under and through constitutional and legal forms; we do not oppose the actually existing political order of this country; but, simply, a new and dangerous interpretation of our institutions, which, if once fully adopted, and acted upon, cannot fail to prove their destruction. We will regard as unwarrantable misrepresentation, and slander even, any repetition of the charge, which has been recently so often made against us, that we intentionally, or by implication, advocate the necessity, or the right, of kings, of nobilities, or of any man, or any set of men, by whatever name called, to rule over the people. We plant ourselves on the institutions of our country; we accept them as they are; we bring in no new doctrine; but we resist with all our energy a mischievous innovation, which is attempted to be brought in by others. This is our position; and we have a right to demand that it be regarded.

What is this innovation, the democracy, for which the Democratic Review contends, and which we oppose? This is not easily answered, for the reviewer does not abound in clear, distinct, and compact statements. Nevertheless, aided by his Notes, appended to some previous article of ours, we can answer with tolerable certainty. In his Review for December last, page 660, he says; "The people are the rightful human source and foundation of governmental authority." The little word human, was probably thrown in to round the period, for the reviewer's purpose, since he was opposing us, was to assert the absolutely human origin and foundation of governmental authority. If he had meant merely to say, that the people are the rightful human source and foundation of governmental authority, that is, that all legitimate power in the State, is, under God, derived from the people, he would only have asserted our own doctrine, for which he was holding us up to public indignation, and murdering us with his terrible reductio ad absurdum. He must, therefore, have meant to assert, in plain language, the simple, absolute sovereignty of the people.

This is evident from what he had previously said, in

a note appended to an Article of ours, on Popular Government, in his Review for May last, page 390.

Away with such cobweb subtleties and sophistications. The people the actual numerical people—including, on terms of equal rights, all persons of reasonable maturity in years and the ordinary degree and completeness of mental competency to think and act for their own self-government, the people themselves, in their own native might and right, are the primary and fundamental sovereignty."

And again, on the same page:

"Our theory is very simple and plain; and safe enough, too, if Mr. Brownson would be a little less afraid of the peopleand if he would consent to pardon their 'moment de vertige' in 1840 it is, that the sovereignty resides in the people [the numerical people] - that sovereignty which made the Constitution, and may unmake. If that people choose to come together, in their own way, whether inside or outside the existing forms of law, and to alter the Constitution, it is to their will and their act that my loyalty is morally due, provided I am bonâ fide satisfied of the fact of the majority."

These quotations prove, that democracy, according to the Democratic Review, asserts government to be of purely human origin and foundation, and that the people themselves are, in their own native might and right, the primary and fundamental sovereignty. Now we assert, in opposition, 1. That democracy, so defined, is tantamount to no government; 2. That if it be a government, it is a government that has no right to govern; and, 3. That, even waiving the question of its right to govern, it cannot answer the practical ends of wise and just government.

1. Government, of some sort, we assume to be necessary. The question is not, government or no government; but, the sort of government that is to be instituted, or sustained.

2. Government, to be government, must govern; and, therefore, a government which does not govern, is no government.

3. The government must not only govern, but have the right to govern; not only be government, but legitimate government.

4. The government, if it have the right to govern, necessarily carries along with it the duty of the subject to obey.

These postulates all parties must accept, and democracy must fulfil all the conditions here implied, or be abandoned as indefensible. We proceed now to the question.

I. DEMOCRACY IS TANTAMOUNT TO NO GOVERNMENT. Let no one, we say again, misinterpret us, and accuse us of opposing, under the name of democracy, what we do not oppose. The word, democracy, is used in more senses than one. Let us begin, then, by recognizing and defining these several senses, and determining the exact sense in which we oppose it.

1. Democracy is the sovereignty of the people; this is the sense in which we suppose the Democratic Review understands it.

2. The word, democracy, is sometimes used, especially by those of our scholars who have been educated abroad, to designate the mass of the people, the great unprivileged many, as distinguished from the privileged few; as when we say, the administration of the government should be in the hands of the democracy.

3. It is used indifferently to designate either the doctrines and measures of the Democratic party, or the members of the party themselves.

4. It is used to designate the doctrine which teaches that all governments rightfully exist, and are to be administered, only for the common good of the whole people, especially for the protection and elevation of the poorer and more numerous classes. In this sense, it designates the end of government, rather than its form; this is the sense, in which we have uniformly used it, when we have called ourselves a democrat; and in this sense, the only sense in which we have ever professed democracy, we are as democratic as ever we were. It was in this sense we used the word, when we defined democracy to be the "Supremacy of man over his accidents," and when we wrote and lectured on "The Democracy of Christianity," endeav

ouring to show that democracy, rightly understood, is nothing but the application to our social and political relations of the great principles of the Gospel.

The reviewer sneers at us for making nice distinctions; and yet, just and accurate distinctions, not of words, merely, but of things, are indispensable, if we would speak or write intelligibly, and not make confusion worse confounded. These distinctions in regard to the word, democracy, and the several senses in which it is used, are very necessary to be observed; for a man may be a democrat in one of these senses, and not in the others, and much may be true of one, which could not be legitimately affirmed of another of them. In this discussion, as in all our recent writings, we use the word, democracy, in the first sense named, and mean by it, that political order which is founded on the principle of the sovereignty of the people, regarded not merely as the administrators, but as the source and ground, of government.

But here, at the risk of another of our friend's withering sneers, we must make a still further distinction. The sovereignty of the people may be taken, 1. NegaTIVELY, as the denial of the king, the nobility, or the right of any one man, or any set of men, caste, or class, to rule over the people; or, 2. POSITIVELY, as the assertion of the absolute right of the people to govern, of their native, inherent, underived sovereignty. The first is the sense in which the people of this country generally understand popular sovereignty, as is evinced by the fact, that they take our denial of popular sovereignty to be the assertion of the right, or necessity, of some one man, or a certain set of men, class, or caste, to rule over the people. But, in this negative sense, which denies all human authority above the people, we accept popular sovereignty with all our heart. deny popular sovereignty only in the second, the positive sense. This distinction is important, as we showed at large in an Essay on Democracy, published in the Boston Quarterly Review, for January, 1838. We pray our readers to remember it, and not to accuse

We

us of asserting the necessity of some human power to rule over the people.

Let us, then, be distinctly understood. Our controversy with democracy is not when it denies the right of the one or the few to rule over the people, but simply, when it founds the State on population alone, and makes the people the primary and fundamental sovereignty, the source and foundation of all legitimate authority. This is the democracy of the Democratic Review, and which we maintain to be tantamount to no government at all.

We begin by demanding of the reviewer a definition of what he means by "the people." He answers, in his Review, "the numerical people, including, on terms of equal rights, all persons of reasonable maturity in years and the ordinary degree and completeness of mental competency to think and act for their own individual self-government." But this is not enough. Does he mean to embrace all the inhabitants of the globe, and to assert that it is only to the decision of the majority of the whole his loyalty is morally due? Of course not. His numerical people are not all the inhabitants of the globe. Then they must be the inhabitants of a certain portion of the globe, that is, of a given territory. But here is a difficulty. What marks and defines the territory, the majority of whose inhabitants "are, in their own native might and right, the primary and fundamental sovereignty"? Is the territory undefinable? If so, how will he be able to tell how many are necessary to constitute a majority? Nor is this all. Before the people have acted, and established the rule by which it may be determined who have the proper maturity in years, and the requisite degree of mental competency, how will it be possible to tell who are the political people, and who not? We hope the reviewer will not, with proud disdain, exclaim, in view of these questions, "Away with such cobweb subtleties. and sophistications," for they are to us serious questions, and we are very anxious to have them answered. But our difficulties increase. If he says the numeri