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THE EVOLUTION OF A NATION.
THE EVOLUTION OF A NATION.
GLEN L. MILLER, Modern Literature Department, WHITE CLOUD, KANSAS.
THE centuries are the spans of a nation's existence. The first hundred years of American nationality, the opening chapter in the grand romance of our Republic, are about completed. 1789 dates the epoch of our Federal union. That fitful burlesque on government, the Confederation, has been aptly characterized "a rope of sand." Yet, while condemning it for its inefficiency, let us not forget that it was the immediate progenitor of our "more perfect Union,"—that, despite the ostentatious boast promulgated in the preamble of the Constitution of "securing the blessings of liberty to ourselves and posterity," the first seventy years of our constitutional career pales with shame in contrast with the glorious Ordinance of 1787, which forever dedicated to freedom the great Northwestern Territory. From Washington to Lincoln was the dark age of our Republic.
The salient fact in our whole political history is, that the most strenuous sticklers for strict construction have been the first to depart from their own precepts, and play fast and loose as might best suit their purpose. When President Jefferson, the great apostle of delegated powers, purchased Louisiana from Napoleon he was forced to admit that the procedure was unconstitutional.
On the other hand, there has from the beginning been a party which has contended for a liberal interpretation of the fundamental law. When the God-like Webster thundered against Hayne in the U. S. Senate, that grand masterpiece was the vindication of a policy that has marked our triumph as a people; that has achieved for us prosperity in peace and proven our salvation when the Demon of Disunion assailed the nation and struggled with the desperation of frenzy to compass its destruction.
The ideal commonwealth of Hamilton and his political associates was stifled by this narrow-minded conception of state
sovereignty. The great principle of "implied powers" has proved the lamp by which we have finally emerged to enduring greatness. Nevertheless, if strict construction has been an incubus on national progress, its conservative influence has not been altogether unfavorable. How often, when sheer fanaticism has ruled the hour, we might have been involved in a policy fraught with deplorable consequences, but for the restrictions of the Constitution. Ever may they stand an impregnable bulwark against union of church and state. Let us not regret that ours is a government of delegated powers. Let us ever be hopeful that, in the future as in the past, when great emergences befall, there shall be found men at the head of state with the sterling common sense, the nerve and the patriotism, to deviate from "the letter that kills."
Can we limit ourselves by the conditions of a century ago? Our fathers built wisely, perhaps better than they knew, but they did not solve all the problems pertaining to civic institutions among men. Since the adoption of the Constitution so wonderful have been the vicissitudes throughout every phase of civilization as to render its provisions out of harmony with the present order of affairs. The railroad and telegraph have annihilated distance and made all men neighbors. Labor-saving inventions have revolutionized our common industries. Science and art have made the fictitious true, and the ideal reality. Manners and customs have changed, and even thought has undergone serious modifications. The impossibilities of yesterday are the accomplishments of to-day. Centuries have become hours. Kings have everywhere become figureheads, and citizens wield the scepter of authority. In two particulars only has the organic law been so altered to conform it to this new civilization—in the emancipation and enfranchisement of the blacks. So far as this nation unfolds