“Such facts have induced nations to abandon the practice of electing their chief magistrate; preferring to receive that officer by hereditary succession. Men have found that the chances of having a good chief magistrate by birth, are about equal to the chances of obtaining one by popular election. And, boast as we will, that the superior intelligence of our citizens may render this government an exception, time will show that this is a mistake. No nation can be an exception, till the Almighty shall change the whole character of man.
“It is a solemn truth, that when executive officers are dependent for their offices on annual or frequent elections, there will be no impartial or efficient administration of the laws.
“It is in vain that men attempt to disguise the truth; the fact, beyond all debate, is that the disorders in our political affairs are the genuine and natural consequences of defects in the Constitution, and of the false and visionary opinions which Mr Jefferson and his disciples have been proclaiming for forty years.
“The mass of the people seem not to consider that the affairs of a great commercial nation require for their correct management talents of the first order.
“Of all this, the mass of our population appear to know little or nothing.
“The mass of the people, seduced and disciplined by their leaders, are still farther deceived, by being taught that our public disorders are to be ascribed to other causes than the ignorance and perversity of their party.
“And yet our citizens are constantly boasting of the intelligence of the people! Intelligence! The history of nations cannot present an example of such total want of intelligence as our country now exhibit: and what is more, a want of integrity is equally surprising.”
This is strong language to use in a republic, but let us examine a little.
The great desideratum to be attended to in the formation of a government is to guard against man preying upon his fellow-creature. Call a government by any name you will, prescribe what forms you may, the one great point to be adhered to, is such a code of laws as will put it out of the power of any one individual, or any one party, from oppressing another. The despot may trifle with the lives of his people; an aristocracy may crush the poorer classes into a state of bondage, and the poorer classes being invariably the most numerous, may resort to their physical force to control those who are wealthy, and despoil them of their possessions. Correctly speaking, the struggle is between the plebeian and the patrician, the poor and the rich, and it is therefore that a third power has, by long experience, been considered as necessary (an apex, or head to the pyramid of society), to prevent and check the disorders which may arise from struggles of ambition among the upper classes.
Wherever this apex has been wanting, there has been a continual attempt to possess it; whenever it has been elective, troubles have invariably ensued; experience has, therefore, shewn that, for the benefit of all classes, and the maintenance of order, the wisest plan was to make it hereditary. It is not to be denied that despotism, when it falls into good hands, has rendered a nation flourishing and happy, that an oligarchy has occasionally, but more rarely, governed with mildness and a regard to justice; but there never yet was a case of a people having seized upon the power, but the result has been one of rapacity and violence, until a master-spirit has sprung up and controlled them by despotic rule. But, although one despot, or one oligarchy may govern well, they are exceptions to the general rule; and, therefore, in framing a government, the rule by which you must be guided, is on the supposition that each class will encroach, and the laws must be so constituted as to guard against the vices and passions of mankind.