III. The Third Republic was soon obliged to fight for her life against the same enemy which had wounded her sister mortally. Socialism was still the religion of the working-men of Paris, who now formed the majority of the National Guard. Indignation at the failure of the new Government to repulse the Prussians led, on March 18, 1871, to the capture of all Paris by what was avowedly the revolution of the workmen against the shopkeepers, "in the name of the rights of labour," for "the suppression of all monopolies," "the reign of labour instead of capital," and "the emancipation of the worker by himself." This was in harmony with the teaching of the International Working-men's Association, which endorsed the insurrection fully and formally, and which held with Karl Marx that wealth is produced entirely by labour and belongs only to the working class. Socialists were active in the rebellion; but property-holders in Paris took no part; and all the rest of France took sides with the Government. What professed to be the rising of the many against the few turned out to be that of the few against the many. Impressment was necessary for manning the barricades, and pillage for raising money. The general closing of stores, factories, and offices showed that capital had been frightened away by the red flag. One of the last decrees of its defenders was, "Destroy all factories employing more than fifteen workers. This monopoly crushes the artisan." This spirit would have caused the confiscation of the funds of the National Bank, if the managers had not said: "If you do that, you will turn the money your own comrades have in their pockets to waste paper." The priceless pictures and statues in the Louvre were condemned to destruction because they represented "gods, kings, and priests." Millions of dollars worth of works of art perished in company with docks, libraries, and public buildings; but this vandalism, like the massacre of prisoners, was largely the work of professional criminals. The capture of Paris, late in May, was accompanied with pitiless slaughter of the rebels, though many lives were saved by Victor Hugo.
Since then the French Republic has been able to keep down not only the Socialists but the Bonapartists and Royalists. It has also succeeded, with the help of writers like Renan, in checking the ambition of the clergy. Continuance of peace in Europe has assisted the growth of local self-government in France, and also in Germany. The famous Prussian victories seem, however, to have increased the power of the German Emperor; and there is still danger that the growth of standing armies may check that of free institutions.
CHAPTER III. DEMOCRATS AND GARRISONIANS
I. The fall of the English aristocracy was hastened by the success of democracy in America. Nowhere were the masses more willing to obey the law; and nowhere else were they so intelligent and prosperous. The gains of the many made the country rich; territory and population increased rapidly; and Britannia found a dangerous competitor on every sea. Political liberty and equality were secured by the almost uninterrupted supremacy of the Democratic party from 1800 to 1860. Twelve presidential elections out of fifteen were carried by Jefferson and his successors; and the Congress whose term began in 1841 was the only one out of the thirty in which both Houses were anti-Democratic.
Political equality was increased in State after State by dispensing with property qualifications for voting or holding office. Jefferson and his successor, Madison, refused to appoint days for fasting and giving thanks, or grant any other special privileges to those citizens who held favoured views about religion. Congress after Congress refused to appoint chaplains; so did some of the States; and a national law, still in force, for opening the post-offices on every day of the week, was passed in 1810. Many attempts were made by Sabbatarians to stop the mails; but the Senate voted in 1829, that "Our government is a civil, and not a religious institution"; and the lower House denied next year that the majority has "any authority over the minority except in matters which regard the conduct of man to his fellow-man." The opposition made by the Federalists to the establishment of religious equality in Connecticut, in 1816, increased the odium which they had incurred by not supporting the war against Great Britain. Four years later, the party was practically extinct; and the disestablishment of Congregationalism as the state church of Massachusetts, in 1833, was accomplished easily.
The Northern States were already so strong in Congress that they might have prevented Missouri from entering the Union that year without any pledge to emancipate her slaves. The sin of extending the area of bondage so far northwards was scarcely palliated by the other conditions of the compromise. The admission of Maine gave her citizens no privileges beyond what they had previously as citizens of Massachusetts; and the pledge that slavery should not again be extended north of latitude thirty-six, thirty, proved worthless.
The North was so far from being united in 1820 that it was not even able to raise the tariff. New York, Pennsylvania, and Ohio wished to exclude foreign competition in manufacturing; but the embargo was too recent for New England to forget the evils of restricting commerce. The Salem merchants petitioned for "free trade" "as the sure foundation of national prosperity"; and the solid men of Boston declared with Webster that "A system of bounties and protection" "would have a tendency to diminish the industry, impede the prosperity, and corrupt the morals of the people."
II. The dark age of American literature had ended in 1760. Before that date there were few able books except about theology; and there were not many during the next sixty years except about politics. The works of Franklin, Jefferson, and other statesmen were more useful than brilliant. Sydney Smith was not far wrong in 1820, when he complained in the Edinburgh Review that the Americans "have done absolutely nothing for the sciences, for art, for literature." He went on to ask, "In the four quarters of the globe, who reads an American book?" His question was answered that same year by the publication in London of Irving's Rip Van Winkle and Legend of Sleepy Hoi-low. Bryant's first volume of poems appeared next year, as did Cooper's popular novel, The Spy; and the North American Review had begun half a dozen years before. But even in 1823, Channing could not claim that there really was any national literature, or much devotion of intellectual labour to great subjects. "Shall America," he asked, "be only an echo of what is thought and written in the aristocracies beyond the ocean?"
This was published during the very year in which President Monroe declared that the people of the United States would look upon attempts of European monarchs "to extend their system to any portion of this hemisphere as dangerous to our peace and liberty." Channing was much interested in the study of German philosophy; but he rested his "chief hopes of an improved literature," on "an improved religion." He maintained that no man could unfold his highest powers until he had risen above "the prevalent theology, which has come down to us from the Dark Ages," and which was then "arrayed against intellect, leagued with oppression, fettering inquiry, and incapable of being blended with the sacred dictates of reason and conscience."