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which they might be seen lying on the pavement in a state of utter insensibility. A small body of electors remained unpolled on the very last day. They were calculating and reflecting persons, who had not yet been convinced by the arguments of either party, although they had had frequent conferences with each. One hour before the close of the poll, Mr. Perker solicited the honour of a private interview with these intelligent, these noble, these patriotic men. It was granted. His arguments were brief, but satisfactory. They went in a body to the poll; and when they returned, the Honourable Samuel Slumkey, of Šlumkey Hall, was returned also."

If those demagogues, who have proposed to render the house of commons more democratic, and to deprive the house of lords of their hereditary privileges, were to complete their revolutionary scheme by proposing to make the British monarchy elective, we need only glance at the relative circumstances of England and America in order to be satisfied, that convulsions which are so perilous even in the United States, at the election of a President, would, in this country, produce the speedy and inevitable ruin of our institutions and our empire. The object contended for in America is an office of very limited power, and very short duration. But only set up as the prize for ambition the crown and sceptre of a mighty kingdom, and civil wars and bloody revolutions would desolate the country, and foreigners, as in ancient and more barbarous times, would be allured to interfere in aid of one or other of the combatants. The advocates of such a scheme would scarcely recommend it by referring to the elections of the Cæsars, during the decline of the Roman empire, when the imperial purple was awarded by the voice of a military mob, and often conferred by means of assassination and civil war. Neither would the precedent

avail them of the election of the popes, where the candidate and electors are ecclesiastics, and the priestly hierarchy and the monarchy are identical; and where, on the death of a pope, recourse is not indeed had to arms-but nepotism, the sale of offices, and manifold intrigues are employed to determine what aged cardinal shall be raised to the papal throne, which is modestly called a chair.

The question of an elective monarchy for England does not deserve an argument: but let us just imagine three rival candidates taking the field in a contest for the British crown, and striving who should first gain over the army or obtain possession of the navy,—or secure the metropolis or rouse the peasantry,-while one of them heads a rebellion in Ireland, to make himself king. When the country is rent asunder with furious factions and civil war, our foreign foes are seen assembling their forces in the distance. This imaginary picture is improbable, only because it is unlikely that we shall ever be so infatuated as to make the fatal experiment of electing our Kings.

The declaration of right was prepared by that distinguished whig nobleman, Lord Somers, and it distinctly sets forth the great principle of the hereditary succession to the throne-"that on the preserving a certainty in the succession thereof, the unity, peace, and tranquillity of this nation doth, under God, wholly depend."

"So far," says Burke, "is it from being true, that we acquired a right, by the revolution, to elect our kings, that if we had possessed it before, the English nation did at that time most solemnly renounce and abdicate it for themselves and all their posterity for

ever.

"At no time, perhaps, did the sovereign legislature manifest a more tender regard to that fundamental

principle of British constitutional policy than at the time of the revolution, when it deviated from the direct line of hereditary succession. The crown was carried somewhat out of the line in which it had before moved, but the new line was derived from the same stock. It was still a line of hereditary descent; still an hereditary descent in the same blood, though an hereditary descent qualified with protestantism. When the legislature altered the direction, but kept the principle, they shewed that they held it inviolable."-Reflections on the French Revolution.

In the event of the death of the President, during his term of office, the Vice President immediately succeeds to him, an arrangement necessary to prevent the state from being left for some time without a chief magistrate. This event has very lately occurred, for the first time in the history of the United States, by the succession of Vice President Tyler to General Harrison. It is singular that the Vice President, holding opposite views to his predecessor on the great party question of the day-the incorporation of the United States Bank, has pronounced his veto in opposition to the voice of the majority who elected General Harrison. This is a strange anomaly in the American institutions, which has just manifested itself. In England the royal prerogatives are exercised with the advice and concurrence of a responsible ministry, and practically the veto is in abeyance. On the contrary, President Tyler has exercised his veto, with regard to the proceedings of Congress, four or five times in about a twelvemonth, and the American legislature and executive are at present at variance with each other.

The committee of the house of representatives has given in a report to Congress, which the President, in a protest just issued by him, says, "has assailed my whole official conduct, without a shadow of a pretext

for such assault; and stopping short of impeachment, has charged me nevertheless with offences declared to deserve impeachment. Had the extraordinary report," he continues, "which the committee thus made to the house, been permitted to remain without the sanction of the latter, I should not have uttered a regret or complaint upon the subject. But, unaccompanied as it is by any particle of testimony to support the charges it contains, without a deliberate examination, almost without any discussion, the house of representatives has been pleased to adopt it as its own, and, thereby, to become my accuser before the country and before the world. ....... I am not only subjected to imputations affecting my character as an individual, but am charged with offences against the country so grave and so heinous, as to deserve public disgrace and disfranchisement. I am charged with violating pledges which I never gave, and, because I execute what I believe to be the law, with usurping powers not conferred by law; and, above all, with using the powers conferred upon the President by the constitution, from corrupt motives and for unwarrantable ends; and these charges are made without any particle of evidence to sustain them, and, as I solemnly affirm, without any foundation in truth.

"I protest against this whole proceeding of the house of representatives, as ex parte and extra judicial. I protest against it, as subversive of the common right of all citizens to be condemned only upon a fair and impartial trial, according to law and evidence, before the country. I protest against it, as destructive of all comity of intercourse between the departments of this government, and destined, sooner or later, to lead to conflicts fatal to the peace of the country, and the integrity of the constitution. I protest against it, in the name of that constitution, which is not only my own

shield of protection and defence, but that of every American citizen. I protest against it, in the name of the people, by whose will I stand where I do, and by whose authority I exercised the power which I am charged with having usurped, and to whom I am responsible for a firm and faithful discharge, according to my own convictions of duty, of the high stewardship confided to me by them. I protest against it, in the name of all regulated liberty, and all limited government, as a proceeding tending to the utter destruction of the checks and balances of the constitution, and the accumulating in the hands of the house of representatives, or a bare majority of Congress, for the time being, of an uncontrouled and despotic power. And I respectfully ask that this, my protest, may be entered upon the journal of the house of representatives, as a solemn and formal declaration, for all time to come, of the injustice and unconstitutionality of such a proceeding. "JOHN TYLER.

66

WASHINGTON, August 30, 1842."

Such unseemly and dangerous collision between the legislature and the executive government tells its own tale.

The President's position is not sufficiently independent to run the risk of unpopularity, by offering honest but unpalatable advice. The prevailing tone of the addresses of the Presidents is therefore homage to the people. A few extracts from the inaugural address of General Harrison, in March, 1841, will illustrate these remarks, and throw light on some points of the American constitution.- The broad foundation upon which our constitution rests being the people—a breath of theirs having made, as a breath can unmake, change, or modify it—it can be assigned to none of the great divisions of government, but to that of democracy. We admit of no government by Divine right, believing,

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