We may ask, What is the spirit of the government which has saved its life by its incomparable energy? Because the United States know their Constitution to be for them the ripened fruit of time, they have never been propagandists. Washington, in the letters in which he declares in favor of republican governments for the United States, gives as his reason that no other government is suited to their social and political condition. The United States have never importuned or encouraged others to adopt their principles of government prematurely. What traits belong specially to government by the people? Montesquieu, the upright magistrate, who, living under despotic rule, nevertheless insisted that by the Constitution of France its king was not absolute, sought in the records of history to discern the tendency of each great form of government, and has left his testimony that "the spirit of monarchy is war and aggrandizement; the spirit of a republic is peace and moderation." "L'esprit de la monarchie est la guerre et l'agrandissement: l'esprit de la république est la paix et la modération.” The necessary conditions of the American Union consisted in an absolute equality of rights among the States. It was hard for some of the original thirteen to think that territories, far in the interior, should be absolutely equal with the original thirteen, and the centre of power be ul timately transferred to the West, which was then a wilderness; but the voice of wisdom and the counsels of hope prevailed, and when the only irresistible cause of antagonism in our country was removed, there ceased to be any motive for dissension between the North and the South. There never was and never can be a collision between the West and the East, for they both alike wish the highways between the oceans to be free; and by universal consent, from the remotest point where Maine touches Canada to the southwestern line of California, from the orange groves of Florida to the strait where the Pacific Ocean drives its deep tide. swiftly between its walls of basalt, there is for the inhabi 'Montesquieu, "l'Esprit des Lois,” ix. 2. tants the one simple rule of universal inter-citizenship and universal free trade under government of the people by the people. The people of the United States are the most conservative in the world, for they cherish self-government as the most precious of possessions. They make laws deliberately only after long reflection, and they only make laws within the limits of their Constitutions. From end to end of the United States two houses of legislation exist as the rule, and the executive possesses a veto. A Constitution may be changed only after a reference in some form to every individual of the community. If the question may be asked, Does a king or a people give the most honest support to the institutions which they both have accepted, we must turn to France for a reply. Once in a reconstruction of its government a Bourbon was enthroned in France as a constitutional king; the first successor to the throne conspired against that settlement and was driven into exile, all the world pronouncing the judg ment that he justly fell. Next came the house of Orleans, holding up the flag of a monarchy that should be the best of republics. Its king, in many things a wise and faithful man, made the interest of his family paramount to the interest of the nation, and in legislation obstinately refused to extend the suffrage so as to conform it to the principle on which he had received the crown. And he, too, having been false to the principle on which he accepted power, provoked an insurrection, and in the judgment of mankind justly fell. A member of another dynasty, being called to the presidency of the French republic, reached at the imperial crown, and carried France into an unequal and wilful war with its neighbor, bringing utter defeat on himself and the heaviest sorrows and losses on the generous land which he had ruled. The form of government of "the new nation" seems to the world to be but of yesterday; and it is so; yet this government by the people, for the people is the oldest one now existing in the civilized world this side of the empire of the Czars. Since the inauguration of Washington, Portugal and Spain have passed from irresponsible monarchy to constitutional rule. The republic of Holland has disappeared. In France government by the people exists by the deliberate choice of the nation. Germany, which in the middle of the last century was divided into hundreds of sovereignties, has formed itself into one consolidated government with a parliament elected by universal suffrage. The republic of Kosciuszko has utterly perished. Switzerland has thrown aside its mediæval form of confederacy, and is now a true government by the people. It would be hard to count the revolutions which the Grand Duchy of Austria has undergone within the last ninety-six years. Italy, thank God, is become one. The United Kingdom, too, is revolutionized. The case of England is simply this: its king and its church long time ago broke from the Roman see; many of the people accepted the Reformation; Englishmen, including dissenters, were driven through a series of conflicts to the attempt to found the government of the people by the people; the attempt was premature and failed. The court again conspired against the rights of Englishmen. The people, especially the dissenters, kept themselves in the background, and in 1688 intrusted the conduct of a new British revolution to the aristocracy. The price taken by the aristocracy for success was their own all but absolute rule of Great Britain. The House of Commons became master of the king; and that master of the king was elected chiefly on the dictation of the majority of the land-owners. The system was secured by bringing in a new dynasty, which had only a parliamentary title to the Crown. This was the revolution of 1688. The aristocracy of England seemed to have founded their power upon an everlasting rock; but the great expansion. of industry and commerce, and the consequent immense accumulation of wealth, soon compelled them to make a place by their side for the moneyed interest. Commerce and industry went on; in due time the example of the United States had its influence in the world; France ex cited rivalry by once more entering upon the career of a free state; at last the reform of the British House of Commons began; next the corn laws were repealed; then science by its successful inventions almost annihilated the cost of transportation of articles, wheat among the rest, from continent to continent, so that land in England lost its high value; the basis on which the rule of the British land-holders rested began to totter; and now, in the fulness of time, the House of Commons, which is the ruler of the United Kingdom, has taken itself out of the hands of the land-owners and placed itself in the keeping of the British and Irish people. "The people," says a late English writer,' "are now sovereign, and officials of all ranks will obey their masters." The United States of to-day are the chief home of the English-speaking population of the world; for in all their extent English is the language of a people of sixty millions. Canada stretches along their border; a straight line from England to Australia would cross their domain; Newfoundland, New Brunswick, and Nova Scotia flank them on the east; the Bermudas and the Bahamas are anchored near their doors; a general representation of all who speak the English tongue would find in the United States the central place most convenient for meeting. Letter from Leopold Von Ranke. Mr. Bancroft, upon the conclusion of his address, called upon the Secretary to communicate to the Association a letter from Leopold von Ranke, accepting honorary membership. By a special resolution offered at the second annual meeting in Saratoga (see Report, vol i., p. 483), the Association had voted that its President should transmit its first testimonial of honorary membership to Leopold von Ranke, the oldest and most distinguished living exponent of historical science. Mr. Bancroft's letter to Dr. Ranke (see above reference) was dated Washington, D. C., December 5, 1885, when the German historian was approaching his 1 Froude, in "Oceana." ninetieth birthday (December 21, 1886). Ranke's reply was as follows: Dem Präsidenten des Amerikanischen historischen Vereins, Herrn GEORGE BANCROFT in Washington Erwidere ich auf sein gütiges Anschreiben, dass ich die stellung eines Ehrenmitgliedes in diesem Verein, zu dem ich erwählt worden bin, dankbar annehme. Zu einer Gesellschaft zu gehören, welche jenseits des Oceans dieselben Zwecke verfolgt, die wir diesseits zu erreichen streben, gereicht mir zu grosser Genugthuung. Die Einheit der Studien verknüpft die räumlich entfernten, aber durch alte Stammesverwandschaft verbundenen Nationalitäten. Namentlich erfüllt es mich mit Freude, Herrn George Bancroft, einen der Meister unseres Faches, mir aus der Ferne die Hand reichen zu sehen einen Mann, der mich während seines Aufenthaltes in Berlin zu verehrungsvoller Freundschaft verpflichtet hat. Ehrerbietig und herzlich, BERLIN, den 14 Februar, 1886. LEOP. V. RANKE. To the President of the American Historical Association, Mr. GEORGE BANCROFT, in Washington: In reply to your kind communication, I gratefully accept the position of an honorary member in the Association, to which I have been elected. It gives me great satisfaction to belong to a society pursuing beyond the ocean the same aims that we on this side are striving to achieve. Such unity of studies binds together peoples widely separated, yet allied by ancient kinship. It fills me with especial joy to see Mr. George Bancroft, one of the masters in our science, extending his hand to me from afar,-a man who, during his residence in Berlin, bound me to himself by ties of reverential friendship. Accept my hearty sentiments of respect and honor, BERLIN, February 14, 1886. The death of Leopold von Ranke, on May 23, 1886, has called forth many eulogistic memorials from institutions and |