Harry Fuller Atwood

“ We radiated over all the world the rays of light, of hope, of progress, of justice, of common sense and of scientific governmental procedure; and while making that matchless record, and wielding that splendid world influence, we made for the United States of America the undisputed leading place among the nations, not because of our great army, our great navy, our vast possessions, or our many people, but because we were enjoying the blessings of the best form of government mankind had ever known. ”

“ We have deposed the Bible in our public schools; would any American object if we substituted the Constitution? Why should our schools have a 'Flag Day'? Why should a teacher point her pupil to the flag and the stars enskied in it, as the symbol of human liberty, without telling him of the tremendous Law that put each star in its place and keeps it there? I would fight for every line in the Constitution as I would for every star in the flag, for flag and Constitution will live or die together. ”

“ And so, on this great continent, which God had kept hidden in a little world—here, with a new heaven and a new earth, where former things had passed away, the people of many nations, of various needs and creeds, but united in heart and soul and mind for the single purpose, builded an altar to Liberty, the first ever built, or that ever could be built, and called it the Constitution of the United States. ”

“ The making of the American Constitution was a stupendous achievement of men who through reading, through reflection, through insight, and through practical experience, had fully grasped the significance of the huge task to which they devoted themselves, and who accomplished that task in a way that has excited the admiration of the civilized world. Those men built a representative republic; they knew the history of other forms of government ”

“ Government ownership is that phase of democracy which assumes that government should not mind its own business.
We should at once abandon all of these dangerous experiments by discharging every board and commission that has been created and by repealing all statutory enactments that have provided for the initiative, referendum and recall in any of the several States. We should avoid the dangers of socialism and anarchy and government ownership as perils that threaten to shake the very foundation of the republic. ”

“ If the people of all nations could be awakened to the tremendous truth that a republic is the only form of government that has solved governmental problems successfully and given wholesome and desirable results, it would compensate in part for the awful sacrifice and carnage of this tragic time. ”

“ All these evidences of the adaptability of the republic successfully to meet unlooked-for emergencies, to harmonize the incoherent elements from other lands, to establish the blessings of liberty, of education and of individual rights, and to successfully solve the problems which had baffled the philosophers and statesmen throughout the ages, are proof that the republic is not only the best, but the standard form of government. ”

“ We should return at once, with all of the humility and penitence of the prodigal son, to a strict and literal adherence to the republic, the golden mean between autocracy and democracy, and encourage the people of each of the other countries of the world to go forward from the form of government that they now have to a republic. ”

“ As one who has consistently championed the cause of equal suffrage for twenty-four years and did it fearlessly when it was less popular than now, I have been chagrined during recent years at the manner in which some women have urged dangerous experiments and applauded the fallacies of the flattering demagogue. Women should remember that the republic was the first form of government under which they were permitted to enter colleges and universities and enjoy the rights of property and the rights of person. ”

“ It would create considerable confusion of thought in the medical world if we should speak of disease as health; if, in the realm of law, we should speak of crime as a contract; if, in the realm of nature, we should speak of a cyclone as a sea breeze; if, in the commercial world, we should speak of a bankrupt as a business success; if, in the religious world, we should speak of a dime novel as the Bible; yet these are fair illustrations to parallel the inaccuracy that prevails in the present-day use of governmental terms. ”

“ The only qualifying terms that can properly be used to describe an autocracy or a democracy are bad, worse, worst. There are no good ones. The only qualifying terms that can properly be used to describe a republic are good, better, best. When a republic ceases to be good it is no longer a republic; it has merged into either a democracy or an autocracy. Just as in the realm of food the only qualifying adjectives that can be used to describe starvation or gluttony are bad, worse, worst, the only qualifying adjectives that can be used to describe nourishment are good, better, best. ”

“ It is a puzzling question to determine whether there should be two permanent political parties or whether the welfare of a Republic requires that a new political party must be born periodically to meet a crisis and advocate a clear, clean-cut issue.
This much, however, is certain. The motto of any political party worthy of continuance should be: A political party can afford to lose if it deserves to win, better than the party can afford to win if it deserves to lose. ”

“ There should be at least one political party in this country that believes in the Constitution and that will be guided by its wise provisions; that believes in the Republic as the best form of government the world has ever known and that will adhere strictly and literally to it. Whether some political party now in existence can throw off its weaknesses and infections and rise to the occasion, or whether a new party must spring forth to meet the situation is a question the future alone must answer. ”

“ It is a noteworthy and singular characteristic of our American government that the Constitution provides a means for protecting individual liberty from invasion by the powers of government itself, as well as from invasion by others more powerful and less scrupulous than ourselves. The principles underlying our civil and political liberty are indelibly written into the Constitution of the United States, and the nation's courts are instituted for their protection. ”

“ It is the golden mean, the republic—the standard form of government, strictly and literally adhered to—which gives just the right amount of participation by the people in governmental affairs and causes the political plant to thrive and reach its best development and its full fruition. ”

“ It is a gross error to provide for the election of judges under any form of government. There is no issue that a candidate for judge can raise in a campaign. The very name of the office means that he is to decide matters in accordance with the law and the evidence.
Our Federal judiciary, which is appointed, has been much better and stronger than it would have been had the Constitution provided for its election. As a proof of this, several States where the judiciary is appointed have a higher grade of judges who do a much better quality of work than is done in States where judges are elected. ”

“ You may read and reread the Constitution, and you cannot find another thing that the people are permitted to do. The Constitution provides for absolutely strict representative government and gives the people no voice in the solution of governmental problems save that of electing representatives to work out the problems. ”

“ This standard form of government would work better than any other form in darkest Africa, densest China, chivalrous France, intellectual England, efficient Germany, chaotic Russia, serious Scandinavia, impulsive Mexico or anywhere else, and it will work better than any other form of government in any nation. State, county, or city, whether the population run into the millions or is limited to a few hundred. The very essence of a republic is to make possible the selection of the best fitted people to work out the problems of government in a representative capacity. ”

“ ALL variations from a strict and literal adherence to the plan and form of government provided by the Constitution have been dangerous experiments to this country and mischievous in their influence upon the world, and every evil from which we suffer governmentally today can be traced directly to a departure from the Constitution. ”

“ If we resort for a criterion to the different principles on which different forms of government are established, we may define a republic to be, or at least may bestow that name on, a government which derives all its powers directly or indirectly from the great body of the people, and is administered by persons holding their offices during pleasure, for a limited period, or during good behavior. ”

“ As people come to know that Lincoln spoke those words and come to understand the full purport of their meaning, the spirit of the great Emancipator will live on, freeing the world from a dangerous experiment that is weakening the effectiveness of our government and undermining the efficiency of other governments throughout the world.
It would take many large volumes to review the expenditures and failures of the various boards and commissions that are gradually wrecking the republic. ”

“ Make drink safe for drunkenness; make food safe for gluttony; make religion safe for fanaticism; make the social world safe for free love; make music safe for discord; make justice safe for lawlessness ”

“ Events have gathered to a head in this the greatest of all war crises. The time is ripe for the people of the world to understand that the Constitution provided for the four elements that constitute a republic and for nothing more. ”

“ He named democracy as the other extreme and defined it as government of the masses; but, the standard form not having been evolved, the golden mean not having been worked out in his day, he could not include the republic as the golden mean. He was therefore forced in his classification to do what we are frequently called upon to do when we cannot find the thing we need—namely, to use the best substitute available—and in lieu of the golden mean he chose aristocracy and defined it as government of the minority. Aristocracy, however, has the same elements and is of the essence of autocracy. ”

“ The republic is a definite, accurate thing with fixed limitations. Take away one or more of the four elements of a republic, and you have some degree of autocracy. Add one or more to the four elements of a republic, and it merges into democracy.
The law of degree also applies to forms of government. The more extreme the autocracy, the more vicious the government; and, on the other hand, the more extreme the democracy, the more vicious the government: but the more strictly and literally the republic is adhered to, the better the government. ”

“ The election of any official by popular vote, aside from the executive and members of the legislative body, is a violation and a dangerous experiment which has brought disastrous results throughout the States. The moment that the people take it upon themselves to elect heads of departments and officials other than the executive and members of the legislative body, they release the executive and legislative body from full responsibility for the quality of public service. ”

“ It may be urged that the republic has not worked perfectly. The answer is that it is not the fault of the form of government, but of its imperfect application. It has provided by far the best government of any form that has ever been devised.
Problems in mathematics are not always worked correctly, but it is not the fault of the digits. It is the fault of imperfect application. Words are misspelled, but it is not the fault of the alphabet. We do not have perfect monetary systems, but it is not the fault of gold. ”

“ The leaders have been guided in their selection of candidates too much by the question, Can the candidate be used; and too little by the question, For what does the candidate stand.
Candidates who are the strongest on promise are generally the weakest on performance. Candidates with the longest platforms of isms and class appeal are generally the shortest on achievement for the public good.
The purpose of a political party should be to succeed by giving the people what they need rather than to succeed by trying to give the crowd what the crowd thinks it wants. ”

“ Any effort toward class legislation or class division is an appeal to passion, prejudice or cupidity. It is the work of demagogues, be they labor leaders, politicians or so–called social–justice reformers. The spirit of a republic is to recognize the equality of all before the law. ”

“ To put the matter bluntly, there is under way in the United States at the present time a definite and determined movement to change our representative republic into a socialistic democracy. That attempt, carried on by men of conviction, men of sincerity, men of honest purpose, men of patriotism, as they conceive patriotism, is the most impressive political factor in our public life of to-day. ”