KING CHARLES
1648.
The Commonwealth.
Government in the United States.
Ownership.
After the death of Charles, a sort of republic was established in England, called the Commonwealth, over which, instead of a king, Oliver Cromwell presided, under the title of Protector. The country was, however, in a very anomalous and unsettled state. It became more distracted still after the death of the Protector, and it was only twelve years after beheading the father that the people of England, by common consent, called back the son to the throne. It seems as if there could be no stable government in a country where any very large portion of the inhabitants are destitute of property, without the aid of that mysterious but all controlling principle of the human breast, a spirit of reverence for the rights, and dread of the power of an hereditary crown. In the United States almost every man is the possessor of property. He has his house, his little farm, his shop and implements of labor, or something which is his own, and which he feels would be jeopardized by revolution and anarchy. He dreads a general scramble, knowing that he would probably get less than he would lose by it. He is willing, therefore, to be governed by abstract law. There is no need of holding up before him a scepter or a crown to induce obedience. He submits without them. He votes with the rest, and then abides by the decision of the ballot-box. In other countries, however, the case is different. If not an actual majority, there is at least a very large proportion of the community who possess nothing. They get scanty daily food for hard and long-continued daily labor; and as change, no matter what, is always a blessing to sufferers, or at least is always looked forward to as such, they are ready to welcome, at all times, any thing that promises commotion. A war, a conflagration, a riot, or a rebellion, is always welcome. They do not know but that they shall gain some advantage by it, and in the mean time the excitement of it is some relief to the dead and eternal monotony of toil and suffering.
No stable governments result from violent revolutions.
It is true that the revolutions by which monarchies are overturned are not generally effected, in the first instance, by this portion of the community. The throne is usually overturned at first by a higher class of men; but the deed being done, the inroad upon the established course and order of the social state being once made, this lower mass is aroused and excited by it, and soon becomes unmanageable. When property is so distributed among the population of a state that all have an interest in the preservation of order, then, and not till then, will it be safe to give to all a share in the power necessary for preserving it; and, in the mean time, revolutions produced by insurrections and violence will probably only result in establishing governments unsteady and transient just in proportion to the suddenness of their origin.
The End.
Footnotes.
[A] Meaning advice to him how he shall make laws, as is evident from what is said below.
[B] Species of taxes granted by Parliament.