THE

CHAPTER I

FORMS

HE purpose of this chapter is to consider governmental types and their special characteristics, with a view to learn the advantages and disadvantages appertaining to each. To do this effectively, the supposition must be made of each one existing free from mixture with other types,-a supposition merely, as the reality is rarely, if ever, to be found. In other words, we must dwell upon the attributes belonging to the simple forms alone.

Monarchy, or the rule of one, naturally first attracts attention. The notion of one supreme ruler, more or less absolute, is a rude and simple idea. Power and authority are the earliest conceived attributes of government. Monarchy and militarism are closely associated. It is easy to suppose that the first idea of monarchy must have arisen from the needs of defence or of aggression. The habits of discipline, of implicit obedience, and of reliance on individual skill-the essential qualities of militarism-are found in monarchy more completely than in any other governmental form. Accordingly, it is the one best fitted for the creation of nations, for extension of territory, and for national aggrandisement. Its prominent feature is force; its effect, the development of the State rather than of the individual. Monarchy, then, is favorable to compactness and power in the State, is hostile to personal liberty and advancement. Lest the example of States of the mixed form may be quoted in

opposition to this view, the warning before given must be heeded, that the monarchical attributes and effects alone are in question.

The early military monarchies depended on the personal qualities of the leader, and naturally lacked the permanence of character which belongs to the dynastic power. In elective monarchies there must be at the close of each reign a disruption of an existing order, a period of uncertainty, to be followed by a new order having its special characteristics, though more or less restricted by tradition or by system. But there is here impressed on the public mind the notion of change and the possibility of improvement, contrasted with the hopelessness of the settled form. The elective system, however, is left too much to the personal character of the monarch at the time being. It precludes the notion of Constitutional principles. Only when the succession is fixed after a certain method, and especially when the hereditary principle is introduced, is a permanent form established, with fixity of institutions and a larger degree of personal rights. The hereditary method of succession seems to have commended itself by the assured possession which it offers, and by the avoidance of turmoil and unsettled conditions. In this respect it is a distinct advance upon earlier methods. Its effect in consolidating and fixing the monarchical idea, is owing to various influences acting on the human mind. In itself, however, hereditary succession is a curious anomaly. To one educated in sound principles of government, which assume that the chief office in a State demands competency in its administrator, hereditary succession is an absurdity. That the qualities which insure a good administration of office should be directly transmitted is improbable to the highest degree. Heredity doubtless is a law. The causes which produce effects obey that law, but they are numerous, and the degree of weight which attaches to each is

indeterminable. The qualities derived by inheritance come from so many sources, and in such varied proportions, as to preclude a sufficient knowledge on which to base computation. That any quality, or any set of qualities, may be transmitted, there must be a freedom from composition with other qualities. The character of an individual is subject also to modification by various circumstances from time to time affecting it, so that transmissible qualities become changed or lost and the transmission is interrupted. It is evident, then, that we cannot look with any certainty to inheritance for desired properties.

But that which may not be ascertainable in individual cases may obtain in the aggregate. The degree of particularity essential in individual cases is not necessary in aggregates. Facts which vitiate conclusions in particular instances may have but slight influence in general cases. Modifying circumstances also may be taken into account, and their operation be computed. The character of a people may be observed, the action of various customs and habits be noted, and the transmissible properties of race be assumed with a large degree of accuracy. The methods of reasoning differ as applied to aggregates or to particulars. The hereditary principle, then, as a means of obtaining personal competency, is inadmissible in politics. But in politics the hereditary principle does not base its claim for recognition on such grounds. It serves in monarchy, besides giving the permanence afforded by regular succession, to impress on the public mind the idea of legitimacy—and legitimacy in this connection implies a great deal. There is something in the notion of inheritance as an innate right which appeals to the general sense of justice. The prescriptive right of long occupation also asserts its claim. If the term "legitimacy" were restricted in its import to a claim, sanctioned by an established order and by a fitness of

purpose, it would be unobjectionable. But in the numerous wars and disturbances occasioned by the clashing of opposing claims, the word has been extended to signify an actual property in the State and in a people, of the right of authority on the one hand, and the duty of obedience on the other. The belief expressed by the meaning of "legitimacy" is a complete misconception of the office of the governing body or of the administrator of public affairs in a State. Loyalty to a person is implied rather than loyalty to a people, and the public good is sacrificed to the supposed rights of one or of a few. This error is one of belief and of reasoning, the result of a continued line of thought and of education; but it is strongly reinforced by a peculiar sentiment, probably an outgrowth of this belief. There is a mixture of the ridiculous and the sublime in the veneration which attaches itself to the notion of royalty. The sublimity lies in the devotion and self-sacrifice which it has so often called forth; the ridiculous, in the insufficient foundation on which it rests, and the frequent contrast between the greatness of the devotion and the littleness of the object on which it is lavished.

Nevertheless, the stability of many monarchical systems, resisting attempts at destruction, resisting even attempts at reformation, is owing to this belief and this sentiment, and the latter is not the least of the sustaining forces. Sentiment is a power against which scientific truth has constantly to contend. The conception of special divine creation or of divine countenance to any system grants it a title superior to any modern consideration of utility. The belief once admitted concedes authority to the utmost degree of absolutism. The most. concentrated form of this belief is found in theocracies, where it implies that the civil Constitution is prescribed by divinity, or that the course of administration is constantly under divine direction. This would necessitate

an intercourse with the Supreme Being directly, or through the medium of a sacerdotal body. The supernatural is thus ever present, re-enforcing the civil power. A somewhat similar conception represents the ruling power, although of human creation, filling, in some obscure way, a sacred office. The reason of this belief, at one time very general, does not very clearly appear. It may be a survival, or a modification, of the theocratic idea. It may be an impression produced by long-continued authority. It may be the effect of association between the Church and the State.

In this association there would seem to be a mutual benefit. Though sometimes in antagonism, the power of mutual assistance is a bond of union between these two institutions. The Church has often needed the aid of the temporal power to secure its possessions, and to enforce its decrees. The State, whether seeking prophetic sanction, oracular approval, or the security derived from the injunction of non-resistance, invokes the assistance of the Church to sanctify its authority. But, however obtained, the impression of a divine derivation intensifies civil power, and tends to remove from those in authority the wholesome restraints of responsibility to those for whose benefit the office should be administered. Although the theocratic idea in completeness or in a modified form may be associated with various governmental systems, it affiliates most readily with the monarchical form, and but rarely with any other form. There is a kinship of methods between the two which renders their union an easy one. The pomp and circumstance of royalty are additional aids to creating an impress of legitimacy. The ordinary mind, much influenced by show, unable to distinguish between the real and the false, between the outward form and the substance, fails to recognise the right to existence based on adaptation to a distinct end.