CHAPTER XXII.

How the United States Entered the Century.

[=The Great Republic of the West=]

Hitherto our attention has been directed to the Eastern Hemisphere, and to the stirring events of nineteenth century history in that great section of the earth. But beyond the ocean, in North America, a greater event, one filled with more promise for mankind, one destined to loom larger on the horizon of time, was meanwhile taking place, the development of the noble commonwealth of the United States of America. To this far-extending Republic of the West, a nation almost solely an outgrowth of the nineteenth century, our attention needs now to be turned. Its history is one full of great steps of progress, illuminated by a hundred events of the highest promise and significance, and it stands to-day as a beacon light of national progress and human liberty to the world, "the land of the brave and the home of the free."

A hundred years ago the giant here described was but a babe, a newborn nation just beginning to feel the strength of its limbs. It is with this section of its history that we are here concerned, its days of origin and childhood. Two events of extraordinary significance in human history rise before us in the final quarter of the eighteenth century, the French Revolution and the American Declaration of Independence and its results. The first of these revolutionary events we have dealt with; the second remains to be presented.

[=The Great Men who Founded our Nation=]

There is one circumstance that impresses us most strongly in this great event, the remarkable group of able men who laid the foundation of the American commonwealth. Among those whose hands gave the first impulse to the ship of state were men of such noble proportions as George Washington, the greatest man of the century not only in America but in the whole world; Benjamin Franklin, who came closely to the level of Washington in another field of human greatness; Patrick Henry, whose masterpieces of oratory still stir the soul like trumpet-blasts; Thomas Jefferson, to whose genius we owe the inimitable "Declaration of Independence;" Thomas Paine, whose pen had the point of a sword and the strength of an army; John Paul Jones, the hero of the most brilliant feat of daring in the whole era of naval warfare, and Alexander Hamilton, whose financial genius saved the infant state in one of the most critical moments of its career. These were not the whole of that surpassing coterie, but simply in their special fields the greatest, and it is doubtful if the earth ever saw an abler group of statesmen than those to whom we owe the Constitution of the United States.

It is not our purpose to tell the story of the American Revolution. That lies back of the borders of time within which this work is confined. But some brief statement of its results is in order, as an introduction to the nineteenth century record of the United States.

[=Weakness of the States After the Revolution=]

It was a country in almost an expiring state when it emerged from the fierce death struggle of the Revolution. It had been swept by fire and sword, its resources destroyed, its industries ruined, its government financially bankrupt, its organization in a state of tottering weakness, little left it but the courage of its people and the aspirations of its leaders. But in courage and aspiration safety and progress lie, and with those for its motive forces the future of the country was assured.

The weakness spoken of was not the only or the worst weakness with which the new community had to contend. Though named the United States, its chief danger lay in its lack of union. The thirteen recent colonies--now states--were combined only by the feeblest of bonds, one calculated to carry them through an emergency, not to hold them together under all the contingencies of human affairs. Practically they were thirteen distinct nations, not one close union; a group of communities with a few ties of common self-interest, but otherwise disunited and distinct.

[=The Articles of Confederation=]

"Articles of Confederation and Perpetual Union" had been adopted in 1777 and ratified by the agreement of all the states in 1781. But the Confederation was not a union. Each state claimed to be a sovereign commonwealth, and little power was given to the central government. The weak point in the Articles of Confederation was that they gave Congress no power to lay taxes or to levy soldiers. It could merely ask the states for men and money, but must wait till they were ready to give them--if they chose to do so at all. It could make treaties, but could not enforce them; could borrow money, but could not repay it; could make war, but could not force a man to join its armies; could recommend, but had no power to act.

The states proposed to remain independent except in minor particulars. They were jealous of one another and of the general Congress. "We are," said Washington, "one nation to-day and thirteen to-morrow." That well expressed the state of the case; no true union existed; the states were free to join hands more closely or to drift more widely asunder.

[=False Ideas in Finance=]

The time from the revolt against the stamp duties in 1775 to the inauguration in 1789 of the National Government under which we live has been called the critical period of American history. It was a period which displayed all the inaptitude of the Americans for sound financiering. There is hardly an evil in finances that cannot be illustrated by some event in American affairs at that time. The Americans began the war without any preparation, they conducted it on credit, and at the end of fourteen years three millions of people were five hundred millions of dollars or more in debt. The exact amount will never be known. Congress and the State Legislatures issued paper currency in unlimited quantities and upon no security. The Americans were deceived themselves in believing that their products were essential to the welfare of Europe, and that all European nations would speedily make overtures to them for the control of American commerce. It may be said that the Americans wholly over-estimated their importance in the world at that time; they thought that to cut off England from American commerce would ruin England; they thought that the bestowal of their commerce upon France would enrich France so much that the French king, for so inestimable a privilege, could well afford to loan them, and even to give them, money.

The doctrine of the rights of man ran riot in America. Paper currency became the infatuation of the day. It was thought that paper currency would meet all the demands for money, would win American independence. Even so practical a man as Franklin, then in France, said: "This effect of paper currency is not understood on this side the water; and, indeed, the whole is a mystery even to the politicians, how we have been able to continue a war four years without money, and how we could pay with paper that had no previously fixed fund appropriated specifically to redeem it. This currency, as we manage it, is a wonderful machine: it performs its office when we issue it; it pays and clothes troops and provides victuals and ammunition, and when we are obliged to issue a quantity excessive, it pays itself off by depreciation."

If the taxing power is the most august power in government, the abuse of the taxing power is the most serious sin government can commit. No one will deny that the Americans were guilty of committing most grievous financial offenses during the critical period of their history. They abused liberty by demanding and by exercising the rights of nationality, and at the same time by neglecting or refusing to burden themselves with the taxation necessary to support nationality.

[=Constitutions of Colonies and Confederated States=]

The inability of the Congress of the Confederation to legislate under the provisions of the Articles compelled their amendment; for while the exigencies of war had forced the colonies into closer union,--a "perpetual league of friendship,"--they had also learned additional lessons in the theory and administration of local government; for each of the colonies, with the exception of Connecticut and Rhode Island, had transformed colonial government into government under a constitution. The people had not looked to Congress as a central power; they considered it as a central committee of the States. The individualistic tendencies of the colonies strengthened when the colonies transformed themselves into commonwealths.

The struggle, which began between the thirteen colonies and the imperial Parliament, was now transformed into a struggle between two tendencies in America, the tendency toward sovereign commonwealths and the tendency toward nationality. The first commonwealth constitutions did not acknowledge the supreme authority of Congress; there was yet lacking that essential bond between the people and their general government, the power of the general government to address itself directly to individuals. Interstate relations in 1787 were scarcely more perfect than they had been fifteen years before. The understanding of American affairs was more common, but intimate political association between the commonwealths was still unknown. The liberty of nationality had not yet been won. A peculiar tendency in American affairs from their beginning is seen in the succession of written constitutions, instruments peculiar to America. The commonwealths of the old Confederation demonstrated the necessity for a clearer definition of their relations to each other and of the association of the American people in nationality.

[=The Constitutional Convention and its Work=]

A sense of the necessity for commercial integrity led to the calling of the Philadelphia Convention to amend the old Articles, but when the Convention assembled it was found that an adequate solution of the large problem of nationality could not be found in an amendment of the old "Articles of Confederation," but called for a new and more vigorous Constitution. This Convention combined the associated states into a strongly united nation, possessed of all the powers of nationality, civil, financial and military. It organized a tripartite government, consisting of Supreme Executive, Supreme Legislative, and Supreme Judicial departments, each with all the power "necessary to make it feared and respected." While the Upper House of Congress still represented the states as separate commonwealths, the Lower House represented the people as individuals; it standing, not for a group of distinct communities, but for a nation of people. And to this House was given the sole power "to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts and excises, and to pay the debt, and provide for the common defence and general welfare of the United States."

With this Constitution the United States of America first came into existence; a strong, energetic and capable nation; its government possessed of all the powers necessary to the full control of the states, and full ability to make itself respected abroad; its people possessed of all the civil rights yet known or demanded.

[=Restrictions on the Right of Suffrage=]

Yet the people, in their political privileges, were still controlled by the constitutions of the states, and these fixed close restrictions on the right of suffrage, the electorate being confined to a small body whose ownership of real estate and whose religious opinions agreed with the ideas existing in colonial times. The property each voter was required to possess differed in different commonwealths. In New Jersey he must have property to the value of fifty pounds, in Maryland and the Carolinas an estate of fifty acres, in Delaware a freehold estate of known value, in Georgia an estate of ten dollars or follow a mechanic trade; in New York, if he would vote for a member of Assembly he must possess a freehold of twenty pounds, and if he would vote for State Senator, it must be a hundred. Massachusetts required an elector to own a freehold estate worth sixty pounds or to possess an annual income of three pounds. Connecticut was satisfied if his estate was of the yearly value of seven dollars, and Rhode Island required him to own the value of one hundred and thirty-four dollars in land. Pennsylvania required him to be a freeholder, but New Hampshire and Vermont were satisfied with the payment of a poll-tax.

[=Religious Qualifications of Voters=]

The number of electors was still further affected by the religious opinions required of them. In New Jersey, in New Hampshire, in Vermont, in Connecticut, and in South Carolina, no Roman Catholic could vote; Maryland and Massachusetts allowed "those of the Christian religion" to exercise the franchise, but the "Christian religion" in Massachusetts was of the Congregational Church. North Carolina required her electors to believe in the divine authority of the Scriptures; Delaware was satisfied with a belief in the Trinity and in the inspiration of the Bible; Pennsylvania allowed those, otherwise qualified, to vote who believed "in one God, in the reward of good, and the punishment of evil, and in the inspiration of the Scriptures." In New York, in Virginia, in Georgia, and in Rhode Island, the Protestant faith was predominant, but a Roman Catholic, if a male resident, of the age of twenty-one years or over, could vote in Rhode Island.

[=Property Qualifications of Officials=]

The property qualifications which limited the number of electors were higher for those who sought office. If a man wished to be governor of New Jersey or of South Carolina, his real and personal property must amount to ten thousand dollars; in North Carolina to one thousand pounds; in Georgia to two hundred and fifty pounds or two hundred and fifty acres of land; in New Hampshire to five hundred pounds; in Maryland to ten times as much, of which a thousand pounds must be of land; in Delaware he must own real estate; in New York he must be worth a hundred pounds; in Rhode Island, one hundred and thirty-four dollars; and in Massachusetts a thousand pounds. Connecticut required her candidate for governor to be qualified as an elector, as did New Hampshire, Vermont, Pennsylvania, and Virginia. In all the commonwealths the candidate for office must possess the religious qualifications required of electors.

[=Condition of the Country in 1787=]

From these statements it is evident that the suffrage in the United States was greatly limited when, after the winning of American independence, the Constitution of the United States was framed and the commonwealths had adopted their first constitutions of government. It may be said that in 1787 the country was bankrupt, and America was without credit, and that of a population of three million souls, who, by our present ratio, would represent six hundred thousand voters, less than one hundred and fifty thousand possessed the right to vote. African slavery and property qualifications excluded above four hundred thousand men from the exercise of the franchise. It is evident, then, that at the time when American liberty was won American liberty had only begun; the offices of the country were in the possession of the few, scarcely any provision existed for common education, the roads of the country may be described as impassable, the means for transportation, trade, and commerce as feeble. If the struggle for liberty in America was not to be in vain, the people of the United States must address themselves directly to the payment of their debts, to the enlargement of the franchise, to improvements in transportation, and to the creation, organization, and support of a national system of common taxation. It is these great changes which constitute the history of this country during the nineteenth century.

[=Payment of Debt and Extension of Suffrage=]

All these have been gained since the adoption of the Constitution. The remarkable financial operations of Alexander Hamilton--by which the crushing load of debt of the new nation was funded, for payment in after years a customs tariff established as a means of obtaining revenue, and provision made for paying the claims of the soldiers of the Revolution--saved the credit and secured the honor of the nation. As regards the franchise, it was greatly extended during the nineteenth century. By the time the Erie canal was excavated property qualifications for suffrage had disappeared in nearly all the states, and by the middle of the century such qualifications had been abandoned in them all. Those of a religious character had vanished thirty years earlier.

As yet, however, the right to vote was limited to "free, white, male citizens." Twenty years afterwards, on March 30, 1870, a further great extension of the right of suffrage was made, when, in accordance with the Fifteenth Amendment to the Constitution, it was proclaimed by Hamilton Fish, Secretary of State, that the right of citizens of this country to vote could not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude.

Universal suffrage, so far as male citizens were concerned, thus became the common condition of American political life in 1870. But the struggle for liberty in this direction was not yet ended. Female citizens, about the middle of the century, gave voice to their claim to the same right, and with such effort that they had gained the right to vote at all elections in four of the States--Wyoming, Colorado, Utah, and Idaho--by the end of the century, and partial rights of suffrage in a majority of the States. The outlook is that before many years universal suffrage in its fullest sense will be established in the United States.

[=Development in State Constitutions=]

With the westward movements of the millions of human beings who have occupied the North American continent have gone the institutions and constitutions of the east, modified in their journey westward by the varying conditions of the life of the people. The brief constitutions of 1776 have developed into extraordinary length by successive changes and additions made by the more than seventy Constitutional Conventions which have been held west of the original thirteen States. These later constitutions resemble elaborate legal codes rather than brief statements of the fundamental ideas of government. But these constitutions, of which those of the Dakotas and of Montana and Washington are a type, express very clearly the opinions of the American people in government at the present time. The earnest desire shown in them for an accurate definition of the theory and the administration of government proves how anxiously the people of this country at all times consider the interpretation of their liberties, and with what hesitation, it may be said, they delegate their powers in government to legislatures, to judges, and to governors.

[=Progress in the United States=]

The struggle for liberty will never cease, for with the progress of civilization new definitions of the wants of the people are constantly forming in the mind. The whole movement of the American people in government, from the simple beginnings of representative government in Virginia, when the little parliament was called, to the present time, when nationality is enthroned and mighty commonwealths are become the component parts of the "more perfect union," has been toward the slow but constant realization of the rights and liberties of the people. Education, for which no commonwealth made adequate provision a century ago, is now the first care of the State. Easy and rapid transportation, wholly unknown to our fathers, is now a necessary condition of daily life. Trade has so prospered that the accumulated wealth of the country is more than sixty billions of dollars. Newspapers, magazines, books and pamphlets are now so numerous as to make it impossible to contain them all in hundreds of libraries, and the American people have become the largest class of readers in the world.

A century ago there were but six cities of more than eight thousand people in this country; the number is now more than five hundred. Three millions of people have become seventy-five millions. The area of the original United States has expanded from eight hundred and thirty thousand square miles to four times that area. With expansion and growth and the amelioration in the conditions of life, the earnest problems of government have been brought home to the people by the leaders in the State, by the clergy, by the teachers in schools and colleges, and by the press.

But though we may be proud of these conquests, we are compelled in the last analysis of our institutions, to return to a few fundamental notions of our government. We must continue the representative idea based upon the doctrine of the equality of rights and exercised by representative assemblies founded on popular elections; and after our most pleasing contemplation of the institutions of America, we must return to the people, the foundation of our government. Their wisdom and self-control, and these alone, will impart to our institutions that strength which insures their perpetuity.