Page images
PDF
EPUB

with. Some semblance - something indeed of the substance of national power was given; although there was no regular legislative, executive, or judicial department. Probably all the power was given to Congress that it was thought necessary that it should possess to do the work that lay before it. This work it did, well and thoroughly; for while the thirteen States were held together by the presence of a common enemy, a common war and a common necessity, the articles of confederation sufficed to make that war triumphant; but they sufficed for this, because the sagacity and singleness of purpose of the men who wielded the powers of government, the patriotism of the people, and the wisdom and constancy of Washington supplied so far at least as was needed for success-all deficiencies.

Then came peace, and it was soon apparent that the want of unity in the nation, and of power in the government and its organs, not only prevented the deep wounds of the war from healing, but seemed even to aggravate all the mischiefs which followed, and which made the first years of peace no years of returning prosperity. The central government no longer sustained and invigorated by the war, found itself utterly unable to prevent or to avenge insults and outrages to our flag: it could not even repel the incursion of the savages on our borders; it could not pay the interest of our national debt; it had no credit, no force, no

vital energy, and it may well be said to have died of inherent weakness, for in 1787 it abrogated its own functions, declared its inability to act as the government of a nation, and it appealed to the ultimate source of all political power-the people of the whole country. And then came the convention of 1787. When they met, there was in that assembly as much of sagacity, of varied intellectual accomplishment and resource, and of earnest devotion to duty as ever cooperated in a great work. And with all these mingled as little of folly and weakness, as little personal ambition, as little self-seeking of any kind, and as little of the disturbing force which these ignoble qualities would exert, as was possible under the conditions of humanity.

If, in saying that the articles of confederation carried this country successfully through the war of independence, I give them high praise, I believe that I give them still higher when I say that they made the National Constitution possible. These articles familiarized the minds of the whole country to the idea of united action and a central government. They proved indisputably the immense advantages which might be obtained thereby; and they proved as certainly that to secure all these advantages, it was absolutely necessary that the nation should have a greater unity than they gave to it, and the central government more power. And, aided and illustrated

by the course of events, they produced a general impression, especially among leading minds, everywhere, that there might be a stricter national unity, and a stronger central government, without absorbing or imperilling those State rights which were deservedly dear to the people of every State. Thus it was that this jealous love for the sovereign rights of the several States yielded slowly, reluctantly, and only step by step, to the inevitable necessity for closer union. It was, at the beginning, paramount and absolute. But it yielded, not, I rejoice that I can say, until it was suppressed or overcome, but until it stood in just equilibrium with the prevailing sense of the need and the good of a national existence and a national government. Then these two sentiments, or principles, met and co-operated; and the result was the Constitution of the United States. And this, I again declare, I regard not merely as the best which could then have been made, but as, in itself good, and very good, and the best for the good of the whole nation which could have been made, by any men, under any circumstances.

Are you to understand me as saying that I consider that this Constitution came into being in itself perfect, and in itself able to go forward forever, the instrument of a great nation's growth, prosperity, and happiness, with no more help, with no new influences to bear upon it and give to it added life and energy,

and efficiency? I mean no such thing. It needed more, a vast deal more, before it could become—what I think it is to be - a permanent instrument of the greatest, the highest, and the completest political good.

The problem to be solved in the establishment of this government, or as it may be better said, in the formation of this nation, was to create the best possible form of a republican government by the perfect reconciliation of the two elements of central power and reserved rights.

In other words of the same meaning, the problem was to create a system of government which should arm the central power with all the force which it could usefully exert, and yet leave to all whom it gathered within its wide embrace the utmost possible freedom for self-government, and the strongest assurance that this freedom should be guarded but not weakened, protected but not impaired.

This was done by the Constitution, as far as written words could do it. For after all our experience, at this day no words could mend that Constitution in this respect; none could make this balance of forces more perfect. But another thing could be done, and remained to be done. It was to fix the meaning of this Constitution by practical construction. To fasten on the public mind the conviction, and fill with it the public heart, that our Constitution meant, on the one

[ocr errors]

hand, a preservation of State rights, and on the other indissoluble National Unity. To root this conviction into the public life firmly, so that no storm could shake it, so that no devastating force could rend it away. It may not be possible to prevent these two elements from sometimes, during the ages that will come, rising separately into undue prominence. At one time, or by one body or class, the national unity may be urged until it threatens consolidation, and at another time the principle of State rights may again assert itself too strongly. But their reconciliation is hereafter to be so established not by the written Constitution only but by the constitution of the public sentiment and the public will, that it will stand, even as our continent stands upon its rocky base, no more to be moved from its foundation than our continent is moved by the two great oceans which beat upon its shores.

And it is precisely this work which the war that is upon us has come to do.

These two elements stood there, as I have said, ready to be combined by the framers of the Constitution. The one, that of a jealous regard to State rights, had grown with the growth of the colonies. The other, the desire of nationality, had arisen from neccessity, and, generally, I think, was accepted only as a necessity. And at that time, these two principles were diffused in about the same proportion in one. part of the country as in another. It is well known.

« PreviousContinue »