and
+garden truck; and it is well! Summer vegetables manufactured under glass
+in winter prove profitable. So, turning his industrial efforts to that
+which he can do best, even the Massachusetts agriculturalist has
+prospered. On the other hand, wherever in this country protection has
+been most completely applied, I insist that if its results are analyzed
+in an unprejudiced spirit, it will be pronounced to have worked
+unmitigated evil,--an unhealthy, because artificially stimulated and too
+rapid, growth. Let Lawrence, in Massachusetts, serve as an example. Look
+at the industrial system there introduced in the name of Protection
+against the Pauper Labor of Europe! No growth is so dangerous as a too
+rapid growth; and I confidently submit that politically, socially,
+economically and industrially, America to-day, on the issues agitating
+us, presents an almost appalling example of the results of hot-house
+stimulation.
+
+Nor is this all, nor the worst. There is another article, and far more
+damaging, in the indictment. Through Protection, and because of it,
+Paternalism has crept in; and, like a huge cancerous growth, is eating
+steadily into the vitals of the political system. Instead of supporting
+a government economically administered by money contributed by the
+People, a majority of the People to-day are looking to the government
+for support, either directly through pension payments or indirectly
+through some form of industrial paternalism. Incidentally, a profuse
+public expenditure is condoned where not actually encouraged.
+Jeffersonian simplicity is preached; extravagance is practised. As the
+New York showman long since shrewdly observed: "The American people
+love to be fooled!"
+
+But I must pass on; I still have far to go. As respects legislation, I
+have said that sixty years ago, when my memories begin, the American
+ideal was the individual, and individuality. This, implied adherence to
+the Jeffersonian theory that heretofore the world had been governed too
+much. The great secret of true national prosperity, happiness and
+success was, we were taught, to allow to each individual the fullest
+possible play, provided only he did not infringe on the rights of
+others. How is it to-day? America is the most governed and legislated
+country in the world! With one national law-making machine perpetually
+at work grinding out edicts, we have some fifty provincial mills engaged
+in the same interesting and, to my mind, pernicious work. No one who has
+given the slightest consideration to the subject will dispute the
+proposition that, taking America as a whole, we now have twenty acts of
+legislation annually promulgated, and with which we are at our peril
+supposed to be familiar, where one would more than suffice. Then we
+wonder that respect for the law shows a sensible decrease! The better
+occasion for wonder is that it survives at all. We are both legislated
+and litigated out of all reason.
+
+Passing to the other proposition of individuality, there has been, as
+all men know and no one will dispute, a most perceptible tendency of
+late years towards what is known as the array of one portion of the
+community--the preponderating, voting portion--against another--the more
+ostentatious property-holding portion. It is the natural result, I may
+say the necessary as well as logical outcome, of a period of too rapid
+growth,--production apportioned by no rule or system other or higher
+than greed and individual aptitude for acquisition. I will put the
+resulting case in the most brutal, and consequently the clearest, shape
+of which I am capable. Working on the combined theories of individualism
+controlled and regulated by competition, it has been one grand game of
+grab,--a process in which the whole tendency of our legislation,
+national or state, has during the last twenty years been, first, to
+create monopolies of capital and, later, to bring into existence a
+counter, but no less privileged, class, known as the "wage-earner."
+
+Of the first class it is needless to speak, for, as a class, it is
+sufficiently pilloried by the press and from the hustings. Much in
+evidence, those prominent in it are known as the possessors of
+"predatory wealth"; "unjailed malefactors," they are subjects of
+continuous "grilling" in the congressional and legislative committee
+rooms. The effort to make them "disgorge" is as continual as it is
+noisy, and, as a rule, futile. It constitutes a curious and in some
+respects instructive exhibition of misdirected popular feeling and
+legislative incompetence. None the less, the existence of a monopolist
+class calls for no proof at the bar of public opinion. Not so the other
+and even more privileged class,--the so-called "wage-earner"; for,
+disguise it as the trades-unionist will, angrily deny it as he does, the
+fact remains that to-day under the operation of our jury system and of
+our laws, the Wage-earner and the member of the Trades-Union has become,
+as respects the rest of the community, himself a monopolist and,
+moreover, privileged as such. Practically, crimes urged and even
+perpetrated in behalf of so-called "labor" receive at the hands of
+juries, and also not infrequently of courts, an altogether excessive
+degree of merciful consideration. At the same time, both here and in
+Europe Organized Labor is instant in its demand that immunity, denied
+to ordinary citizens, and those whom it terms "the classes," shall by
+special exemption be conferred upon the Labor Union and upon the
+Wage-earner. The tendency on both sides and at each extreme to
+inequality in the legislature and before the law is thus manifest.
+
+Viewing conditions face to face and as they now are, no thoughtful
+observer can, in my judgment, avoid the conviction that, whether for
+good or ill, for better or for worse, this country as a community has,
+within the last thirty years--that is, we will say, since our centennial
+year, 1876--cast loose from its original moorings. It has drifted, and
+is drifting, into unknown seas. Nor is this true of English-speaking
+America alone. I have already quoted Lord Morley in another connection.
+Lord Morley, however, only the other day delivered, as Chancellor of
+Manchester University, a most interesting and highly suggestive
+address, in which, referring to conservative Great Britain, he thus
+pictured a phase of current belief: "Political power is described as
+lying in the hands of a vast and mobile electorate, with scanty regard
+for tradition or history. Democracy, they say, is going to write its own
+programme. The structure of executive organs and machinery is undergoing
+half-hidden, but serious alterations. Men discover a change of attitude
+towards law as law; a decline in reverence for institutions as
+institutions."
+
+While, however, the influences at work are thus general and the
+manifestations whether on the other side of the Atlantic or here bear a
+strong resemblance, yet difference of conditions and detail
+--constitutional peculiarities, so to speak--must not be
+disregarded. One form of treatment may not be prescribed for all. In our
+case, therefore, it remains to consider how best to adapt this country
+and ourselves to the unforeseeable,--the navigation of uncharted waters;
+and this adaptation cannot be considered hi any correct and helpful,
+because scientific, spirit, unless the cause of change is located.
+Surface manifestations are, in and of themselves, merely deceptive. A
+physician, diagnosing the chances of a patient, must first correctly
+ascertain, or at least ascertain with approximate correctness, the seat
+of the trouble under which the patient is suffering. So, we.
+
+And here I must frankly confess to small respect for the
+politician,--the man whose voice is continually heard, whether from the
+Senate Chamber or the Hustings. There is in those of his class a
+continual and most noticeable tendency to what may best be described as
+the _post ergo propter_ dispensation. With them, the eye is fixed on the
+immediate manifestation. Because one event preceded another, the first
+event is obviously and indisputably the cause of the later event. For
+instance, in the present case, the cause or seat of our existing and
+very manifest social, political and financial disturbances is attributed
+as of course to some peculiarity of legislation, either a subtreasury
+bill passed in the administration of General Jackson, or a tariff bill
+passed in the administration of Mr. Taft, or the demonetization of
+silver in the Hayes period,--that "Crime of the Century," the
+Crucifixion of Labor on the Cross of Gold! Once for all, let me say, I
+contemplate this school of politicians and so-called "thinkers" with
+sentiments the reverse of respectful. In plain language, I class them
+with those known in professional parlance as quacks and charlatans. Not
+always, not even in the majority of cases, does that which preceded bear
+to that which follows the relation of cause and effect. A marked example
+of this false attribution is afforded in more recent political history
+by the everlasting recurrence of the statement that American prosperity
+is the result of an American protective system. Yet in the Protectionist
+dispensation, this has become an article of faith. To my mind, it is
+undeserving of even respectful consideration.
+
+If I were asked the cause of that change, little short of
+revolutionary, if indeed in any respect short of it, which has occurred
+in the material condition of the American people, and consequently in
+all its theories and ideals, within the last thirty years, I should
+attribute it to a wholly different cause. Mr. Lecky some years ago, in
+his book entitled "Liberty and Democracy," made the following statement,
+in no way original, but, as he put it, sufficiently striking: "The
+produce of the American mines [incident to the discoveries made by
+Columbus] created, in the most extreme form ever known in Europe, the
+change which beyond all others affects most deeply and universally the
+material well-being of men: it revolutionized the value of the precious
+metals, and, in consequence, the price of all articles, the effects of
+all contracts, the burden of all debts."
+
+In other words, referring to the first half of the sixteenth
+century,--the sixty years, we will say, following the land-fall of
+Columbus,--the historian attributed the great change which then occurred
+and which stands forth so markedly in history, to the increased
+New-World production of the precious metals, combined with the impetus
+given to trade and industry as a consequence of that discovery, and of
+the mastery of man over additional globe areas. Now, dismissing from
+consideration the so-called American protective system, likewise our
+currency issues and, generally, the patchwork, so to speak, of
+crazy-quilt legislation to which so much is attributed during the last
+thirty years, I confidently submit that in the production of the results
+under discussion, they are quantities and factors hardly worthy of
+consideration. The cause of the change which has taken place lies far
+deeper and must be sought in influences of a wholly different nature,
+influences developed into an increased and still ever increasing
+activity, over which legislation has absolutely no control. I refer, of
+course, to man's mastery over the latent forces of Nature. Of these
+Steam and Electricity are the great examples, which, because always
+apparent, at once strike the imagination. These, as tools, it is to be
+remembered, date practically from within one hundred years back. It may,
+indeed, safely be asserted that up to 1815, the end of the Wars of
+Napoleon and the time of your Professor Lieber, steam even had not as
+yet practically affected the operations of man, while electricity, when
+not a terror, was as yet but a toy. Commerce was still exclusively
+carried on by the sailing ship and canal-boat. The years from the fall
+of Napoleon to our own War of Secession--from Waterloo to
+Gettysburg--were practically those of early and partial development. Not
+until well after Appomattox, that is, since the year 1870,--a period
+covering but little more than the life of a generation,--did what is
+known to you here as the Applied Sciences cover a range difficult to
+specialize. As factors in development, it is safe to say that those
+three tremendous agencies--Steam, Electricity, Chemistry--have, so to
+speak, worked all their noticeable results within the lifetime of the
+generation born since we celebrated the Centennial of Independence. The
+manifestations now resulting and apparent to all are the natural outcome
+of the use of these modern appliances, become in our case everyday
+working tools in the hands of the most resourceful, adaptive, ingenious
+and energetic of communities, developing a virgin continent of
+undreamed-of wealth. Naturally, under such conditions, the advance has
+been not only general and continuous, but one of ever increasing
+celerity. So Protection and the Currency become flies on the fast
+revolving wheel!
+
+But what has otherwise resulted?--An unrest, social, economical,
+political. Not contentment, but a lamentation and an ancient tale of
+wrong! We hear it in the continual cry over what is known as the
+increased cost of living, and feel its pressure in the higher standard
+of living. What was considered wealth by our ancestors is to-day hardly
+competence. What sufficed for luxury in our childhood barely now
+supplies what are known as the comforts of life. Take, for instance, the
+motor,--the automobile. I speak within bounds, I think, when I say there
+are many fold more motors to-day racing over the streets, the highways
+and the byways of America than there were one-horse wagons thirty-five
+years ago. Six hundred, I am told, are to be found within the immediate
+neighborhood of Columbia; and, since I have been here I have seen in
+your streets just one man on horse-back! These figures and that
+statement tell the tale. A few years only back, every Carolinian rode
+to town, and the motor was unknown. A single illustrative example, this
+could be duplicated in innumerable ways everywhere and in all walks
+of life.
+
+The result is obvious, and was inevitable. Entered on a new phase of
+existence, the world is not as it was in the days of Columbus, when a
+single new continent was discovered containing in it what we would now
+regard as a limited accumulation of the precious metals. It is, on the
+contrary, as if, in the language of Dr. Johnson, "the potentiality of
+wealth" had been revealed "beyond the dreams of avarice"; together with
+not one or two, but a dozen continents, the existence and secrets of
+which are suddenly laid bare. The Applied Sciences have been the
+magicians,--not Protection or the Currency.
+
+And still scientists are continually dinning in our ears the question
+whether this state of affairs is going to continue,--whether the era of
+disturbance has reached its limit! I hold such a question to be little
+short of childish. That era has not reached its limits, nor has it even
+approximated those limits. On the contrary, we have just entered on the
+uncharted sea. We know what the last thirty years have brought about as
+the result of the agencies at work; but as yet we can only dimly dream
+of what the next sixty years are destined to see brought about.
+Imagination staggers at the suggestion.
+
+What, then, has been of this the inevitable consequence,--the
+consequence which even the blindest should have foreseen? It has
+resulted in all those far-reaching changes suggested in the earlier part
+of what I have said to-day, as respects our ideals, our political
+theories, our social conditions. In other words, the old era is ended;
+what is implied when we say a new era is entered upon?
+
+To attempt a partial answer to the query implies no claim to a prophetic
+faculty. Whether we like to face the fact or not, far-reaching changes
+in our economical theories and social conditions are imminent, involving
+corresponding readjustments in our constitutional arrangements and
+political machinery. Tennyson foreshadowed it all in his "Locksley Hall"
+seventy years ago:--"The individual withers, and the world is more and
+more." The day of individualism as it existed in the American ideal of
+sixty years since is over; that of collectivism and possibly socialism
+has opened. The day of social equality is relegated to what may be
+considered a somewhat patriarchal past,--that patriarchal past having
+come to a close during the memory of those still in active life.
+
+And yet, though all this can now be studied in the political discussion
+endlessly dragging on, strangely and sadly enough that discussion
+carries in it hardly a note of encouragement. It is, in a word,
+unspeakably shallow. And here, having sufficiently for my present
+purpose though in hurried manner, diagnosed the situation,--located the
+seat of disturbance,--we come to the question of treatment. Involving,
+as it necessarily does, problems of the fundamental law, and a
+rearrangement and different allocation of the functions of government,
+this challenges the closest thought of the publicist. That the problem
+is here crying aloud for solution is apparent. The publications which
+cumber the counters of our book-stores, those for which the greatest
+popular call to-day exists--treatises relating to trade interests, to
+collectivism, to socialism, even to anarchism--tell the tale in part; in
+part it is elsewhere and otherwise told. Only recently, in once Puritan
+Massachusetts, processions paraded the streets carrying banners marked
+with this device, more suggestive than strange:--"No master and no God!"
+
+What are the remedies popularly proposed? In that important branch of
+polity known as Political Ethics, or, as he termed them, Hermeneutics,
+which your Professor Lieber sixty years ago endeavored to treat of, what
+advance has since his time been effected?--Nay! what advance has been
+effected since the time, over two thousand years, of his great
+predecessor, Aristotle? I confidently submit that what progress is now
+being made in this most erudite of sciences is in the nature of that of
+the crab--backwards! In the discussions of Aristotle, the problem in
+view was, how to bring about government by the wisest,--that is, the
+most observant and expert. In other words, government, the object of
+politics, was by Aristotle treated in a scientific spirit. And this is
+as it should be. Take, for example, any problem,--I do not care whether
+it is legal or medical or one of engineering: How successfully dispose
+of it? Uniformly, in one way. Those problems are successfully solved, if
+at all, only when their solution is placed in the hands of the most
+proficient. Judged by the discussions of to-day, what advance has in
+politics been effected? Do the _Outlook_ and the _Commoner_ imply
+progress since the Stagirite? Not to any noticeable extent. We are, on
+the contrary, fumbling and wallowing about where the Greek pondered and
+philosophized.
+
+Democracy, as it is called, is to-day the great panacea,--the political
+nostrum; as such it is confidently advocated by statesmen and professors
+and even by the presidents of our institutions of the advanced
+education. "Trust the People" is the shibboleth! "Let the People rule!"
+"The cure for too much Liberty is more Liberty!" To Democracy plain and
+simple--Composite Wisdom--I frankly confess I feel no call,--no call
+greater than, for instance, towards Autocracy or Aristocracy or
+Plutocracy. Taken simply, and applied as hitherto applied, all and each
+lead to but one result,--failure! And that result, let me here predict,
+will, in the future, be the same in the case of pure Democracy that, in
+the past, it was in the case of the pure Autocracy of the Caesars, or
+the case of the pure Aristocracy of Rome or of the so-called Republics
+of the Middle Ages. A political edifice on shifting sands.
+
+Yet, to-day what do we see and hear in America? Tell it not in Gath;
+publish it not in the streets of Askalon I Two thousand years after the
+time of Aristotle, we see a prevailing school working directly back to
+the condition of affairs which existed in the Athenian agora under the
+disapproving eyes of the father of political philosophy. Panaceas,
+universal cure-alls, and quack remedies--the Initiative, the Referendum,
+and the Recall are paraded as if these--nostrums of the mountebanks of
+the county fair--would surely remedy the perplexing ills of new and
+hitherto unheard-of social, economical, and political conditions.
+Democracy! What is Democracy? Democracy, as it is generally understood,
+I submit, is nothing but the reaching of political conclusions through
+the frequent counting of noses; or, as Macaulay two generations ago
+better phrased it, "the majority of citizens told by the head";--the
+only question at just this juncture being whether, in order to the
+arriving at more acceptable results, both sexes shall be "told," instead
+of one sex only. Moreover, I with equal confidence make bold to suggest
+that while conceded, and while men have even persuaded themselves that
+they have faith in it, and really do believe in this "telling" of noses
+as the best and fairest attainable means of reaching correct results,
+yet in so doing and so professing they simply, as men are prone to do,
+deceive themselves. In other words, victims of their own cant, they
+preach a panacea in which they really do not believe. Nor of this is
+proof far to seek. _Vox populi, vox Dei_! If you extend the application
+of this principle by a single step, its loudest advocates draw back in
+alarm from the inevitable. They seek refuge in the assertion--"Oh! That
+is different!" For instance, take a concrete case; so best can we
+illustrate.
+
+One of the greatest scientific triumphs reached in modern times--perhaps
+I might fairly say the greatest--is the discovery of the cause of yellow
+fever, and its consequent control. As a result of the studies, the
+patient experimentation and self-sacrifice of the wisest,--that is, the
+most observant and expert,--the amazing conclusion was reached that not
+only the yellow fever but the innumerable ills of the flesh known under
+the caption of "malarial," were due to causes hitherto unsuspected,
+though obvious when revealed,--to the existence in the atmosphere of a
+venomous insect, in comparison with the work of which the ravages on
+mankind of the entire carnivorous and reptile creation were of
+comparatively small account. The mosquito flew disclosed, the
+atmospheric viper,--a viper most venomous and deadly. How was the
+disclosure brought about? What was the remedy applied? Was the discovery
+effected through universal suffrage? Was the remedy sought for and
+decided upon by the Initiative, or through a Referendum at an election
+held on the Tuesday succeeding the first Monday of a certain month and
+year? Had recourse in this case been had to the panacea now in greatest
+political vogue, we all know perfectly well what would have followed.
+History tells us. The quarantine, as it is called, would have been
+decreed, and a day of fasting, humiliation and prayer appointed. The
+mosquito, quite ignored, would then have gone on in his deadly work. We
+all equally well know that the man, even the politician or the
+statesman, who had suggested a solution of that problem by a count of
+noses would have been effaced with ridicule. Even the most simple minded
+would have rejected that method of reaching a result. Yet the ilia of
+the body politic, too, are complicated. Indeed, far more intricate in
+their processes and more deceitful in their aspects, they more deeply
+affect the general well-being and happiness than any ill or epidemic
+which torments the physical being, even the mosquito malaria. Yet the
+ills of the body politic, the complications which surround us on every
+side,--for these the unfailing panacea is said to lie in universal
+suffrage, that remedy which is immediately and of course laughed out of
+court if suggested in case of the simpler ills of the flesh.
+
+This, I submit, is demonstration. The true remedy is not to be sought in
+that direction in the one case any more than the other.
+
+There is a considerable element of truth, though possibly a not
+inconsiderable one of exaggeration, in this statement from a paper I
+recently chanced upon in the issue of the sober and classical _Edinburgh
+Review_ for October last,--a paper entitled "Democracy and
+Liberalism":--"History testifies unmistakably and unanimously to the
+passion of democracies for incompetence. There is nothing democracy
+dislikes and suspects so heartily as technical efficiency, particularly
+when it is independent of the popular vote." But to-day, what is
+politically proposed by our senatorial charlatans and the mountebanks of
+the market-place? The Referendum, the constant and easy Recall, the
+everlasting Initiative are dinned into our ears as the cure-alls of
+every ill of the body politic. On the contrary, I submit that, while in
+the absence of any better method as yet devised and accepted, the
+process of reaching results by a count of the "majority told by the
+head" of the citizens then present and voting has certain political
+advantages, yet, for all this, as a final, scientific, political
+process, it is unworthy of consideration. A passing expedient, it in no
+degree reflects credit on twentieth-century intelligence.
+
+And now I come to the crux of my discussion. Thus rejecting results
+reached by the ballot as now in practical use, a query is already in the
+minds of those who listen. At once suggesting itself and flung in my
+face, it is asked as a political poser, and not without a sneer,--What
+else or better have I to propose? Would I advise a return to old and
+discarded methods,--Heredity, Caste, Autocracy, Plutocracy? I
+respectfully submit this is a question no one has a right to put, and
+one I am not called upon to answer. Again, let me take a concrete case.
+Once more I appeal to the yellow fever precedent. The first step towards
+a solution of a medical, as of a political, problem is a correct
+diagnosis. Then necessarily follows a long period devoted to
+observation, to investigation and experiment. If, in the case of the
+yellow fever, a score of years only ago an observer had pointed out the
+nature of the disease and the manifest inadequacy of current theories
+and prevailing methods of prevention and treatment, do you think others
+would have had a right to turn upon him and demand that he instantly
+prescribe a remedy which should be not only complete, but at once
+recognized as such and so accepted? In the present case, as I have
+already observed, from the days of Aristotle down through two and twenty
+centuries, men had been experimenting in all, to them, conceivable ways,
+on the government of the body politic, exactly as they experimented on
+the disorders of the physical body. But only yesterday was the source of
+the yellow fever, for instance, diagnosed and located, and the proper
+means of prevention applied. The cancer and tuberculosis are to-day
+unsolved problems. By analogy, they are inviting subjects for an
+Initiative and a Referendum! Yet would any person who to-day, standing
+where I stand, expressed a disbelief, at once total and contemptuous, of
+such a procedure as respects them, be met by a demand for some other
+panacea of immediate and guaranteed efficiency? And so with the body
+politic. I here to-day am merely attempting a diagnosis, pointing out
+the disorders, and exposing as best I can the utter crudeness and
+insufficiency of the market-place remedies proposed. Have you a right,
+then, to turn on me, and call for some other prescription, warranted to
+cure, in place of the nostrums so loudly advertised by the sciolists and
+the dabblers of the day, and by me so contemptuously set aside? I
+confess I am unable to respond, or even to attempt a response to any
+such demand. I am not altogether a quack, nor is this a county fair.
+
+"Paracelsus," so denominated, was one of Robert Browning's earlier
+poems. In it he causes the fifteenth-century alchemist and forerunner of
+all modern pharmaceutical chemistry, to declare that as the result of
+long travel and much research
+
+
+"I possess
+Two sorts of knowledge: one,--vast, shadowy,
+Hints of the unbounded aim....
+The other consists of many secrets, caught
+While bent on nobler prize,--perhaps a few
+Prime principles which may conduct to much:
+These last I offer."
+
+
+So, _longo intervallo_, I have a few suggestions,--the result of an
+observation extending, as I said at the beginning, over the lives of two
+generations and a connection with many great events in which I have
+borne a part,--a part not prominent indeed, and more generally, I
+acknowledge, mistaken than correct. My errors, however, have at least
+made me cautious and doubtful of my own conclusions. I submit them for
+what they are worth. Not much, I fear.
+
+What, then, would I do, were it in my power to prescribe alterations and
+curatives for the ills of our American body politic, of which I have
+spoken; or, more correctly, the far-reaching disturbances manifestly due
+to the agencies at work, to which I have made reference? Let us come at
+once to the point, taking the existing Constitution of the United States
+as a concrete example, and recognizing the necessity for its revision
+and readjustment to meet radically changed conditions,--conditions
+social, material, geographical, changed and still changing.
+
+It was Mr. Gladstone who, years ago, made the often-quoted assertion
+that the Constitution of the United States was "the most wonderful work
+ever struck off at a given time by the brain and purpose of man." I do
+not think he was far wrong; though we, of course, realize that the
+Federal Constitution was a growth and in no degree an inspiration. That
+Constitution has through a century and a quarter stood the test of time
+and stress of war, during a period of almost unlimited growth of the
+community for which it was devised. It has outlasted many nationalities
+and most of the dynasties in existence at the time of its adoption; and
+that, too, under conditions sufficiently trying. I, therefore, regard it
+with profound respect; and, so regarding it, I would treat it with a
+cautious and tender hand. Not lightly pronouncing it antiquated, what
+changes would I make in it if to-morrow it were given me to prescribe
+alterations adapting it to the altered conditions which confront us? I
+do not hesitate to say, and I am glad to say, the changes I would
+suggest would be limited; yet, I fancy, far-reaching.
+
+And, in the first place, let us have a clear conception of the end in
+view. That end is, I submit, exactly the same to-day which Aristotle had
+in view more than twenty centuries ago. It is, not to solve all
+political problems, but to put political problems as they arise in the
+hands of those whom he termed the "best,"--but whom we know as the most
+intelligent, observant and expert,--to be, through their agency, in the
+way of ultimate solution. If, adopting every ill-considered and
+half-fledged measure of so-called reform which might be the fancy of the
+day, we incorporated them in our fundamental law, but one thing could
+result therefrom,--ultimate confusion. The Constitution is neither a
+legislative crazy-quilt nor a receptacle of fads. To make it such is in
+every respect the reverse of scientific. The work immediately in hand,
+therefore, is to devise such changes in the fundamental law as will tend
+most effectually to bring about the solution of issues as they may
+arise, by the most expert, observant and reliable. This accomplished, if
+its accomplishment were only practicable, all possible would have been
+done; and the necessary and inevitable readjustment of things would, in
+politics as in medicine and in science, be left to solve itself as
+occasion arose. Provision cannot be made against every contingency.
+
+This premised, the Constitution of the United States is an instrument
+through which powers are delegated by several local communities to a
+central government. The instrument, it was originally held, should be
+strictly construed and the powers delegated limited; and in this
+respect, with certain alterations made obviously necessary to meet
+changed conditions, I would return to the fundamental idea of
+the framers.
+
+In saying this I feel confidence also that here in South Carolina at
+least I shall meet with an earnest response. The time is not yet remote
+when local self-government worked salvation for South Carolina, as for
+her sister States of the Confederacy. You here will never forget what
+immediately followed the close of our Civil War. As an historic fact,
+the Constitution was then suspended. It was suspended by act of an
+irresponsible Congress, exercising revolutionary but unlimited powers
+over a large section of the common country. You then had an
+illustration, not soon to be forgotten, of concentration of legislative
+power. An episode at once painful and discreditable, it is not necessary
+here to refer to it in detail. Appeal, however, was made to the
+principle of local self-government,--it was, so to speak, a recurrence
+to the theory of State Sovereignty. The appeal struck a responsive,
+because traditional, chord; and it was through a recurrence to State
+Sovereignty as the agency of local self-government that loyalty and
+contentment were restored, and, I may add, that I am here to-day.
+Ceasing to be a Military Department, South Carolina once more became a
+State. Not improbably the demand will in a not remote future be heard
+that State lines and local autonomy be practically obliterated. In that
+event, I feel a confident assurance that, recurring in memory to the
+evil days which followed 1865, the spirit of enlightened conservatism
+will assert itself here and in the sister States of what was once the
+Confederacy; and again it will prevail. In the future, as in the past,
+you in South Carolina at least will cling to what in 1876 proved the ark
+of your social and political salvation.
+
+Taking another step in the discussion of changes, the Constitution is
+founded on that well-known distribution and allocation of powers first
+theoretically suggested by Montesquieu. There is a division, accompanied
+by a mutual limitation of authority, through the Judiciary, the
+Executive, and the Legislative. As respects this allocation, how would I
+modify that instrument? I freely say that the tendency of my thought,
+based on observation, is to conservatism. I have never yet in a single
+instance found that when the people of this or any other country
+accustomed to parliamentary government desired a thing, they failed to
+obtain it within a reasonable limit of time. Hasty changes are wisely
+deprecated; but I think I speak within limitation when I say that
+neither in the history of Great Britain,--the mother of Parliaments--nor
+in the history of the United States, has any modification which the
+people, on sober second thought, have considered to be for the best,
+long been deferred. Action, revolutionary in character, has not, as a
+rule, been needful, or, when taken, proved salutary. This is a record
+and result that no careful student of our history will, I take it, deny.
+
+Such being the case, so far as our Judiciary is concerned, I do not
+hesitate to say I would adhere to older, and, as I think, better
+principles, or revert to them where they have been experimentally
+abandoned. It took the Anglo-Saxon race two centuries of incessant
+conflict to wrest from a despotic executive, practically an autocracy,
+judicial independence. That was effected through what is known as a
+tenure during good behavior, as opposed to a tenure at the will of the
+monarch. This, then, for two centuries, was accepted as a fundamental
+principle of constitutional government. Of late, a new theory has been
+propounded, and by those chafing at all restraint--constitutionally
+lawless in disposition--it is said the Recall should also be applied to
+the Judiciary. Having, therefore, wrested the independence of the
+Judiciary from the hand of the Autocrat, we now propose to place it, in
+all trustfulness, in the hands of the Democrat. To me the proposition
+does not commend itself. It is founded on no correct principle, for the
+irresponsible democratic majority is even more liable to ill-considered
+and vacillating action than is the responsible autocrat. In that matter
+I would not trust myself; why, then, should I trust the composite
+Democrat? In the case of the Judiciary, therefore, I would so far as the
+fundamental law is concerned abide by the older and better considered
+principles of the framers.
+
+Next, the Executive. Again, we hear the demand of Democracy,--the
+Recall! Once more I revert to the record. This Republic has now been in
+working operation, and, taken altogether, most successful operation,
+for a century and a quarter. During that century and a quarter we have
+had, we will say, some five and twenty different chief magistrates.
+There is an ancient and somewhat vulgar adage to the effect that the
+proof of a certain dietary article is in its eating. Apply that homely
+adage to the matter under consideration. What is the lesson taught? It
+is simply this,--during a whole century and a quarter of existence there
+has not been one single chief executive of the United States to whom the
+arbitrary Recall could have been applied with what would now be agreed
+upon as a fortunate result. In the Andrew Johnson impeachment case was
+it not better that things were as they were? On the other hand, every
+one of the seven independent, self-respecting Senators who then by a
+display of high moral courage saved the country from serious prejudice
+would have been recalled out-of-hand had the Recall now demanded been in
+existence. Its working would have received prompt exemplification; as it
+was, the recall was effected in time, and after due deliberation. The
+delay occasioned no public detriment. In this life, experience is
+undeniably worth something; and the experience here referred to is
+fairly entitled to consideration. No political system possible to devise
+is wholly above criticism,--not open to exceptional contingencies or to
+dangers possible to conjure up. Such have from time to time arisen in
+the past; in the future such will inevitably arise. This consideration
+must, however, be balanced against a general average of successful
+working; and I confidently submit that, weighing thus the proved
+advantage of the system we have against the possibilities of danger
+which hereafter may occur, but which never yet have occurred, the scale
+on which are the considerations in favor of change kicks the beam.
+
+In view, however, of the growth of the country, the vastly increased
+complexity of interests involved, the intricacy and the cost of the
+election processes to which recourse is necessarily had, I would
+substitute for the present brief tenure of the presidential office--a
+tenure well enough perhaps in the comparatively simple days which
+preceded our Civil War--a tenure sufficiently long to enable the
+occupant of the presidential chair to have a policy and to accomplish at
+least something towards its adoption. As the case stands to-day, a
+President for the first time elected has during his term of four years,
+one year, and one year only, in which really to apply himself to the
+accomplishment of results. The first year of his term is necessarily
+devoted to the work of acquiring a familiarity with the machinery of the
+government, and the shaping of a policy. The second year may be devoted
+to a more or less strenuous effort at the adoption of the policy thus
+formulated. As experience shows, the action of the third and fourth
+years is gravely affected--if not altogether perverted from the work in
+hand--by what are known as the political exigencies incident to a
+succession. Manifestly, this calls for correction. The remedy, however,
+to my mind, is obvious and suggests itself. As the presidency is the
+one office under our Constitution national in character, and in no way
+locally representative, I would extend the term to seven years, and
+render the occupant of the office thereafter ineligible for reelection.
+Seven years is, I am aware, under our political system, an unusual term;
+and here my ears will, I know, be assailed by the great "mandate"
+cackle. The count of noses being complete, the mind of the composite
+Democrat is held to be made up. It only remains to formulate the
+consequent decree; and, with least possible delay, put it in way of
+practical enforcement. Again, I, as a publicist, demur. It is the old
+issue, that between instant action and action on second thought,
+presented once more. Briefly, the experience of sixty years strongly
+inclines me to a preference of matured and considerate action over that
+immediate action which notoriously is in nine cases out of ten as
+ill-advised as it is precipitate. Only in the field of politics is the
+expediency of the latter assumed as of course; yet, as in science and
+literature and art so in politics, final, because satisfactory, results
+are at best but slowly thrashed out. As respects wisdom, the modern
+statute book does not loom, monumental. Its contemplation would indeed
+perhaps even lead to a surmise that reasonable delay in formulating his
+"mandate" might, in the case of the composite Democrat as in that of the
+individual Autocrat, prove a not altogether unmixed, and so in the end
+an intolerable, evil.
+
+Thus while a change of the Executive and Legislative branches of the
+government might not be always simultaneously effected, by selecting
+seven years as the presidential term the election would be brought
+about, as frequently as might be, by itself, uncomplicated by local
+issues connected with the fortunes or political fate of individual
+candidates for office, whether State, Congressional, or Senatorial; and
+during the seven years of tenure, four, at least, it might reasonably be
+anticipated, would be devoted to the promotion of a definite policy, in
+place of one year in a term of four, as now. If also ineligible for
+reelection, there is at least a fair presumption that the occupant of
+the position might from start to finish apply himself to its duties and
+obligations, without being distracted therefrom by ulterior personal
+ends as constantly as humanly held in view.
+
+Having thus disposed of the Judiciary and the Executive, we come to the
+Legislative. And here I submit is the weak point in our American
+system,--manifestly the weak point, and to those who, like myself, have
+had occasion to know, undeniably so. I am here as a publicist; not as a
+writer of memoirs: so, on this head, I do not now propose to dilate or
+bear witness. I will only briefly say that having at one period, and for
+more than the lifetime of a generation, been in charge of large
+corporate and financial interests, I have had much occasion to deal with
+legislative bodies, National, State and Municipal. That page of my
+experiences is the one I care least to recall, and would most gladly
+forget. I am not going to specify, or give names of either localities or
+persons; but, knowing what I know, it is useless to approach me on this
+topic with the usual good-natured and optimistic, if somewhat unctuous
+and conventional, commonplaces on general uprightness and the tendency
+to improved conditions and a higher standard. I know better! I have seen
+legislators bought like bullocks--they selling themselves. I have
+watched them cover their tracks with a cunning more than vulpine. I have
+myself been black-mailed and sandbagged, while whole legislative bodies
+watched the process, fully cognizant at every step of what was going on.
+This, I am glad to say, was years ago. The legislative conditions were
+then bad, scandalously bad; nor have I any reason to believe in a
+regeneration since. The stream will never rise higher than its source;
+but it generally indicates the level thereof. In this case, I can only
+hope that in my experience it failed so to do. Running at a low level,
+the waters of that stream were deplorably dirty.
+
+That the legislative branch of our government has fallen so markedly in
+public estimation is not, I think, open to denial. To my mind, under the
+conditions I have referred to, such could not fail to be the case. It
+has, consequently, lost public confidence. Hence this popular demand for
+immediate legislation by the People,--this twentieth-century appeal to
+the Agora and Forum methods which antedate the era of Christ. It is true
+the world outgrew them two thousand years ago, and they were discarded;
+but, living in a progressive and not a reactionary period, all that, we
+are assured, is changed! The heart is no longer on the right-hand side
+of the body. To secure desired results it is only necessary to start
+quite fresh, as a mere preliminary discarding all lessons of experience.
+
+Such reasoning does not commend itself to my judgment. On the contrary,
+the failure of the American legislative to command an increasing public
+confidence, while both natural and obvious, is, if my observation guides
+me to conclusions in any degree correct, traceable to two reasons. So
+far as government is concerned, the law-making branch is assumed to be
+made up of the wisest and the most expert. Meanwhile, it is as a matter
+of fact chosen by the process I have not over-respectfully referred to
+as the counting of noses; and, moreover, by an unwritten law more
+binding than any in the Statute Book, that counting of noses is with us
+localized. In other words, when it comes to the choice of our
+law-makers, reducing provincialism to a system we make the local
+numerical majority supreme, and any one is considered competent to
+legislate. He can do that, even if by common knowledge he is incompetent
+or untrustworthy in every other capacity. Localization thus becomes the
+stronghold of mediocrity, the sure avenue to office of the second-and
+third-rate man,--he who wishes always to enjoy his share of a little
+brief authority, to have, he also, a taste of public life. In this
+respect our American system is, I submit, manifestly and incomparably
+inferior to the system of parliamentary election existing in Great
+Britain, itself open to grave criticism. In Great Britain the public man
+seeks the constituency wherever he can find it; or the constituency
+seeks its representative wherever it recognizes him. The present Prime
+Minister of Great Britain, for instance, represents a small Scotch
+constituency in which he never resided, but by which he was elected more
+than twenty years ago, and through which he has since consecutively
+remained in public life. On the other hand, look at the waste and
+extravagance of the system now and traditionally in use with us. To get
+into public life a man must not only be in sympathy with the majority of
+the citizens of the locality in which he lives, but he must continue to
+be in sympathy with that majority; or, at any election, like Mr. Cannon
+in the election just held, where for any passing cause a majority of his
+neighbors in the locality in which he lives may fail to support him, he
+must go into retirement. I cannot here enlarge on this topic, vital as I
+see it; I have neither space nor time, and must, therefore, needs
+content myself with the "hints" of Paracelsus. I will merely say that as
+an outcome this localized majority system practically disfranchises the
+more intelligent and the more disinterested, the more individual and
+independent of every constituency. It reduces their influence, and
+negatives their action. It operates in like fashion everywhere. My
+field of observation has been at home, here in America; but it has been
+the same in France. For instance, while preparing this address I came
+across the following in that most respectable sheet, the London
+_Athenaum_. A very competent Frenchman was there criticising a recent
+book entitled "Idealism in France." Reference was by him made to what,
+in France, is known as the "_scrutin d'arrondissement,"_ or, in other
+words, the district representative system. The critic declares that this
+system has there "created a party machine which has brought the country
+under the sway of a sort of Radical-Socialist Tammany, and bound
+together the voter and the deputy by a tie of mutual corruption, the
+candidate promising Government favors to the elector in return for his
+vote, and the elector supporting the candidate who promises most. Hence
+a policy in which ideas and ideals are forgotten for personal and local
+interests, as each candidate strives to outbid his rivals in the bribes
+that he offers to his constituents. Hence, finally, a general lowering
+in the tone of French home politics, every question being made
+subservient by the deputies to that of their reelection."
+
+I would respectfully inquire if the above does not apply word for word
+to the condition of affairs with which we are familiar in America.
+
+But let me here again cite a concrete case, still fresh in memory;
+nothing in abstract discussion tells so much. Take the late Carl
+Schurz. If there was one man in our public life since 1865 who showed a
+genius for the parliamentary career, and who in six short years in the
+United States Senate--a single term--displayed there constructive
+legislating qualities of the highest order, it was Carl Schurz. Yet at
+the end of that single senatorial term, for local and temporary reasons
+he failed to obtain the support of a majority, or the support of
+anything approaching a majority, of those composing the constituency
+upon which he depended. Consequently he was retired from that
+parliamentary position necessary for the accomplishment, through him, of
+best public results. Yet at that very time there was no man in the
+United States who commanded so large and so personal a constituency as
+Carl Schurz; for he represented the entire Germanic element in the
+United States. Distributed as that element was, however, with its vote
+localized under our law, unwritten as well as statutory, there was no
+possibility of any constituency so concentrating itself that Carl Schurz
+could be kept in the position where he could continue to render services
+of the greatest possible value to the country. I, therefore, confidently
+here submit a doubt whether human ingenuity could devise any system
+calculated to lead to a greater waste of parliamentary ability, or more
+effectually keep from the front and position of influence that
+legislative superiority which was the arm of Aristotle to secure.
+"Cant-patriotism," as your Francis Lieber termed it; and, on this
+score, he waxed eloquent. "Do we not live in a world of cant," he wrote
+from Columbia here to a friend at the North seventy-five years ago,
+"that cant-patriotism which plumes itself in selecting men from within
+the State confines only. The truer a nation is, the more essentially it
+is elevated, the more it disregards petty considerations, and takes the
+true and the good from whatever quarter it may come. Look at history and
+you find the proof. Look around you, where you are, and you find it
+now." And, were Lieber living to-day, he would find a striking
+exemplification of the consequences of a total and systematic disregard
+of this elementary proposition in studying the United States Senate from
+and through its reporters' gallery. The decline in the standards of that
+body, whether of aspect, intelligence, education or character, under the
+operation of the local primary has been not less pronounced than
+startling. The outcome and ripe result of "cant-patriotism," it affords
+to the curious observer an impressive object-lesson,--provincialism
+reduced to a political system; what a witty and incisive French writer
+has recently termed the "Cult of Incompetence." Speaking of conditions
+prevailing not here but in France, this observer says:--"Democracy in
+its modern form chooses its' delegates in its own image.... What ought
+the character of the legislator to be? The very opposite, it seems to
+me, of the democratic legislator, for he ought to be well-informed and
+entirely devoid of prejudice." Taken as a whole, and a few striking
+individual exceptions apart, are those composing the Senate of the
+United States conspicuous in these respects? They certainly do not so
+impress the casual observer. That, as a body, they increasingly fail to
+command confidence and attention is matter of common remark. Nor is the
+reason far to seek. It would be the same as respects literature, science
+and art, were their representatives chosen and results reached through a
+count of noses localized, with selection severely confined to
+home talent.
+
+I am well aware of the criticism which will at once be passed on what I
+now advance. Local representation through choice by numerical majorities
+within given confines, geographically and mathematically fixed, is a
+system so rooted and intrenched in the convictions and traditions of the
+American community that even to question its wisdom evinces a lack of
+political common-sense. It in fact resembles nothing so much as the
+attempt to whistle down a strongly prevailing October wind from the
+West. The attempt so to do is not practical politics! In reply, however,
+I would suggest that such a criticism is wholly irrelevant. The
+publicist has nothing to do with practical politics. It is as if it were
+objected to a physician who prescribed sanitation against epidemics that
+the community in question was by custom and tradition wedded to filth
+and surface-drainage, and could not possibly be induced to abandon them
+in favor of any new-fangled theories of soap-and-water cleanliness. So
+why waste time in prescribing such? Better be common-sensed and
+practical, taking things as they are. In the case suggested, and
+confronted with such criticism, the medical adviser simply shrugs his
+shoulders, and is silent; the alternative he knows is inescapable. After
+a sufficiency of sound scourgings the objecting community will probably
+know better, and may listen to reason; in a way, conforming thereto. So,
+also, the body politic. If Ephraim is indeed thus joined to idols, the
+publicist simply shrugs his shoulders, and passes on; possibly, after
+Ephraim has been sufficiently scourged, he may in that indefinite future
+popularly known as "one of these days" be more clear sighted and wiser.
+
+None the less, so far as our national parliamentary system is concerned,
+could I have my way in a revision of the Constitution, I would increase
+the senatorial term to ten years, and I would, were such a thing within
+the range of possibility, break down the system of the necessary
+senatorial selection by a State of an inhabitant of the State. If I
+could, I would introduce the British system. For example, though I never
+voted for Mr. Bryan and have not been in general sympathy with Mr.
+Roosevelt, yet few things would give me greater political satisfaction
+than to see Mr. Bryan, we will say, elected a Senator from Arizona or
+Oregon, Mr. Roosevelt elected from Illinois or Pennsylvania, President
+Taft from Utah or Vermont. They apparently best represent existing
+feelings and the ideals prevailing in those communities; why, then,
+should they not voice those feelings and ideals in our highest
+parliamentary chamber?
+
+As respects our House of Representatives, it would in principle be the
+same. I do not care to go into the rationale of what is known as
+proportional representation, nor have I time so to do; but, were it in
+my power, I would prescribe to-morrow that hereafter the national House
+of Representatives should be constituted on the proportional basis,--the
+choice of representatives to be by States, but, as respects the
+nomination of candidates, irrespective of district lines. Like many
+others, I am very weary of provincial nobodies, "good men" locally known
+to be such!
+
+As I have already said, in parliamentary government all depends in the
+end on the truly representative character of the legislative body. If
+that is as it should be, the rest surely follows. The objective of
+Aristotle is attained.
+
+Exceeding the limits assigned to it, my discussion has, however,
+extended too far. I must close. One word before so doing. Why am I here?
+I am here,--a man considerably exceeding in age the allotted threescore
+and ten--to deliver a message, be the value of the same greater or less.
+I greatly fear it is less. I would, however, impart the lessons of an
+experience stretching over sixty years,--the results of such observation
+as my intelligence has enabled me to exercise. I do so, addressing
+myself to a local institution of the advanced education. Why? Because,
+looking over the country, diagnosing its conditions as well as my
+capacity enables me, observing the evolution of the past and
+forecasting, in as far as I may, the outcome, I am persuaded that the
+future of the country rests more largely in the hands of such
+institutions as this than in those of any other agency or activity. Do
+not say I flatter; for, while I can hope for no advancement, I think I
+have not overstated the case; I certainly have not overstated my
+conviction. There has been no man who has influenced the course of
+modern thought more deeply and profoundly than Adam Smith, a Professor
+in a Scotch University of the second class. So here in Columbia seventy
+years ago, Francis Lieber prepared and published his "Manual of
+Political Ethics." Adam Smith and Francis Lieber were but
+prototypes--examples of what I have in mind. The days were when the
+Senate of the United States afforded a rostrum from which thinkers and
+teachers first formulated, and then advanced, great policies. Those
+days, and I say it regretfully, are past. Unless I am greatly mistaken,
+however, a new political force is now asserting itself. I have recently,
+at a meeting of historical and scientific associations in Boston, had my
+attention forcibly called to this aspect of the situation now shaping
+itself. I there met young men, many, and not the least noticeable of
+whom, came from this section. They inspired me with a renewed confidence
+in our political future. Essentially teachers,--I might add, they were
+publicists as well as professors. Observers and students, they actively
+followed the course of developing thought in Europe as in this country.
+Exact in their processes, philosophical and scientific in their methods,
+unselfish in their devotion, they were broad of view. It is for them to
+realize in a future not remote the University ideal pictured, and
+correctly pictured, from this stage by one who here preceded me a short
+six months ago. They, constituting the University, are the "hope of the
+State in the direction of its practical affairs; in teaching the lawyer
+the better standards of his profession, his duty to place character
+above money making; in teaching the legislator the philosophy of
+legislation, and that the constructive forces of legislation carefully
+considered should precede every effort to change an existing status; in
+teaching those in official life, executive and judicial, that demagogy,
+and theories of life uncontrolled by true principles, do not make for
+success, when final success is considered, but that, if they did lead to
+success, they should be avoided for their inherent imperfection.... The
+province of the University is to educate citizenship in the abstract."
+
+It is the presence of this class, to those composing which I bow as
+distinctly of a period superior to mine, that you owe my presence
+to-day,--whatever that presence may be worth. I regard their existence
+and their coming forward in such institutions as this University of
+South Carolina, as the arc of the bow of promise spanning the political
+horizon of our future.
+
+Through you, to them my message is addressed.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's 'Tis Sixty Years Since, by Charles Francis Adams
+
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+Project Gutenberg's 'Tis Sixty Years Since, by Charles Francis Adams
+
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+Title: 'Tis Sixty Years Since
+
+Author: Charles Francis Adams
+
+Release Date: February, 2006 [EBook #9996]
+[Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule]
+[This file was first posted on November 6, 2003]
+
+Edition: 10
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 'TIS SIXTY YEARS SINCE ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Afra Ullah, Sjaani and PG Distributed Proofreaders
+
+
+
+
+"TIS SIXTY YEARS SINCE"
+
+ADDRESS OF
+
+CHARLES FRANCIS ADAMS
+
+
+
+FOUNDERS' DAY, JANUARY 16, 1913
+
+
+
+"'TIS SIXTY YEARS SINCE"
+
+In the single hour self-allotted for my part in this occasion there is
+much ground to cover,--the time is short, and I have far to go. Did I
+now, therefore, submit all I had proposed to say when I accepted your
+invitation, there would remain no space for preliminaries. Yet something
+of that character is in place. I will try to make it brief.[1]
+
+As the legend or text of what I have in mind to submit, I have given the
+words "'Tis Sixty Years Since." As some here doubtless recall, this is
+the second or subordinate title of Walter Scott's first novel,
+"Waverley," which brought him fame. Given to the world in 1814,--hard on
+a century ago,--"Waverley" told of the last Stuart effort to recover the
+crown of Great Britain,--that of "The '45." It so chances that Scott's
+period of retrospect is also just now most appropriate in my case,
+inasmuch as I entered Harvard as a student in the year 1853--"sixty
+years since!" It may fairly be asserted that school life ends, and what
+may in contradistinction thereto be termed thinking and acting life
+begins, the day the young man passes the threshold of the institution of
+more advanced education. For him, life's responsibilities then begin.
+Prior to that confused, thenceforth things with him become
+consecutive,--a sequence. Insensibly he puts away childish things.
+
+[1] Owing to its length, this "Address" was compressed in delivery,
+occupying one hour only. It is here printed in the form in which it was
+prepared,--the parts omitted in delivery being included.
+
+In those days, as I presume now, the college youth harkened to inspired
+voices. Sir Walter Scott belonged to a previous generation. Having held
+the close attention of a delighted world as the most successful
+story-teller of his own or any preceding period, he had passed off the
+stage; but only a short twenty years before. Other voices no less
+inspired had followed; and, living, spoke to us. Perhaps my scheme
+to-day is best expressed by one of these.
+
+When just beginning to attract the attention of the English-speaking
+world, Alfred Tennyson gave forth his poem of "Locksley Hall,"--very
+familiar to those of my younger days. Written years before, at the time
+of publication he was thirty-three. In 1886, a man of seventy-five, he
+composed a sequel to his earlier effort,--the utterance entitled
+"Locksley Hall Sixty Years After." He then, you will remember, reviewed
+his young man's dreams,--dreams of the period when he
+
+
+" ... dip't into the future, far as human eye could see,
+Saw the Vision of the world, and all the wonder that would be,"
+
+
+--threescore years later contrasting in sombre verse an old man's stern
+realities with the bright anticipations of youth. Such is my purpose
+to-day. "Wandering back to living boyhood," to the time when I first
+simultaneously passed the Harvard threshold and the threshold of
+responsible life, I propose to compare the ideals and actualities of the
+present with the ideals, anticipations and dreams of a past now
+somewhat remote.
+
+To say that in life and in the order of life's events it is the
+unexpected which is apt to occur, is a commonplace. That it has been so
+in my own case, I shall presently show. Meanwhile, not least among the
+unexpected things is my presence here to-day. If, when I entered Harvard
+in 1853, it had been suggested that in 1913, I,--born of the New England
+Sanhedrim, a Brahmin Yankee by blood, tradition and environment--had it
+been suggested that I, being such, would sixty years later stand by
+invitation here in Columbia before the faculty and students of the
+University of South Carolina, I should under circumstances then existing
+have pronounced the suggestion as beyond reasonable credence. Here,
+however, I am; and here, from this as my rostrum, I propose to-day to
+deliver a message,--such as it is.
+
+And yet, though such a future outcome, if then foretold, would have
+seemed scarcely possible of occurrence, there, after all, were certain
+conditions which would have rendered the contingency even at that time
+not only possible, but in accordance with the everlasting fitness of
+things. For, curiously enough, personal relations of a certain character
+held with this institution would have given me, even in 1853, a sense of
+acquaintance with it such as individually I had with no other
+institution of similar character throughout the entire land. It in this
+wise came about. At that period, preceding as it did the deluge about to
+ensue, it was the hereditary custom of certain families more especially
+of South Carolina and of Louisiana,--but of South Carolina in
+particular--to send their youth to Harvard, there to receive a college
+education. It thus chanced that among my associates at Harvard were not
+a few who bore names long familiarly and honorably known to Carolinian
+records,--Barnwell and Preston, Rhett and Alston, Parkman and Eliot; and
+among these were some I knew well, and even intimately. Gone now with
+the generation and even the civilization to which they belonged, I doubt
+if any of them survive. Indeed only recently I chanced on a grimly
+suggestive mention of one who had left on me the memory of a character
+and personality singularly pure, high-toned and manly,--permeated with a
+sense of moral and personal obligation. I have always understood he died
+five years later at Sharpsburg, as you call it, or Antietam, as it was
+named by us, in face-to-face conflict with a Massachusetts regiment
+largely officered by Harvard men of his time and even class,--his own
+familiar friends. This is the record, the reference being to a marriage
+service held at St. Paul's church in Richmond, in the late autumn of
+1862: "An indefinable feeling of gloom was thrown over a most auspicious
+event when the bride's youngest sister glided through a side door just
+before the processional. Tottering to a chancel pew, she threw herself
+upon the cushions, her slight frame racked with sobs. Scarcely a year
+before, the wedding march had been played for her, and a joyous throng
+saw her wedded to gallant Breck Parkman. Before another twelvemonth
+rolled around the groom was killed at the front."[2] Samuel Breck
+Parkman was in the Harvard class following that to which I belonged.
+Graduating in 1857, fifty-five years later I next saw his name in the
+connection just given. It recorded an incident of not infrequent
+occurrence in those dark and cruel days.
+
+It was, however, in Breck Parkman and his like that I first became
+conscious of certain phases of the South Carolina character which
+subsequently I learned to bear in high respect.
+
+So far as this University of South Carolina was concerned, it also so
+chanced that, by the merest accident, I, a very young man, was thrown
+into close personal relations with one of the most eminent of your
+professors,--Francis Lieber. Few here, I suppose, now personally
+remember Francis Lieber. To most it gives indeed a certain sense of
+remoteness to meet one who, as in my case, once held close and even
+intimate relations with a German emigrant, distinguished as a publicist,
+who as a youth had lain, wounded and helpless, a Prussian recruit, on
+the field above Namur. Occurring in June, 1815, two days after Waterloo,
+the affair at Namur will soon be a century gone. Of those engaged in
+it, the last obeyed the fell sergeant's summons a half score years ago.
+It seems remote; but at the time of which I speak Waterloo was
+appreciably nearer those in active life than are Shiloh and Gettysburg
+now. The Waterloo campaign was then but thirty-eight years removed,
+whereas those last are fifty now; and, while Lieber was at Waterloo, I
+was myself at Gettysburg.
+
+[2] DeLeon, "Belles, Beaux and Brains of the Sixties," p. 158.
+
+Subsequently, later in life, it was again my privilege to hold close
+relations with another Columbian,--an alumnus of this University as it
+then was--in whom I had opportunity to study some of the strongest and
+most respect-commanding traits of the Southern character. I refer to one
+here freshly remembered,--Alexander Cheves Haskell,--soldier, jurist,
+banker and scholar, one of a septet of brothers sent into the field by a
+South Carolina mother calm and tender of heart, but in silent suffering
+unsurpassed by any recorded in the annals whether of Judea or of Rome.
+It was the fourth of the seven Haskells I knew, one typical throughout,
+in my belief, of what was best in your Carolinian development. With him,
+as I have said, I was closely and even intimately associated through
+years, and in him I had occasion to note that almost austere type
+represented in its highest development in the person and attributes of
+Calhoun. Of strongly marked descent, Haskell was, as I have always
+supposed, of a family and race in which could be observed those virile
+Scotch-Irish and Presbyterian qualities which found their
+representative types in the two Jacksons,--Andrew, and him known in
+history as "Stonewall." To Alec Haskell I shall in this discourse again
+have occasion to refer.
+
+Thus, though in 1853, and for long years subsequent thereto, it would
+not have entered my mind as among the probabilities that I should ever
+stand here, reviewing the past after the manner of Tennyson in his
+"Locksley Hall Sixty Years After," yet if there was any place in the
+South, or, I may say, in the entire country, where, as a matter of
+association, I might naturally have looked so to stand, it would have
+been where now I find myself.
+
+But I must hasten on; for, as I have said, if I am to accomplish even a
+part of my purpose, I have no time wherein to linger.
+
+Not long ago I chanced, in a country ramble, to be conversing with an
+eminent foreigner, known, and favorably known, to all Americans. In the
+course of leisurely exchange of ideas between us, he suddenly asked if I
+could suggest any explanation of the fact that not only were the
+publicists who had the greatest vogue in our college days now to a large
+extent discredited, but that almost every view and theory advanced by
+them, and which we had accepted as fixed and settled, was, where not
+actually challenged, silently ignored. Nor did the assertion admit of
+denial; for, looking back through the vista of threescore years, of the
+principles of what may be called "public polity" then advanced as
+indisputable, few to-day meet with general acceptance. To review the
+record from this point of view is curious.
+
+When in 1853 I entered Harvard, so far as this country and its polity
+were concerned certain things were matters of contention, while others
+were accepted as axiomatic,--the basic truths of our system. Among the
+former--the subjects of active contention--were the question of Slavery,
+then grimly assuming shape, and that of Nationality intertwined
+therewith. Subordinate to this was the issue of Free Trade and
+Protection, with the school of so-called American political economy
+arrayed against that of Adam Smith. Beyond these as political ideals
+were the tenets and theories of Jeffersonian Democracy. That the world
+had heretofore been governed too much was loudly acclaimed, and the
+largest possible individualism was preached, not only as a privilege but
+as a right. The area of government action was to be confined within the
+narrowest practical limits, and ample scope was to be allowed to each to
+develop in the way most natural to himself, provided only he did not
+infringe upon the rights of others. Materially, we were then reaching
+out to subdue a continent,--a doctrine of Manifest Destiny was in vogue.
+Beyond this, however, and most important now to be borne in mind,
+compared with the present the control of man over natural agencies and
+latent forces was scarcely begun. Not yet had the railroad crossed the
+Missouri; electricity, just bridled, was still unharnessed.
+
+I have now passed in rapid review what may perhaps without exaggeration
+be referred to as an array of conditions and theories, ideals and
+policies. It remains to refer to the actual results which have come
+about during these sixty years as respects them, or because of them;
+and, finally, to reach if possible conclusions as to the causes which
+have affected what may not inaptly be termed a process of general
+evolution. Having thus, so to speak, diagnosed the situation, the
+changes the situation exacts are to be measured, and a forecast
+ventured. An ambitious programme, I am well enough aware that the not
+very considerable reputation I have established for myself hardly
+warrants me in attempting it. This, I premise.
+
+Let us, in the first place, recur in somewhat greater detail to the
+various policies and ideals I have referred to as in vogue in the
+year 1853.
+
+First and foremost, overshadowing all else, was the political issue
+raised by African slavery, then ominously assuming shape. The clouds
+foreboding the coming tempest were gathering thick and heavy; and,
+moreover, they were even then illumined by electric flashes, accompanied
+by a mutter of distant thunder. Though we of the North certainly did not
+appreciate its gravity, the situation was portentous in the extreme.
+
+Involved in this problem of African slavery was the incidental issue of
+Free Trade and Protection,--apparently only economical and industrial in
+character, but in reality fundamentally crucial. And behind this lay
+the constitutional question, involving as it did not only the
+conflicting theories of a strict or liberal construction of the
+fundamental law, but nationality also,--the right of a Sovereign State
+to withdraw from the Union created in 1787, and developed through two
+generations.
+
+These may be termed concrete political issues, as opposed to basic
+truths generally accepted and theories individually entertained. The
+theories were constitutional, social, economical. Constitutionally, they
+turned upon the obligations of citizenship. There was no such thing then
+as a citizen of the United States of and by itself. The citizen of the
+United States was such simply because of his citizenship of a Sovereign
+State,--whether Massachusetts or Virginia or South Carolina; and, of
+course, an instrument based upon a divided sovereignty admitted of
+almost infinitely diverse interpretation. It is a scriptural aphorism
+that no man can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and
+love the other, or else he will hold to the one and despise the other.
+And in the fulness of time it literally with us so came about. The
+accepted economical theories of the period were to a large extent
+corollaries of the fundamental proposition, and differing material and
+social conditions. Beyond all this, and coming still under the head of
+individual theories, was the doctrine enunciated by Thomas Jefferson in
+the Declaration of Independence,--the doctrine that all men were created
+equal,--meaning, of course, equal before the law. But the theorist and
+humanitarian of the North, accepting the fundamental principle laid down
+in the Declaration, gave to it a far wider application than had been
+intended by its authors,--a breadth of application it would not bear.
+Such science as he had being of scriptural origin, he interpreted the
+word "equal" as signifying equal in the possibilities of their
+attributes,--physical, moral, intellectual; and in so doing, he of
+course ignored the first principles of ethnology. It was, I now realize,
+a somewhat wild-eyed school of philosophy, that of which I myself was a
+youthful disciple.
+
+But, on the other hand, beside these, between 1850 and 1860 a class of
+trained and more cautious thinkers, observers, scientists and
+theologians was coming to the front. Their investigations, though we did
+not then foresee it, were a generation later destined gently to subvert
+the accepted fundamentals of religious and economical thought, literary
+performance, and material existence. The work they had in hand to do was
+for the next fifteen years to be subordinate, so far as this country was
+concerned, to the solution of the terrible political problems which were
+first insistent on settlement; yet, as is now apparent, an initial
+movement was on foot which foreboded a revolution world-wide in its
+nature, and one in comparison with which the issues of slavery and
+American constitutionality became practically insignificant,--in a word,
+local and passing incidents.
+
+Finally, it remains to consider specifically the political theories
+then in vogue in their relation to the individual. In this country, it
+was the period of the equality of man and individuality in the
+development of the type. It was generally believed that the world had
+hitherto been governed too much,--that the day of caste, and even class,
+was over and gone; and finally, that America was a species of vast
+modern melting-pot of humanity, in which, within a comparatively short
+period of time, the characteristics of all branches of Indo-Aryan origin
+would resolve themselves. A new type would emerge,--the American. These
+theories were also in their consequences far-reaching. Practically, 1853
+antedates all our present industrial organizations so loudly in
+evidence,--the multifarious trades-unions which now divide the
+population of the United States into what are known as the "masses" and
+the "classes." As recently as a century ago, it used to be said of the
+French army under the Empire, that every soldier carried the baton of
+the Field-Marshal in his knapsack. And this ideal of equality and
+individuality was fixed in the American mind.
+
+Not that I for a moment mean to imply that in my belief the middle of
+the last century, or the twenty years anterior to the Civil War, was a
+species of golden age in our American annals. On the contrary, it was,
+as I remember it, a phase of development very open to criticism; and
+that in many respects. It was crude, self-conscious and self-assertive;
+provincial and formative, rather than formed. Socially and materially
+we were, compared with the present era of motors and parlor-cars, in the
+"one-hoss shay" and stove-heated railroad-coach stage. Nevertheless,
+what is now referred to as "predatory wealth" had not yet begun to
+accumulate in few hands; much greater equality of condition prevailed;
+nor was the "wage-earner" referred to as constituting a class distinct
+from the holders of property. Thus the individual was then
+encouraged,--whether in literature, in commerce, or in politics. In
+other words, there being a free field, one man was held to be in all
+respects the equal of the rest. Especially was what I have said true of
+the Northern, or so-called Free States, as contrasted with the States of
+the South, where the presence of African slavery distinctly affected
+individual theories, no matter where or to what extent entertained.
+
+Such, briefly and comprehensively stated, having been the situation in
+1853, it remains to consider the practical outcome thereof during the
+sixty years it has been my fortune to take part, either as an actor or
+as an observer, in the great process of evolution. It is curious to note
+the extent to which the unexpected has come about. In the first place,
+consider the all-absorbing mid-century political issue, that involving
+the race question, to which I first referred,--the issue which divided
+the South from the North, and which, eight years only after I had
+entered college, carried me from the walks of civil life into the
+calling of arms.
+
+And here I enter on a field of discussion both difficult and dangerous;
+and, for reasons too obvious to require statement, what I am about to
+say will be listened to with no inconsiderable apprehension as to what
+next may be forthcoming. Nevertheless, this is a necessary part of my
+theme; and I propose to say what I have in mind to say, setting forth
+with all possible frankness the more mature conclusions reached with the
+passage of years. Let it be received in the spirit in which it
+is offered.
+
+So far, then, as the institution of slavery is concerned, in its
+relations to ownership and property in those of the human species,--I
+have seen no reason whatever to revise or in any way to alter the
+theories and principles I entertained in 1853, and in the maintenance of
+which I subsequently bore arms between 1861 and 1865. Economically,
+socially, and from the point of view of abstract political justice, I
+hold that the institution of slavery, as it existed in this country
+prior to the year 1865, was in no respect either desirable or
+justifiable. That it had its good and even its elevating side, so far at
+least as the African is concerned, I am not here to deny. On the
+contrary, I see and recognize those features of the institution far more
+clearly now than I should have said would have been possible in 1853.
+That the institution in itself, under conditions then existing, tended
+to the elevation of the less advanced race, I frankly admit I did not
+then think. On the other hand, that it exercised a most pernicious
+influence upon those of the more advanced race, and especially upon
+that large majority of the more advanced race who were not themselves
+owners of slaves,--of that I have become with time ever more and more
+satisfied. The noticeable feature, however, so far as I individually am
+concerned, has been the entire change of view as respects certain of the
+fundamental propositions at the base of our whole American political and
+social edifice brought about by a more careful and intelligent
+ethnological study. I refer to the political equality of man, and to
+that race absorption to which I have alluded,--that belief that any
+foreign element introduced into the American social system and body
+politic would speedily be absorbed therein, and in a brief space
+thoroughly assimilated. In this all-important respect I do not hesitate
+to say we theorists and abstractionists of the North, throughout that
+long anti-slavery discussion which ended with the 1861 clash of arms,
+were thoroughly wrong. In utter disregard of fundamental, scientific
+facts, we theoretically believed that all men--no matter what might be
+the color of their skin, or the texture of their hair--were, if placed
+under exactly similar conditions, in essentials the same. In other
+words, we indulged in the curious and, as is now admitted, utterly
+erroneous theory that the African was, so to speak, an Anglo-Saxon, or,
+if you will, a Yankee "who had never had a chance,"--a fellow-man who
+was guilty, as we chose to express it, of a skin not colored like our
+own. In other words, though carved in ebony, he also was in the image
+of God.
+
+Following out this theory, under the lead of men to whom scientific
+analysis and observation were anathema if opposed to accepted cardinal
+political theories as enunciated in the Declaration as read by them, the
+African was not only emancipated, but so far as the letter of the law,
+as expressed in an amended Constitution, would establish the fact, the
+quondam slave was in all respects placed on an equality, political,
+legal and moral, with those of the more advanced race.
+
+I do not hesitate here,--as one who largely entertained the theoretical
+views I have expressed,--I do not hesitate here to say, as the result of
+sixty years of more careful study and scientific observation, the
+theories then entertained by us were not only fundamentally wrong, but
+they further involved a problem in the presence of which I confess
+to-day I stand appalled.
+
+It is said,--whether truthfully or not,--that when some years ago John
+Morley, the English writer and thinker, was in this country, on
+returning to England he remarked that the African race question, as now
+existing in the United States, presented a problem as nearly, to his
+mind, insoluble as any human problem well could be. I do not care
+whether Lord Morley made this statement or did not make it. I am
+prepared, however, to say that, individually, so far as my present
+judgment goes, it is a correct presentation. To us in the North, the
+African is a comparatively negligible factor. So far as Massachusetts,
+for instance, or the city of Boston more especially, are concerned, as
+a problem it is solving itself. Proportionately, the African infusion is
+becoming less--never large, it is incomparably less now than it was in
+the days of my own youth. Thus manifestly a negligible factor, it is
+also one tending to extinction. Indeed, it would be fairly open to
+question whether a single Afro-American of unmixed Ethiopian descent
+could now be found in Boston. That the problem presents itself with a
+wholly different aspect here in Carolina is manifest. The difference too
+is radical; it goes to the heart of the mystery.
+
+As I have already said, the universal "melting-pot" theory in vogue in
+my youth was that but seven, or at the most fourteen, years were
+required to convert the alien immigrant--no matter from what region or
+of what descent--into an American citizen. The educational influences
+and social environment were assumed to be not only subtle, but
+all-pervasive and powerful. That this theory was to a large and even
+dangerous extent erroneous the observation of the last fifty years has
+proved, and our Massachusetts experience is sadly demonstrating to-day.
+It was Oliver Wendell Holmes, who, years ago, when asked by an anxious
+mother at what age the education of a child ought to begin, remarked in
+reply that it should begin about one hundred and fifty years before the
+child is born. It has so proved with us; and the fact is to-day in
+evidence that this statement of Dr. Holmes should be accepted as an
+undeniable political aphorism. So far from seven or fourteen years
+making an American citizen, fully and thoroughly impregnated with
+American ideals to the exclusion of all others, our experience is that
+it requires at least three generations to eliminate what may be termed
+the "hyphen" in citizenship. Not in the first, nor in the second, and
+hardly in the third, generation, does the immigrant cease to be an
+Irish-American, or a French-American, or a German-American, or a
+Slavonic-American, or yet a Dago. Nevertheless, in process of tune,
+those of the Caucasian race do and will become Americans. Ultimately
+their descendants will be free from the traditions and ideals, so to
+speak, ground in through centuries passed under other conditions. Not so
+the Ethiopian. In his case, we find ourselves confronted with a
+situation never contemplated in that era of political dreams and
+scriptural science in which our institutions received shape. Stated
+tersely and in plain language, so far as the African is concerned--the
+cause and, so to speak, the motive of the great struggle of 1861 to
+1865--we recognize the presence in the body politic of a vast alien mass
+which does not assimilate and which cannot be absorbed. In other words,
+the melting-pot theory came in sharp contact with an ethnological fact,
+and the unexpected occurred. The problem of African servitude was solved
+after a fashion; but in place of it a race issue of most uncompromising
+character evolved itself.
+
+A survivor of the generation which read "Uncle Tom's Cabin" as it week
+by week appeared,--fresh to-day from Massachusetts with its Lawrence
+race issues of a different character, I feel a sense of satisfaction in
+discussing here in South Carolina this question and issue in a spirit
+the reverse of dogmatic, a spirit purely scientific, observant and
+sympathetic. And in this connection let me say I well remember
+repeatedly discussing it with your fellow-citizen and my friend, Colonel
+Alexander Haskell, to whom I have already made reference. Rarely have I
+been more impressed by a conclusion reached and fixed in the mind of one
+who to the study of a problem had obviously given much and kindly
+thought. As those who knew him do not need to be told, Alexander Cheves
+Haskell was a man of character, pure and just and thoughtful. He felt
+towards the African as only a Southerner who had himself never been the
+owner of slaves can feel. He regarded him as of a less advanced race
+than his own, but one who was entitled not only to just and kindly
+treatment but to sympathetic consideration. When, however, the question
+of the future of the Afro-American was raised, as matter for abstract
+discussion, it was suggestive as well as curious to observe the fixed,
+hard expression which immediately came over Haskell's face, as with
+stern lips, from which all suggestion of a smile had faded away, he
+pronounced the words:--"Sir, it is a dying race!" To express the thought
+more fully, Colonel Haskell maintained, as I doubt not many who now
+listen to me will maintain, that the nominal Afro-American increase, as
+shown in the figures of the national census, is deceptive,--that in
+point of fact, the Ethiop in America is incurring the doom which has
+ever befallen those of an inferior and less advanced race when brought
+in direct and immediate contact, necessarily and inevitably competitive,
+with the more advanced, the more masterful, and intellectually the more
+gifted. In other words, those of the less advanced race have a fatal
+aptitude for contracting the vices, both moral and physical, of the
+superior race, in the end leading to destruction; while the capacity for
+assimilating the elevating qualities and attributes which constitute a
+saving grace is denied them. Elimination, therefore, became in Haskell's
+belief a question of time only,--the law of the survival of the fittest
+would assert itself. The time required may be long,--numbered by
+centuries; but, however remotely, it nevertheless would come. God's mill
+grinds slowly, but it grinds uncommon small; and, I will add, its
+grinding is apt to be merciless.
+
+The solution thus most pronouncedly laid down by Colonel Haskell may or
+may not prove in this case correct and final. It certainly is not for
+me, coming from the North, to undertake dogmatically to pass upon it. I
+recur to it here as a plausible suggestion only, in connection with my
+theme. As such, it unquestionably merits consideration. I am by no means
+prepared to go the length of an English authority in recently saying
+that "emancipation on two continents sacrificed the real welfare of the
+slave and his intrinsic worth as a person, to the impatient vanity of
+an immediate and theatrical triumph."[3] This length I say, I cannot go;
+but so far as the present occasion is concerned, with such means of
+observation as are within my reach, I find the conclusion difficult to
+resist that the success of the abolitionists in effecting the
+emancipation of the Afro-American, as unexpected and sweeping as it was
+sudden, has led to phases of the race problem quite unanticipated at
+least. For instance, as respects segregation. Instead of assimilating,
+with a tendency to ultimate absorption, the movement in the opposite
+direction since 1865 is pronounced. It has, moreover, received the final
+stamp of scientific approval. This implies much; for in the old days of
+the "peculiar institution" there is no question the relations between
+the two races were far more intimate, kindly, and even absorptive than
+they now are.
+
+That African slavery, as it existed in the United States anterior to the
+year 1862, presented a mild form of servitude, as servitude then existed
+and immemorially had almost everywhere existed, was, moreover,
+incontrovertibly proven in the course of the Civil War. Before 1862, it
+was confidently believed that any severe social agitation within, or
+disturbance from without, would inevitably lead to a Southern servile
+insurrection. In Europe this result was assumed as of course; and,
+immediately after it was issued, the Emancipation Proclamation of President
+[3] Bussell's (Dr. F.W.) "Christian Theology and Social Progress."
+Bampton Lectures, 1905. Lincoln was denounced in unmeasured terms by
+the entire London press. Not a voice was raised in its defence. It was
+regarded as a measure unwarranted in civilized warfare, and a sure and
+intentional incitement to the horrors which had attended the servile
+insurrections of Haiti and San Domingo; and, more recently, the
+unspeakable Sepoy incidents of the Indian mutiny. What actually occurred
+is now historic. The confident anticipations of our English brethren
+were, not for the first time, negatived; nor is there any page in our
+American record more creditable to those concerned than the attitude
+held by the African during the fierce internecine struggle which
+prevailed between April, 1861, and April, 1865. In it there is scarcely
+a trace, if indeed there is any trace at all, of such a condition of
+affairs as had developed in the Antilles and in Hindustan. The attitude
+of the African towards his Confederate owner was submissive and kindly.
+Although the armed and masterful domestic protector was at the front and
+engaged in deadly, all-absorbing conflict, yet the women and children of
+the Southern plantation slept with unbarred doors,--free from
+apprehension, much more from molestation.
+
+Moreover, as you here well know, during the old days of slavery there
+was hardly a child born, of either sex, who grew up in a Southern
+household of substantial wealth without holding immediate and most
+affectionate relations with those of the other race. Every typical
+Southern man had what he called his "daddy" and his "mammy," his
+"uncle" and his "aunty," by him familiarly addressed as such, and who
+were to him even closer than are blood relations to most. They had cared
+for him in his cradle; he followed them to their graves. Is it needful
+for me to ask to what extent such relations still exist? Of those born
+thirty years after emancipation, and therefore belonging distinctly to a
+later generation, how many thus have their kindly, if humble, kin of the
+African blood? I fancy I would be safe in saying not one in twenty.
+
+Here, then, as the outcome of the first great issue I have suggested as
+occupying the thought and exciting the passions of that earlier period,
+is a problem wholly unanticipated,--a problem which, merely stating,
+I dismiss.
+
+Passing rapidly on, I come to the next political issue which presented
+itself in my youth,--the constitutional issue,--that of State
+Sovereignty, as opposed to the ideal, Nationality. And, whether for
+better or worse, this issue, I very confidently submit, has been
+settled. We now, also, looking at it in more observant mood, in a spirit
+at once philosophical and historical, see that it involved a process of
+natural evolution which, under the conditions prevailing, could hardly
+result in any other settlement than that which came about. We now have
+come to a recognition of the fact that Anglo-Saxon nationality on this
+continent was a problem of crystallization, the working out of which
+occupied a little over two centuries. It was in New England the process
+first set in, when, in 1643, the scattered English-speaking settlements
+under the hegemony of the colony of Massachusetts Bay united in a
+confederation. It was the initial step. I have no time in which to
+enumerate successive steps, each representing a stage in advance of what
+went before. The War of Independence,--mistakenly denominated the
+Revolutionary War, but a struggle distinctly conservative in character,
+and in no way revolutionary,--the War of Independence gave great impetus
+to the process, resulting in what was known as Federation. Then came the
+Constitution of 1787 and the formation of the, so called, United States
+as a distinct nationality. The United States next passed through two
+definite processes of further crystallization,--one in 1812-1814, when
+the second war with Great Britain, and more especially our naval
+victories, kindled, especially in the North, the fire of patriotism and
+the conception of nationality; the other, half a century later,
+presented the stern issue in a concrete form, and at last the complete
+unification of a community--whether for better or for worse is no
+matter--was hammered by iron and cemented in blood. It is there now; an
+established fact. Secession is a lost cause; and, whether for good or
+for ill, the United States exists, and will continue to exist, a unified
+World Power. Sovereignty now rests at Washington, and neither in
+Columbia for South Carolina nor in Boston for Massachusetts. The State
+exists only as an integral portion of the United States. That issue has
+been fought out. The result stands beyond controversy; brought about by
+a generation now passed on, but to which I belonged.
+
+Meanwhile, the ancient adage, the rose is not without its thorn,
+receives new illustration; for even this great result has not been
+wrought without giving rise to considerations suggestive of thought.
+Speaking tersely and concentrating what is in my mind into the fewest
+possible words, I may say that in our national growth up to the year
+1830 the play of the centrifugal forces predominated,--that is, the
+necessity for greater cohesion made itself continually felt. A period of
+quiescence then followed, lasting until, we will say, 1865. Since 1865,
+it is not unsafe to say, the centripetal, or gravitating, force has
+predominated to an extent ever more suggestive of increasing political
+uneasiness. It is now, as is notorious, more in evidence than ever
+before. The tendency to concentrate at Washington, the demand that the
+central government, assuming one function after another, shall become
+imperial, the cry for the national enactment of laws, whether relating
+to marital divorce or to industrial combinations,--all impinge on the
+fundamental principle of local self-government, which assumed its
+highest and most pronounced form in the claim of State Sovereignty. I am
+now merely stating problems. I am not discussing the political ills or
+social benefits which possibly may result from action. Nevertheless,
+all, I think, must admit that the tendency to gravitation and
+attraction is to-day as pronounced and as dangerous, especially in the
+industrial communities of the North, as was the tendency to separation
+and segregation pronounced and dangerous seventy years ago in the South.
+
+To this I shall later return. I now merely point out what I apprehend to
+be a tendency to extremes--an excess in the swinging of our
+political pendulum.
+
+We next come to that industrial factor which I have referred to as the
+issue between the Free Trade of Adam Smith and Protection, as inculcated
+by the so-called American school of political economists. The phases
+which this issue has assumed are, I submit, well calculated to excite
+the attention of the observant and thoughtful. I merely allude to them
+now; but, in so far as it is in my power to make it so, my allusion will
+be specific. I frankly acknowledge myself a Free-Trader. A Free-Trader
+in theory, were it in my power I would be a Free-Trader in national
+practice. There has been, so far as I know, but one example of absolute
+free trade on the largest scale in world history. That one example,
+moreover, has been a success as unqualified as undeniable. I refer to
+this American Union of ours. We have here a country consisting of fifty
+local communities, stretching from the Atlantic to the Pacific, from
+tropical Porto Rico to glacial Alaska, representing every conceivable
+phase of soil, climate and material conditions, with diverse industrial
+systems. With a Union established on the principle of absolutely
+unrestricted commercial intercourse, you here in South Carolina, and
+more especially in Columbia, are to-day making it, so to speak,
+uncomfortable for the cotton manufacturer in New England; and I am glad
+of it! A sharp competition is a healthy incentive to effort and
+ingenuity, and the brutal injunction, "Root hog or die!" is one from
+which I in no way ask to have New England exempt. When Massachusetts is
+no longer able to hold its own industrially in a free field, the time
+will, in my judgment, have come for Massachusetts to go down. With
+communities as with children, paternalism reads arrested development.
+One of the great products of Massachusetts has been what is generically
+known as "footwear." Yet I am told that under the operation of absolute
+Free Trade, St. Louis possesses the largest boot and shoe factory in its
+output in the entire world. That is, the law of industrial development,
+as natural conditions warrant and demand, has worked out its results;
+and those results are satisfactory. I am aware that the farmer of
+Massachusetts has become practically extinct; he cannot face the
+competition of the great West: but the Massachusetts consumer is greatly
+advantaged thereby. So far as agricultural products are concerned,
+Massachusetts is to-day reduced to what is known as dairy products and
+garden truck; and it is well! Summer vegetables manufactured under glass
+in winter prove profitable. So, turning his industrial efforts to that
+which he can do best, even the Massachusetts agriculturalist has
+prospered. On the other hand, wherever in this country protection has
+been most completely applied, I insist that if its results are analyzed
+in an unprejudiced spirit, it will be pronounced to have worked
+unmitigated evil,--an unhealthy, because artificially stimulated and too
+rapid, growth. Let Lawrence, in Massachusetts, serve as an example. Look
+at the industrial system there introduced in the name of Protection
+against the Pauper Labor of Europe! No growth is so dangerous as a too
+rapid growth; and I confidently submit that politically, socially,
+economically and industrially, America to-day, on the issues agitating
+us, presents an almost appalling example of the results of hot-house
+stimulation.
+
+Nor is this all, nor the worst. There is another article, and far more
+damaging, in the indictment. Through Protection, and because of it,
+Paternalism has crept in; and, like a huge cancerous growth, is eating
+steadily into the vitals of the political system. Instead of supporting
+a government economically administered by money contributed by the
+People, a majority of the People to-day are looking to the government
+for support, either directly through pension payments or indirectly
+through some form of industrial paternalism. Incidentally, a profuse
+public expenditure is condoned where not actually encouraged.
+Jeffersonian simplicity is preached; extravagance is practised. As the
+New York showman long since shrewdly observed: "The American people
+love to be fooled!"
+
+But I must pass on; I still have far to go. As respects legislation, I
+have said that sixty years ago, when my memories begin, the American
+ideal was the individual, and individuality. This, implied adherence to
+the Jeffersonian theory that heretofore the world had been governed too
+much. The great secret of true national prosperity, happiness and
+success was, we were taught, to allow to each individual the fullest
+possible play, provided only he did not infringe on the rights of
+others. How is it to-day? America is the most governed and legislated
+country in the world! With one national law-making machine perpetually
+at work grinding out edicts, we have some fifty provincial mills engaged
+in the same interesting and, to my mind, pernicious work. No one who has
+given the slightest consideration to the subject will dispute the
+proposition that, taking America as a whole, we now have twenty acts of
+legislation annually promulgated, and with which we are at our peril
+supposed to be familiar, where one would more than suffice. Then we
+wonder that respect for the law shows a sensible decrease! The better
+occasion for wonder is that it survives at all. We are both legislated
+and litigated out of all reason.
+
+Passing to the other proposition of individuality, there has been, as
+all men know and no one will dispute, a most perceptible tendency of
+late years towards what is known as the array of one portion of the
+community--the preponderating, voting portion--against another--the more
+ostentatious property-holding portion. It is the natural result, I may
+say the necessary as well as logical outcome, of a period of too rapid
+growth,--production apportioned by no rule or system other or higher
+than greed and individual aptitude for acquisition. I will put the
+resulting case in the most brutal, and consequently the clearest, shape
+of which I am capable. Working on the combined theories of individualism
+controlled and regulated by competition, it has been one grand game of
+grab,--a process in which the whole tendency of our legislation,
+national or state, has during the last twenty years been, first, to
+create monopolies of capital and, later, to bring into existence a
+counter, but no less privileged, class, known as the "wage-earner."
+
+Of the first class it is needless to speak, for, as a class, it is
+sufficiently pilloried by the press and from the hustings. Much in
+evidence, those prominent in it are known as the possessors of
+"predatory wealth"; "unjailed malefactors," they are subjects of
+continuous "grilling" in the congressional and legislative committee
+rooms. The effort to make them "disgorge" is as continual as it is
+noisy, and, as a rule, futile. It constitutes a curious and in some
+respects instructive exhibition of misdirected popular feeling and
+legislative incompetence. None the less, the existence of a monopolist
+class calls for no proof at the bar of public opinion. Not so the other
+and even more privileged class,--the so-called "wage-earner"; for,
+disguise it as the trades-unionist will, angrily deny it as he does, the
+fact remains that to-day under the operation of our jury system and of
+our laws, the Wage-earner and the member of the Trades-Union has become,
+as respects the rest of the community, himself a monopolist and,
+moreover, privileged as such. Practically, crimes urged and even
+perpetrated in behalf of so-called "labor" receive at the hands of
+juries, and also not infrequently of courts, an altogether excessive
+degree of merciful consideration. At the same time, both here and in
+Europe Organized Labor is instant in its demand that immunity, denied
+to ordinary citizens, and those whom it terms "the classes," shall by
+special exemption be conferred upon the Labor Union and upon the
+Wage-earner. The tendency on both sides and at each extreme to
+inequality in the legislature and before the law is thus manifest.
+
+Viewing conditions face to face and as they now are, no thoughtful
+observer can, in my judgment, avoid the conviction that, whether for
+good or ill, for better or for worse, this country as a community has,
+within the last thirty years--that is, we will say, since our centennial
+year, 1876--cast loose from its original moorings. It has drifted, and
+is drifting, into unknown seas. Nor is this true of English-speaking
+America alone. I have already quoted Lord Morley in another connection.
+Lord Morley, however, only the other day delivered, as Chancellor of
+Manchester University, a most interesting and highly suggestive
+address, in which, referring to conservative Great Britain, he thus
+pictured a phase of current belief: "Political power is described as
+lying in the hands of a vast and mobile electorate, with scanty regard
+for tradition or history. Democracy, they say, is going to write its own
+programme. The structure of executive organs and machinery is undergoing
+half-hidden, but serious alterations. Men discover a change of attitude
+towards law as law; a decline in reverence for institutions as
+institutions."
+
+While, however, the influences at work are thus general and the
+manifestations whether on the other side of the Atlantic or here bear a
+strong resemblance, yet difference of conditions and detail
+--constitutional peculiarities, so to speak--must not be
+disregarded. One form of treatment may not be prescribed for all. In our
+case, therefore, it remains to consider how best to adapt this country
+and ourselves to the unforeseeable,--the navigation of uncharted waters;
+and this adaptation cannot be considered hi any correct and helpful,
+because scientific, spirit, unless the cause of change is located.
+Surface manifestations are, in and of themselves, merely deceptive. A
+physician, diagnosing the chances of a patient, must first correctly
+ascertain, or at least ascertain with approximate correctness, the seat
+of the trouble under which the patient is suffering. So, we.
+
+And here I must frankly confess to small respect for the
+politician,--the man whose voice is continually heard, whether from the
+Senate Chamber or the Hustings. There is in those of his class a
+continual and most noticeable tendency to what may best be described as
+the _post ergo propter_ dispensation. With them, the eye is fixed on the
+immediate manifestation. Because one event preceded another, the first
+event is obviously and indisputably the cause of the later event. For
+instance, in the present case, the cause or seat of our existing and
+very manifest social, political and financial disturbances is attributed
+as of course to some peculiarity of legislation, either a subtreasury
+bill passed in the administration of General Jackson, or a tariff bill
+passed in the administration of Mr. Taft, or the demonetization of
+silver in the Hayes period,--that "Crime of the Century," the
+Crucifixion of Labor on the Cross of Gold! Once for all, let me say, I
+contemplate this school of politicians and so-called "thinkers" with
+sentiments the reverse of respectful. In plain language, I class them
+with those known in professional parlance as quacks and charlatans. Not
+always, not even in the majority of cases, does that which preceded bear
+to that which follows the relation of cause and effect. A marked example
+of this false attribution is afforded in more recent political history
+by the everlasting recurrence of the statement that American prosperity
+is the result of an American protective system. Yet in the Protectionist
+dispensation, this has become an article of faith. To my mind, it is
+undeserving of even respectful consideration.
+
+If I were asked the cause of that change, little short of
+revolutionary, if indeed in any respect short of it, which has occurred
+in the material condition of the American people, and consequently in
+all its theories and ideals, within the last thirty years, I should
+attribute it to a wholly different cause. Mr. Lecky some years ago, in
+his book entitled "Liberty and Democracy," made the following statement,
+in no way original, but, as he put it, sufficiently striking: "The
+produce of the American mines [incident to the discoveries made by
+Columbus] created, in the most extreme form ever known in Europe, the
+change which beyond all others affects most deeply and universally the
+material well-being of men: it revolutionized the value of the precious
+metals, and, in consequence, the price of all articles, the effects of
+all contracts, the burden of all debts."
+
+In other words, referring to the first half of the sixteenth
+century,--the sixty years, we will say, following the land-fall of
+Columbus,--the historian attributed the great change which then occurred
+and which stands forth so markedly in history, to the increased
+New-World production of the precious metals, combined with the impetus
+given to trade and industry as a consequence of that discovery, and of
+the mastery of man over additional globe areas. Now, dismissing from
+consideration the so-called American protective system, likewise our
+currency issues and, generally, the patchwork, so to speak, of
+crazy-quilt legislation to which so much is attributed during the last
+thirty years, I confidently submit that in the production of the results
+under discussion, they are quantities and factors hardly worthy of
+consideration. The cause of the change which has taken place lies far
+deeper and must be sought in influences of a wholly different nature,
+influences developed into an increased and still ever increasing
+activity, over which legislation has absolutely no control. I refer, of
+course, to man's mastery over the latent forces of Nature. Of these
+Steam and Electricity are the great examples, which, because always
+apparent, at once strike the imagination. These, as tools, it is to be
+remembered, date practically from within one hundred years back. It may,
+indeed, safely be asserted that up to 1815, the end of the Wars of
+Napoleon and the time of your Professor Lieber, steam even had not as
+yet practically affected the operations of man, while electricity, when
+not a terror, was as yet but a toy. Commerce was still exclusively
+carried on by the sailing ship and canal-boat. The years from the fall
+of Napoleon to our own War of Secession--from Waterloo to
+Gettysburg--were practically those of early and partial development. Not
+until well after Appomattox, that is, since the year 1870,--a period
+covering but little more than the life of a generation,--did what is
+known to you here as the Applied Sciences cover a range difficult to
+specialize. As factors in development, it is safe to say that those
+three tremendous agencies--Steam, Electricity, Chemistry--have, so to
+speak, worked all their noticeable results within the lifetime of the
+generation born since we celebrated the Centennial of Independence. The
+manifestations now resulting and apparent to all are the natural outcome
+of the use of these modern appliances, become in our case everyday
+working tools in the hands of the most resourceful, adaptive, ingenious
+and energetic of communities, developing a virgin continent of
+undreamed-of wealth. Naturally, under such conditions, the advance has
+been not only general and continuous, but one of ever increasing
+celerity. So Protection and the Currency become flies on the fast
+revolving wheel!
+
+But what has otherwise resulted?--An unrest, social, economical,
+political. Not contentment, but a lamentation and an ancient tale of
+wrong! We hear it in the continual cry over what is known as the
+increased cost of living, and feel its pressure in the higher standard
+of living. What was considered wealth by our ancestors is to-day hardly
+competence. What sufficed for luxury in our childhood barely now
+supplies what are known as the comforts of life. Take, for instance, the
+motor,--the automobile. I speak within bounds, I think, when I say there
+are many fold more motors to-day racing over the streets, the highways
+and the byways of America than there were one-horse wagons thirty-five
+years ago. Six hundred, I am told, are to be found within the immediate
+neighborhood of Columbia; and, since I have been here I have seen in
+your streets just one man on horse-back! These figures and that
+statement tell the tale. A few years only back, every Carolinian rode
+to town, and the motor was unknown. A single illustrative example, this
+could be duplicated in innumerable ways everywhere and in all walks
+of life.
+
+The result is obvious, and was inevitable. Entered on a new phase of
+existence, the world is not as it was in the days of Columbus, when a
+single new continent was discovered containing in it what we would now
+regard as a limited accumulation of the precious metals. It is, on the
+contrary, as if, in the language of Dr. Johnson, "the potentiality of
+wealth" had been revealed "beyond the dreams of avarice"; together with
+not one or two, but a dozen continents, the existence and secrets of
+which are suddenly laid bare. The Applied Sciences have been the
+magicians,--not Protection or the Currency.
+
+And still scientists are continually dinning in our ears the question
+whether this state of affairs is going to continue,--whether the era of
+disturbance has reached its limit! I hold such a question to be little
+short of childish. That era has not reached its limits, nor has it even
+approximated those limits. On the contrary, we have just entered on the
+uncharted sea. We know what the last thirty years have brought about as
+the result of the agencies at work; but as yet we can only dimly dream
+of what the next sixty years are destined to see brought about.
+Imagination staggers at the suggestion.
+
+What, then, has been of this the inevitable consequence,--the
+consequence which even the blindest should have foreseen? It has
+resulted in all those far-reaching changes suggested in the earlier part
+of what I have said to-day, as respects our ideals, our political
+theories, our social conditions. In other words, the old era is ended;
+what is implied when we say a new era is entered upon?
+
+To attempt a partial answer to the query implies no claim to a prophetic
+faculty. Whether we like to face the fact or not, far-reaching changes
+in our economical theories and social conditions are imminent, involving
+corresponding readjustments in our constitutional arrangements and
+political machinery. Tennyson foreshadowed it all in his "Locksley Hall"
+seventy years ago:--"The individual withers, and the world is more and
+more." The day of individualism as it existed in the American ideal of
+sixty years since is over; that of collectivism and possibly socialism
+has opened. The day of social equality is relegated to what may be
+considered a somewhat patriarchal past,--that patriarchal past having
+come to a close during the memory of those still in active life.
+
+And yet, though all this can now be studied in the political discussion
+endlessly dragging on, strangely and sadly enough that discussion
+carries in it hardly a note of encouragement. It is, in a word,
+unspeakably shallow. And here, having sufficiently for my present
+purpose though in hurried manner, diagnosed the situation,--located the
+seat of disturbance,--we come to the question of treatment. Involving,
+as it necessarily does, problems of the fundamental law, and a
+rearrangement and different allocation of the functions of government,
+this challenges the closest thought of the publicist. That the problem
+is here crying aloud for solution is apparent. The publications which
+cumber the counters of our book-stores, those for which the greatest
+popular call to-day exists--treatises relating to trade interests, to
+collectivism, to socialism, even to anarchism--tell the tale in part; in
+part it is elsewhere and otherwise told. Only recently, in once Puritan
+Massachusetts, processions paraded the streets carrying banners marked
+with this device, more suggestive than strange:--"No master and no God!"
+
+What are the remedies popularly proposed? In that important branch of
+polity known as Political Ethics, or, as he termed them, Hermeneutics,
+which your Professor Lieber sixty years ago endeavored to treat of, what
+advance has since his time been effected?--Nay! what advance has been
+effected since the time, over two thousand years, of his great
+predecessor, Aristotle? I confidently submit that what progress is now
+being made in this most erudite of sciences is in the nature of that of
+the crab--backwards! In the discussions of Aristotle, the problem in
+view was, how to bring about government by the wisest,--that is, the
+most observant and expert. In other words, government, the object of
+politics, was by Aristotle treated in a scientific spirit. And this is
+as it should be. Take, for example, any problem,--I do not care whether
+it is legal or medical or one of engineering: How successfully dispose
+of it? Uniformly, in one way. Those problems are successfully solved, if
+at all, only when their solution is placed in the hands of the most
+proficient. Judged by the discussions of to-day, what advance has in
+politics been effected? Do the _Outlook_ and the _Commoner_ imply
+progress since the Stagirite? Not to any noticeable extent. We are, on
+the contrary, fumbling and wallowing about where the Greek pondered and
+philosophized.
+
+Democracy, as it is called, is to-day the great panacea,--the political
+nostrum; as such it is confidently advocated by statesmen and professors
+and even by the presidents of our institutions of the advanced
+education. "Trust the People" is the shibboleth! "Let the People rule!"
+"The cure for too much Liberty is more Liberty!" To Democracy plain and
+simple--Composite Wisdom--I frankly confess I feel no call,--no call
+greater than, for instance, towards Autocracy or Aristocracy or
+Plutocracy. Taken simply, and applied as hitherto applied, all and each
+lead to but one result,--failure! And that result, let me here predict,
+will, in the future, be the same in the case of pure Democracy that, in
+the past, it was in the case of the pure Autocracy of the Caesars, or
+the case of the pure Aristocracy of Rome or of the so-called Republics
+of the Middle Ages. A political edifice on shifting sands.
+
+Yet, to-day what do we see and hear in America? Tell it not in Gath;
+publish it not in the streets of Askalon I Two thousand years after the
+time of Aristotle, we see a prevailing school working directly back to
+the condition of affairs which existed in the Athenian agora under the
+disapproving eyes of the father of political philosophy. Panaceas,
+universal cure-alls, and quack remedies--the Initiative, the Referendum,
+and the Recall are paraded as if these--nostrums of the mountebanks of
+the county fair--would surely remedy the perplexing ills of new and
+hitherto unheard-of social, economical, and political conditions.
+Democracy! What is Democracy? Democracy, as it is generally understood,
+I submit, is nothing but the reaching of political conclusions through
+the frequent counting of noses; or, as Macaulay two generations ago
+better phrased it, "the majority of citizens told by the head";--the
+only question at just this juncture being whether, in order to the
+arriving at more acceptable results, both sexes shall be "told," instead
+of one sex only. Moreover, I with equal confidence make bold to suggest
+that while conceded, and while men have even persuaded themselves that
+they have faith in it, and really do believe in this "telling" of noses
+as the best and fairest attainable means of reaching correct results,
+yet in so doing and so professing they simply, as men are prone to do,
+deceive themselves. In other words, victims of their own cant, they
+preach a panacea in which they really do not believe. Nor of this is
+proof far to seek. _Vox populi, vox Dei_! If you extend the application
+of this principle by a single step, its loudest advocates draw back in
+alarm from the inevitable. They seek refuge in the assertion--"Oh! That
+is different!" For instance, take a concrete case; so best can we
+illustrate.
+
+One of the greatest scientific triumphs reached in modern times--perhaps
+I might fairly say the greatest--is the discovery of the cause of yellow
+fever, and its consequent control. As a result of the studies, the
+patient experimentation and self-sacrifice of the wisest,--that is, the
+most observant and expert,--the amazing conclusion was reached that not
+only the yellow fever but the innumerable ills of the flesh known under
+the caption of "malarial," were due to causes hitherto unsuspected,
+though obvious when revealed,--to the existence in the atmosphere of a
+venomous insect, in comparison with the work of which the ravages on
+mankind of the entire carnivorous and reptile creation were of
+comparatively small account. The mosquito flew disclosed, the
+atmospheric viper,--a viper most venomous and deadly. How was the
+disclosure brought about? What was the remedy applied? Was the discovery
+effected through universal suffrage? Was the remedy sought for and
+decided upon by the Initiative, or through a Referendum at an election
+held on the Tuesday succeeding the first Monday of a certain month and
+year? Had recourse in this case been had to the panacea now in greatest
+political vogue, we all know perfectly well what would have followed.
+History tells us. The quarantine, as it is called, would have been
+decreed, and a day of fasting, humiliation and prayer appointed. The
+mosquito, quite ignored, would then have gone on in his deadly work. We
+all equally well know that the man, even the politician or the
+statesman, who had suggested a solution of that problem by a count of
+noses would have been effaced with ridicule. Even the most simple minded
+would have rejected that method of reaching a result. Yet the ilia of
+the body politic, too, are complicated. Indeed, far more intricate in
+their processes and more deceitful in their aspects, they more deeply
+affect the general well-being and happiness than any ill or epidemic
+which torments the physical being, even the mosquito malaria. Yet the
+ills of the body politic, the complications which surround us on every
+side,--for these the unfailing panacea is said to lie in universal
+suffrage, that remedy which is immediately and of course laughed out of
+court if suggested in case of the simpler ills of the flesh.
+
+This, I submit, is demonstration. The true remedy is not to be sought in
+that direction in the one case any more than the other.
+
+There is a considerable element of truth, though possibly a not
+inconsiderable one of exaggeration, in this statement from a paper I
+recently chanced upon in the issue of the sober and classical _Edinburgh
+Review_ for October last,--a paper entitled "Democracy and
+Liberalism":--"History testifies unmistakably and unanimously to the
+passion of democracies for incompetence. There is nothing democracy
+dislikes and suspects so heartily as technical efficiency, particularly
+when it is independent of the popular vote." But to-day, what is
+politically proposed by our senatorial charlatans and the mountebanks of
+the market-place? The Referendum, the constant and easy Recall, the
+everlasting Initiative are dinned into our ears as the cure-alls of
+every ill of the body politic. On the contrary, I submit that, while in
+the absence of any better method as yet devised and accepted, the
+process of reaching results by a count of the "majority told by the
+head" of the citizens then present and voting has certain political
+advantages, yet, for all this, as a final, scientific, political
+process, it is unworthy of consideration. A passing expedient, it in no
+degree reflects credit on twentieth-century intelligence.
+
+And now I come to the crux of my discussion. Thus rejecting results
+reached by the ballot as now in practical use, a query is already in the
+minds of those who listen. At once suggesting itself and flung in my
+face, it is asked as a political poser, and not without a sneer,--What
+else or better have I to propose? Would I advise a return to old and
+discarded methods,--Heredity, Caste, Autocracy, Plutocracy? I
+respectfully submit this is a question no one has a right to put, and
+one I am not called upon to answer. Again, let me take a concrete case.
+Once more I appeal to the yellow fever precedent. The first step towards
+a solution of a medical, as of a political, problem is a correct
+diagnosis. Then necessarily follows a long period devoted to
+observation, to investigation and experiment. If, in the case of the
+yellow fever, a score of years only ago an observer had pointed out the
+nature of the disease and the manifest inadequacy of current theories
+and prevailing methods of prevention and treatment, do you think others
+would have had a right to turn upon him and demand that he instantly
+prescribe a remedy which should be not only complete, but at once
+recognized as such and so accepted? In the present case, as I have
+already observed, from the days of Aristotle down through two and twenty
+centuries, men had been experimenting in all, to them, conceivable ways,
+on the government of the body politic, exactly as they experimented on
+the disorders of the physical body. But only yesterday was the source of
+the yellow fever, for instance, diagnosed and located, and the proper
+means of prevention applied. The cancer and tuberculosis are to-day
+unsolved problems. By analogy, they are inviting subjects for an
+Initiative and a Referendum! Yet would any person who to-day, standing
+where I stand, expressed a disbelief, at once total and contemptuous, of
+such a procedure as respects them, be met by a demand for some other
+panacea of immediate and guaranteed efficiency? And so with the body
+politic. I here to-day am merely attempting a diagnosis, pointing out
+the disorders, and exposing as best I can the utter crudeness and
+insufficiency of the market-place remedies proposed. Have you a right,
+then, to turn on me, and call for some other prescription, warranted to
+cure, in place of the nostrums so loudly advertised by the sciolists and
+the dabblers of the day, and by me so contemptuously set aside? I
+confess I am unable to respond, or even to attempt a response to any
+such demand. I am not altogether a quack, nor is this a county fair.
+
+"Paracelsus," so denominated, was one of Robert Browning's earlier
+poems. In it he causes the fifteenth-century alchemist and forerunner of
+all modern pharmaceutical chemistry, to declare that as the result of
+long travel and much research
+
+
+"I possess
+Two sorts of knowledge: one,--vast, shadowy,
+Hints of the unbounded aim....
+The other consists of many secrets, caught
+While bent on nobler prize,--perhaps a few
+Prime principles which may conduct to much:
+These last I offer."
+
+
+So, _longo intervallo_, I have a few suggestions,--the result of an
+observation extending, as I said at the beginning, over the lives of two
+generations and a connection with many great events in which I have
+borne a part,--a part not prominent indeed, and more generally, I
+acknowledge, mistaken than correct. My errors, however, have at least
+made me cautious and doubtful of my own conclusions. I submit them for
+what they are worth. Not much, I fear.
+
+What, then, would I do, were it in my power to prescribe alterations and
+curatives for the ills of our American body politic, of which I have
+spoken; or, more correctly, the far-reaching disturbances manifestly due
+to the agencies at work, to which I have made reference? Let us come at
+once to the point, taking the existing Constitution of the United States
+as a concrete example, and recognizing the necessity for its revision
+and readjustment to meet radically changed conditions,--conditions
+social, material, geographical, changed and still changing.
+
+It was Mr. Gladstone who, years ago, made the often-quoted assertion
+that the Constitution of the United States was "the most wonderful work
+ever struck off at a given time by the brain and purpose of man." I do
+not think he was far wrong; though we, of course, realize that the
+Federal Constitution was a growth and in no degree an inspiration. That
+Constitution has through a century and a quarter stood the test of time
+and stress of war, during a period of almost unlimited growth of the
+community for which it was devised. It has outlasted many nationalities
+and most of the dynasties in existence at the time of its adoption; and
+that, too, under conditions sufficiently trying. I, therefore, regard it
+with profound respect; and, so regarding it, I would treat it with a
+cautious and tender hand. Not lightly pronouncing it antiquated, what
+changes would I make in it if to-morrow it were given me to prescribe
+alterations adapting it to the altered conditions which confront us? I
+do not hesitate to say, and I am glad to say, the changes I would
+suggest would be limited; yet, I fancy, far-reaching.
+
+And, in the first place, let us have a clear conception of the end in
+view. That end is, I submit, exactly the same to-day which Aristotle had
+in view more than twenty centuries ago. It is, not to solve all
+political problems, but to put political problems as they arise in the
+hands of those whom he termed the "best,"--but whom we know as the most
+intelligent, observant and expert,--to be, through their agency, in the
+way of ultimate solution. If, adopting every ill-considered and
+half-fledged measure of so-called reform which might be the fancy of the
+day, we incorporated them in our fundamental law, but one thing could
+result therefrom,--ultimate confusion. The Constitution is neither a
+legislative crazy-quilt nor a receptacle of fads. To make it such is in
+every respect the reverse of scientific. The work immediately in hand,
+therefore, is to devise such changes in the fundamental law as will tend
+most effectually to bring about the solution of issues as they may
+arise, by the most expert, observant and reliable. This accomplished, if
+its accomplishment were only practicable, all possible would have been
+done; and the necessary and inevitable readjustment of things would, in
+politics as in medicine and in science, be left to solve itself as
+occasion arose. Provision cannot be made against every contingency.
+
+This premised, the Constitution of the United States is an instrument
+through which powers are delegated by several local communities to a
+central government. The instrument, it was originally held, should be
+strictly construed and the powers delegated limited; and in this
+respect, with certain alterations made obviously necessary to meet
+changed conditions, I would return to the fundamental idea of
+the framers.
+
+In saying this I feel confidence also that here in South Carolina at
+least I shall meet with an earnest response. The time is not yet remote
+when local self-government worked salvation for South Carolina, as for
+her sister States of the Confederacy. You here will never forget what
+immediately followed the close of our Civil War. As an historic fact,
+the Constitution was then suspended. It was suspended by act of an
+irresponsible Congress, exercising revolutionary but unlimited powers
+over a large section of the common country. You then had an
+illustration, not soon to be forgotten, of concentration of legislative
+power. An episode at once painful and discreditable, it is not necessary
+here to refer to it in detail. Appeal, however, was made to the
+principle of local self-government,--it was, so to speak, a recurrence
+to the theory of State Sovereignty. The appeal struck a responsive,
+because traditional, chord; and it was through a recurrence to State
+Sovereignty as the agency of local self-government that loyalty and
+contentment were restored, and, I may add, that I am here to-day.
+Ceasing to be a Military Department, South Carolina once more became a
+State. Not improbably the demand will in a not remote future be heard
+that State lines and local autonomy be practically obliterated. In that
+event, I feel a confident assurance that, recurring in memory to the
+evil days which followed 1865, the spirit of enlightened conservatism
+will assert itself here and in the sister States of what was once the
+Confederacy; and again it will prevail. In the future, as in the past,
+you in South Carolina at least will cling to what in 1876 proved the ark
+of your social and political salvation.
+
+Taking another step in the discussion of changes, the Constitution is
+founded on that well-known distribution and allocation of powers first
+theoretically suggested by Montesquieu. There is a division, accompanied
+by a mutual limitation of authority, through the Judiciary, the
+Executive, and the Legislative. As respects this allocation, how would I
+modify that instrument? I freely say that the tendency of my thought,
+based on observation, is to conservatism. I have never yet in a single
+instance found that when the people of this or any other country
+accustomed to parliamentary government desired a thing, they failed to
+obtain it within a reasonable limit of time. Hasty changes are wisely
+deprecated; but I think I speak within limitation when I say that
+neither in the history of Great Britain,--the mother of Parliaments--nor
+in the history of the United States, has any modification which the
+people, on sober second thought, have considered to be for the best,
+long been deferred. Action, revolutionary in character, has not, as a
+rule, been needful, or, when taken, proved salutary. This is a record
+and result that no careful student of our history will, I take it, deny.
+
+Such being the case, so far as our Judiciary is concerned, I do not
+hesitate to say I would adhere to older, and, as I think, better
+principles, or revert to them where they have been experimentally
+abandoned. It took the Anglo-Saxon race two centuries of incessant
+conflict to wrest from a despotic executive, practically an autocracy,
+judicial independence. That was effected through what is known as a
+tenure during good behavior, as opposed to a tenure at the will of the
+monarch. This, then, for two centuries, was accepted as a fundamental
+principle of constitutional government. Of late, a new theory has been
+propounded, and by those chafing at all restraint--constitutionally
+lawless in disposition--it is said the Recall should also be applied to
+the Judiciary. Having, therefore, wrested the independence of the
+Judiciary from the hand of the Autocrat, we now propose to place it, in
+all trustfulness, in the hands of the Democrat. To me the proposition
+does not commend itself. It is founded on no correct principle, for the
+irresponsible democratic majority is even more liable to ill-considered
+and vacillating action than is the responsible autocrat. In that matter
+I would not trust myself; why, then, should I trust the composite
+Democrat? In the case of the Judiciary, therefore, I would so far as the
+fundamental law is concerned abide by the older and better considered
+principles of the framers.
+
+Next, the Executive. Again, we hear the demand of Democracy,--the
+Recall! Once more I revert to the record. This Republic has now been in
+working operation, and, taken altogether, most successful operation,
+for a century and a quarter. During that century and a quarter we have
+had, we will say, some five and twenty different chief magistrates.
+There is an ancient and somewhat vulgar adage to the effect that the
+proof of a certain dietary article is in its eating. Apply that homely
+adage to the matter under consideration. What is the lesson taught? It
+is simply this,--during a whole century and a quarter of existence there
+has not been one single chief executive of the United States to whom the
+arbitrary Recall could have been applied with what would now be agreed
+upon as a fortunate result. In the Andrew Johnson impeachment case was
+it not better that things were as they were? On the other hand, every
+one of the seven independent, self-respecting Senators who then by a
+display of high moral courage saved the country from serious prejudice
+would have been recalled out-of-hand had the Recall now demanded been in
+existence. Its working would have received prompt exemplification; as it
+was, the recall was effected in time, and after due deliberation. The
+delay occasioned no public detriment. In this life, experience is
+undeniably worth something; and the experience here referred to is
+fairly entitled to consideration. No political system possible to devise
+is wholly above criticism,--not open to exceptional contingencies or to
+dangers possible to conjure up. Such have from time to time arisen in
+the past; in the future such will inevitably arise. This consideration
+must, however, be balanced against a general average of successful
+working; and I confidently submit that, weighing thus the proved
+advantage of the system we have against the possibilities of danger
+which hereafter may occur, but which never yet have occurred, the scale
+on which are the considerations in favor of change kicks the beam.
+
+In view, however, of the growth of the country, the vastly increased
+complexity of interests involved, the intricacy and the cost of the
+election processes to which recourse is necessarily had, I would
+substitute for the present brief tenure of the presidential office--a
+tenure well enough perhaps in the comparatively simple days which
+preceded our Civil War--a tenure sufficiently long to enable the
+occupant of the presidential chair to have a policy and to accomplish at
+least something towards its adoption. As the case stands to-day, a
+President for the first time elected has during his term of four years,
+one year, and one year only, in which really to apply himself to the
+accomplishment of results. The first year of his term is necessarily
+devoted to the work of acquiring a familiarity with the machinery of the
+government, and the shaping of a policy. The second year may be devoted
+to a more or less strenuous effort at the adoption of the policy thus
+formulated. As experience shows, the action of the third and fourth
+years is gravely affected--if not altogether perverted from the work in
+hand--by what are known as the political exigencies incident to a
+succession. Manifestly, this calls for correction. The remedy, however,
+to my mind, is obvious and suggests itself. As the presidency is the
+one office under our Constitution national in character, and in no way
+locally representative, I would extend the term to seven years, and
+render the occupant of the office thereafter ineligible for reëlection.
+Seven years is, I am aware, under our political system, an unusual term;
+and here my ears will, I know, be assailed by the great "mandate"
+cackle. The count of noses being complete, the mind of the composite
+Democrat is held to be made up. It only remains to formulate the
+consequent decree; and, with least possible delay, put it in way of
+practical enforcement. Again, I, as a publicist, demur. It is the old
+issue, that between instant action and action on second thought,
+presented once more. Briefly, the experience of sixty years strongly
+inclines me to a preference of matured and considerate action over that
+immediate action which notoriously is in nine cases out of ten as
+ill-advised as it is precipitate. Only in the field of politics is the
+expediency of the latter assumed as of course; yet, as in science and
+literature and art so in politics, final, because satisfactory, results
+are at best but slowly thrashed out. As respects wisdom, the modern
+statute book does not loom, monumental. Its contemplation would indeed
+perhaps even lead to a surmise that reasonable delay in formulating his
+"mandate" might, in the case of the composite Democrat as in that of the
+individual Autocrat, prove a not altogether unmixed, and so in the end
+an intolerable, evil.
+
+Thus while a change of the Executive and Legislative branches of the
+government might not be always simultaneously effected, by selecting
+seven years as the presidential term the election would be brought
+about, as frequently as might be, by itself, uncomplicated by local
+issues connected with the fortunes or political fate of individual
+candidates for office, whether State, Congressional, or Senatorial; and
+during the seven years of tenure, four, at least, it might reasonably be
+anticipated, would be devoted to the promotion of a definite policy, in
+place of one year in a term of four, as now. If also ineligible for
+reelection, there is at least a fair presumption that the occupant of
+the position might from start to finish apply himself to its duties and
+obligations, without being distracted therefrom by ulterior personal
+ends as constantly as humanly held in view.
+
+Having thus disposed of the Judiciary and the Executive, we come to the
+Legislative. And here I submit is the weak point in our American
+system,--manifestly the weak point, and to those who, like myself, have
+had occasion to know, undeniably so. I am here as a publicist; not as a
+writer of memoirs: so, on this head, I do not now propose to dilate or
+bear witness. I will only briefly say that having at one period, and for
+more than the lifetime of a generation, been in charge of large
+corporate and financial interests, I have had much occasion to deal with
+legislative bodies, National, State and Municipal. That page of my
+experiences is the one I care least to recall, and would most gladly
+forget. I am not going to specify, or give names of either localities or
+persons; but, knowing what I know, it is useless to approach me on this
+topic with the usual good-natured and optimistic, if somewhat unctuous
+and conventional, commonplaces on general uprightness and the tendency
+to improved conditions and a higher standard. I know better! I have seen
+legislators bought like bullocks--they selling themselves. I have
+watched them cover their tracks with a cunning more than vulpine. I have
+myself been black-mailed and sandbagged, while whole legislative bodies
+watched the process, fully cognizant at every step of what was going on.
+This, I am glad to say, was years ago. The legislative conditions were
+then bad, scandalously bad; nor have I any reason to believe in a
+regeneration since. The stream will never rise higher than its source;
+but it generally indicates the level thereof. In this case, I can only
+hope that in my experience it failed so to do. Running at a low level,
+the waters of that stream were deplorably dirty.
+
+That the legislative branch of our government has fallen so markedly in
+public estimation is not, I think, open to denial. To my mind, under the
+conditions I have referred to, such could not fail to be the case. It
+has, consequently, lost public confidence. Hence this popular demand for
+immediate legislation by the People,--this twentieth-century appeal to
+the Agora and Forum methods which antedate the era of Christ. It is true
+the world outgrew them two thousand years ago, and they were discarded;
+but, living in a progressive and not a reactionary period, all that, we
+are assured, is changed! The heart is no longer on the right-hand side
+of the body. To secure desired results it is only necessary to start
+quite fresh, as a mere preliminary discarding all lessons of experience.
+
+Such reasoning does not commend itself to my judgment. On the contrary,
+the failure of the American legislative to command an increasing public
+confidence, while both natural and obvious, is, if my observation guides
+me to conclusions in any degree correct, traceable to two reasons. So
+far as government is concerned, the law-making branch is assumed to be
+made up of the wisest and the most expert. Meanwhile, it is as a matter
+of fact chosen by the process I have not over-respectfully referred to
+as the counting of noses; and, moreover, by an unwritten law more
+binding than any in the Statute Book, that counting of noses is with us
+localized. In other words, when it comes to the choice of our
+law-makers, reducing provincialism to a system we make the local
+numerical majority supreme, and any one is considered competent to
+legislate. He can do that, even if by common knowledge he is incompetent
+or untrustworthy in every other capacity. Localization thus becomes the
+stronghold of mediocrity, the sure avenue to office of the second-and
+third-rate man,--he who wishes always to enjoy his share of a little
+brief authority, to have, he also, a taste of public life. In this
+respect our American system is, I submit, manifestly and incomparably
+inferior to the system of parliamentary election existing in Great
+Britain, itself open to grave criticism. In Great Britain the public man
+seeks the constituency wherever he can find it; or the constituency
+seeks its representative wherever it recognizes him. The present Prime
+Minister of Great Britain, for instance, represents a small Scotch
+constituency in which he never resided, but by which he was elected more
+than twenty years ago, and through which he has since consecutively
+remained in public life. On the other hand, look at the waste and
+extravagance of the system now and traditionally in use with us. To get
+into public life a man must not only be in sympathy with the majority of
+the citizens of the locality in which he lives, but he must continue to
+be in sympathy with that majority; or, at any election, like Mr. Cannon
+in the election just held, where for any passing cause a majority of his
+neighbors in the locality in which he lives may fail to support him, he
+must go into retirement. I cannot here enlarge on this topic, vital as I
+see it; I have neither space nor time, and must, therefore, needs
+content myself with the "hints" of Paracelsus. I will merely say that as
+an outcome this localized majority system practically disfranchises the
+more intelligent and the more disinterested, the more individual and
+independent of every constituency. It reduces their influence, and
+negatives their action. It operates in like fashion everywhere. My
+field of observation has been at home, here in America; but it has been
+the same in France. For instance, while preparing this address I came
+across the following in that most respectable sheet, the London
+_Athenaum_. A very competent Frenchman was there criticising a recent
+book entitled "Idealism in France." Reference was by him made to what,
+in France, is known as the "_scrutin d'arrondissement,"_ or, in other
+words, the district representative system. The critic declares that this
+system has there "created a party machine which has brought the country
+under the sway of a sort of Radical-Socialist Tammany, and bound
+together the voter and the deputy by a tie of mutual corruption, the
+candidate promising Government favors to the elector in return for his
+vote, and the elector supporting the candidate who promises most. Hence
+a policy in which ideas and ideals are forgotten for personal and local
+interests, as each candidate strives to outbid his rivals in the bribes
+that he offers to his constituents. Hence, finally, a general lowering
+in the tone of French home politics, every question being made
+subservient by the deputies to that of their reëlection."
+
+I would respectfully inquire if the above does not apply word for word
+to the condition of affairs with which we are familiar in America.
+
+But let me here again cite a concrete case, still fresh in memory;
+nothing in abstract discussion tells so much. Take the late Carl
+Schurz. If there was one man in our public life since 1865 who showed a
+genius for the parliamentary career, and who in six short years in the
+United States Senate--a single term--displayed there constructive
+legislating qualities of the highest order, it was Carl Schurz. Yet at
+the end of that single senatorial term, for local and temporary reasons
+he failed to obtain the support of a majority, or the support of
+anything approaching a majority, of those composing the constituency
+upon which he depended. Consequently he was retired from that
+parliamentary position necessary for the accomplishment, through him, of
+best public results. Yet at that very time there was no man in the
+United States who commanded so large and so personal a constituency as
+Carl Schurz; for he represented the entire Germanic element in the
+United States. Distributed as that element was, however, with its vote
+localized under our law, unwritten as well as statutory, there was no
+possibility of any constituency so concentrating itself that Carl Schurz
+could be kept in the position where he could continue to render services
+of the greatest possible value to the country. I, therefore, confidently
+here submit a doubt whether human ingenuity could devise any system
+calculated to lead to a greater waste of parliamentary ability, or more
+effectually keep from the front and position of influence that
+legislative superiority which was the arm of Aristotle to secure.
+"Cant-patriotism," as your Francis Lieber termed it; and, on this
+score, he waxed eloquent. "Do we not live in a world of cant," he wrote
+from Columbia here to a friend at the North seventy-five years ago,
+"that cant-patriotism which plumes itself in selecting men from within
+the State confines only. The truer a nation is, the more essentially it
+is elevated, the more it disregards petty considerations, and takes the
+true and the good from whatever quarter it may come. Look at history and
+you find the proof. Look around you, where you are, and you find it
+now." And, were Lieber living to-day, he would find a striking
+exemplification of the consequences of a total and systematic disregard
+of this elementary proposition in studying the United States Senate from
+and through its reporters' gallery. The decline in the standards of that
+body, whether of aspect, intelligence, education or character, under the
+operation of the local primary has been not less pronounced than
+startling. The outcome and ripe result of "cant-patriotism," it affords
+to the curious observer an impressive object-lesson,--provincialism
+reduced to a political system; what a witty and incisive French writer
+has recently termed the "Cult of Incompetence." Speaking of conditions
+prevailing not here but in France, this observer says:--"Democracy in
+its modern form chooses its' delegates in its own image.... What ought
+the character of the legislator to be? The very opposite, it seems to
+me, of the democratic legislator, for he ought to be well-informed and
+entirely devoid of prejudice." Taken as a whole, and a few striking
+individual exceptions apart, are those composing the Senate of the
+United States conspicuous in these respects? They certainly do not so
+impress the casual observer. That, as a body, they increasingly fail to
+command confidence and attention is matter of common remark. Nor is the
+reason far to seek. It would be the same as respects literature, science
+and art, were their representatives chosen and results reached through a
+count of noses localized, with selection severely confined to
+home talent.
+
+I am well aware of the criticism which will at once be passed on what I
+now advance. Local representation through choice by numerical majorities
+within given confines, geographically and mathematically fixed, is a
+system so rooted and intrenched in the convictions and traditions of the
+American community that even to question its wisdom evinces a lack of
+political common-sense. It in fact resembles nothing so much as the
+attempt to whistle down a strongly prevailing October wind from the
+West. The attempt so to do is not practical politics! In reply, however,
+I would suggest that such a criticism is wholly irrelevant. The
+publicist has nothing to do with practical politics. It is as if it were
+objected to a physician who prescribed sanitation against epidemics that
+the community in question was by custom and tradition wedded to filth
+and surface-drainage, and could not possibly be induced to abandon them
+in favor of any new-fangled theories of soap-and-water cleanliness. So
+why waste time in prescribing such? Better be common-sensed and
+practical, taking things as they are. In the case suggested, and
+confronted with such criticism, the medical adviser simply shrugs his
+shoulders, and is silent; the alternative he knows is inescapable. After
+a sufficiency of sound scourgings the objecting community will probably
+know better, and may listen to reason; in a way, conforming thereto. So,
+also, the body politic. If Ephraim is indeed thus joined to idols, the
+publicist simply shrugs his shoulders, and passes on; possibly, after
+Ephraim has been sufficiently scourged, he may in that indefinite future
+popularly known as "one of these days" be more clear sighted and wiser.
+
+None the less, so far as our national parliamentary system is concerned,
+could I have my way in a revision of the Constitution, I would increase
+the senatorial term to ten years, and I would, were such a thing within
+the range of possibility, break down the system of the necessary
+senatorial selection by a State of an inhabitant of the State. If I
+could, I would introduce the British system. For example, though I never
+voted for Mr. Bryan and have not been in general sympathy with Mr.
+Roosevelt, yet few things would give me greater political satisfaction
+than to see Mr. Bryan, we will say, elected a Senator from Arizona or
+Oregon, Mr. Roosevelt elected from Illinois or Pennsylvania, President
+Taft from Utah or Vermont. They apparently best represent existing
+feelings and the ideals prevailing in those communities; why, then,
+should they not voice those feelings and ideals in our highest
+parliamentary chamber?
+
+As respects our House of Representatives, it would in principle be the
+same. I do not care to go into the rationale of what is known as
+proportional representation, nor have I time so to do; but, were it in
+my power, I would prescribe to-morrow that hereafter the national House
+of Representatives should be constituted on the proportional basis,--the
+choice of representatives to be by States, but, as respects the
+nomination of candidates, irrespective of district lines. Like many
+others, I am very weary of provincial nobodies, "good men" locally known
+to be such!
+
+As I have already said, in parliamentary government all depends in the
+end on the truly representative character of the legislative body. If
+that is as it should be, the rest surely follows. The objective of
+Aristotle is attained.
+
+Exceeding the limits assigned to it, my discussion has, however,
+extended too far. I must close. One word before so doing. Why am I here?
+I am here,--a man considerably exceeding in age the allotted threescore
+and ten--to deliver a message, be the value of the same greater or less.
+I greatly fear it is less. I would, however, impart the lessons of an
+experience stretching over sixty years,--the results of such observation
+as my intelligence has enabled me to exercise. I do so, addressing
+myself to a local institution of the advanced education. Why? Because,
+looking over the country, diagnosing its conditions as well as my
+capacity enables me, observing the evolution of the past and
+forecasting, in as far as I may, the outcome, I am persuaded that the
+future of the country rests more largely in the hands of such
+institutions as this than in those of any other agency or activity. Do
+not say I flatter; for, while I can hope for no advancement, I think I
+have not overstated the case; I certainly have not overstated my
+conviction. There has been no man who has influenced the course of
+modern thought more deeply and profoundly than Adam Smith, a Professor
+in a Scotch University of the second class. So here in Columbia seventy
+years ago, Francis Lieber prepared and published his "Manual of
+Political Ethics." Adam Smith and Francis Lieber were but
+prototypes--examples of what I have in mind. The days were when the
+Senate of the United States afforded a rostrum from which thinkers and
+teachers first formulated, and then advanced, great policies. Those
+days, and I say it regretfully, are past. Unless I am greatly mistaken,
+however, a new political force is now asserting itself. I have recently,
+at a meeting of historical and scientific associations in Boston, had my
+attention forcibly called to this aspect of the situation now shaping
+itself. I there met young men, many, and not the least noticeable of
+whom, came from this section. They inspired me with a renewed confidence
+in our political future. Essentially teachers,--I might add, they were
+publicists as well as professors. Observers and students, they actively
+followed the course of developing thought in Europe as in this country.
+Exact in their processes, philosophical and scientific in their methods,
+unselfish in their devotion, they were broad of view. It is for them to
+realize in a future not remote the University ideal pictured, and
+correctly pictured, from this stage by one who here preceded me a short
+six months ago. They, constituting the University, are the "hope of the
+State in the direction of its practical affairs; in teaching the lawyer
+the better standards of his profession, his duty to place character
+above money making; in teaching the legislator the philosophy of
+legislation, and that the constructive forces of legislation carefully
+considered should precede every effort to change an existing status; in
+teaching those in official life, executive and judicial, that demagogy,
+and theories of life uncontrolled by true principles, do not make for
+success, when final success is considered, but that, if they did lead to
+success, they should be avoided for their inherent imperfection.... The
+province of the University is to educate citizenship in the abstract."
+
+It is the presence of this class, to those composing which I bow as
+distinctly of a period superior to mine, that you owe my presence
+to-day,--whatever that presence may be worth. I regard their existence
+and their coming forward in such institutions as this University of
+South Carolina, as the arc of the bow of promise spanning the political
+horizon of our future.
+
+Through you, to them my message is addressed.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's 'Tis Sixty Years Since, by Charles Francis Adams
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+Title: 'Tis Sixty Years Since
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+Author: Charles Francis Adams
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+[Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule]
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+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 'TIS SIXTY YEARS SINCE ***
+
+
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+Produced by Afra Ullah, Sjaani and PG Distributed Proofreaders
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+
+
+<table width="80%" border="0" align="center">
+ <tr>
+ <td>
+ <h1 align="center">&quot;'TIS SIXTY YEARS SINCE&quot;</h1>
+ <h3 align="center">ADDRESS OF <br />
+ CHARLES FRANCIS ADAMS </h3>
+ <div align="center">* * * * * </div>
+ <h4 align="center">FOUNDERS' DAY, JANUARY 16, 1913</h4>
+ </td>
+ </tr>
+</table>
+<br />
+<hr align="center" width="40%" />
+
+<table width="80%" border="0" align="center">
+ <tr>
+ <td>
+ <h1 align="center">&quot;'TIS SIXTY YEARS SINCE&quot;</h1>
+
+
+<p>In the single hour self-allotted for my part in this
+occasion there is much ground to cover,--the time is
+short, and I have far to go. Did I now, therefore, submit
+all I had proposed to say when I accepted your
+invitation, there would remain no space for preliminaries.
+Yet something of that character is in place.
+I will try to make it brief.<a href="#one"><sup>[1]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p>As the legend or text of what I have in mind to submit,
+I have given the words &quot;'Tis Sixty Years Since.&quot;
+As some here doubtless recall, this is the second or subordinate
+title of Walter Scott's first novel, &quot;Waverley,&quot;
+which brought him fame. Given to the world in 1814,--hard
+on a century ago,--&quot;Waverley&quot; told of the last
+Stuart effort to recover the crown of Great Britain,--that
+of &quot;The '45.&quot; It so chances that Scott's period of
+retrospect is also just now most appropriate in my case,
+inasmuch as I entered Harvard as a student in the year
+1853--&quot;sixty years since!&quot; It may fairly be asserted
+that school life ends, and what may in contradistinction
+thereto be termed thinking and acting life begins, the
+day the young man passes the threshold of the institution
+of more advanced education. For him, life's
+responsibilities then begin. Prior to that confused,
+thenceforth things with him become consecutive,--a
+sequence. Insensibly he puts away childish things.</p>
+
+<p><a name="one"></a>[1] Owing to its length, this &quot;Address&quot; was compressed in delivery,
+occupying one hour only. It is here printed in the form in which it was
+prepared,--the parts omitted in delivery being included.</p>
+
+<p>In those days, as I presume now, the college youth
+harkened to inspired voices. Sir Walter Scott belonged to
+a previous generation. Having held the close attention
+of a delighted world as the most successful story-teller
+of his own or any preceding period, he had passed off the
+stage; but only a short twenty years before. Other voices
+no less inspired had followed; and, living, spoke to us.
+Perhaps my scheme to-day is best expressed by one of
+these.</p>
+
+<p>When just beginning to attract the attention of the
+English-speaking world, Alfred Tennyson gave forth
+his poem of &quot;Locksley Hall,&quot;--very familiar to those
+of my younger days. Written years before, at the time
+of publication he was thirty-three. In 1886, a man of
+seventy-five, he composed a sequel to his earlier effort,--the
+utterance entitled &quot;Locksley Hall Sixty Years
+After.&quot; He then, you will remember, reviewed his
+young man's dreams,--dreams of the period when he</p>
+
+<p>&quot; ... dip't into the future, far as human eye could see,
+Saw the Vision of the world, and all the wonder that would be,&quot;</p>
+
+<p>--threescore years later contrasting in sombre verse
+an old man's stern realities with the bright anticipations
+of youth. Such is my purpose to-day. &quot;Wandering
+back to living boyhood,&quot; to the time when I first
+simultaneously passed the Harvard threshold and the
+threshold of responsible life, I propose to compare the
+ideals and actualities of the present with the ideals,
+anticipations and dreams of a past now somewhat remote.</p>
+
+<p>To say that in life and in the order of life's events it
+is the unexpected which is apt to occur, is a commonplace.
+That it has been so in my own case, I shall presently
+show. Meanwhile, not least among the unexpected
+things is my presence here to-day. If, when I entered
+Harvard in 1853, it had been suggested that in 1913, I,--born
+of the New England Sanhedrim, a Brahmin Yankee
+by blood, tradition and environment--had it been suggested
+that I, being such, would sixty years later stand
+by invitation here in Columbia before the faculty and
+students of the University of South Carolina, I should
+under circumstances then existing have pronounced the
+suggestion as beyond reasonable credence. Here, however,
+I am; and here, from this as my rostrum, I propose
+to-day to deliver a message,--such as it is.</p>
+
+<p>And yet, though such a future outcome, if then foretold,
+would have seemed scarcely possible of occurrence,
+there, after all, were certain conditions which would
+have rendered the contingency even at that time not only
+possible, but in accordance with the everlasting fitness of
+things. For, curiously enough, personal relations of a
+certain character held with this institution would have
+given me, even in 1853, a sense of acquaintance with it
+such as individually I had with no other institution of
+similar character throughout the entire land. It in this
+wise came about. At that period, preceding as it did the
+deluge about to ensue, it was the hereditary custom of
+certain families more especially of South Carolina and of
+Louisiana,--but of South Carolina in particular--to
+send their youth to Harvard, there to receive a college
+education. It thus chanced that among my associates
+at Harvard were not a few who bore names long familiarly
+and honorably known to Carolinian records,--Barnwell
+and Preston, Rhett and Alston, Parkman and
+Eliot; and among these were some I knew well, and even
+intimately. Gone now with the generation and even
+the civilization to which they belonged, I doubt if any of
+them survive. Indeed only recently I chanced on a grimly
+suggestive mention of one who had left on me the memory
+of a character and personality singularly pure, high-toned
+and manly,--permeated with a sense of moral
+and personal obligation. I have always understood he
+died five years later at Sharpsburg, as you call it, or
+Antietam, as it was named by us, in face-to-face conflict
+with a Massachusetts regiment largely officered by Harvard
+men of his time and even class,--his own familiar
+friends. This is the record, the reference being to a marriage
+service held at St. Paul's church in Richmond,
+in the late autumn of 1862: &quot;An indefinable feeling
+of gloom was thrown over a most auspicious event when
+the bride's youngest sister glided through a side door
+just before the processional. Tottering to a chancel pew,
+she threw herself upon the cushions, her slight frame
+racked with sobs. Scarcely a year before, the wedding
+march had been played for her, and a joyous throng
+saw her wedded to gallant Breck Parkman. Before
+another twelvemonth rolled around the groom was killed
+at the front.&quot;<a href="#two"><sup>[2]</sup></a> Samuel Breck Parkman was in the
+Harvard class following that to which I belonged. Graduating
+in 1857, fifty-five years later I next saw his name
+in the connection just given. It recorded an incident of
+not infrequent occurrence in those dark and cruel days.</p>
+
+<p>It was, however, in Breck Parkman and his like that
+I first became conscious of certain phases of the South
+Carolina character which subsequently I learned to bear
+in high respect.</p>
+
+<p>So far as this University of South Carolina was concerned,
+it also so chanced that, by the merest accident,
+I, a very young man, was thrown into close personal
+relations with one of the most eminent of your professors,--Francis
+Lieber. Few here, I suppose, now personally
+remember Francis Lieber. To most it gives indeed
+a certain sense of remoteness to meet one who, as in my
+case, once held close and even intimate relations with a
+German emigrant, distinguished as a publicist, who as a
+youth had lain, wounded and helpless, a Prussian recruit,
+on the field above Namur. Occurring in June, 1815,
+two days after Waterloo, the affair at Namur will soon
+be a century gone. Of those engaged in it, the last
+obeyed the fell sergeant's summons a half score years
+ago. It seems remote; but at the time of which I speak
+Waterloo was appreciably nearer those in active life than
+are Shiloh and Gettysburg now. The Waterloo campaign
+was then but thirty-eight years removed, whereas those
+last are fifty now; and, while Lieber was at Waterloo, I
+was myself at Gettysburg.</p>
+
+<p><a name="two"></a>[2] DeLeon, &quot;Belles, Beaux and Brains of the Sixties,&quot; p. 158.</p>
+<p>
+Subsequently, later in life, it was again my privilege
+to hold close relations with another Columbian,--an
+alumnus of this University as it then was--in whom I
+had opportunity to study some of the strongest and most
+respect-commanding traits of the Southern character.
+I refer to one here freshly remembered,--Alexander
+Cheves Haskell,--soldier, jurist, banker and scholar,
+one of a septet of brothers sent into the field by a South
+Carolina mother calm and tender of heart, but in silent
+suffering unsurpassed by any recorded in the annals
+whether of Judea or of Rome. It was the fourth of the
+seven Haskells I knew, one typical throughout, in my
+belief, of what was best in your Carolinian development.
+With him, as I have said, I was closely and even intimately
+associated through years, and in him I had occasion to
+note that almost austere type represented in its highest
+development in the person and attributes of Calhoun.
+Of strongly marked descent, Haskell was, as I have always
+supposed, of a family and race in which could be observed
+those virile Scotch-Irish and Presbyterian qualities
+which found their representative types in the two
+Jacksons,--Andrew, and him known in history as &quot;Stonewall.&quot;
+To Alec Haskell I shall in this discourse again
+have occasion to refer.</p>
+
+<p>Thus, though in 1853, and for long years subsequent
+thereto, it would not have entered my mind as among the
+probabilities that I should ever stand here, reviewing the
+past after the manner of Tennyson in his &quot;Locksley Hall
+Sixty Years After,&quot; yet if there was any place in the
+South, or, I may say, in the entire country, where, as a
+matter of association, I might naturally have looked so
+to stand, it would have been where now I find myself.</p>
+
+<p>But I must hasten on; for, as I have said, if I am to
+accomplish even a part of my purpose, I have no time
+wherein to linger.</p>
+
+<p>Not long ago I chanced, in a country ramble, to be
+conversing with an eminent foreigner, known, and favorably
+known, to all Americans. In the course of leisurely
+exchange of ideas between us, he suddenly asked if I
+could suggest any explanation of the fact that not only
+were the publicists who had the greatest vogue in our
+college days now to a large extent discredited, but that
+almost every view and theory advanced by them, and
+which we had accepted as fixed and settled, was, where
+not actually challenged, silently ignored. Nor did the
+assertion admit of denial; for, looking back through the
+vista of threescore years, of the principles of what may
+be called &quot;public polity&quot; then advanced as indisputable,
+few to-day meet with general acceptance. To review
+the record from this point of view is curious.</p>
+
+<p>When in 1853 I entered Harvard, so far as this country
+and its polity were concerned certain things were matters
+of contention, while others were accepted as axiomatic,--the
+basic truths of our system. Among the former--the
+subjects of active contention--were the question
+of Slavery, then grimly assuming shape, and that of
+Nationality intertwined therewith. Subordinate to this
+was the issue of Free Trade and Protection, with the school
+of so-called American political economy arrayed against
+that of Adam Smith. Beyond these as political ideals
+were the tenets and theories of Jeffersonian Democracy.
+That the world had heretofore been governed too much
+was loudly acclaimed, and the largest possible individualism
+was preached, not only as a privilege but as a right.
+The area of government action was to be confined within
+the narrowest practical limits, and ample scope was to
+be allowed to each to develop in the way most natural
+to himself, provided only he did not infringe upon the
+rights of others. Materially, we were then reaching
+out to subdue a continent,--a doctrine of Manifest
+Destiny was in vogue. Beyond this, however, and most
+important now to be borne in mind, compared with the
+present the control of man over natural agencies and latent
+forces was scarcely begun. Not yet had the railroad
+crossed the Missouri; electricity, just bridled, was still
+unharnessed.</p>
+
+<p>I have now passed in rapid review what may perhaps
+without exaggeration be referred to as an array of conditions
+and theories, ideals and policies. It remains to
+refer to the actual results which have come about during
+these sixty years as respects them, or because of them;
+and, finally, to reach if possible conclusions as to the
+causes which have affected what may not inaptly be
+termed a process of general evolution. Having thus, so
+to speak, diagnosed the situation, the changes the situation
+exacts are to be measured, and a forecast ventured. An
+ambitious programme, I am well enough aware that the not
+very considerable reputation I have established for myself
+hardly warrants me in attempting it. This, I
+premise.</p>
+
+<p>Let us, in the first place, recur in somewhat greater
+detail to the various policies and ideals I have referred
+to as in vogue in the year 1853.</p>
+
+<p>First and foremost, overshadowing all else, was the
+political issue raised by African slavery, then ominously
+assuming shape. The clouds foreboding the coming tempest
+were gathering thick and heavy; and, moreover, they
+were even then illumined by electric flashes, accompanied
+by a mutter of distant thunder. Though we of the North
+certainly did not appreciate its gravity, the situation
+was portentous in the extreme.</p>
+
+<p>Involved in this problem of African slavery was the
+incidental issue of Free Trade and Protection,--apparently
+only economical and industrial in character, but
+in reality fundamentally crucial. And behind this lay
+the constitutional question, involving as it did not only
+the conflicting theories of a strict or liberal construction
+of the fundamental law, but nationality also,--the right
+of a Sovereign State to withdraw from the Union created
+in 1787, and developed through two generations.</p>
+
+<p>These may be termed concrete political issues, as opposed
+to basic truths generally accepted and theories
+individually entertained. The theories were constitutional,
+social, economical. Constitutionally, they turned
+upon the obligations of citizenship. There was no such
+thing then as a citizen of the United States of and by itself.
+The citizen of the United States was such simply
+because of his citizenship of a Sovereign State,--whether
+Massachusetts or Virginia or South Carolina; and, of
+course, an instrument based upon a divided sovereignty
+admitted of almost infinitely diverse interpretation.
+It is a scriptural aphorism that no man can serve two
+masters; for either he will hate the one and love the
+other, or else he will hold to the one and despise the
+other. And in the fulness of time it literally with us
+so came about. The accepted economical theories of
+the period were to a large extent corollaries of the
+fundamental proposition, and differing material and
+social conditions. Beyond all this, and coming still
+under the head of individual theories, was the doctrine
+enunciated by Thomas Jefferson in the Declaration
+of Independence,--the doctrine that all men were created
+equal,--meaning, of course, equal before the law. But
+the theorist and humanitarian of the North, accepting
+the fundamental principle laid down in the Declaration,
+gave to it a far wider application than had been intended
+by its authors,--a breadth of application it would not
+bear. Such science as he had being of scriptural origin,
+he interpreted the word &quot;equal&quot; as signifying equal in
+the possibilities of their attributes,--physical, moral,
+intellectual; and in so doing, he of course ignored the
+first principles of ethnology. It was, I now realize, a
+somewhat wild-eyed school of philosophy, that of which I
+myself was a youthful disciple.</p>
+
+<p>But, on the other hand, beside these, between 1850
+and 1860 a class of trained and more cautious thinkers,
+observers, scientists and theologians was coming to the
+front. Their investigations, though we did not then
+foresee it, were a generation later destined gently to subvert
+the accepted fundamentals of religious and economical
+thought, literary performance, and material existence.
+The work they had in hand to do was for the next fifteen
+years to be subordinate, so far as this country was concerned,
+to the solution of the terrible political problems
+which were first insistent on settlement; yet, as is now
+apparent, an initial movement was on foot which foreboded
+a revolution world-wide in its nature, and one in
+comparison with which the issues of slavery and American
+constitutionality became practically insignificant,--in
+a word, local and passing incidents.</p>
+
+<p>Finally, it remains to consider specifically the political
+theories then in vogue in their relation to the individual.
+In this country, it was the period of the equality of man
+and individuality in the development of the type. It
+was generally believed that the world had hitherto been
+governed too much,--that the day of caste, and even
+class, was over and gone; and finally, that America was
+a species of vast modern melting-pot of humanity, in
+which, within a comparatively short period of time, the
+characteristics of all branches of Indo-Aryan origin would
+resolve themselves. A new type would emerge,--the
+American. These theories were also in their consequences
+far-reaching. Practically, 1853 antedates all our present
+industrial organizations so loudly in evidence,--the
+multifarious trades-unions which now divide the population
+of the United States into what are known as the
+&quot;masses&quot; and the &quot;classes.&quot; As recently as a century
+ago, it used to be said of the French army under the Empire,
+that every soldier carried the baton of the Field-Marshal
+in his knapsack. And this ideal of equality and
+individuality was fixed in the American mind.</p>
+
+<p>Not that I for a moment mean to imply that in my
+belief the middle of the last century, or the twenty years
+anterior to the Civil War, was a species of golden age in
+our American annals. On the contrary, it was, as I
+remember it, a phase of development very open to criticism;
+and that in many respects. It was crude, self-conscious
+and self-assertive; provincial and formative,
+rather than formed. Socially and materially we were,
+compared with the present era of motors and parlor-cars,
+in the &quot;one-hoss shay&quot; and stove-heated railroad-coach
+stage. Nevertheless, what is now referred to as &quot;predatory
+wealth&quot; had not yet begun to accumulate in few
+hands; much greater equality of condition prevailed;
+nor was the &quot;wage-earner&quot; referred to as constituting
+a class distinct from the holders of property. Thus the
+individual was then encouraged,--whether in literature,
+in commerce, or in politics. In other words, there being
+a free field, one man was held to be in all respects the
+equal of the rest. Especially was what I have said true
+of the Northern, or so-called Free States, as contrasted
+with the States of the South, where the presence of
+African slavery distinctly affected individual theories, no
+matter where or to what extent entertained.</p>
+
+<p>Such, briefly and comprehensively stated, having been
+the situation in 1853, it remains to consider the practical
+outcome thereof during the sixty years it has been my
+fortune to take part, either as an actor or as an observer,
+in the great process of evolution. It is curious to note
+the extent to which the unexpected has come about. In
+the first place, consider the all-absorbing mid-century
+political issue, that involving the race question, to which I
+first referred,--the issue which divided the South from
+the North, and which, eight years only after I had entered
+college, carried me from the walks of civil life into the
+calling of arms.</p>
+
+<p>And here I enter on a field of discussion both difficult
+and dangerous; and, for reasons too obvious to require
+statement, what I am about to say will be listened to with
+no inconsiderable apprehension as to what next may be
+forthcoming. Nevertheless, this is a necessary part of
+my theme; and I propose to say what I have in mind to
+say, setting forth with all possible frankness the more
+mature conclusions reached with the passage of years.
+Let it be received in the spirit in which it is offered.</p>
+
+<p>So far, then, as the institution of slavery is concerned,
+in its relations to ownership and property in those of the
+human species,--I have seen no reason whatever to revise
+or in any way to alter the theories and principles I
+entertained in 1853, and in the maintenance of which I
+subsequently bore arms between 1861 and 1865. Economically,
+socially, and from the point of view of abstract
+political justice, I hold that the institution of slavery,
+as it existed in this country prior to the year 1865, was
+in no respect either desirable or justifiable. That it had
+its good and even its elevating side, so far at least as the
+African is concerned, I am not here to deny. On the contrary,
+I see and recognize those features of the institution
+far more clearly now than I should have said would have
+been possible in 1853. That the institution in itself,
+under conditions then existing, tended to the elevation
+of the less advanced race, I frankly admit I did not then
+think. On the other hand, that it exercised a most pernicious
+influence upon those of the more advanced race,
+and especially upon that large majority of the more advanced
+race who were not themselves owners of slaves,--of
+that I have become with time ever more and more
+satisfied. The noticeable feature, however, so far as I
+individually am concerned, has been the entire change
+of view as respects certain of the fundamental propositions
+at the base of our whole American political and
+social edifice brought about by a more careful and intelligent
+ethnological study. I refer to the political equality
+of man, and to that race absorption to which I have alluded,--that belief that any foreign element introduced
+into the American social system and body politic would
+speedily be absorbed therein, and in a brief space thoroughly
+assimilated. In this all-important respect I do
+not hesitate to say we theorists and abstractionists of the
+North, throughout that long anti-slavery discussion which
+ended with the 1861 clash of arms, were thoroughly
+wrong. In utter disregard of fundamental, scientific facts,
+we theoretically believed that all men--no matter what
+might be the color of their skin, or the texture of their
+hair--were, if placed under exactly similar conditions,
+in essentials the same. In other words, we indulged in
+the curious and, as is now admitted, utterly erroneous
+theory that the African was, so to speak, an Anglo-Saxon,
+or, if you will, a Yankee &quot;who had never had a chance,&quot;--a
+fellow-man who was guilty, as we chose to express it,
+of a skin not colored like our own. In other words, though
+carved in ebony, he also was in the image of God.</p>
+
+<p>Following out this theory, under the lead of men to
+whom scientific analysis and observation were anathema
+if opposed to accepted cardinal political theories as enunciated
+in the Declaration as read by them, the African
+was not only emancipated, but so far as the letter of the
+law, as expressed in an amended Constitution, would
+establish the fact, the quondam slave was in all respects
+placed on an equality, political, legal and moral, with those
+of the more advanced race.</p>
+
+<p>I do not hesitate here,--as one who largely entertained
+the theoretical views I have expressed,--I do not hesitate
+here to say, as the result of sixty years of more careful
+study and scientific observation, the theories then entertained
+by us were not only fundamentally wrong, but
+they further involved a problem in the presence of which
+I confess to-day I stand appalled.</p>
+
+<p>It is said,--whether truthfully or not,--that when
+some years ago John Morley, the English writer and
+thinker, was in this country, on returning to England he
+remarked that the African race question, as now existing
+in the United States, presented a problem as nearly, to
+his mind, insoluble as any human problem well could be.
+I do not care whether Lord Morley made this statement
+or did not make it. I am prepared, however, to say
+that, individually, so far as my present judgment goes,
+it is a correct presentation. To us in the North, the
+African is a comparatively negligible factor. So far as
+Massachusetts, for instance, or the city of Boston more
+especially, are concerned, as a problem it is solving itself.
+Proportionately, the African infusion is becoming less--never
+large, it is incomparably less now than it was in
+the days of my own youth. Thus manifestly a negligible
+factor, it is also one tending to extinction. Indeed, it
+would be fairly open to question whether a single Afro-American
+of unmixed Ethiopian descent could now be
+found in Boston. That the problem presents itself with
+a wholly different aspect here in Carolina is manifest.
+The difference too is radical; it goes to the heart of the
+mystery.</p>
+
+<p>As I have already said, the universal &quot;melting-pot&quot;
+theory in vogue in my youth was that but seven, or at
+the most fourteen, years were required to convert the
+alien immigrant--no matter from what region or of what
+descent--into an American citizen. The educational influences
+and social environment were assumed to be not only
+subtle, but all-pervasive and powerful. That this theory
+was to a large and even dangerous extent erroneous the observation
+of the last fifty years has proved, and our Massachusetts
+experience is sadly demonstrating to-day. It was
+Oliver Wendell Holmes, who, years ago, when asked by an
+anxious mother at what age the education of a child ought
+to begin, remarked in reply that it should begin about one
+hundred and fifty years before the child is born. It has so
+proved with us; and the fact is to-day in evidence that this
+statement of Dr. Holmes should be accepted as an undeniable
+political aphorism. So far from seven or fourteen years
+making an American citizen, fully and thoroughly impregnated
+with American ideals to the exclusion of all others,
+our experience is that it requires at least three generations
+to eliminate what may be termed the &quot;hyphen&quot; in citizenship.
+Not in the first, nor in the second, and hardly
+in the third, generation, does the immigrant cease to be
+an Irish-American, or a French-American, or a German-American,
+or a Slavonic-American, or yet a Dago.
+Nevertheless, in process of tune, those of the Caucasian
+race do and will become Americans. Ultimately their
+descendants will be free from the traditions and ideals, so
+to speak, ground in through centuries passed under other
+conditions. Not so the Ethiopian. In his case, we find
+ourselves confronted with a situation never contemplated
+in that era of political dreams and scriptural science in
+which our institutions received shape. Stated tersely
+and in plain language, so far as the African is concerned--the
+cause and, so to speak, the motive of the great
+struggle of 1861 to 1865--we recognize the presence in
+the body politic of a vast alien mass which does not
+assimilate and which cannot be absorbed. In other
+words, the melting-pot theory came in sharp contact
+with an ethnological fact, and the unexpected occurred.
+The problem of African servitude was solved after a
+fashion; but in place of it a race issue of most uncompromising
+character evolved itself.</p>
+
+<p>A survivor of the generation which read &quot;Uncle Tom's
+Cabin&quot; as it week by week appeared,--fresh to-day from
+Massachusetts with its Lawrence race issues of a different
+character, I feel a sense of satisfaction in discussing here
+in South Carolina this question and issue in a spirit the
+reverse of dogmatic, a spirit purely scientific, observant
+and sympathetic. And in this connection let me say I
+well remember repeatedly discussing it with your fellow-citizen
+and my friend, Colonel Alexander Haskell, to
+whom I have already made reference. Rarely have I
+been more impressed by a conclusion reached and fixed
+in the mind of one who to the study of a problem had
+obviously given much and kindly thought. As those
+who knew him do not need to be told, Alexander Cheves
+Haskell was a man of character, pure and just and
+thoughtful. He felt towards the African as only a Southerner
+who had himself never been the owner of slaves
+can feel. He regarded him as of a less advanced race than
+his own, but one who was entitled not only to just and
+kindly treatment but to sympathetic consideration.
+When, however, the question of the future of the Afro-American
+was raised, as matter for abstract discussion,
+it was suggestive as well as curious to observe the fixed,
+hard expression which immediately came over Haskell's
+face, as with stern lips, from which all suggestion of a
+smile had faded away, he pronounced the words:--&quot;Sir,
+it is a dying race!&quot; To express the thought more fully,
+Colonel Haskell maintained, as I doubt not many who
+now listen to me will maintain, that the nominal Afro-American
+increase, as shown in the figures of the national
+census, is deceptive,--that in point of fact, the
+Ethiop in America is incurring the doom which has ever
+befallen those of an inferior and less advanced race when
+brought in direct and immediate contact, necessarily and
+inevitably competitive, with the more advanced, the
+more masterful, and intellectually the more gifted. In
+other words, those of the less advanced race have a fatal
+aptitude for contracting the vices, both moral and physical,
+of the superior race, in the end leading to destruction;
+while the capacity for assimilating the elevating qualities
+and attributes which constitute a saving grace is denied
+them. Elimination, therefore, became in Haskell's belief
+a question of time only,--the law of the survival
+of the fittest would assert itself. The time required
+may be long,--numbered by centuries; but, however
+remotely, it nevertheless would come. God's mill grinds
+slowly, but it grinds uncommon small; and, I will add,
+its grinding is apt to be merciless.</p>
+
+<p>The solution thus most pronouncedly laid down by
+Colonel Haskell may or may not prove in this case correct
+and final. It certainly is not for me, coming from the
+North, to undertake dogmatically to pass upon it. I
+recur to it here as a plausible suggestion only, in connection
+with my theme. As such, it unquestionably merits
+consideration. I am by no means prepared to go the
+length of an English authority in recently saying that
+&quot;emancipation on two continents sacrificed the real welfare
+of the slave and his intrinsic worth as a person, to
+the impatient vanity of an immediate and theatrical
+triumph.&quot;><sup><a href="#three">[3</a>]</sup> This length I say, I cannot go; but so far
+as the present occasion is concerned, with such means of
+observation as are within my reach, I find the conclusion
+difficult to resist that the success of the abolitionists in
+effecting the emancipation of the Afro-American, as unexpected
+and sweeping as it was sudden, has led to phases
+of the race problem quite unanticipated at least. For
+instance, as respects segregation. Instead of assimilating,
+with a tendency to ultimate absorption, the movement
+in the opposite direction since 1865 is pronounced. It
+has, moreover, received the final stamp of scientific
+approval. This implies much; for in the old days of
+the &quot;peculiar institution&quot; there is no question the relations
+between the two races were far more intimate,
+kindly, and even absorptive than they now are.</p>
+
+<p><a name="three"></a>[3]Bussell's (Dr. F.W.) &quot;Christian Theology and Social Progress.&quot;
+Bampton Lectures, 1905.</p>
+
+
+<p>That African slavery, as it existed in the United States
+anterior to the year 1862, presented a mild form of servitude,
+as servitude then existed and immemorially had almost
+everywhere existed, was, moreover, incontrovertibly proven
+in the course of the Civil War. Before 1862, it was confidently
+believed that any severe social agitation within,
+or disturbance from without, would inevitably lead to a
+Southern servile insurrection. In Europe this result was
+assumed as of course; and, immediately after it was
+issued, the Emancipation Proclamation of President
+Lincoln was denounced in unmeasured terms by the entire
+London press. Not a voice was raised in its defence.
+It was regarded as a measure unwarranted in civilized
+warfare, and a sure and intentional incitement to the
+horrors which had attended the servile insurrections of
+Haiti and San Domingo; and, more recently, the unspeakable
+Sepoy incidents of the Indian mutiny. What
+actually occurred is now historic. The confident anticipations
+of our English brethren were, not for the first
+time, negatived; nor is there any page in our American
+record more creditable to those concerned than the attitude
+held by the African during the fierce internecine
+struggle which prevailed between April, 1861, and April,
+1865. In it there is scarcely a trace, if indeed there is
+any trace at all, of such a condition of affairs as had
+developed in the Antilles and in Hindustan. The attitude
+of the African towards his Confederate owner was
+submissive and kindly. Although the armed and masterful
+domestic protector was at the front and engaged
+in deadly, all-absorbing conflict, yet the women and
+children of the Southern plantation slept with unbarred
+doors,--free from apprehension, much more from molestation.</p>
+
+<p>Moreover, as you here well know, during the old days
+of slavery there was hardly a child born, of either sex,
+who grew up in a Southern household of substantial
+wealth without holding immediate and most affectionate
+relations with those of the other race. Every typical
+Southern man had what he called his &quot;daddy&quot; and his
+&quot;mammy,&quot; his &quot;uncle&quot; and his &quot;aunty,&quot; by him familiarly
+addressed as such, and who were to him even closer
+than are blood relations to most. They had cared for
+him in his cradle; he followed them to their graves. Is
+it needful for me to ask to what extent such relations
+still exist? Of those born thirty years after emancipation,
+and therefore belonging distinctly to a later generation,
+how many thus have their kindly, if humble, kin of
+the African blood? I fancy I would be safe in saying
+not one in twenty.</p>
+
+<p>Here, then, as the outcome of the first great issue I
+have suggested as occupying the thought and exciting
+the passions of that earlier period, is a problem wholly
+unanticipated,--a problem which, merely stating, I
+dismiss.</p>
+
+<p>Passing rapidly on, I come to the next political issue
+which presented itself in my youth,--the constitutional
+issue,--that of State Sovereignty, as opposed to the
+ideal, Nationality. And, whether for better or worse,
+this issue, I very confidently submit, has been settled.
+We now, also, looking at it in more observant mood, in
+a spirit at once philosophical and historical, see that it
+involved a process of natural evolution which, under the
+conditions prevailing, could hardly result in any other
+settlement than that which came about. We now have
+come to a recognition of the fact that Anglo-Saxon nationality
+on this continent was a problem of crystallization,
+the working out of which occupied a little over two centuries.
+It was in New England the process first set in,
+when, in 1643, the scattered English-speaking settlements
+under the hegemony of the colony of Massachusetts
+Bay united in a confederation. It was the initial step.
+I have no time in which to enumerate successive steps,
+each representing a stage in advance of what went
+before. The War of Independence,--mistakenly denominated
+the Revolutionary War, but a struggle distinctly
+conservative in character, and in no way revolutionary,--the
+War of Independence gave great impetus
+to the process, resulting in what was known as Federation.
+Then came the Constitution of 1787 and the formation
+of the, so called, United States as a distinct nationality.
+The United States next passed through two definite processes
+of further crystallization,--one in 1812-1814, when
+the second war with Great Britain, and more especially
+our naval victories, kindled, especially in the North,
+the fire of patriotism and the conception of nationality;
+the other, half a century later, presented the stern issue
+in a concrete form, and at last the complete unification
+of a community--whether for better or for worse is no
+matter--was hammered by iron and cemented in blood.
+It is there now; an established fact. Secession is a lost
+cause; and, whether for good or for ill, the United States
+exists, and will continue to exist, a unified World Power.
+Sovereignty now rests at Washington, and neither in
+Columbia for South Carolina nor in Boston for Massachusetts.
+The State exists only as an integral portion of the
+United States. That issue has been fought out. The
+result stands beyond controversy; brought about by a
+generation now passed on, but to which I belonged.</p>
+
+<p>Meanwhile, the ancient adage, the rose is not without
+its thorn, receives new illustration; for even this great
+result has not been wrought without giving rise to considerations
+suggestive of thought. Speaking tersely and
+concentrating what is in my mind into the fewest possible
+words, I may say that in our national growth up to the
+year 1830 the play of the centrifugal forces predominated,--that
+is, the necessity for greater cohesion made itself
+continually felt. A period of quiescence then followed,
+lasting until, we will say, 1865. Since 1865, it is not
+unsafe to say, the centripetal, or gravitating, force has
+predominated to an extent ever more suggestive of increasing
+political uneasiness. It is now, as is notorious,
+more in evidence than ever before. The tendency to
+concentrate at Washington, the demand that the central
+government, assuming one function after another, shall
+become imperial, the cry for the national enactment of
+laws, whether relating to marital divorce or to industrial
+combinations,--all impinge on the fundamental principle
+of local self-government, which assumed its highest
+and most pronounced form in the claim of State Sovereignty.
+I am now merely stating problems. I am not
+discussing the political ills or social benefits which possibly
+may result from action. Nevertheless, all, I think, must
+admit that the tendency to gravitation and attraction
+is to-day as pronounced and as dangerous, especially
+in the industrial communities of the North, as was the
+tendency to separation and segregation pronounced and
+dangerous seventy years ago in the South.</p>
+
+<p>To this I shall later return. I now merely point out
+what I apprehend to be a tendency to extremes--an
+excess in the swinging of our political pendulum.</p>
+
+<p>We next come to that industrial factor which I have
+referred to as the issue between the Free Trade of Adam
+Smith and Protection, as inculcated by the so-called
+American school of political economists. The phases
+which this issue has assumed are, I submit, well calculated
+to excite the attention of the observant and thoughtful.
+I merely allude to them now; but, in so far as it is in my
+power to make it so, my allusion will be specific. I
+frankly acknowledge myself a Free-Trader. A Free-Trader
+in theory, were it in my power I would be a
+Free-Trader in national practice. There has been, so
+far as I know, but one example of absolute free trade on
+the largest scale in world history. That one example,
+moreover, has been a success as unqualified as undeniable.
+I refer to this American Union of ours. We have
+here a country consisting of fifty local communities,
+stretching from the Atlantic to the Pacific, from
+tropical Porto Rico to glacial Alaska, representing every
+conceivable phase of soil, climate and material conditions,
+with diverse industrial systems. With a Union
+established on the principle of absolutely unrestricted
+commercial intercourse, you here in South Carolina, and
+more especially in Columbia, are to-day making it, so to
+speak, uncomfortable for the cotton manufacturer in
+New England; and I am glad of it! A sharp competition
+is a healthy incentive to effort and ingenuity, and the
+brutal injunction, &quot;Root hog or die!&quot; is one from which
+I in no way ask to have New England exempt. When
+Massachusetts is no longer able to hold its own industrially
+in a free field, the time will, in my judgment,
+have come for Massachusetts to go down. With communities
+as with children, paternalism reads arrested
+development. One of the great products of Massachusetts
+has been what is generically known as &quot;footwear.&quot;
+Yet I am told that under the operation of absolute
+Free Trade, St. Louis possesses the largest boot
+and shoe factory in its output in the entire world. That
+is, the law of industrial development, as natural
+conditions warrant and demand, has worked out its
+results; and those results are satisfactory. I am aware
+that the farmer of Massachusetts has become practically
+extinct; he cannot face the competition of the great
+West: but the Massachusetts consumer is greatly advantaged
+thereby. So far as agricultural products are
+concerned, Massachusetts is to-day reduced to what is
+known as dairy products and garden truck; and it is
+well! Summer vegetables manufactured under glass in
+winter prove profitable. So, turning his industrial
+efforts to that which he can do best, even the Massachusetts
+agriculturalist has prospered. On the other
+hand, wherever in this country protection has been most
+completely applied, I insist that if its results are analyzed
+in an unprejudiced spirit, it will be pronounced to have
+worked unmitigated evil,--an unhealthy, because artificially
+stimulated and too rapid, growth. Let Lawrence,
+in Massachusetts, serve as an example. Look at the industrial
+system there introduced in the name of Protection
+against the Pauper Labor of Europe! No growth is so
+dangerous as a too rapid growth; and I confidently
+submit that politically, socially, economically and industrially,
+America to-day, on the issues agitating us, presents
+an almost appalling example of the results of hot-house
+stimulation.</p>
+
+<p>Nor is this all, nor the worst. There is another article,
+and far more damaging, in the indictment. Through
+Protection, and because of it, Paternalism has crept in;
+and, like a huge cancerous growth, is eating steadily into
+the vitals of the political system. Instead of supporting
+a government economically administered by money contributed
+by the People, a majority of the People to-day
+are looking to the government for support, either
+directly through pension payments or indirectly through
+some form of industrial paternalism. Incidentally, a profuse
+public expenditure is condoned where not actually
+encouraged. Jeffersonian simplicity is preached; extravagance
+is practised. As the New York showman long
+since shrewdly observed: &quot;The American people love to
+be fooled!&quot;</p>
+
+<p>But I must pass on; I still have far to go. As respects
+legislation, I have said that sixty years ago, when my
+memories begin, the American ideal was the individual,
+and individuality. This, implied adherence to the Jeffersonian
+theory that heretofore the world had been
+governed too much. The great secret of true national
+prosperity, happiness and success was, we were taught,
+to allow to each individual the fullest possible play, provided
+only he did not infringe on the rights of others.
+How is it to-day? America is the most governed and
+legislated country in the world! With one national law-making
+machine perpetually at work grinding out edicts,
+we have some fifty provincial mills engaged in the same
+interesting and, to my mind, pernicious work. No one
+who has given the slightest consideration to the subject
+will dispute the proposition that, taking America as a
+whole, we now have twenty acts of legislation annually
+promulgated, and with which we are at our peril supposed
+to be familiar, where one would more than suffice. Then
+we wonder that respect for the law shows a sensible decrease!
+The better occasion for wonder is that it survives
+at all. We are both legislated and litigated out of
+all reason.</p>
+
+<p>Passing to the other proposition of individuality, there
+has been, as all men know and no one will dispute, a
+most perceptible tendency of late years towards what is
+known as the array of one portion of the community--the
+preponderating, voting portion--against another--the
+more ostentatious property-holding portion. It is
+the natural result, I may say the necessary as well as
+logical outcome, of a period of too rapid growth,--production
+apportioned by no rule or system other or higher
+than greed and individual aptitude for acquisition. I
+will put the resulting case in the most brutal, and consequently
+the clearest, shape of which I am capable. Working
+on the combined theories of individualism controlled
+and regulated by competition, it has been one grand game
+of grab,--a process in which the whole tendency of our
+legislation, national or state, has during the last twenty
+years been, first, to create monopolies of capital and,
+later, to bring into existence a counter, but no less privileged,
+class, known as the &quot;wage-earner.&quot;</p>
+
+<p>Of the first class it is needless to speak, for, as a class,
+it is sufficiently pilloried by the press and from the hustings.
+Much in evidence, those prominent in it are known
+as the possessors of &quot;predatory wealth&quot;; &quot;unjailed malefactors,&quot;
+they are subjects of continuous &quot;grilling&quot; in
+the congressional and legislative committee rooms. The
+effort to make them &quot;disgorge&quot; is as continual as it is
+noisy, and, as a rule, futile. It constitutes a curious and
+in some respects instructive exhibition of misdirected
+popular feeling and legislative incompetence. None the
+less, the existence of a monopolist class calls for no proof
+at the bar of public opinion. Not so the other and even
+more privileged class,--the so-called &quot;wage-earner&quot;;
+for, disguise it as the trades-unionist will, angrily deny it
+as he does, the fact remains that to-day under the operation
+of our jury system and of our laws, the Wage-earner
+and the member of the Trades-Union has become, as
+respects the rest of the community, himself a monopolist
+and, moreover, privileged as such. Practically, crimes
+urged and even perpetrated in behalf of so-called &quot;labor&quot;
+receive at the hands of juries, and also not infrequently
+of courts, an altogether excessive degree of merciful consideration.
+At the same time, both here and in Europe,
+Organized Labor is instant in its demand that immunity,
+denied to ordinary citizens, and those whom it terms
+&quot;the classes,&quot; shall by special exemption be conferred
+upon the Labor Union and upon the Wage-earner. The
+tendency on both sides and at each extreme to inequality
+in the legislature and before the law is thus manifest.</p>
+
+<p>Viewing conditions face to face and as they now are,
+no thoughtful observer can, in my judgment, avoid the
+conviction that, whether for good or ill, for better or for
+worse, this country as a community has, within the last
+thirty years--that is, we will say, since our centennial
+year, 1876--cast loose from its original moorings. It
+has drifted, and is drifting, into unknown seas. Nor is
+this true of English-speaking America alone. I have
+already quoted Lord Morley in another connection.
+Lord Morley, however, only the other day delivered, as
+Chancellor of Manchester University, a most interesting
+and highly suggestive address, in which, referring to conservative
+Great Britain, he thus pictured a phase of
+current belief: &quot;Political power is described as lying
+in the hands of a vast and mobile electorate, with scanty
+regard for tradition or history. Democracy, they say,
+is going to write its own programme. The structure of
+executive organs and machinery is undergoing half-hidden
+but serious alterations. Men discover a change of attitude
+towards law as law; a decline in reverence for institutions
+as institutions.&quot;</p>
+
+<p>While, however, the influences at work are thus general
+and the manifestations whether on the other side of the
+Atlantic or here bear a strong resemblance, yet difference
+of conditions and detail--constitutional peculiarities,
+so to speak--must not be disregarded. One form
+of treatment may not be prescribed for all. In our case,
+therefore, it remains to consider how best to adapt this
+country and ourselves to the unforeseeable,--the navigation
+of uncharted waters; and this adaptation cannot
+be considered hi any correct and helpful, because scientific,
+spirit, unless the cause of change is located. Surface
+manifestations are, in and of themselves, merely deceptive.
+A physician, diagnosing the chances of a patient,
+must first correctly ascertain, or at least ascertain with
+approximate correctness, the seat of the trouble under
+which the patient is suffering. So, we.</p>
+
+<p>And here I must frankly confess to small respect for
+the politician,--the man whose voice is continually
+heard, whether from the Senate Chamber or the Hustings.
+There is in those of his class a continual and most noticeable
+tendency to what may best be described as the <i>post
+ergo propter</i> dispensation. With them, the eye is fixed on
+the immediate manifestation. Because one event preceded
+another, the first event is obviously and indisputably
+the cause of the later event. For instance, in the present
+case, the cause or seat of our existing and very manifest
+social, political and financial disturbances is attributed
+as of course to some peculiarity of legislation, either a
+subtreasury bill passed in the administration of General
+Jackson, or a tariff bill passed in the administration of
+Mr. Taft, or the demonetization of silver in the Hayes
+period,--that &quot;Crime of the Century,&quot; the Crucifixion
+of Labor on the Cross of Gold! Once for all, let me say,
+I contemplate this school of politicians and so-called
+&quot;thinkers&quot; with sentiments the reverse of respectful.
+In plain language, I class them with those known in professional
+parlance as quacks and charlatans. Not always,
+not even in the majority of cases, does that which preceded
+bear to that which follows the relation of cause and
+effect. A marked example of this false attribution is
+afforded in more recent political history by the everlasting
+recurrence of the statement that American prosperity
+is the result of an American protective system. Yet in
+the Protectionist dispensation, this has become an article
+of faith. To my mind, it is undeserving of even respectful
+consideration.</p>
+
+<p>If I were asked the cause of that change, little short of
+revolutionary, if indeed in any respect short of it, which
+has occurred in the material condition of the American
+people, and consequently in all its theories and ideals,
+within the last thirty years, I should attribute it to a
+wholly different cause. Mr. Lecky some years ago, in
+his book entitled &quot;Liberty and Democracy,&quot; made the
+following statement, in no way original, but, as he put it,
+sufficiently striking: &quot;The produce of the American
+mines [incident to the discoveries made by Columbus]
+created, in the most extreme form ever known in Europe,
+the change which beyond all others affects most deeply
+and universally the material well-being of men: it revolutionized
+the value of the precious metals, and, in consequence,
+the price of all articles, the effects of all contracts,
+the burden of all debts.&quot;</p>
+
+<p>In other words, referring to the first half of the sixteenth
+century,--the sixty years, we will say, following the land-fall
+of Columbus,--the historian attributed the great
+change which then occurred and which stands forth so
+markedly in history, to the increased New-World production
+of the precious metals, combined with the impetus
+given to trade and industry as a consequence of that discovery,
+and of the mastery of man over additional globe
+areas. Now, dismissing from consideration the so-called
+American protective system, likewise our currency issues
+and, generally, the patchwork, so to speak, of crazy-quilt
+legislation to which so much is attributed during the
+last thirty years, I confidently submit that in the production
+of the results under discussion, they are quantities
+and factors hardly worthy of consideration. The
+cause of the change which has taken place lies far deeper
+and must be sought in influences of a wholly different
+nature, influences developed into an increased and still
+ever increasing activity, over which legislation has absolutely
+no control. I refer, of course, to man's mastery
+over the latent forces of Nature. Of these Steam and
+Electricity are the great examples, which, because always
+apparent, at once strike the imagination. These, as
+tools, it is to be remembered, date practically from within
+one hundred years back. It may, indeed, safely be asserted
+that up to 1815, the end of the Wars of Napoleon
+and the time of your Professor Lieber, steam even had
+not as yet practically affected the operations of man,
+while electricity, when not a terror, was as yet but a toy.
+Commerce was still exclusively carried on by the sailing
+ship and canal-boat. The years from the fall of Napoleon
+to our own War of Secession--from Waterloo to Gettysburg--were
+practically those of early and partial development.
+Not until well after Appomattox, that is, since
+the year 1870,--a period covering but little more than
+the life of a generation,--did what is known to you here
+as the Applied Sciences cover a range difficult to specialize.
+As factors in development, it is safe to say that those
+three tremendous agencies--Steam, Electricity, Chemistry--have,
+so to speak, worked all their noticeable
+results within the lifetime of the generation born since
+we celebrated the Centennial of Independence. The
+manifestations now resulting and apparent to all are the
+natural outcome of the use of these modern appliances,
+become in our case everyday working tools in the hands
+of the most resourceful, adaptive, ingenious and energetic
+of communities, developing a virgin continent of undreamed-of
+wealth. Naturally, under such conditions,
+the advance has been not only general and continuous,
+but one of ever increasing celerity. So Protection and
+the Currency become flies on the fast revolving wheel!</p>
+
+<p>But what has otherwise resulted?--An unrest, social,
+economical, political. Not contentment, but a lamentation
+and an ancient tale of wrong! We hear it in the
+continual cry over what is known as the increased cost
+of living, and feel its pressure in the higher standard of
+living. What was considered wealth by our ancestors
+is to-day hardly competence. What sufficed for luxury
+in our childhood barely now supplies what are known as
+the comforts of life. Take, for instance, the motor,--the
+automobile. I speak within bounds, I think, when I
+say there are many fold more motors to-day racing over
+the streets, the highways and the byways of America
+than there were one-horse wagons thirty-five years ago.
+Six hundred, I am told, are to be found within the immediate
+neighborhood of Columbia; and, since I have
+been here I have seen in your streets just one man on
+horse-back! These figures and that statement tell the
+tale. A few years only back, every Carolinian rode to
+town, and the motor was unknown. A single illustrative
+example, this could be duplicated in innumerable ways
+everywhere and in all walks of life.</p>
+
+<p>The result is obvious, and was inevitable. Entered
+on a new phase of existence, the world is not as it was in
+the days of Columbus, when a single new continent was
+discovered containing in it what we would now regard as
+a limited accumulation of the precious metals. It is,
+on the contrary, as if, in the language of Dr. Johnson, &quot;the
+potentiality of wealth&quot; had been revealed &quot;beyond the
+dreams of avarice&quot;; together with not one or two, but a
+dozen continents, the existence and secrets of which are
+suddenly laid bare. The Applied Sciences have been the
+magicians,--not Protection or the Currency.</p>
+
+<p>And still scientists are continually dinning in our ears
+the question whether this state of affairs is going to continue,--whether
+the era of disturbance has reached its
+limit! I hold such a question to be little short of childish.
+That era has not reached its limits, nor has it even approximated
+those limits. On the contrary, we have just entered
+on the uncharted sea. We know what the last thirty
+years have brought about as the result of the agencies
+at work; but as yet we can only dimly dream of what the
+next sixty years are destined to see brought about.
+Imagination staggers at the suggestion.</p>
+
+<p>What, then, has been of this the inevitable consequence,--the
+consequence which even the blindest should have
+foreseen? It has resulted in all those far-reaching changes
+suggested in the earlier part of what I have said to-day,
+as respects our ideals, our political theories, our social
+conditions. In other words, the old era is ended; what
+is implied when we say a new era is entered upon?</p>
+
+<p>To attempt a partial answer to the query implies no
+claim to a prophetic faculty. Whether we like to face
+the fact or not, far-reaching changes in our economical
+theories and social conditions are imminent, involving
+corresponding readjustments in our constitutional arrangements
+and political machinery. Tennyson foreshadowed
+it all in his &quot;Locksley Hall&quot; seventy years ago:--&quot;The
+individual withers, and the world is more and more.&quot;
+The day of individualism as it existed in the American
+ideal of sixty years since is over; that of collectivism
+and possibly socialism has opened. The day of social
+equality is relegated to what may be considered a somewhat
+patriarchal past,--that patriarchal past having
+come to a close during the memory of those still in active
+life.</p>
+
+<p>And yet, though all this can now be studied in the
+political discussion endlessly dragging on, strangely and
+sadly enough that discussion carries in it hardly a note
+of encouragement. It is, in a word, unspeakably shallow.
+And here, having sufficiently for my present purpose
+though in hurried manner, diagnosed the situation,--located
+the seat of disturbance,--we come to the question
+of treatment. Involving, as it necessarily does, problems
+of the fundamental law, and a rearrangement and different
+allocation of the functions of government, this challenges
+the closest thought of the publicist. That the problem
+is here crying aloud for solution is apparent. The publications
+which cumber the counters of our book-stores,
+those for which the greatest popular call to-day exists--treatises
+relating to trade interests, to collectivism, to
+socialism, even to anarchism--tell the tale in part; in
+part it is elsewhere and otherwise told. Only recently,
+in once Puritan Massachusetts, processions paraded the
+streets carrying banners marked with this device, more
+suggestive than strange:--&quot;No master and no God!&quot;</p>
+
+<p>What are the remedies popularly proposed? In that
+important branch of polity known as Political Ethics,
+or, as he termed them, Hermeneutics, which your Professor
+Lieber sixty years ago endeavored to treat of, what advance
+has since his time been effected?--Nay! what
+advance has been effected since the time, over two thousand
+years, of his great predecessor, Aristotle? I confidently
+submit that what progress is now being made in
+this most erudite of sciences is in the nature of that of
+the crab--backwards! In the discussions of Aristotle,
+the problem in view was, how to bring about government
+by the wisest,--that is, the most observant and expert.
+In other words, government, the object of politics, was
+by Aristotle treated in a scientific spirit. And this is as
+it should be. Take, for example, any problem,--I do
+not care whether it is legal or medical or one of engineering: How
+successfully dispose of it? Uniformly, in
+one way. Those problems are successfully solved, if at
+all, only when their solution is placed in the hands of the
+most proficient. Judged by the discussions of to-day,
+what advance has in politics been effected? Do the
+<i>Outlook</i> and the <i>Commoner</i> imply progress since the
+Stagirite? Not to any noticeable extent. We are,
+on the contrary, fumbling and wallowing about where
+the Greek pondered and philosophized.</p>
+
+<p>Democracy, as it is called, is to-day the great panacea,--the
+political nostrum; as such it is confidently advocated
+by statesmen and professors and even by the presidents
+of our institutions of the advanced education. &quot;Trust
+the People&quot; is the shibboleth! &quot;Let the People rule!&quot;
+&quot;The cure for too much Liberty is more Liberty!&quot; To
+Democracy plain and simple--Composite Wisdom--I
+frankly confess I feel no call,--no call greater than, for
+instance, towards Autocracy or Aristocracy or Plutocracy.
+Taken simply, and applied as hitherto applied, all and
+each lead to but one result,--failure! And that result,
+let me here predict, will, in the future, be the same in the
+case of pure Democracy that, in the past, it was in the
+case of the pure Autocracy of the Caesars, or the case of
+the pure Aristocracy of Rome or of the so-called Republics
+of the Middle Ages. A political edifice on shifting sands.</p>
+
+<p>Yet, to-day what do we see and hear in America? Tell
+it not in Gath; publish it not in the streets of Askalon I
+Two thousand years after the time of Aristotle, we see a
+prevailing school working directly back to the condition
+of affairs which existed in the Athenian agora under the
+disapproving eyes of the father of political philosophy.
+Panaceas, universal cure-alls, and quack remedies--the
+Initiative, the Referendum, and the Recall are paraded
+as if these--nostrums of the mountebanks of the county
+fair--would surely remedy the perplexing ills of new and
+hitherto unheard-of social, economical, and political conditions.
+Democracy! What is Democracy? Democracy,
+as it is generally understood, I submit, is nothing
+but the reaching of political conclusions through the frequent
+counting of noses; or, as Macaulay two generations
+ago better phrased it, &quot;the majority of citizens told by
+the head&quot;;--the only question at just this juncture
+being whether, in order to the arriving at more acceptable
+results, both sexes shall be &quot;told,&quot; instead of one
+sex only. Moreover, I with equal confidence make bold
+to suggest that while conceded, and while men have even
+persuaded themselves that they have faith in it, and
+really do believe in this &quot;telling&quot; of noses as the best
+and fairest attainable means of reaching correct results,
+yet in so doing and so professing they simply, as men are
+prone to do, deceive themselves. In other words, victims
+of their own cant, they preach a panacea in which they
+really do not believe. Nor of this is proof far to seek.
+<i>Vox populi, vox Dei</i>! If you extend the application of
+this principle by a single step, its loudest advocates draw
+back in alarm from the inevitable. They seek refuge
+in the assertion--&quot;Oh! That is different!&quot; For instance,
+take a concrete case; so best can we illustrate.</p>
+
+<p>One of the greatest scientific triumphs reached in modern
+times--perhaps I might fairly say the greatest--is
+the discovery of the cause of yellow fever, and its consequent
+control. As a result of the studies, the patient
+experimentation and self-sacrifice of the wisest,--that
+is, the most observant and expert,--the amazing conclusion
+was reached that not only the yellow fever but the
+innumerable ills of the flesh known under the caption of
+&quot;malarial,&quot; were due to causes hitherto unsuspected,
+though obvious when revealed,--to the existence in the
+atmosphere of a venomous insect, in comparison with the
+work of which the ravages on mankind of the entire carnivorous
+and reptile creation were of comparatively small
+account. The mosquito flew disclosed, the atmospheric
+viper,--a viper most venomous and deadly. How was
+the disclosure brought about? What was the remedy
+applied? Was the discovery effected through universal
+suffrage? Was the remedy sought for and decided upon
+by the Initiative, or through a Referendum at an election
+held on the Tuesday succeeding the first Monday of a
+certain month and year? Had recourse in this case been
+had to the panacea now in greatest political vogue, we
+all know perfectly well what would have followed. History
+tells us. The quarantine, as it is called, would have
+been decreed, and a day of fasting, humiliation and prayer
+appointed. The mosquito, quite ignored, would then
+have gone on in his deadly work. We all equally well
+know that the man, even the politician or the statesman,
+who had suggested a solution of that problem by a count
+of noses would have been effaced with ridicule. Even
+the most simple minded would have rejected that method
+of reaching a result. Yet the ilia of the body politic,
+too, are complicated. Indeed, far more intricate in their
+processes and more deceitful in their aspects, they more
+deeply affect the general well-being and happiness than
+any ill or epidemic which torments the physical being,
+even the mosquito malaria. Yet the ills of the body
+politic, the complications which surround us on every
+side,--for these the unfailing panacea is said to lie in
+universal suffrage, that remedy which is immediately
+and of course laughed out of court if suggested in case of
+the simpler ills of the flesh.</p>
+
+<p>This, I submit, is demonstration. The true remedy is
+not to be sought in that direction in the one case any
+more than the other.</p>
+
+<p>There is a considerable element of truth, though possibly
+a not inconsiderable one of exaggeration, in this
+statement from a paper I recently chanced upon in the
+issue of the sober and classical <i>Edinburgh Review</i> for
+October last,--a paper entitled &quot;Democracy and Liberalism&quot;:--&quot;History
+testifies unmistakably and unanimously
+to the passion of democracies for incompetence. There
+is nothing democracy dislikes and suspects so heartily as
+technical efficiency, particularly when it is independent
+of the popular vote.&quot; But to-day, what is politically proposed
+by our senatorial charlatans and the mountebanks
+of the market-place? The Referendum, the constant and
+easy Recall, the everlasting Initiative are dinned into
+our ears as the cure-alls of every ill of the body politic.
+On the contrary, I submit that, while in the absence of
+any better method as yet devised and accepted, the process
+of reaching results by a count of the &quot;majority told
+by the head&quot; of the citizens then present and voting has
+certain political advantages, yet, for all this, as a final,
+scientific, political process, it is unworthy of consideration.
+A passing expedient, it in no degree reflects credit
+on twentieth-century intelligence.</p>
+
+<p>And now I come to the crux of my discussion. Thus
+rejecting results reached by the ballot as now in practical
+use, a query is already in the minds of those who listen.
+At once suggesting itself and flung in my face, it is asked
+as a political poser, and not without a sneer,--What else
+or better have I to propose? Would I advise a return
+to old and discarded methods,--Heredity, Caste, Autocracy,
+Plutocracy? I respectfully submit this is a question
+no one has a right to put, and one I am not called
+upon to answer. Again, let me take a concrete case.
+Once more I appeal to the yellow fever precedent. The
+first step towards a solution of a medical, as of a political,
+problem is a correct diagnosis. Then necessarily follows
+a long period devoted to observation, to investigation
+and experiment. If, in the case of the yellow fever,
+a score of years only ago an observer had pointed out the
+nature of the disease and the manifest inadequacy of
+current theories and prevailing methods of prevention
+and treatment, do you think others would have had a
+right to turn upon him and demand that he instantly
+prescribe a remedy which should be not only complete,
+but at once recognized as such and so accepted? In the
+present case, as I have already observed, from the days
+of Aristotle down through two and twenty centuries, men
+had been experimenting in all, to them, conceivable ways,
+on the government of the body politic, exactly as they
+experimented on the disorders of the physical body. But
+only yesterday was the source of the yellow fever, for
+instance, diagnosed and located, and the proper means
+of prevention applied. The cancer and tuberculosis are
+to-day unsolved problems. By analogy, they are inviting
+subjects for an Initiative and a Referendum!
+Yet would any person who to-day, standing where I stand,
+expressed a disbelief, at once total and contemptuous,
+of such a procedure as respects them, be met by a demand
+for some other panacea of immediate and guaranteed
+efficiency? And so with the body politic. I here to-day
+am merely attempting a diagnosis, pointing out the disorders,
+and exposing as best I can the utter crudeness and
+insufficiency of the market-place remedies proposed.
+Have you a right, then, to turn on me, and call for some
+other prescription, warranted to cure, in place of the
+nostrums so loudly advertised by the sciolists and the
+dabblers of the day, and by me so contemptuously set
+aside? I confess I am unable to respond, or even to
+attempt a response to any such demand. I am not altogether
+a quack, nor is this a county fair.</p>
+
+<p>&quot;Paracelsus,&quot; so denominated, was one of Robert
+Browning's earlier poems. In it he causes the fifteenth-century
+alchemist and forerunner of all modern pharmaceutical
+chemistry, to declare that as the result of
+long travel and much research</p>
+
+&quot;I possess<br />
+Two sorts of knowledge: one,--vast, shadowy,<br />
+Hints of the unbounded aim....<br />
+The other consists of many secrets, caught<br />
+While bent on nobler prize,--perhaps a few<br />
+Prime principles which may conduct to much:<br />
+These last I offer.&quot;<br />
+
+<p>So, <i>longo intervallo</i>, I have a few suggestions,--the
+result of an observation extending, as I said at the beginning,
+over the lives of two generations and a connection
+with many great events in which I have borne a part,--a
+part not prominent indeed, and more generally, I acknowledge,
+mistaken than correct. My errors, however,
+have at least made me cautious and doubtful of my own
+conclusions. I submit them for what they are worth.
+Not much, I fear.</p>
+
+<p>What, then, would I do, were it in my power to prescribe
+alterations and curatives for the ills of our American
+body politic, of which I have spoken; or, more
+correctly, the far-reaching disturbances manifestly due
+to the agencies at work, to which I have made reference?
+Let us come at once to the point, taking the existing
+Constitution of the United States as a concrete example,
+and recognizing the necessity for its revision and readjustment
+to meet radically changed conditions,--conditions
+social, material, geographical, changed and still
+changing.</p>
+
+<p>It was Mr. Gladstone who, years ago, made the often-quoted
+assertion that the Constitution of the United States
+was &quot;the most wonderful work ever struck off at a given
+time by the brain and purpose of man.&quot; I do not think
+he was far wrong; though we, of course, realize that the
+Federal Constitution was a growth and in no degree an inspiration.
+That Constitution has through a century and
+a quarter stood the test of time and stress of war, during
+a period of almost unlimited growth of the community
+for which it was devised. It has outlasted many nationalities
+and most of the dynasties in existence at the time of
+its adoption; and that, too, under conditions sufficiently
+trying. I, therefore, regard it with profound respect;
+and, so regarding it, I would treat it with a cautious and
+tender hand. Not lightly pronouncing it antiquated,
+what changes would I make in it if to-morrow it were
+given me to prescribe alterations adapting it to the
+altered conditions which confront us? I do not hesitate
+to say, and I am glad to say, the changes I would suggest
+would be limited; yet, I fancy, far-reaching.</p>
+
+<p>And, in the first place, let us have a clear conception
+of the end in view. That end is, I submit, exactly the
+same to-day which Aristotle had in view more than twenty
+centuries ago. It is, not to solve all political problems,
+but to put political problems as they arise in the hands
+of those whom he termed the &quot;best,&quot;--but whom we
+know as the most intelligent, observant and expert,--to
+be, through their agency, in the way of ultimate solution.
+If, adopting every ill-considered and half-fledged
+measure of so-called reform which might be the fancy of
+the day, we incorporated them in our fundamental law,
+but one thing could result therefrom,--ultimate confusion.
+The Constitution is neither a legislative crazy-quilt
+nor a receptacle of fads. To make it such is in every
+respect the reverse of scientific. The work immediately
+in hand, therefore, is to devise such changes in the fundamental
+law as will tend most effectually to bring about
+the solution of issues as they may arise, by the most expert,
+observant and reliable. This accomplished, if
+its accomplishment were only practicable, all possible
+would have been done; and the necessary and inevitable
+readjustment of things would, in politics as in medicine
+and in science, be left to solve itself as occasion arose.
+Provision cannot be made against every contingency.</p>
+
+<p>This premised, the Constitution of the United States
+is an instrument through which powers are delegated by
+several local communities to a central government. The
+instrument, it was originally held, should be strictly construed
+and the powers delegated limited; and in this respect,
+with certain alterations made obviously necessary
+to meet changed conditions, I would return to the fundamental
+idea of the framers.</p>
+
+<p>In saying this I feel confidence also that here in South
+Carolina at least I shall meet with an earnest response.
+The time is not yet remote when local self-government
+worked salvation for South Carolina, as for her sister
+States of the Confederacy. You here will never forget
+what immediately followed the close of our Civil War.
+As an historic fact, the Constitution was then suspended.
+It was suspended by act of an irresponsible Congress,
+exercising revolutionary but unlimited powers over a
+large section of the common country. You then had an
+illustration, not soon to be forgotten, of concentration
+of legislative power. An episode at once painful and discreditable,
+it is not necessary here to refer to it in detail.
+Appeal, however, was made to the principle of local self-government,--it
+was, so to speak, a recurrence to the
+theory of State Sovereignty. The appeal struck a responsive,
+because traditional, chord; and it was through
+a recurrence to State Sovereignty as the agency of local
+self-government that loyalty and contentment were restored,
+and, I may add, that I am here to-day. Ceasing
+to be a Military Department, South Carolina once more
+became a State. Not improbably the demand will in a not
+remote future be heard that State lines and local autonomy
+be practically obliterated. In that event, I feel
+a confident assurance that, recurring in memory to the
+evil days which followed 1865, the spirit of enlightened
+conservatism will assert itself here and in the sister States
+of what was once the Confederacy; and again it will
+prevail. In the future, as in the past, you in South Carolina
+at least will cling to what in 1876 proved the ark of
+your social and political salvation.</p>
+
+<p>Taking another step in the discussion of changes, the
+Constitution is founded on that well-known distribution
+and allocation of powers first theoretically suggested by
+Montesquieu. There is a division, accompanied by a
+mutual limitation of authority, through the Judiciary,
+the Executive, and the Legislative. As respects this allocation,
+how would I modify that instrument? I freely
+say that the tendency of my thought, based on observation,
+is to conservatism. I have never yet in a single instance
+found that when the people of this or any other
+country accustomed to parliamentary government desired
+a thing, they failed to obtain it within a reasonable
+limit of time. Hasty changes are wisely deprecated; but
+I think I speak within limitation when I say that neither in
+the history of Great Britain,--the mother of Parliaments--nor
+in the history of the United States, has any modification
+which the people, on sober second thought, have considered
+to be for the best, long been deferred. Action, revolutionary
+in character, has not, as a rule, been needful, or,
+when taken, proved salutary. This is a record and result
+that no careful student of our history will, I take it, deny.</p>
+
+<p>Such being the case, so far as our Judiciary is concerned,
+I do not hesitate to say I would adhere to older, and, as
+I think, better principles, or revert to them where they
+have been experimentally abandoned. It took the Anglo-Saxon
+race two centuries of incessant conflict to wrest
+from a despotic executive, practically an autocracy, judicial
+independence. That was effected through what is
+known as a tenure during good behavior, as opposed to a
+tenure at the will of the monarch. This, then, for two
+centuries, was accepted as a fundamental principle of
+constitutional government. Of late, a new theory has
+been propounded, and by those chafing at all restraint--constitutionally
+lawless in disposition--it is said the
+Recall should also be applied to the Judiciary. Having,
+therefore, wrested the independence of the Judiciary from
+the hand of the Autocrat, we now propose to place it,
+in all trustfulness, in the hands of the Democrat. To me
+the proposition does not commend itself. It is founded
+on no correct principle, for the irresponsible democratic
+majority is even more liable to ill-considered and vacillating
+action than is the responsible autocrat. In that matter
+I would not trust myself; why, then, should I trust
+the composite Democrat? In the case of the Judiciary,
+therefore, I would so far as the fundamental law is concerned
+abide by the older and better considered principles
+of the framers.</p>
+
+<p>Next, the Executive. Again, we hear the demand of
+Democracy,--the Recall! Once more I revert to the
+record. This Republic has now been in working operation,
+and, taken altogether, most successful operation, for a
+century and a quarter. During that century and a quarter
+we have had, we will say, some five and twenty different
+chief magistrates. There is an ancient and somewhat
+vulgar adage to the effect that the proof of a certain
+dietary article is in its eating. Apply that homely adage to
+the matter under consideration. What is the lesson taught?
+It is simply this,--during a whole century and a quarter
+of existence there has not been one single chief executive
+of the United States to whom the arbitrary Recall could
+have been applied with what would now be agreed upon
+as a fortunate result. In the Andrew Johnson impeachment
+case was it not better that things were as they were?
+On the other hand, every one of the seven independent,
+self-respecting Senators who then by a display of high
+moral courage saved the country from serious prejudice
+would have been recalled out-of-hand had the Recall now
+demanded been in existence. Its working would have
+received prompt exemplification; as it was, the recall was
+effected in time, and after due deliberation. The delay
+occasioned no public detriment. In this life, experience
+is undeniably worth something; and the experience here
+referred to is fairly entitled to consideration. No political
+system possible to devise is wholly above criticism,--not
+open to exceptional contingencies or to dangers possible
+to conjure up. Such have from time to time arisen in the
+past; in the future such will inevitably arise. This consideration
+must, however, be balanced against a general
+average of successful working; and I confidently submit
+that, weighing thus the proved advantage of the system we
+have against the possibilities of danger which hereafter may
+occur, but which never yet have occurred, the scale on which
+are the considerations in favor of change kicks the beam.</p>
+
+<p>In view, however, of the growth of the country, the
+vastly increased complexity of interests involved, the
+intricacy and the cost of the election processes to which
+recourse is necessarily had, I would substitute for the present
+brief tenure of the presidential office--a tenure well
+enough perhaps in the comparatively simple days which
+preceded our Civil War--a tenure sufficiently long to enable
+the occupant of the presidential chair to have a policy
+and to accomplish at least something towards its adoption.
+As the case stands to-day, a President for the first time
+elected has during his term of four years, one year, and one
+year only, in which really to apply himself to the accomplishment
+of results. The first year of his term is necessarily
+devoted to the work of acquiring a familiarity with
+the machinery of the government, and the shaping of a
+policy. The second year may be devoted to a more or
+less strenuous effort at the adoption of the policy thus
+formulated. As experience shows, the action of the third
+and fourth years is gravely affected--if not altogether
+perverted from the work in hand--by what are known as
+the political exigencies incident to a succession. Manifestly,
+this calls for correction. The remedy, however,
+to my mind, is obvious and suggests itself. As the presidency
+is the one office under our Constitution national in
+character, and in no way locally representative, I would
+extend the term to seven years, and render the occupant
+of the office thereafter ineligible for re&euml;lection.
+Seven years is, I am aware, under our political system,
+an unusual term; and here my ears will, I know, be assailed
+by the great &quot;mandate&quot; cackle. The count of
+noses being complete, the mind of the composite Democrat
+is held to be made up. It only remains to formulate
+the consequent decree; and, with least possible delay,
+put it in way of practical enforcement. Again, I, as a
+publicist, demur. It is the old issue, that between
+instant action and action on second thought, presented
+once more. Briefly, the experience of sixty years
+strongly inclines me to a preference of matured and
+considerate action over that immediate action which
+notoriously is in nine cases out of ten as ill-advised as it
+is precipitate. Only in the field of politics is the expediency
+of the latter assumed as of course; yet, as in
+science and literature and art so in politics, final, because
+satisfactory, results are at best but slowly thrashed out.
+As respects wisdom, the modern statute book does not
+loom, monumental. Its contemplation would indeed
+perhaps even lead to a surmise that reasonable delay in
+formulating his &quot;mandate&quot; might, in the case of the
+composite Democrat as in that of the individual Autocrat,
+prove a not altogether unmixed, and so in the end
+an intolerable, evil.</p>
+
+<p>Thus while a change of the Executive and Legislative
+branches of the government might not be always simultaneously
+effected, by selecting seven years as the presidential
+term the election would be brought about, as frequently
+as might be, by itself, uncomplicated by local
+issues connected with the fortunes or political fate of
+individual candidates for office, whether State, Congressional,
+or Senatorial; and during the seven years
+of tenure, four, at least, it might reasonably be anticipated,
+would be devoted to the promotion of a definite policy,
+in place of one year in a term of four, as now. If also
+ineligible for reelection, there is at least a fair presumption
+that the occupant of the position might from start to
+finish apply himself to its duties and obligations, without
+being distracted therefrom by ulterior personal ends
+as constantly as humanly held in view.</p>
+
+<p>Having thus disposed of the Judiciary and the Executive,
+we come to the Legislative. And here I submit is
+the weak point in our American system,--manifestly
+the weak point, and to those who, like myself, have had
+occasion to know, undeniably so. I am here as a publicist;
+not as a writer of memoirs: so, on this head, I do not now
+propose to dilate or bear witness. I will only briefly
+say that having at one period, and for more than the lifetime
+of a generation, been in charge of large corporate
+and financial interests, I have had much occasion to deal
+with legislative bodies, National, State and Municipal.
+That page of my experiences is the one I care least to recall,
+and would most gladly forget. I am not going to
+specify, or give names of either localities or persons; but,
+knowing what I know, it is useless to approach me on this
+topic with the usual good-natured and optimistic, if
+somewhat unctuous and conventional, commonplaces on
+general uprightness and the tendency to improved conditions
+and a higher standard. I know better! I have
+seen legislators bought like bullocks--they selling themselves.
+I have watched them cover their tracks with a
+cunning more than vulpine. I have myself been black-mailed
+and sandbagged, while whole legislative bodies
+watched the process, fully cognizant at every step of what
+was going on. This, I am glad to say, was years ago.
+The legislative conditions were then bad, scandalously
+bad; nor have I any reason to believe in a regeneration
+since. The stream will never rise higher than its source;
+but it generally indicates the level thereof. In this case,
+I can only hope that in my experience it failed so to do.
+Running at a low level, the waters of that stream were
+deplorably dirty.</p>
+
+<p>That the legislative branch of our government has fallen
+so markedly in public estimation is not, I think, open to
+denial. To my mind, under the conditions I have referred
+to, such could not fail to be the case. It has, consequently,
+lost public confidence. Hence this popular
+demand for immediate legislation by the People,--this
+twentieth-century appeal to the Agora and Forum methods
+which antedate the era of Christ. It is true the world
+outgrew them two thousand years ago, and they were
+discarded; but, living in a progressive and not a reactionary
+period, all that, we are assured, is changed!
+The heart is no longer on the right-hand side of the body.
+To secure desired results it is only necessary to start quite
+fresh, as a mere preliminary discarding all lessons of experience.</p>
+
+<p>Such reasoning does not commend itself to my judgment.
+On the contrary, the failure of the American
+legislative to command an increasing public confidence,
+while both natural and obvious, is, if my observation
+guides me to conclusions in any degree correct, traceable
+to two reasons. So far as government is concerned, the
+law-making branch is assumed to be made up of the wisest
+and the most expert. Meanwhile, it is as a matter of
+fact chosen by the process I have not over-respectfully
+referred to as the counting of noses; and, moreover,
+by an unwritten law more binding than any in the Statute
+Book, that counting of noses is with us localized. In
+other words, when it comes to the choice of our law-makers,
+reducing provincialism to a system we make the
+local numerical majority supreme, and any one is considered
+competent to legislate. He can do that, even
+if by common knowledge he is incompetent or untrustworthy
+in every other capacity. Localization thus becomes
+the stronghold of mediocrity, the sure avenue to
+office of the second-and third-rate man,--he who wishes
+always to enjoy his share of a little brief authority,
+to have, he also, a taste of public life. In this respect our
+American system is, I submit, manifestly and incomparably
+inferior to the system of parliamentary election
+existing in Great Britain, itself open to grave criticism.
+In Great Britain the public man seeks the constituency
+wherever he can find it; or the constituency seeks its
+representative wherever it recognizes him. The present
+Prime Minister of Great Britain, for instance, represents
+a small Scotch constituency in which he never resided,
+but by which he was elected more than twenty years ago,
+and through which he has since consecutively remained
+in public life. On the other hand, look at the waste and
+extravagance of the system now and traditionally in use
+with us. To get into public life a man must not only
+be in sympathy with the majority of the citizens of the
+locality in which he lives, but he must continue to be in
+sympathy with that majority; or, at any election, like
+Mr. Cannon in the election just held, where for any
+passing cause a majority of his neighbors in the locality
+in which he lives may fail to support him, he must
+go into retirement. I cannot here enlarge on this topic,
+vital as I see it; I have neither space nor time, and must,
+therefore, needs content myself with the &quot;hints&quot; of
+Paracelsus. I will merely say that as an outcome this
+localized majority system practically disfranchises the
+more intelligent and the more disinterested, the more
+individual and independent of every constituency. It
+reduces their influence, and negatives their action. It
+operates in like fashion everywhere. My field of
+observation has been at home, here in America; but it
+has been the same in France. For instance, while preparing
+this address I came across the following in that
+most respectable sheet, the London <i>Athenaum</i>. A very
+competent Frenchman was there criticising a recent book
+entitled &quot;Idealism in France.&quot; Reference was by him
+made to what, in France, is known as the &quot;<i>scrutin
+d'arrondissement,&quot;</i> or, in other words, the district representative
+system. The critic declares that this system
+has there &quot;created a party machine which has brought
+the country under the sway of a sort of Radical-Socialist
+Tammany, and bound together the voter and the deputy
+by a tie of mutual corruption, the candidate promising
+Government favors to the elector in return for his vote,
+and the elector supporting the candidate who promises
+most. Hence a policy in which ideas and ideals are
+forgotten for personal and local interests, as each candidate
+strives to outbid his rivals in the bribes that he
+offers to his constituents. Hence, finally, a general
+lowering in the tone of French home politics, every question
+being made subservient by the deputies to that of
+their re&euml;lection.&quot;</p>
+
+<p>I would respectfully inquire if the above does not apply
+word for word to the condition of affairs with which we
+are familiar in America.</p>
+
+<p>But let me here again cite a concrete case, still fresh
+in memory; nothing in abstract discussion tells so
+much. Take the late Carl Schurz. If there was one
+man in our public life since 1865 who showed a genius
+for the parliamentary career, and who in six short years
+in the United States Senate--a single term--displayed
+there constructive legislating qualities of the highest
+order, it was Carl Schurz. Yet at the end of that
+single senatorial term, for local and temporary reasons
+he failed to obtain the support of a majority, or the
+support of anything approaching a majority, of those
+composing the constituency upon which he depended.
+Consequently he was retired from that parliamentary position
+necessary for the accomplishment, through him, of
+best public results. Yet at that very time there was no
+man in the United States who commanded so large and
+so personal a constituency as Carl Schurz; for he represented
+the entire Germanic element in the United States.
+Distributed as that element was, however, with its vote
+localized under our law, unwritten as well as statutory,
+there was no possibility of any constituency so concentrating
+itself that Carl Schurz could be kept in the position
+where he could continue to render services of the
+greatest possible value to the country. I, therefore,
+confidently here submit a doubt whether human ingenuity
+could devise any system calculated to lead to a greater
+waste of parliamentary ability, or more effectually keep
+from the front and position of influence that legislative
+superiority which was the arm of Aristotle to secure.
+&quot;Cant-patriotism,&quot; as your Francis Lieber termed it;
+and, on this score, he waxed eloquent. &quot;Do we not live
+in a world of cant,&quot; he wrote from Columbia here to a
+friend at the North seventy-five years ago, &quot;that cant-patriotism
+which plumes itself in selecting men from
+within the State confines only. The truer a nation is, the
+more essentially it is elevated, the more it disregards
+petty considerations, and takes the true and the good
+from whatever quarter it may come. Look at history
+and you find the proof. Look around you, where you
+are, and you find it now.&quot; And, were Lieber living to-day,
+he would find a striking exemplification of the consequences
+of a total and systematic disregard of this elementary
+proposition in studying the United States Senate
+from and through its reporters' gallery. The decline in
+the standards of that body, whether of aspect, intelligence,
+education or character, under the operation of the
+local primary has been not less pronounced than startling.
+The outcome and ripe result of &quot;cant-patriotism,&quot; it
+affords to the curious observer an impressive object-lesson,--provincialism
+reduced to a political system; what a
+witty and incisive French writer has recently termed the
+&quot;Cult of Incompetence.&quot; Speaking of conditions prevailing
+not here but in France, this observer says:--&quot;Democracy
+in its modern form chooses its' delegates in
+its own image.... What ought the character of the
+legislator to be? The very opposite, it seems to me, of
+the democratic legislator, for he ought to be well-informed
+and entirely devoid of prejudice.&quot; Taken as a whole,
+and a few striking individual exceptions apart, are those
+composing the Senate of the United States conspicuous
+in these respects? They certainly do not so impress the
+casual observer. That, as a body, they increasingly
+fail to command confidence and attention is matter of
+common remark. Nor is the reason far to seek. It
+would be the same as respects literature, science and art,
+were their representatives chosen and results reached
+through a count of noses localized, with selection severely
+confined to home talent.</p>
+
+<p>I am well aware of the criticism which will at once be
+passed on what I now advance. Local representation
+through choice by numerical majorities within given confines,
+geographically and mathematically fixed, is a system
+so rooted and intrenched in the convictions and traditions
+of the American community that even to question
+its wisdom evinces a lack of political common-sense.
+It in fact resembles nothing so much as the attempt
+to whistle down a strongly prevailing October wind
+from the West. The attempt so to do is not practical
+politics! In reply, however, I would suggest that
+such a criticism is wholly irrelevant. The publicist has
+nothing to do with practical politics. It is as if it were
+objected to a physician who prescribed sanitation against
+epidemics that the community in question was by custom
+and tradition wedded to filth and surface-drainage, and
+could not possibly be induced to abandon them in favor
+of any new-fangled theories of soap-and-water cleanliness.
+So why waste time in prescribing such? Better
+be common-sensed and practical, taking things as
+they are. In the case suggested, and confronted with
+such criticism, the medical adviser simply shrugs his
+shoulders, and is silent; the alternative he knows is
+inescapable. After a sufficiency of sound scourgings
+the objecting community will probably know better, and
+may listen to reason; in a way, conforming thereto. So,
+also, the body politic. If Ephraim is indeed thus joined to
+idols, the publicist simply shrugs his shoulders, and passes
+on; possibly, after Ephraim has been sufficiently scourged,
+he may in that indefinite future popularly known as &quot;one
+of these days&quot; be more clear sighted and wiser.</p>
+
+<p>None the less, so far as our national parliamentary
+system is concerned, could I have my way in a revision
+of the Constitution, I would increase the senatorial term
+to ten years, and I would, were such a thing within the
+range of possibility, break down the system of the necessary
+senatorial selection by a State of an inhabitant of the
+State. If I could, I would introduce the British system.
+For example, though I never voted for Mr. Bryan and
+have not been in general sympathy with Mr. Roosevelt,
+yet few things would give me greater political satisfaction
+than to see Mr. Bryan, we will say, elected a Senator
+from Arizona or Oregon, Mr. Roosevelt elected from
+Illinois or Pennsylvania, President Taft from Utah or
+Vermont. They apparently best represent existing feelings
+and the ideals prevailing in those communities;
+why, then, should they not voice those feelings and ideals
+in our highest parliamentary chamber?</p>
+
+<p>As respects our House of Representatives, it would
+in principle be the same. I do not care to go into the
+rationale of what is known as proportional representation,
+nor have I time so to do; but, were it in my power, I
+would prescribe to-morrow that hereafter the national
+House of Representatives should be constituted on the
+proportional basis,--the choice of representatives to be
+by States, but, as respects the nomination of candidates,
+irrespective of district lines. Like many others, I am very
+weary of provincial nobodies, &quot;good men&quot; locally known
+to be such!</p>
+
+<p>As I have already said, in parliamentary government all
+depends in the end on the truly representative character of
+the legislative body. If that is as it should be, the rest
+surely follows. The objective of Aristotle is attained.</p>
+
+<p>Exceeding the limits assigned to it, my discussion has,
+however, extended too far. I must close. One word
+before so doing. Why am I here? I am here,--a man
+considerably exceeding in age the allotted threescore and
+ten--to deliver a message, be the value of the same
+greater or less. I greatly fear it is less. I would, however,
+impart the lessons of an experience stretching over sixty
+years,--the results of such observation as my intelligence
+has enabled me to exercise. I do so, addressing
+myself to a local institution of the advanced education.
+Why? Because, looking over the country, diagnosing
+its conditions as well as my capacity enables me, observing
+the evolution of the past and forecasting, in as far
+as I may, the outcome, I am persuaded that the future
+of the country rests more largely in the hands of such
+institutions as this than in those of any other agency or
+activity. Do not say I flatter; for, while I can hope for
+no advancement, I think I have not overstated the case;
+I certainly have not overstated my conviction. There
+has been no man who has influenced the course of modern
+thought more deeply and profoundly than Adam Smith,
+a Professor in a Scotch University of the second class.
+So here in Columbia seventy years ago, Francis Lieber
+prepared and published his &quot;Manual of Political Ethics.&quot;
+Adam Smith and Francis Lieber were but prototypes--examples
+of what I have in mind. The days were
+when the Senate of the United States afforded a rostrum
+from which thinkers and teachers first formulated, and
+then advanced, great policies. Those days, and I say
+it regretfully, are past. Unless I am greatly mistaken,
+however, a new political force is now asserting itself. I
+have recently, at a meeting of historical and scientific associations
+in Boston, had my attention forcibly called
+to this aspect of the situation now shaping itself. I there
+met young men, many, and not the least noticeable of
+whom, came from this section. They inspired me with
+a renewed confidence in our political future. Essentially
+teachers,--I might add, they were publicists as well as
+professors. Observers and students, they actively followed
+the course of developing thought in Europe as in this country.
+Exact in their processes, philosophical and scientific in
+their methods, unselfish in their devotion, they were broad
+of view. It is for them to realize in a future not remote
+the University ideal pictured, and correctly pictured, from
+this stage by one who here preceded me a short six months
+ago. They, constituting the University, are the &quot;hope
+of the State in the direction of its practical affairs; in
+teaching the lawyer the better standards of his profession,
+his duty to place character above money making;
+in teaching the legislator the philosophy of legislation,
+and that the constructive forces of legislation carefully
+considered should precede every effort to change an
+existing status; in teaching those in official life, executive
+and judicial, that demagogy, and theories of life
+uncontrolled by true principles, do not make for success,
+when final success is considered, but that, if they did
+lead to success, they should be avoided for their inherent
+imperfection.... The province of the University is
+to educate citizenship in the abstract.&quot;</p>
+
+<p>It is the presence of this class, to those composing which
+I bow as distinctly of a period superior to mine, that you
+owe my presence to-day,--whatever that presence
+may be worth. I regard their existence and their coming
+forward in such institutions as this University of South
+Carolina, as the arc of the bow of promise spanning the
+political horizon of our future.</p>
+
+<p>Through you, to them my message is addressed.</p>
+</td></tr></table>
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+<pre>
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's 'Tis Sixty Years Since, by Charles Francis Adams
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+</body>
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