The bestowal of these important functions upon the Senate made it more powerful than the House of Lords upon which it was modelled. Great things were expected of the Senate. Of course it would represent wealth. The qualifications then. required for membership in the state legislatures would insure that. John Dickinson, on whose motion it was decided that the senators should be elected by the state legislatures, gave as one of his reasons that "he wished the Senate to consist of the most distinguished characters, distinguished for their rank in life and their weight of property, and bearing as strong a likeness to the British House of Lords as was possible." James Madison thought that "the second branch, as a limited number of citizens, respectable for wisdom and virtue, will be watched by and will keep watch over the representatives of the people; it will seasonably interpose between impetuous councils, and will guard the minority who are placed above indigence against the agrarian attempts of the ever-increasing class who labor under the hardships of life, and secretly strive for a more equal distribution of its blessings." Gouverneur Morris hoped that the Senate "will show us the might of aristocracy."

But even the creation of such a body as this was

of 1689, will show other points of resemblance indicating the source of the political ideas embodied in the constitution. See Stevens' "Sources of the Constitution of the United States " for a thorough discussion of this subject.

"2

not a sufficient safeguard against democracy. The great concern of the delegates was to provide effective restraints on the legislative branch. "It is against the enterprising ambition of this department," said Madison, "that the people ought to indulge all their jealousy and exhaust all their precautions." 1 On the other hand, Hamilton remarked that "energy in the executive is a leading character in the definition of a good government." Congress was given no powers except such as were specified. The powers of the President are plenary except as specifically limited. In the one case the language of the constitution is: "All legislative powers herein granted shall be vested in a Congress of the United States, which shall consist of a Senate and a House of Representatives." In the other case the grant is without reserve, "The executive power shall be vested in a President of the United States of America." Language which might imply subordination is avoided. The President's oath of office is: "I will faithfully execute the office of President of the United States, and will, to the best of my ability, preserve, protect, and defend the constitution of the United States." Not Congressional authority alone but executive prerogative also is a fountain of law. Madison declared, "All constitutional acts of power, whether in the executive or in the judicial department, have

1 The Federalist, No. 48.

2 Ibid., No. 70.

as much legal validity and obligation as if they proceeded from the legislature." The delegates seem to have looked forward to the possibility that the President might have to act as a saviour of society, on the principle tersely stated by Madison that "the safety and happiness of society are the objects at which all political institutions aim and to which all such institutions must be sacrificed." 2 To obtain their full significance as conceived by the fathers, the provisions of the constitution, requiring that the United States shall guarantee to every state a republican form of government and give protection from domestic violence, should be interpreted in connection with this embodiment of prerogative. The Shays' Rebellion in Massachusetts and the disturbances in New Hampshire and Rhode Island had laid a great fear on the delegates.

At the first session of Congress, the Senate, under the lead of John Adams, endeavored to carry out these ideas of presidential prerogative by attaching titles of royalty to the office; but the House of Representatives defeated all such propositions. Nevertheless the precautions taken by the framers of the constitution, in behalf of the presidency, were so effectual that Congress was made an incurably deficient and inferior organ of governAs the nation develops and the people

ment.

1 The Federalist, No. 64.

2 Ibid., No. 45.

increase their qualifications for self-government, it will be seen that they will lay hold of the presidency as the only organ sufficient for the exercise of their sovereignty.

In giving shape to the determinations of the convention, the draughting committee seems to have made free use of material afforded by state constitutions. It is a common legislative practice to consult the statute books for material already shaped for use, and in this respect the behavior of the convention of 1787 was what that of any constitutional convention in our own times might be. In plan and purpose, the constitution is a product of the political ideas of the English race. It stands in lineal succession to such muniments of public right as Magna Charta, the Bill of Rights of 1689, and the Act of Settlement of 1700. The embodiment of Whig doctrine in a written constitution was, however, an unperceived revolution in political conditions, since it converted what was simply a working theory, open to modification as times changed, into a rigid frame of government. The anatomy of the English constitution was completed by the establishment of royalty on a parliamentary title. Its development since then has been carried on by functional activities.1 The constitution of the United States was a sort of Act of Settlement

1 Lecky comments instructively upon this point. History of England, Vol. III., p. 10.

after the American Whig revolution of 1775-1783; but in adapting the traditional structure of government to new uses, the federal composition of the nation compelled changes which, although intended as simple variations, resulted in generic difference. In endeavoring to get back to the old type of government, the fathers originated a new type of more complex organization and larger capacities of development. The old type, from its superior complexity to the simple forms of absolute rule, could not have been developed save in the shelter of England's insular position. The still more elaborate organization of the new type had a remote new world in which to expand. Although its development is still incomplete, its stability is so well established that federal government is now the mould of empire. Guizot says, "Of all the systems of government and political guarantee, it may be asserted without fear of contradiction that the most difficult to establish and render effectual is the federated system: a system which consists in leaving in each place or province, in every separate society, all that portion of government which can abide there, and in taking from it only so much of it as is indispensable to a general society, in order to carry it to the centre of this larger society, and there to embody it under the form of a central government." 1

1 Guizot's History of Civilization, Lecture IV.