In One Respect A
Guess May Be Made With Some Safety.
The next President will be a
man whose name has as yet offended no one by its prominence.
But
one requisite is essential for a President; he must be a man whom
none as yet have delighted to honor.
This has come of universal suffrage; and seeing that it has come in
spite of the Constitution, and not by the Constitution, it is very
bad. Nor in saying this am I speaking my own conviction so much as
that of all educated Americans with whom I have discussed the
subject. At the present moment universal suffrage is not popular.
Those who are the highest among the people certainly do not love it.
I doubt whether the masses of the people have ever craved it. It
has been introduced into the presidential elections by men called
politicians; by men who have made it a matter of trade to dabble in
State affairs, and who have gradually learned to see how the
constitutional law, with reference to the presidential electors,
could be set aside without any positive breach of the Constitution.*
* On this matter one of the best, and best-informed Americans that I
have known, told me that he differed from me. "It introduced
itself," said he. "It was the result of social and political
forces. Election of the President by popular choice became a
necessity." The meaning of this is, that in regard to their
presidential elections the United States drifted into universal
suffrage.
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