The power of a chieftain is, however, usually limited by class rights; that is, by the rights of sub-chieftains of especially distinguished families, and of the popular assembly, among which elements the division of power and of jurisdiction is exceedingly varied. These primitive institutions are rude prototypes of future varieties of coercive government, of kingship, either of aristocratic or of republican form, in which the primitive idea of chieftainship as the absorption of all private privileges is given up, and in its place the various principles of rights and duties of government enter.
Growth of Military Classes
Class-differentiation with attendant privileges and prerogatives is especially developed in warlike races, and in nations which must be ever prepared to resist the attacks of enemies, by the establishment of a militant class. The militant class occupies an intermediate position between the governing, priest, and scholar classes on the one hand, and the industrial class—agriculturists, craftsmen, merchants—on the other. Employment in warfare, necessary discipline, near association with the chieftain, and the holding of fiefs for material support give to this class a unique position. Thus the warrior castes developed in India, the feudal and military nobility in Japan, the nobility in Germany, with obligations and service to feudal superiors and to the Court. This system survives for many years, until at last feudal tenure gradually disappears, and its attendant prerogatives are swallowed up by all classes through a universal subjection to military service; although even yet a distinct class of professional soldiers remains at the head of military affairs and operations, and will continue to do so as long as there is a possibility of internal or external warfare. However, here too the militant class is absorbed into a general body of officials. Officials are citizens who not only occupy the usual position of members of the state, but to whom in addition is appointed the execution of the life functions of the nation, as its organs; in other words, such functions as are peculiar to the civic organisation in contradistinction to the general functions exercised and actions performed by individual citizens as independent units. Officialism includes to a special degree duty to its calling and to the public trust, and there are also special privileges granted to officials within the sphere appointed for them.
The Birth of Parliaments
In a society governed by a chieftain, as well as in a monarchy, there is a popular assembly or consultative body; either an unorganised meeting of individuals, or an organised convention of estates founded on class right. A modern development, that certainly had its prototype in the patriarchal state, is the representative assembly, an assembly of individuals chosen to represent the people in place of the popular gathering. The English Government, with its representative legislative bodies, is a typical example in modern civilisation.
One of the chief problems encountered not only in a society ruled by a chieftain, but also in states of later development, whether governed by a potentate or by an aristocracy, is the relation of temporal to spiritual power. Sometimes both are united in the head of the state, as in the cases of the Incas of Peru and of the Caliphate. Sometimes the spiritual head is distinct and separate from the temporal; frequently the two forces are nearly associated, a member of the imperial family being chosen for the office of high-priest, as among the Aztecs. Often, however, the two functions are completely independent of each other, as among many African races, the medicine-man occupying a position entirely independent of the chieftain. Such separation may, of course, lead to friction and civil war; it may also become an element furthering to civilisation, a source of new ideas, opening the way to alliances between nations, and setting bounds to the tyranny of individuals, as exemplified in the relation of the Papacy to the Holy Roman Empire.
State Justice a Momentous Step Forward
The form of state in which the functions of government are exercised by a chieftain contributes greatly to state control and enforcement of justice. The realisation of right had been from the first a social function; but its enforcement was incumbent on the unit group of individuals (families or tribes bound together by friendship). The acquisition by the state of the power to dispense justice and to make and enforce law is one of the greatest events of the world’s history. The idea of all right being incorporated in the chieftain (and social classes) played an important part in bringing about this condition of affairs; for as soon as this conception receives general acceptance, the chieftain, and with him the state, become interested in the preservation and enforcement of justice, even in its lower forms in the common rights of the subjects. On the other hand, not only the interests of chieftainship, but also those of agriculture and commerce, are furthered by the preservation of internal peace; and internal peace calls for state control of justice and enforcement of law.
Mansell