PART TWO: AN ANTHOLOGY OF STRIKING AND SIGNIFICANT PASSAGES FROM OUR NATIONAL DOCUMENTS, STATE PAPERS, AND THE WRITINGS AND SPEECHES OF AMERICAN STATESMEN AND LEADERS FROM 1619 TO 1924

PART TWO: ANTHOLOGY

FOREWORD

The division of the following excerpts into groups has been made largely for the convenience of those who may wish to use this book as an anthology in locating material for journalistic or other purposes.

The excerpts overlap and no entirely successful division of them is possible.

The headings of the groups are merely indicative of the general nature of the quotations brought together in them.

Inasmuch as one of the chief objects of this book is to suggest the desirability of critical examination of the too-precise formulas sometimes accepted as expressing the essential American traditions and tendencies, the quotations are obviously not selected to support the formulas implied in these headings but rather to cover the whole range of thoughts and impulses from which these formulas have been crystallised.

While most of the quotations deal with ideas and principles, a few excerpts are included from the primary documents which show the first development of the American organs of govern

ment.

It will be noted that dates and references are lacking in a few instances. The excerpts have, in some cases, been gleaned from writers who did not give sources or dates. When the writers have been sufficiently authoritative to justify such trust the quotations have been given without reference if they seemed of unusual importance.

GROUP ONE: THE INDIVIDUAL

DEMOCRACY. POPULAR SOVEREIGNTY. "GOVERNMENT of the PEOPLE, BY THE PEOPLE, FOR THE PEOPLE.'

In the case of America, as in every other instance where con'ditions have permitted the disrupting of the customs and ideas of a long established order, individualism was engendered. The individual, largely freed from oppression and restrictions, gained new sense of self importance and self respect, made new demands and claims.

As always, under such circumstances, these demands and claims were phrased in many different formulas. The indesignate "liberty" and "freedom" claimed ranged from minor political and social demands to the assertion of the right of the individual to withdraw entirely from society.

Later, influenced by diverse claims and opinions, the developing institutions of America deliberately sought to free the individual-at the very least-from any capricious, arbitrary or irresponsible authority of any other individual or groups of individuals. In accomplishing this to a degree unprecedented it necessarily permitted such application of some of the formulas as must inevitably, later, lead to types of individualism logically indefensible.

The following excerpts have been chosen largely to give examples of the more important claims of the individual made by representative Americans. They show that the formulas accepted were never entirely inclusive of all aspects of American individualism.

It is not the purpose of this volume necessarily to uphold or endorse the individualistic philosophy characteristic of early America. In the contemporary political philosophy of today in which the common good is accentuated even at the expense of the individual there is much irrefutable logic and truth.

The object here has been rather to show the unique and characteristic contribution of America to all political thought as largely, and despite its formulas, an empirical contribution resulting from unique environmental influences.

Nevertheless the phrase of Jefferson's: "That government is best which governs least," the phrase of Walt Whitman's: "Produce fine people, the rest follows"-these appear to contain basic truth. For the progress of the individual affects the progress of society and man can only grow to his proper intellectual and spiritual stature if he has the greatest practicable measure of freedom; if he is protected to the greatest practicable degree from all unnecessary external pressure.

The society which grows and progresses at the expense of the individual, grows and progresses by making the individual citizen subsidiary to aims foreign to him, has definite limits fixed both to its development and its duration.

The society which grows and progresses through the voluntary coöperation of men free to the greatest possible degree has no limits fixed to its development or its duration.

The phrases used to express some of the original ideals of American individualism were faulty. But the deep human impulse they sought to voice is not faulty. Properly rephrased to meet developing conditions it is the enduring glory of America.

THOMAS HOOKER [1638]

A Congregationalist minister in a sermon preached at Hartford, May 31, 1638. The quotation shows how the impulse for religious freedom was inevitably coming to be applied, also, to the civil relations.

Conn. His. Soc. Collections. I, 20-21.

TEXT: Deut. I, 13. "Take you wise men, and understanding, and known among your tribes and I will make them rulers over you. Captains over thousands, and captains over hundreds over fifties-over tens."

DOCTRINE: I. That the choice of public magistrates belongs unto the people by God's own allowance.

II. The privilege of election, which belongs to the people, therefore, must not be exercised according to their humours but according to the blessed will and law of God.

III. They who have power to appoint officers and magistrates, it is in their power, also, to set the bounds and limitations of the power and place unto which they call them.