ing States offer the facilities for introducing this plan without inconvenience, whereas in Great Britain, where they have their districts formed, districts which have existed for centuries, where the habits and relations of the people have been formed for long periods of time, until they have become inveterate, it is almost impossible to make up political constituencies upon whom to apply this plan of voting. In our States, however, in nearly all of which more members than one are to be elected by the same body of electors, the introduction of this plan is both possible and convenient.

I conclude, Mr. President, by saying that I shall attach, probably, to my remarks a tabular statement, summing up the results of representation as they are exhibited by the existing system in the composition of the Fortieth Congress, excluding, possibly, some of the returns which I do not possess. Now, I submit to the Senate, and to whoever in the country may pay attention to our proceedings and see my remarks on this occasion, that upon grounds of both reason and authority this proposition has been sustained; and that if it be introduced into this country, whether in one State or in many States, or universally throughout the country, in any event it will bear the character of a material, useful, and necessary reform of our political system.

SPEECH

AT THE

ASSEMBLY BUILDINGS, PHILADELPHIA,

TUESDAY EVENING, NOV. 19, 1867.

Fellow-Citizens of the City of Philadelphia:— You have had stated to you the circumstances under which I appear in your presence to speak upon the subject of representative reform. Without any introductory remarks, without pausing over preliminary topics, I shall proceed to the subjectmatter of my discourse.

Ours is said to be a Government of the people, meaning by that term the whole electoral body with whom the right of suffrage is lodged by our constitution. The people, considered in this sense, are said to rule themselves, and our system is therefore described as one of self-government. Those who are bound by the laws are to enact them. Power is in the first instance exerted by them and obedience yielded afterward. All rests upon their voluntary assent and upon their free action. But, as it is impossible that the whole mass of the political community should assemble together for the purpose of enacting or agreeing upon those rules of conduct

which are to bind the citizens, and as it would be impossible for such an enormous body, even if it were convened, to act with convenience or to act at all, we, like the people of other countries in former times have resorted to what is known as the representative system.

From the impossibility of convening ourselves together to determine those great questions which pertain to the political and social bodies, and about which government is employed, we have determined to select from among ourselves a certain number of persons with whom shall be lodged all our powers connected with legislation and with government, and whatsoever they shall determine shall be to us and to all men within our borders the law of individual conduct.

Well, now, gentlemen, in carrying on this system of representative government the manner in which the agents of the people shall be selected becomes in the highest degree important. Although by our theory, although by our fundamental principle of self-government by the people, all the people are to be represented in the making of laws and in the administration of government, in point of fact we have not attained to this result. We have fallen short of it in our arrangements, and hence it is that men of intelligence and of sagacity, driven to their conclusions by thorough examination and by full inquiry, have been compelled to declare that our system is imperfect, and imperfect to such an extent that the quality of our government is deeply affected, and many pernicious things have place in its administration.

Instead of there being under the representative system, as it is known among us, a representation of the entire electoral body, of all the individuals who compose it, there is in fact a representation of only a part. In other words, representation instead of being complete and coextensive with all those who are to be represented and who are to be bound by the action of government, is partial and restricted to a part only of the political body.

Well, gentlemen, in the infancy or in the early stages of a Government an imperfection of this kind may be permitted or overlooked. The affairs of society when they are not complicated, before the community has become rich, before its affairs, social and political, become involved and intricate, may admit of very rude and imperfect arrangements, and yet the people may be well governed, the laws may be just and wholesome and administered in a proper spirit and with complete success. But, as wealth accumulates, as population becomes dense and great cities grow up, as vices are spread through the social body, and as widely extended and complicated political action becomes necessary, those earlier and simpler arrangements-imperfect always-become positively pernicious and hurtful; and the necessity arises for their correction, and that the system of government shall be purified and invigorated by amendment.

In your popular elections which are held or taken under the majority or rather under the plurality rule, (which ordinarily amounts to the same thing,) at your popular elections the smaller number of voices which are spoken in the election of represent

atives who are to enact your laws are stricken from the count. When the officers charged with the duty of collecting the voices of the people come to make up the count and declare the result, they strike from the poll or the return all those who when numbered are the smaller quantity or the smaller political force. Then after your representatives selected in this manner by a majority merely, by a part of the community, are convened together, when they come to act in the business of government, to enact laws, they again act by a similar rule. The majority in the representative body pronounce the opinion and decree of that body, and what they pronounce becomes law, binding upon all the people. Now, what is observable in this statement of facts? Why, that in the first place, in selecting representatives you strike off a part of the political body; then, again, in representative action you strike off the minority of the representative body, who represent another portion or mass of the popular electors. The result is that your laws may be made by men who represent a minority of the people who are to be bound by the laws so made. A representative majority may not be, in point of fact -and often is not-a representative of the majority of the people.

When we come to consider in addition to this that the representative majority, whether in a State Legislature or in Congress, in modern times or comparatively corrupt times, when pernicious and selfish interests invade the halls of legislation, ordinarily acts under what is known as the caucus system; you perceive how far we have departed from those рори