The subject is, however, touched upon in a chapter of Part III, for the sake of indicating the effects on political institutions which a system of State Socialism might produce.
Book VI., ch. 43.
Subject, as respects the Union of South Africa and its component States, to the remark made above regarding persons of colour.
I have read American writers who hold that the ownership of “public utilities “is what makes a community democratic.
Tacitus, Germonia.
Two volumes published in 1867 and entitled Essays on Reform and Questions for a Reformed Parliament by these academic writers make cunous reading to-day
The overturning (in 1866) of the railings in Hyde Park in London by a crowd assembled to hold a reform meeting was made much of at the time in the British press and treated in the foreign press as the prelude to a revolution. But having been close to the railings when they fell, I can say that the fall was half an accident and the crowd waB perfectly good-humoured and not at all excited. Led by a respectable old revising barrister, Mr. Edmond Beales, M. A., and composed chiefly of persons drawn by curiosity, it was so dense that its pressure on the railings, which were much lower and weaker than those which now enclose the park, made them give way, lifting as they sank the stone bases in which they were fixed. The front rank, who were squeezed against them, gleefully proceeded to shake them. Down they went, and the people jumped over them into the park amid general laughter.
Except of course where religious freedom was involved, for in such cases there was usually a section which supported persecution on behalf of its own faith.
A reaction against the extreme extension of State power has driven some philosophic minds into what is called Anarchism. Its principles, the attractiveness of which many of us have felt, do not solve the difficulty, for if anarchy means the withdrawal of legal control acting through State power, the door is opened to the rule of mere force, the force of the physically strong, in which the weak will go to the wall and individual liberty perish more completely than at the hands of the State.
Mazzini and Gladstone were, among the famous Europeans of the last generation, the two who seemed to those who talked with them most possessed by this faith.
'Eλ∊υθ∊ρoυs
In Belgium this notion induced a plan which, while bestowing votes on all adult males, allotted what were called “supplementary votes “to persons possessed of various property or educational qualifications. This system was subsequently abolished.
There were, of course, other arguments for extensions of the suffrage, such as the broadening of the basis of power and the securing of more constant attention to grievances, but these need no notice here.
At Athens almost all the officials, except the Generals, were chosen by lot, and in order still further to secure equality, chosen for short terms, so that many could enjoy office (see Chapter XVI.). A similar system was in force in Florence under the republic in the fifteenth century, though in practice it was so worked as frequently to vest the chief offices in the persons whom the ruling party preferred. In the United States the same tendency appears in the very slight regard had to personal fitness in choosing and running candidates for most elective posts.
A sort of Social Equality has always existed in Musulman countries, because all Musulmans are, as True Believers, gathered into a religious community which, despising the members of other faiths, recognizes an internal brotherhood. This sentiment has given civil equality, but done little or nothing for political equality, no Muslim country having so far succeeded in working constitutional government.
See chapter “Democracy and the Backward Races “in Part III.
An American who, having fallen on evil days, was obliged to hire himself as day labourer to a negro employer is reported to have stipulated that the employer should always address him as “Boss.”
Even the Venetian rulers of Dalmatia in the eighteenth century-kept their Slav subjects ignorant so that they might be less able to assert themselves.
ολνμαθη νον
“Civisme “is taught in the Swiss schools, the book most used being the Manuel de Droit Cwique of the late M. Numa Droz, famous among the Presidents of the Confederation for his calm wisdom. In most of the American States the subject is regularly taught, with special reference to the Federal Constitution, and something, though not much, has been done in the same direction in Great Britain. In France the teacher in the public elementary schools is a mainstay of the Republican party, relied upon to combat the influence of the parish priest.
There are Dervish fraternities among the Muslims, and organized sects such as the Senussi of North-East Africa have sometimes risen to importance.
The interdiction of human sacrifices among the Celts of Gaul was due not to hostility to Druidical beliefs but to motives of humanity.
The word means “successor or representative.” According to the old orthodox doctrine, the Khalif must belong to the tribe of the Koreish, and must be in control of the sacred cities, Mecca and Medina. Since the fall of the Abbasside Khalifate at Bagdad, the office possessed scarcely any political importance till Abdul Hamid II., whose predecessor Selim I. had obtained it from the helpless Fatimite Khalif of Egypt, began to employ it as a means of increasing his influence outside Turkey.
Calvin observed that it was a vain thing to dispute as to the best form of political institutions; circumstances must determine that. His own preference was for a well-tempered liberty under a wise oligarchy. I quote from Hasbach, p. 2 and note.
Acts of the Apostles, iv. 32.
In Japan an attempt was recently made to revive, as against foreign influences, the declining power of Buddhist worship. In India there are agitators who appeal to Muslim sentiment or Hindu sentiment for the purposes of their political propaganda.
Acts of the Apostles, v. 29.
“Truth abideth and is strong for ever: she liveth and conquereth for evermore” (I Esdras iv. 38).
As instances may be mentioned Horace Greeley (in his better moments) and Edwin L. Godkin in America, Edward Sterling and John T. Delane in England, Emile Girardin in France.
There were, however, some conspicuous exceptions In one of these an important newspaper incurred much unpopularity and lost heavily, but it held on, and when the South African War was over regained more than it had lost.
Cases have even occurred in which the Ministry (or a Minister), in one country has, in the course of a controversy with a foreign Power, endeavoured to win domestic support for itself or frighten the foreign Power by secretly directing attacks upon the latter through the press.
Among them the cartoon representing a public man in the commission of offences he has never committed is one specially difficult to deal with. When this is done at an election, the result desired may be attained before the calumny can be refuted, and there are countries in which the law of libel gives no sufficient protection.
A parallel, perhaps not too fanciful, may be drawn between such cases and those of famous thinkers whose creative gift, continuing to work long after them, was evoked, or turned into the needed channel, by the circumstances of their own time. St. Paul coming at a moment when a new religious teaching had to be diffused over the world, St. Augustine when the fall of Rome made it necessary to create a theological view of history to replace the reverence for the Empire that was breaking in pieces, Thomas of Aquinum meeting the call of the moment for a philosophic systematization of Christian doctrine, Kant stirred to his constructive work by the scepticism of Hume, may be cited as instances of this. Whenever such minds had come into the world they would probably have done memorable work, but the stimulus of the moment would have been wanting, and the state of the world might have prevented their gifts from having full effect. Conversely there are cases to be noted in which, when a great opportunity arrives, no genius appears capable of turning it to account.
I knew a Scottish constituency in which a party had from personal dissensions become cleft into two sections where there was no political difference between the sections, but each held together and, during a long series of years, tried to carry a candidate of its own merely because each desired to be the ruling force in the town.
This used to happen in the Italian republics of the Middle Ages, the personal rivalries of leaders becoming the basis for factions.
When in 1897 the whole of London was divided into ten boroughs, each with an elected Council, few residents in a borough had any means of judging the merits of the candidates offering themselves for election. The nominators were not known to the vast majority of the voters, and as the elections were not fought on party lines one could not, even if one had wished to do so, vote for a man as a Tory or a Liberal. I remember at such an election (in a borough of 300.000 inhabitants) to have scanned the lists of candidates, and found no clue to guide my choice till in one I discovered the name of a learned Homeric scholar. For him I promptly voted, and, assuming that a man of his distinction would choose his company well, voted for most of those on the list in which his name appeared.
Thus in 1899-1901 many persons in England who disapproved the South African War kept silence, because they belonged to the party which had led the country into what they thought a needless conflict, and in 1903 many who disapproved what was called the policy of “passive resistance “to the levying of a local tax, part of whose proceeds went to support denominational schools, abstained from expressing their disapproval of that policy, though they privately admitted that those prominent men in their own party who had advised it were setting a dangerous precedent. One expects this from the more ignorant or thoughtless members of a party, but in both these and other similar cases the same phenomenon was visible among the “wise and good” also.
Cases of conscience do no doubt arise, and are sometimes perplexing, but twenty-seven years' experience in the British House of Commons have led me to believe that they are less frequent than one would, looking at the matter a priori , have expected them to be. Old members have often told me that they had more often regretted votes given against their party under what they thought a sense of duty than those which they had, though with some doubt, given to support it. I have discussed the limits of party obligation in a little volume entitled Hindrances to Good Citizenship , published in 1909.
Political philosophers have incessantly denounced party, but none seems to have shown how they can either be prevented from arising or eliminated when they exist. I could never extract from Mr. Goldwin Smith, with all his mastery of history and political acumen, any answer to the question how representative government could be carried on without them.
Neither the Primrose League in England nor the Carbonari of Italy can properly be referred to this category. The latter is now virtually extinct. As to the former, see in the Démocratie et Partis politiques of Mr. Ostrogorski, p. 250 of French edition of 1912, an instructive treatment of the whole subject.
See the Chapters on Australia in Part II., post .
See Chapters on the United States in Part II., post .
Cf. Iliad , Book ix. 1. 628 and xviii. 498, with which compare the laws of the West Saxon King Ine; and many references in the Icelandic Sagas (see the author's Studies in History and Jurisprudence , Essay on Primitive Iceland). The custom of blood revenge, which is as old as the Pentateuch, is still alive in Albania and among the Pathans. Only recently did it vanish from Corsica, and it long remained among the peasantry of Ireland.
An account of the Pitso may be found in the author's Impressions of South Africa.
See Chapters on Switzerland in Part II., post.
See Chapters on United States, Part II., post. The word “Town “includes a rural as well as an urban area.
The person who betrayed William Wallace to the English.
Dante, Inferno , canto III. v. 60. The reference is supposed to be to Pope Celestine V.
The famous story of the forty-seven Ronins who died for their chief is familiar to every Japanese. The temple at Tokyo where their figures are reverently shown has become almost a place of pilgrimage.
The Irish tradition of “voting agin the Government” was formed in the first half of last century, and was not without its justification.
Nee vera virtus, quum semel excidit, Curat reponi deterioribus. So Horace ( Odes , iii. 5).
It might be argued that those aliens who are taxed ought to be represented. The question is usually unimportant, but there is one European country (Switzerland) in which aliens constitute 15 per cent of the population; and the exclusion of foreigners from the suffrage in the Transvaal was the chief grievance out of which the South African War arose in 1899.
There is a constantly recurring fallacy which makes men unconsciously think of the majority as if it were the whole. When we talk of “the American people,” we forget the many millions of non-Americanized immigrants; when we talk of “the English people” we forget the non-English elements in Britain; when we talk of “the Irish people “we forget the inhabitants of Ulster; when we talk of “the people of Ulster” we forget that large section which is politically and religiously out of sympathy with the majority.
The oldest method of ascertaining the wishes of the assembled people was by a calling for a shout of “Yea” or “Nay.” This custom continued at parliamentary elections in England till the Hustings were abolished by the Ballot Act of 1872, and it still survives in both Houses of the British Parliament, the Speaker calling for the “Ayes” and “Noes,” and ordering a division only when one or the other section challenges his statement that the “Ayes” or “Noes” (as the case may be) “have it.” In the House of Lords the words used are “Contents” and “Not Contents,” in the Convocation of the University of Oxford “Placet” and “Non placet.”
I do not forget, but cannot find space for an adequate discussion of, the other objections taken to a representative system which ignores minorities. Much light may be expected from the many experiments that are now being tried in various forms of Proportional Representation.
As to the influence of Public Opinion on international policy see Chapter on Democracy and Foreign Policy in Part III., post. It need hardly be said that Public Opinion cannot, and much less can Voting, pass judgment on details in legislation. Its action, both in that sphere and in foreign policy, deals with broad principles only.
The observations here made regarding voting at public elections or on questions submitted by Referendum or Initiative are equally applicable to votings in party gatherings or at the meetings of ecclesiastical or labour organizations.
Aristotle in his Polities , where the best kind of constitution for a republic is fully discussed, contemplates a city which is not too large for one man's voice to be heard by the whole assembly ( Pol. Bk. vii. ch. 4).
A striking picture of the fierce hatreds which internal strife aroused in these city republics is given by Thucydides in the chapters of Book III., Chapters 70-85 of his History , which describe the seditions at Corcyra.
The nearest approach to representation made in the ancient world seems to have been in the assembly of delegates from the chief cities of the Roman province of Asia under the Roman Empire; but it met for religious or ceremonial not for political purposes.
A brilliant, if possibly exaggerated, description and estimate of the influence of religion on civic organization and politics will be found in the well-known book of Fustel de Coulanges, La Cité Antique.
The Athenian prisoners enslaved after their defeat at Syracuse improved their lot by reciting passages from Euripides to their owners, who had heard of the poet's fame, but had never seen his dramas acted.
As to this institution of the Assembly of all freemen, which appears in Switzerland as the Landesgemeinde, see Chapter XII p. 146, ante.
See Polity of the Athenians (now generally accepted as a work of Aristotle), where (chapters 43-46) the functions of the Council and the duties of these and other official persons are described. This treatise, discovered in an Egyptian papyrus, and published by Sir F. Kenyon in 1891, is the only part of Aristotle's treatise (or treatises) on the Greek constitutions which has been preserved to us Parts of it are wanting, or undecipherable, in the MS. The outline I have given in the text describes the system generally. To set forth the variations between the earlier and the later arrangements would involve a much fuller treatment.
Eighteen was the age which qualified a maa to sit in the Assembly.
Polity of the Athenians , ch. 41.
A somewhat similar distinction is drawn in France and Switzerland between Lois and Arrêtés ( Beschlusse ), though the Greek υóµos corresponds in a sense to a French Uri canstitutionelle.
For a vivacious description of what the Assembly may have been like, see the bright and suggestive book of Mr. A. E. Zimmern, The Greek Commonwealth, pp. 163-7.
There was also a corps of 1600 free citizen archers maintained at Athens and paid as a city guard.
The Assembly sat judicially also where another kind of charge was brought by what was called a πρoβoλη, condemnation in which did not carry therewith a penalty, but might be followed by a prosecution in the courts.
The great size of the courts was due not only to the idea that the people ought to rule, but probably also to the fear that smaller tribunals would be bribed. The judicia at Rome, despite their large numbers, often were.
The speeches of the Athenian orators which have come down to us furnish abundant illustrations. These speeches were of course hardly ever, if ever, reported as delivered, but were written out before or afterwards, and possibly used as political pamphlets, as were some of the famous orations of Cicero, e. g. the speech for Milo and the Second Philippic ( divina Philippica ), neither of which was actually delivered.
The rich were also heavily taxed, but in spite of everything there were always rich men. It is wonderful how much the richer class can bear and still be rich. We shall find this in Australia also.
See as to the use of the Lot the interesting little book of Mr. J. W. Headlam, Election by Lot at Athens, with which compare the concise Handbook of Greek Constitutional History of A. H. J. Greenidge, a scholar too soon lost to learning. The Lot is to Aristotle a characteristically democratic institution. It was used in the Italian republics. notably in Florence in the fifteenth century.
He wished to have magistrates chosen from persons possessing a property qualification, not so high as to exclude the majority of the citizens, to let offices be unpaid, to strengthen the power of the middle class by taking steps to reduce the inequality of fortunes, and to have the legal tribunals filled by competent citizens. He prefers elections by the citizens in tribes rather than by the whole people, and so may be cited as favouring scrutin d'arrondissement as against scrutin de liste “ward elections “as opposed to the “general ticket” of American cities (see chapters on France and on the U.S.A., post ).
“…, says Aristotle, in whose time the sense of civic duty was probably lower than it had been in the days of Pericles.
To see the best and the worst that could be said of the Athenian democracy, read and consider the two striking descriptions given by two famous Athenians, the statesman and the philosopher, the long funeral oration of Pericles in Thucydides, Book ii., and the description of democracy in Plato, Republic, Book viii
To apprehend how the merits and faults of divers forms of government presented them to the imaginative but non-philosophical type of Greek mind, read the account in Herodotus, Book iii. chap. 80, of the alleged discussion of different forms of government among seven Persian nobles.
These may be classified under three heads:
With three insular Republics also tropical — Cuba, San Domingo, and Haiti (French-speaking).
Slavery in the proper sense was practically confined to the negroes, a small element even in Peru and along the coasts of the Caribbean Sea. Brazil is the only country where the coloured people are a large element.
Including Southern Argentina, Chile, Uruguay, and Southern Brazil.
The purely heathen population is small, existing chiefly in the tropical regions on both sides of the Equator; but even in Mexico Christianity is only skin-deep among the aborigines.
In the long war which Lopez, dictator of Paraguay, an almost purely Indian State, maintained against Uruguay, Argentina, and Brazil from 1865 to 1870, nearly the whole adult male population of Paraguay perished.
Haiti has recently fallen under the influence of the United States, with a consequent improvement in its social as well as its economic conditions.
There is an educational qualification, but it is not strictly enforced.
The climate, tempered by the ocean, has less marked extremes than Argentina, and the surface is more undulating.
An interesting experiment in Government is now being tried under the new Constitution (1919) in the creation of a body called the National Council of Administration, consisting of nine persons elected for six years by direct popular vote, one-third retiring every two years They appoint the ministers, and exercise all powers not expressly given to the President, who is popularly elected, and not re-eligible till after eight years. His veto on financial proposals may be overridden by a two-thirds majority of the Council. Manhood suffrage and proportional representation are established.
So I was told when visiting Mexico in 1902.
Russia has, of course, with her vast stretches of fertile land, a greater productive capacity, but less variety of products and a less genial climate.
Breton is spoken in the north-west corner of Brittany and Basque in a still smaller area in the Western Pyrenees, as well as German in parts of Alsace.
In respect of the possession of the Papacy by Italy and of the Holy Roman Empire by the German kings.
It would seem that the Assembly, in which there was a Monarchist majority, acquiesced in the use of the word “Republic,” because they feared that if they proclaimed a monarchy forthwith, the monarch would have to bear the odium of signing the harsh treaty of peace which victorious Germany was imposing. See ch. i. of the France contemporaire of M. Gabriel Hanotaux.
The outline of events which occupies the next few pages seems needed to explain the parties that now exist in France and determine the character of its government.
There was a story current that Pope Pius IX., when he learnt of the failure of his hopes for monarchy in France (the Count of Chatnbord having insisted on the white flag of his House), remarked, “Et tout cela pour une serviette.”
The scrutm de liste system of election which had been introduced in 1885 enabled him to stand for a whole Department. It was abolished in February 1889 in order to check this device, but has now been restored (see p. 241).
Anti-religious reaction has been strongest in those countries of Europe and America where ecclesiastical power had been most fully dominant It was a political misfortune for France when the Huguenots were crushed by Louis XIV. Many of them were educated and thoughtful men, imbued with a liberalism which France could ill spare.
Babóuf had proclaimed communistic doctrines during the First Revolution, but found little support for them. The National Assembly of 1789 in its declaration of the Rights of Man recognizes Property as a primordial right, along with Liberty, Security, and Self-Defence.
Histoire politique de I'Europe contemporaine, 1814-1896.
Something similar has been observed in other peoples of Celtic stock.
The procedure for amending the Constitution has been used twice only.
I.e. that the presiding officer of an Assembly in which such a proposal is made cannot allow it to be discussed there. This law, though only negative, may be considered to be a provision of the Constitution meant to convey a solemn warning to any legislature invited to consider the abolition of the republican form of government. Were a legislature so disposed, it would of course begin by striking this provision out of the Constitution, and would then proceed to abolish the Republic just as if the provision had never existed. See as to a similar expedient in some ancient Greek republics, the Author's Studies in History and Jurisprudence, Essay III., pp. 205-207, of vol. i. of English Edition.
See Chap. V. in Part I.
The description which follows of the structure and functions of the organs of Government in France has been made somewhat full because the French system may probably be imitated in the new republics which are now (1919) springing up in Europe, the new constitutional monarchies which were formerly in fashion having been discredited by the behaviour of the recently deposed kings who (or whose predecessors) had been given to rather than chosen by Greece and Bulgaria.
On the occasion of a despatch addressed in 1861 to the United States Government regarding the Trent affair.
Here may be noted another contrast with the United States, where out of the Presidents chosen since Lincoln only four had sat in either House of Congress.
The Commune is in France the unit of local government in town as in country. It is a municipality presided over by a Mayor (Maire) whatever its size, from great Paris down to a hamlet in an Alpine valley.
The average age of Senators is sixty-three.
It subsequently, as a High Court of Justice, found him guilty of high treason, he having fled from France.
In the election of 1919 out of 626 seats all but 50 were filled on the first balloting. For these a second balloting took place.
The great banks and financial companies are said to subscribe to the funds of some of the parties, but apparently not to such an extent as that which led to the legal prohibition in the United States of such contributions.
André Siegfried, Tableaux Pohtiques de la France de l'Ouest
A darker (and, so far as I can judge, overdrawn) picture as respects bribery, intimidation, and election frauds is presented by Hasbach, Moderne Demokratic, pp. 560-563, who, however, describes southern France rather than northern.
M. Felix Faure (afterwards President of the Republic) said in 1893 that functionaries are often more preoccupied in giving satisfaction to the Ministry of to-morrow than to that which they actually represent. (I quote from Mr. J. E. C. Bodley's France.)
That this frequently happened in England sixty or seventy years ago was one of the grounds alleged for transferring the trial of election petitions to the judges in 1867
I omit many details regarding these Bureaux and Commissions which are not necessary for a comprehension of the working of the Chamber.
The names were occasionally published between 1871 and 1885. The official record now states the names of deputies who did not vote, or were absent on leave, or were detained by attendance at the Budget Commission. The names of members voting in divisions in the British House of Commons were not recorded before the passing of the Reform Act of 1832.
The Chamber elected in 1919 contained 140 advocates, 44 journalists or men of letters, 4 Catholic priests, and 3 Protestant clergymen.
Between 1881 and 1910 the percentage of abstentions ranged in Western France from 24 to 32 per cent.
The numbers were for Continental France, without Alsace-Lorraine — electors, 11,048,092; votes east, 7,801,879; and for Alsace-Lorraine — electors, 397,610; votes cast, 328,924.
In 1914 the party groups in the Chamber of Deputies were the following. I give them as from Eight to Left:
In 1920 there were stated to be besides twenty-one “non-inserits” deputies more or less detached, but classifiable in a general way with the Left, the following eight groups:
Of these the largest were No. 4 with 93 and No. 6 with 86 members. At the election of 1919, which took place under the influence of a reaction against Socialism, there was a certain co-operation between the Right and the Centre parties.
Of the “Nationalists,” who can hardly be described as a party or group but who represent a tendency affecting the members of several groups, I shall speak later.
There was in the House of Commons a so-called Radical group from 1870 till 1880, and a sort of “Neo-Conservative “group from 1880 till 1885, the latter very small but very active, and containing men of importance. Of the present House and its varying groups the time has not come to speak. British Parliamentarism seems to be entering a new phase of development.
The constitutional arrangements of the United States and Switzerland scarcely permit a comparison between leadership in France and leadership in those countries.
It is not to be supposed that in these latter cases justice suffers. It is easy to write a letter which can be read between the lines.
M. Poincare, speaking in the Chamber in 1912 (June 25) observed: “Nous sommes obliges d'employer la plus grande partie de notre activity a des beBognes fastidieuses, a des demarches ingrates et nous en arrivons sous la passion des influences locales a considerer comme une necessity vitale pour conserver notre mandat notre ingfirence quotidienne dans toutes les questions administratives.”
Rousseau wrote: “Sitôt que le service public cesse d'être la principal affaire des citoyens, et qu'ils aiment mieux servir de leur bourse que de leur personne, 1'État est déjà près de sa mine” (Contrat Social, iii. 15).
In England, the custom which requires a Minister to be a member of one or other House of Parliament has been sometimes departed fiom, though only for a time, since the prolonged absence of a person responsible for the management of a department would be highly inconvenient I take no account of the cases which occurred during the war of 1914-19, for the conditions were then quite exceptional.
A word probably suggested by the Italian adjective Pcc=papibile (of a man fit to be chosen Pope); and an equivalent of the American phrase, “Cabinet timber”
True of England also, where a Minister is (in normal times) very rarely selected with any regard to his special knowledge.
Jules Ferry seemed for a time to be coming near to this position, and Waldeck Rousseau, a finer character, came still nearer.
Local political party committees in France are a creation of the Third Republic. When universal suffrage had been established and the party system had “got into its stride,” some kind of organization became necessary; but the conditions of the country have prevented it from developing to the extent attained in the United States, or even in England and Australia.
The number has been given at 982 of the former and 1763 of the latter class.
The title given to the official charged with the investigation and preparation of a criminal ease. This could happen only in those few places where more than one juge d'instruction is attached to a tribunal, and the function of the official is only to report if there is a case for a piosecution. The French judicial system, with its separate administrative courts and special treatment of the military and naval services, presents more varieties than are found in English-speaking countries.
It need hardly be said that much less use is made of trial by jury in civil cases than is the practice in England and the United States.
It is sometimes said that the equal division of inheritances, believed to have the effect of discouraging emigration, tends to increase the eagernesss to obtain posts under government.
Excluding Alsace-Lorraine which stands for the present outside.
The system was on this ground maintained in the Constitution of 1791.
Often, however, as in Normandy, Brittany, Gascony, Provence, a group of departments corresponds pretty closely with the ancient Province.
The fact that the Councils have a part in choosing the Senate has contributed to bring national politics into local elections. A like result followed in the United States from vesting the choice of the senators in those State Legislatures from which it has been now withdrawn.
I use the French name, because the word Mayor is to English and American readers indissolubly associated with a city or borough.
Some of the smaller and poorer communes occasionally receive subventions from the public treasury.
See, for example, a striking passage in Octave Feuillet's story, M. de Camors, published as far back as the Second Empire.
Seventeen such local divisions, each containing from 3 to 10 departments, have been suggested.
See Chapter XV. in Part I.
In the United States one must, of course except nearly all the coloured people and most of the recent immigrants, many of whom cannot speak English.
Such as was the condition of vine-growing, which produced the angry demonstrations of the “viticoles “some years ago.
An extremely interesting study of the political character of the western and north-western parts of France may be found in the book of M. André Siegfried, Tableau politique de la France, and some valuable articles on the same subject by the Count de Calan have appeared in the Revue politique de l'Ecole Libre des Sciences politiques during recent months. The persistence of political attitude since 1789 shown by constituencies in the south-west, north-west, and south-east of France is remarkable. There is more changefulness in the Central regions. It is to be wished that some British student would undertake a like local enquiry into the political proclivities of British counties and cities, and the causes thereof.
Not a few journals, even among those of importance, are believed to have succumbed to the wiles of “interests,” foreign or domestic, but the truth of these allegations is not easily ascertained.
A veteran statesman, candidate for the Senate, describing himself as “ni libéral ni progressiste, ni radical ni socialiste,” but “tout simple-ment républicain,” wrote in November 1911 as follows: to the electors “Trouvez-vous que la justice soit assez indépendante, l'armée assez protégée contre les influences politiques, la masse grossissante de nos fonc-tionnaires eat-elle assez pénétrée du sentiment de la discipline? Le scep-ticisme et 1'apathie des citoyens paisibles ne font-ils pas de redoutables progrès, et l'audace impunie des autres? … Vous sentez-vous assez gouvernés?”
The building in which the Chamber sits.
See chapter on Australia, post.
People sometimes allege that there is a fondness for abstract theory in the Celtic mind and a preference for practical expedients in the Teutonic. But no Celtic gathering ever produced more theories and showed more viewiness than did the Frankfurt Parliament of 1848-9.
In recent years something has been done to provide better guarantees. But something still remains to be done. A high authority wrote in 1910: “Notre histoire politique des cent vingt dernières années se resume dans ce paradox irreductible énervant et sterile, loger un individu parfaitement libre heureux et satisfait dans un État puissant omni- potent et autoritaire.”—M. Maurice Caudel, in the preface to his instructive book Nos Liberiés politiques
The monarchy of Napoleon lasted fourteen years (dating from the beginning of the Consulate), that of the Bourbon Restoration sixteen years, that of Louis Philippe eighteen years, that of Louis Napoleon Bonaparte nineteen years. The first Republic had a life of seven, the second of three years.
Of Labour troubles and the advocacy of what is called “Direct Action “nothing need be said here because these phenomena have appeared in other democratic countries also. So far from being characteristic of democracy, the General Strike (as a means for compelling submission by a government) and Direct Action are attacks on the fundamental principles of democratic government What they show is that those fundamental principles are either not understood or not regarded by a section of those who consider themselves democrats
There are in English several histories of Switzerland, and several useful descriptions of the constitutional system, but there does not seem to be any systematic account of the practical working of that system, presenting a picture of the current political life of the nation. The sketch which follows is based on personal enquiries made in Switzerland by myself in 1905 and 1919.
A succinct and lucid account of these events is given in Mr Coolidge's valuable article “Switzerland “in the Encyclopaedia Britannica , 11th edition, vol xxvi
The Sonderbund was the separate league set up by seven seceding Roman Catholic cantons.
A form of Romance speech differing a little from the Romansch which is spoken, along with German, in the Grisons (Graubunden).
In the district round Zurich there were said to be, in 1914, 50,000 Italians, the great majority of whom were not being assimilated by the Swiss. Of the total population of the Confederation 15 per cent were in that year foreigners.
The Protestants were, in 1910, 2,108,000; the Roman Catholics 1,594,000.
The rural circumscription called a District (Bezirk) , which includes a number of communes, is an artificial area, established for administrative purposes, and needs no description here.
I was told that the Teachers' Union is apt to protect teachers from losing their posts by preventing a commune, whose dismissal of a teacher has displeased the profession, from finding another person to fill the vacancy.
These three are Unterwalden, divided into Unterwald above the wood (Ob dem Wald) and Unterwald below the wood (Nid dem Wald), Appenzell, divided into Ausser Rhoden and Inner Rhoden, and Basle, divided into Country and City (Basel Land and Basel Stadt)
A Civil Code for the whole country, in which the old Teutonic customary law has been skilfully combined with the principles of modern French laws, was enacted in 1912, and a penal code was in 1919 being prepared by a committee of the Federal Legislature.
The view that the Landesgemeinde has, as Freeman and other writers have held, descended from the meetings of the early Germans described by Tacitus, now finds less favour, and it is rather deemed to be a product, during the earlier Middle Age, of the conditions of collective life in small and isolated communities.
Subject, in some cantons, to rules respecting notice to be given or which require a proposal to have been previously submitted to a smaller body.
The question of extending the suffrage to women was in 1919 being raised in Neuchatel and Zürich.
See chapters on the United States.
Of the Cantonal Judges I shall speak when we come to the judiciary of the Confederation.
This view is indeed expressly recognized in the Constitutions of Bern and Aargau.
This provision was designed to prevent any attempt to create another Sonderhund.
The Judicial Department is not, however, as will presently appear, a “branch of the Government” in the American sense.
Excluding persons who have been deprived of their civic rights for crime, and (in some cantons) bankrupts and paupers.
The Federal Council may convoke an extraordinary session should any emergency arise
Western Switzerland constituted in the earlier Middle Ages the kingdom of Transjurane Burgundy, formed by the Teutonic Burgundian tribes who came from the Middle Ehineland. It stretched from the Rhine above Basle to the Pennine Alps.
This happened occasionally when important deliverances of opinion were made during and after the late European war.
In 1919 a plan for the creation of a tribunal to deal with administrative cases involving complaints against officials was being considered in pursuance of a constitutional amendment passed in 1914.
One is sometimes told that this practice makes it hard to get rid of a Councillor who is no longer equal to his work.
During the war of 1914-1918 difficulties did arise, but into these I need not enter, for the circumstances were most exceptional.
The powers of the Tribunal are stated in Arts. CX. to CXIV. of the Constitution, in terms which it is not easy to abridge, except in a general and somewhat vague way.
Constitution, Art. CII. 5.
A private citizen who is party in a civil suit may also contest before a court the validity of a Cantonal law alleged to transgress the Federal Constitution.
In Zurich, and probably elsewhere also, the Bar try to secure good selections.
Dr. E. Zürcher in Hoderne Demokratie, p. 16.
Every soldier keeps his arms and accoutrements in his own house, the pride of a Swiss in his arms being an old tradition This accelerates mobilization.
In 1919 the people of Vorarlberg expressed their wish to be admitted as a Canton, but though the proposal had much to recommend it, it found no general favour among the Swiss, some of whom did not desire to strengthen the Roman Catholic party, while in the French-speaking districts a certain dislike was shown to the addition of a German-speaking Canton. It was believed at the time that the French Government would have opposed the plan had it ever been formally presented to the Paris Conference.
Here again I speak of things as they were before 1914, for censures were passed on the handling of some of the matters dealt with during the war.
Aristotle, agreeing with the Hebrew sage who prayed he might have neither poverty nor riches, would have applauded in Switzerland an approximation to his model democracy in which power rested with citizens of moderate means.
A not too friendly picture of political party arts, as practised in a city of French-speaking Switzerland, may be found in the novel called L'Echelle, by M. J. P. Porret. There may be, but I have not found, a similar picture of cantonal politics in Zurich or Basle. M. Porret's description may be compared with the graphic and humorous treatment of New Hampshire (U. S. A.) politics in the Comston, and Mr. Crewe's Career of Mr. Winston Churchill.
In some Slavonic countries something similar seems to have existed, but apparently not among the Celtic peoples.
A description of the Pitso (a primary assembly) among the Basu-tos may be found in the author's Impressions of South Africa, chap. xx.
As to these Volksanfragen , see an instructive discourse (published as a pamphlet) by M. Horace Micheli (of Geneva) entitled La Souverameté populaire.
See an interesting pamphlet of M. G. Wagniére, La Democratic en Suisse , p. 15. Throughout the eighteenth century a struggle went on in Geneva between the oligarchic government and the popular party which was endeavouring to assert, or recover, the rights of the mass of citizens. An interesting view of its latest phase may be found in Mr. D. W. Freshfield's Life of Saussure.
I quote (in note at the end of this chapter) from M Wagniére a passage from the First Consul's address to the Swiss delegates who came to Paris in 1801.
See as to the history of Swiss popular legislation, the valuable book of Th. Curti, Le Referendum , Paris, 1905, a translation, with additions, from the German original.
The Federal Constitution prescribes (Art. VI.) that every Cantonal Constitution must be accepted by the people.
It is sometimes alleged that this power of the Assembly has, especially in recent years, been unduly extended. By giving the title of Resolutions to enactments which are really Laws, and by declaring such Resolutions to be either “urgent” or “not of general application,” it can withdraw from the operation of the Referendum matters not really urgent. Whereas between 1874 and 1913 the citizens used the right of demanding a Referendum 31 times on a total of 284 Laws and Resolutions passed by the Assembly, they used it only 3 times on 62 Laws and Resolutions passed between 1905 and 1919. This decline from a percentage of 11 per cent to 5 per cent may suggest that the citizens found less occasion for the exercise of their right, but it may also be due to the large use of the power of “declaring urgency,” a power liable to be employed when the Assembly feared rejection by the people. Of 1150 enactments passed by the Assembly between 1874 and 1919, upon only about 350 could the Referendum have been demanded. In a debate (in 1919) in the Assembly a member observed “On raconte qu'un homme d'église qui voulait manger un poulet un jour de caréme dit à son poulet' Je te baptise carpe,' et sa conscience éìtait tranquille. Le Conseil Fédéral et la Commission du Conseil National font un peu la même chose pour leur poulet, pour ce projet. lis la baptisent' arrêté,' et leur conscience démoeratique est tranquille, parce que si c'est un arrêté il n'y a pas besoin de le soumettre au Referendum.” On this occasion the remonstrance prevailed, and the National Council changed the description of the enactment fiom “arrete” “to “loi.”
Geneva has an automatic revision of her Constitution every fifteen years
The Federal Constitution also prescribes (Art. VI) that in every canton the absolute majority of the citizens ( i.e a majority of the whole number of citizens) shall have the right of demanding a revision of the Constitution.
The same difficulty has arisen in those States of the American Union which have adopted the Popular Initiative. To-day. the only distinction that can, both in Switzerland and these States, be drawn between a Law and a provision of the Constitution is that the latter can be repeated or amended only by a vote of the people.
Professor Hilty mentions that, having asked one of the inhabitants of a remote valley why all his village had signed the demand for a Referendum, he was informed that a native of the valley who came to collect signatures told the people that he was to get ten centimes — one penny, two cents — for every signature. Having no opinion of their own on the matter, their courteous generosity enriched him by a gift which cost them nothing.
A Memorandum is, however, issued in Oregon, U.S.A., for the information of the voters.
Deploige, Referendum in Switzerland , p. 181 of English translation.
Swiss opinion does not generally approve the plan of a Special Convention, and it is not employed in the Confederation.
Two were withdrawn, and at the beginning of 1920 three Initiative proposals were pending on which the people had not yet voted (one of these has since been carried), and the question proposed by the Assembly of accepting the decision of the Assembly that Switzerland should enter the League of Nations had not yet been voted upon.
In one case a Bill passed by the Assembly with only a single dissentient vote was rejected by a large majority on a Referendum.
The majority was wiser than the Ministry, for the measure damaged the party at the next general election.
Nevertheless in those States of the N. American Union which use the Referendum, democratic as they are, voting does not closely follow party lines
As to these four instances, called at the time “the four-humped camel,” see Th. Curti, ut supra , p. 334. And Deploige, English translation, p. 225.
One of these two was a proposal to strengthen the staff of the Federal Department of Justice, the other to increase by £400 the expenditure on the Legation at Washington.
Sir H. S Maine, Popular Government , p. 97.
When the Federal Constitution was submitted in 1874 the percentage who voted in Canton Zürich was 93.7, which seems to make a “record “in popular votings.
In the thirty years ending with 1912, even Geneva used the Referendum only ten times and the Initiative only seven.
Rousseau held that every law ought to be enacted by the citizens, but seems to have had in mind small communities, rather than a large nation. The doctrine that the People are the ultimate fountain of power descends from the ancient world, and was taken from the Roman law by St. Thomas Aquinas and other mediaeval writers.
This the people did when that Code was, after Welti's time, enacted.
No case was brought to my knowledge in which this had occurred. In Switzerland, as in America, minorities usually acquiesce quietly, perceiving that only thus can free government go on.
In his book entitled Popular Government.
Geneva was mentioned to me as a canton in which an independent committee of citizens had succeeded in defeating, on a popular vote, a scheme propounded by the Council, which they deemed likely to reduce the standard and variety of university teaching. Similarly, an ancient tower, associated with the history of the city, which the Council had meant to remove was saved by an appeal to popular vote.
A Swiss friend whose great abilities and experience entitle his opinion to high respect sums up to me his view as follows:
“The Referendum compels all citizens to occupy themselves with and pass a judgment upon the practical questions of the State, and thus draws the individual directly into the interest of the State, while anchoring the State in the People
“This means for the individual citizen an enrichment of his personality, and, reciprocally, the State is obliged to keep the instruction of the People on the highest possible level.
“The Referendum makes all classes and districts in Switzerland partners in State tasks and duties and creates therewith a very strong feeling of membership in one community. Every Swiss submits himself to a decision by the people.”
This sense of a common duty to the State seems to be stronger in Switzerland than anywhere else in the world. I remember that when long ago in a secluded Alpine valley I asked a peasant whether all the dwellers had not the right to attend and vote in the Landesgemeindr, he answered, Not the right merely, the Duty” (Es ist ihre Pflicht).
An interesting abstract of the doctrines of Rittinghausen and Considerant, writers of the last generation who influenced opinion on this subject in their time, may be found in the (already mentioned) excellent book of Th. Curti, he Referendum, pp. 200-207.
This objection was of course overridden by the insertion of the amendment as a part of the Constitution.
This happened in the case of a proposal to forbid vivisection.
It is sometimes alleged that the habit of withdrawing enactments as “urgent” from the category of those which can be made the subject of a Referendum may have contributed to this larger use of the Initiative, but other causes also may be suggested.
In the Canton of Zurich where the Initiative exists for Laws, enactments desired are usually proposed as Laws, and the popular Initiative in constitutional amendments is rare.
In the National Council it had 102 members out of 189. In 1919 when the election was held on the plan of Proportional Representation this party, though remaining the largest, did not obtain in the National Council a majority of the whole, but only 63 members, the Catholic Conservative party securing 41 seats, the Socialists 41, while the new group of Peasants, Artisans, and Bourgeois party won 26, and the Liberal Democratic Group 9. Seven seats went to a so-called “Groupe de politique socialé,” and two to Independents. The composition of these groups may, however, soon begin to vary.
ttatisme has suffered in public favour through the failure in economy and efficiency, which here, as well as in England and the United States, were noted in the administration (during the recent war) of several departments which had to bear a severe strain.
A further reason was that the holding by Germans of a large proportion of the shares in the Gothard railway, an undertaking of vast international importance, had made it politically desirable for the Swiss Government to obtain full control of that line; and to do this it seemed necessary to acquire the other lines also.
One does not hear of proposals to fix wages by law or to entrust the fixing thereof, as in Australia, to a Court of law.
In these communes, if the citizen neither appeared to drop his ballot paper nor transmitted it in the official envelope within three days, it was sent for, and he was charged one franc for the trouble.
Protestant pastors seldom seek to exert political influence, and in French-speaking cantons carefully abstain from even the appearance of doing so.
I have, however, heard it remarked that the slight decline noticeable in the intellectual quality of representatives is due to the recent tendency to prefer docile candidates to men of more independent character. It is also said that sensitive men sometimes refrain from candidacy, because the personal criticism to which politicians are subjected is more disagreeable in small constituencies, where everybody is personally known, than it can well be in large communities.
Such little opposition as there was turned upon personal not political reasons.
In ordinary times there are only colonels.
Even in Great Britain it may happen that members of a Ministry are permitted to oppose one another in debate. I recall a case in which this happened when Woman Suffrage, a subject on which the Cabinet had not delivered a collective opinion, was being debated in the House of Commons.
I know of a commune near Geneva in which Protestants subscribed to the erection of a Catholic Church, and Catholics to that of a Protestant.
“Civis inquilinus urbis Eomae “(according to Sallust).
The German-speakers are said to be more prone to accept governmental direction, and to favour the extension of state functions than are the inhabitants of “ Suisse romande,” who dislike “ reglementation.”
I speak only of the native Swiss, not including the recent immigrants, mostly still unassimilated.
Dr. Karl Hilty, one of the sagest as well as one of the most lovable Swiss I have ever known. He died in 1908.
To be a citizen, one must be admitted to a commune, and though poor communes welcome rich applicants, all communes are careful not to burden themselves with those whom they might have to support.
A Swiss friend wrote to me during the progress of this contest: “Le paete de la Société des Nations est distribue à tous les citoyens avec diverses annexes. Les articles de journaux, les conférences se multiplient Dans la moindre auberge on entend des discussions acharnées sur tel ou tel article que des citoyens tout à fait simples savent par coeur tout comme ils connaissent et invoquent les commentaires qu'en ont donné les plus grand juristes J'ai été interpellé' dans la rue par des citoyens modestes qui exigaient de leur poche leur exemphcaire du paete tout erayonné des remarques et qui exigaient des explications détaillées surtel ou tel article.” The debates and the voting were an aid to political education such as no other European country has seen, and when the proposal, which was opposed by the Socialists and by the great bulk of the Conservatives in the German-speaking cantons, was carried by a majority of 414,000 to 322,000, the decision was at once accepted with a good grace by the minority.
The Law of the Constitution.
Something similar happened in the United States during the first half-century of the Constitution. Convenience established, among the then small number of leading men in Congress, usages many of which have held their ground (see the author's American Commonuealth, vol. i. chap, xxxiv.)
A similar feeling operated at Athens (see above, Chapter XVI.). There are similarities between the Greek republics, at their best, and Switzerland, just as there are also similarities between them, at their worst, and the more backward of the Spanish-American republics.
Perhaps also because in mediaeval Switzerland there was never any monarch nearer than the Emperor, so that no monarchical tradition was formed which in other countries made a single Head of the State, however limited his powers, seem a natural apex of the governmental edifice.
Except in so far as small salaries fail to secure high special competence in officials.
I do not venture into the controversial question as to what proportion of their income the rich ought to contribute to the services of the State, but state the complaint as I heard it in Switzerland, and as it is heard now in many other countries.
In 1920 the Federal Council contained five Radicals and two Catholics. The Socialists having refused to work along with the other members, there was no Socialist. There were four members from “Suisse allemande,” two from “Suisse romande,” and one Italian.
Jefferson, however, must have seen, though he thought it safer not to add, that it was not merely the Town meetings but also the quality of the men who composed those meetings, educated land-owning farmers, members of Congregational churches, that vivified the local politics of Massachusetts and Connecticut.
Vetus Liga Alemarmiae Bwperioris,
In order to prevent the first volume of this book from being much larger than the second it has been thought desirable to relegate the chapters on the United States to Volume II. And place in Volume I. the shorter chapters on Canada. The reader is, however, recommended to peruse first the account of democracy in the United States, as much of what is said regarding Canada will be better understood if the description of the United States, the economic and social conditions of which resemble those of Canada, while the political institutions are different, has been previously read.
In 1911 the population was 7,206,000.
Though very nearly all the French speakers are Catholics, by no means all the Catholics are French speakers, for many of the German, Irish, Italian, and Polish immigrants are Catholics, so it might be more exact to say that three-tenths are French speaking, and rather more than one-third Catholics. Conversions from either faith to the other are uncommon, but the children of Catholics from the European Continents often lapse from their faith, the Irish rarely.
That machinery will be described in the chapters on Australia and the United States respectively. Other points in which the constitutional arrangements of Canada differ from those of the United States will be noticed in Chapter XXXV.
In the beginning of 1920 it had not been enacted in Nova Scotia, Quebec, and Prince Edward Island Women are eligible for seats in the House of Commons, and are already members of one or two Provincial legislatures.
Manitoba. Saskatchewan, and Alberta have received their constitutions and Governments since 1867. Their territories were purchased by the Dominion Government from the Hudson Bay Company.
Instances have occurred in which a Lieutenant-Governor took independent action in what was deemed to be the general public interest, the most recent being that in which (in Manitoba) a judicial enquiry was ordered into misdeeds alleged to have been committed by a Ministry. See as to this and the earlier case in Quebec the book of Mr. Justice Riddell on the Constitution of Canada, p. 108.
Manitoba, Saskatchewan, and Alberta.
Especially in Ontario and Manitoba. In Quebec the Roman hierarchy get their own way.
The sale of alcoholic liquors (except for medical and scientific purposes) and for export has been practically forbidden, in slightly different forms, in all the Provinces save Quebec.
The “Grain Growers of the West Association,” lately formed in the Prairie Provinces, and now prospering there is another sign of agricultural discontent.
It was alleged at a general election not many years ago that large contributions to party funds had been made by some great manufacturing firms.
These lines describe things as they were before 1914. The taking over by the Dominion Government during the War, and the recent financial collapse of some important lines have so altered the situation that one must not venture to speak of the future.
See as to this interesting point, Mr Justice Riddell's Lectures on the Constitution of Canada, pp. 98 and 112 and notes, and also an article by Mr. Murray Clark, K.C., in the Canadian Bankers? Magazine for Jan. 1919.
In these and other respects Professor Henry Jones Ford compares the Provincial Legislatures with the State Legislatures in the United States, to the advantage of the former (North American Review, No. 194 (1911)).
This principle is, however, not followed in Switzerland nor indeed fully recognized by most lawyers of the European Continent. See Chapter XXVIII. p. 401, ante.
This is called in the U.S.A. the “Pork Barrel.” It is common in New Zealand also, and not infrequent in France.
This is complained of in France also (see Chapter XX. ante).
Visitors to Canada are apt to be misled by the external resemblances to the United States, in such things as the aspect of the streets, the hotels, the newspapers, the railway cars, the currency, into supposing the people to have been more affected by influences from their southern neighbours than is really the case. In character and in political habits there are marked differences.
This subject will be more fully explained and discussed in the chapters on the United States.
Such as frequent elections, short terms of office, the election of judges by the people, the relations of Congress to the President.