It is no mistake to think of America as a democratic country. But if you wish to understand the nature and quality of the democracy which prevails there,—its specific marks, its peculiarities, and perhaps its inconsistencies,—you must trace it to its source in the spirit of fair play. Therefore it will be profitable to study this spirit a little more carefully, to define it a little more clearly, and to consider some illustrations of its working in American institutions, society, and character.

The spirit of fair play, in its deepest origin, is a kind of religion. It is true that religious organizations have not always shown it so that it could be identified by people outside. But this has been the fault of the organizations. At bottom, fair play is a man’s recognition of the fact that he is not alone in the universe, that the world was not made for his private benefit, that the law of being is a benevolent justice which must regard and rule him as well as his fellow-men with sincere impartiality, and that any human system or order which interferes with this impartiality is contrary to the will of the Supreme Wisdom and Love. Is not this a kind of religion, and a very good kind? Do we not instinctively recognize a Divine authority in its voice when it says: “Whatsoever ye would that men should do unto you, do ye even so unto them”?

But in its practical operation in everyday affairs this spirit is not always conscious of its deep origin. It is not usually expressed in terms of religion, any more than an ordinary weighing-machine is inscribed with the formula of gravitation. It appears simply as the wish to conduct trade with just weights and measures, to live in a State which affords equal protection and opportunity to all its citizens, to play a game in which the rules are the same for every player, and a good stroke counts, no matter who makes it.

The Anglo-Saxon race has fallen into the habit of claiming this spirit of fair play as its own peculiar property. The claim does not illustrate the quality which it asserts. Certainly no one can defend the proposition that the growth of this spirit in America was due exclusively, or even chiefly, to English influence. It was in New England and in Virginia that ecclesiastical intolerance and social exclusiveness were most developed. In the middle colonies like New York, Pennsylvania, and Delaware, where the proportion of colonists from Holland, France, and Germany was much larger, a more liberal and tolerant spirit prevailed.

But, after all, it must be acknowledged that in the beginning there was no part of America where the spirit of self-reliance really carried with it that necessary complement,—the spirit of fair play. This was a thing of much slower growth. Indeed, it was not until the American people, passionately desiring self-rule, were brought into straits where they needed the help of every man to fight for independence, that they began to feel the right of every man to share equally in the benefits and privileges of that self-rule.

I pass by the discussion of the reasons why this second trait in the soul of the people developed later than the first. I pass by the tempting opportunity to describe the absurd pretensions of colonial aristocracy. I pass by the familiar theme of the inflexible prejudices of Puritan theocracy, which led men to interpret liberty of conscience as the right to practise their own form of worship and to persecute all others. I pass by the picturesque and neglected spectacle of the violence of the mobs which shouted for liberty—a violence which reminds one of the saying of Rivarol that “the crowd never believes that it has liberty until it attacks the liberties of others.” All this I pass by for want of time, and come at once to the classic utterance of the spirit of fair play in America—I mean the Declaration of Independence.

If I must apologize for discussing a document so familiar, it is because familiarity, not being illuminated by intelligence, has bred in these latter days a certain kind of contempt. A false interpretation has led the enthusiastic admirers of the Declaration of Independence to complain that it has been abandoned, and its scornful despisers to say that it ought to be abandoned. The Declaration, in fact, has been as variously and as absurdly explained as the writings of St. Paul, of whom a French critic said that “the only man of the second century who understood St. Paul was Marcion, and he misunderstood him.”

Take the famous sentence from the beginning of that document. “We hold these truths to be self-evident; that all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness; that to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed; that whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to institute a new form of government, laying its foundations on such principles and organizing its power in such form as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness.”

Now what have we here? A defence of revolution, no doubt, but not a sweeping and unqualified defence. It is carefully guarded and limited by the condition that revolution is justified only when government becomes destructive of its own ends,—the security and the happiness of the people.

And what have we here in the way of political doctrine? An assertion of the common rights of man as derived from his Creator, no doubt, and an implication that the specific prerogatives of rulers are not of divine origin. But there is no denial that the institution of government among men has a divine sanction. On the contrary, such a sanction is distinctly implied in the statement that government is necessary for the security of rights divinely given. There is no assertion of the divinity or even the superiority of any particular form of government, republican or democratic. On the contrary, “just powers” are recognized as derivable from the consent of the people. According to this view, a happy and consenting people under George III or Louis XVI would be as rightly and lawfully governed as a happy people under a congress and a president.

And what have we here in the way of social theory? An assertion of equality, no doubt, and a very flat-footed and peremptory assertion. “All men are created equal.” But equal in what? In strength, in ability, in influence, in possessions. Not a word of it. The assertion of such a thing in an assembly which contained men as different as George Washington, with his lofty stature and rich estate, and Samuel Adams, for whose unimpressive person his friends were sometimes obliged to supply lodging and raiment, would have been a palpable absurdity.

“But,” says Professor Wendell, “the Declaration only asserts that men are created equal, not that they must remain so.” Not at all. It implies that what equality exists by creation ought to remain by protection. It is, and ought to be, inalienable.

But what is that equality? Not of person; for that would be to say that all men are alike, which is evidently false. Not of property; for that would be to say that all men are on a level, which never has been true, and, whether it is desirable or not, probably never will be true. The equality which is asserted among men refers simply to the rights which are common to men: life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Here government must make no distinctions, no exceptions. Here the social order must impose no arbitrary and unequal deprivations and barriers. The life of all is equally sacred, the liberty of all must be equally secure, in order that the right of all to pursue happiness may be equally open.

Equality of opportunity: that is the proposition of the Declaration of Independence. And when you come to look at it closely, it does not seem at all unreasonable. For it proposes no alteration in the laws of the universe,—only a principle to be observed in human legislation. It predicts no Utopia of universal prosperity,—only a common adventure of equal risks and hopes. It has not the accent of that phrase, “Liberty, equality, fraternity, or death,” which Chamfort translated so neatly, “Be my brother or I will kill you.” It proceeds rather upon the assumption that fraternity already exists. It says, “We are brothers; therefore let us deal squarely with one another.” It is, in fact, nothing more and nothing less than the voice of the spirit of fair play speaking gravely of the deepest interests of man. Here, in this game of life, it says, as we play it in America, the rules shall be the same for all. The penalties shall be the same for all. The prizes, so far as we can make it so, shall be open to all. And let the best man win.

This, so far as I can see it, or feel it, or comprehend it, is the sum total of democracy in America.

It is not an abstract theory of universal suffrage and the infallibility of the majority. For, as a matter of fact, universal suffrage never has existed in the United States and does not exist to-day. Each State has the right to fix its own conditions of suffrage. It may require a property qualification; and in the past many States imposed this condition. It may require an educational qualification; and to-day some States are imposing this condition. It may exclude the Chinese; and California, Oregon, and Nevada make this exclusion. It may admit only natives and foreigners who have been naturalized, as the majority of the States do. It may admit also foreigners who have merely declared their intention of becoming naturalized, as eleven of the States do. It may permit only men to vote, or it may expressly grant the suffrage to every citizen, male or female, as Idaho, Wyoming, Colorado, and Utah do. The only thing that the law of the nation says upon the subject is that when citizenship is established, the right to vote shall not be denied or abridged on account of race, colour, or previous condition of servitude.

It is entirely possible, therefore, that within this condition, suffrage should expand or contract in the United States according to the will of the people. Woman suffrage might come in next year without the change of a word in the Constitution. All that would be necessary would be a change in the mind of the women, the majority of whom at present do not want to vote, and would not do it if you paid them. On the other hand, educational and property qualifications might be proposed which would reduce the suffrage by a quarter or a third; but this, again, is not likely to happen. The point is that suffrage in America is not regarded as a universal and inalienable human right, but as a political privilege granted on the ground of fair play in order to make the rights of the people more secure.

The undeniable tendency has been to widen the suffrage; for Americans, as a rule, have a large confidence in the reasonableness of human nature, and believe that public opinion, properly and deliberately ascertained, will prove to be a wise and safe guide. But they recognize that a popular election may not always represent public opinion, that a people, like an individual, may and probably will need time to arrive at the best thought, the wisest counsel.

President Grover Cleveland, a confirmed and inflexible Democrat, but not an obstreperous or flamboyant one, often said to me, “You can trust the best judgment of the rank and file, but you cannot always reach that best judgment in a hurry.” James Russell Lowell said pretty much the same thing: “An appeal to the reason of the people has never been known to fail in the long run.” The long run,—that is the needful thing in the successful working of popular suffrage. And that the Americans have tried to gain by the division and distribution of powers, by the interposition of checks and delays, by lodging extraordinary privileges of veto in the hands of governors of States, and of the President of the United States. In short, by making swift action difficult and sudden action impossible, they have sought to secure fair play, even from the crowd, for every man and every interest.

There are some of us who think that this might have been done more easily and more certainly if the bounds of suffrage had not been made so wide. We doubt, for example, whether a group of day-labourers coming from Italy with their padrone are really protected in their natural rights by having the privilege of a vote before they can understand the language of the land in which they cast it. So far from being a protection, it seems to us like a danger. It exposes them to the seductions of the demagogue and to the control of the boss.

The suffrage of the ignorant is like a diamond hung round the neck of a little child who is sent out into the street: an invitation to robbers. It is like a stick of dynamite in the hands of a foolish boy: a prophecy of explosion.

There are some of us who think that “coming of age” might be measured by intelligence as well as by years; that it would be easier to get at the mind of the people if the vote were cast by the people who have minds; that a popular election would come nearer to representing public opinion if there were some way of sifting out at least a considerable part of those electors who can neither read nor write, nor understand the Constitution under which they are voting.

But whatever may be the thoughts and wishes of the more conservative Americans upon this subject, two things are certain. One is that the privilege of voting is a thing which is easy to give away and very hard to take back. The other sure thing is that the Spirit of America will never consent to any restriction of the suffrage which rests upon artificial distinctions, or seems to create ranks and orders and estates within the body politic. If any conditions are imposed, they must be the same for all. If the privilege should be in any way narrowed, it must still be open alike to all who will make the necessary effort to attain it. This is fair play; and this, so far as the suffrage and popular sovereignty are concerned, is what American democracy means. Not that every man shall count alike in the affairs of state, but that every man shall have an equal chance to make himself count for what he is worth.

Mark you, I do not say that this result has been fully accomplished in the United States. The machinery of parties interferes with it. The presentation of men and of measures from a purely partisan point of view interferes with it. In any national election it is reasonably sure that either the Republican party or the Democratic party will win. The policies and the candidates of both have been determined in committee or caucus, by processes which the ordinary citizen does not understand and cannot touch. But what if he does not like the results on either side? What if neither party seems to him clear or consistent or satisfactory? Still he must go with one or the other, or else be content to assert his individuality and lose his electoral efficiency by going in with one of the three or four little parties which stand for moral protest, or intellectual whim, or political vagary, without any possible chance of carrying the election.

A thoughtful man sometimes feels as if he were almost helpless amid the intricacies of the system by which his opinion on national affairs is asked. He sits with his vote in his hand as if it were some strange and antiquated instrument, and says to himself, “Now what, in heaven’s name, am I going to do with this?”

In the large cities, especially, this sense of impotence is likely to trouble the intelligent and conscientious American. For here a species of man has developed called the Boss, who takes possession of the political machinery and uses it for his own purposes. He controls the party through a faction, and the faction through a gang, and the gang through a ring, and the ring by his own will, which is usually neither sweet nor savoury. He virtually owns the public franchises, the public offices, the public payroll. Like Rob Roy or Robin Hood, he takes tribute from the rich and distributes it to the poor,—for a consideration; namely, their personal loyalty to him. He leads his followers to the polls as a feudal chief led his retainers to battle. And the men whom he has chosen, the policies which he approves, are the ones that win.

What does this mean? The downfall of democracy? No; only the human weakness of the system in which democracy has sought to reach its ends; only the failure in duty, in many cases, of the very men who ought to have watched over the system in order to prevent its corruption.

It is because good men in America too often neglect politics that bad men sometimes control them. And, after all, when the evil goes far enough, it secretes its own remedy,—popular discontent, a reform movement, a peaceful revolution. The way is open. Speech is free. There is no need of pikes and barricades and firebrands. There is a more powerful weapon in every man’s hand. Persuade him to use it for his own good. Combine the forces of intelligence and conscience, and the city which sees its own interest will find out how to secure it.

But the trouble, with such a mass of voters, is to produce this awakening, to secure this combination of better forces. It is a trouble which Americans often feel deeply, and of which they sometimes complain bitterly. But after all, if you can get down to the bottom of their minds, you will find that they would rather take their trouble in this form than in any other. They feel that there is something wholesome and bracing in the idea that people must want good government before they can get it. And for the sake of this they are willing, upon the whole, and except during intervals, to give that eternal vigilance which is the price of fair play.

It is not, however, of democracy as it has taken shape in political forms that I would speak; but rather of democracy as a spirit, a sentiment existing in the soul of the American people. The root of it is the feeling that the openings of life, so far as they are under human control, ought to be equal for all. The world may be like a house of many stories, some higher, some lower. But there shall be no locked doors between those stories. Every stairway shall be unbarred. Every man shall have his chance to rise. Every man shall be free to pursue his happiness, and protected in the enjoyment of his liberty, and secure in the possession of his life, so far as he does not interfere with others in the same rights.

This does not mean that all shall be treated alike, shall receive the same rewards. For, as Plato says, “The essence of equality lies in treating unequal things unequally.” But it means what the first Napoleon called la carriÈre ouverte aux talents. Nay, it means a little more than that. For it goes beyond the talents, to the mediocrities, to the inefficiencies, and takes them into its just and humane and unprejudiced account. It means what President Roosevelt meant when he spoke of “the square deal for everybody.” The soul of the American people answered to his words because he had expressed one of their dominant ideals.

You must not imagine that I propose to claim that this ideal has been perfectly realized in America. It is not true that every man gets justice there. It is not true that none are oppressed or unfairly treated. It is not true that every one finds the particular stairway which he wishes to climb open and unencumbered. But where is any ideal perfectly realized except in heaven and in the writings of female novelists? It is of the real desire and purpose, the good intention, the aim and temper of the American people, that I speak. And here I say, without doubt, the spirit of fair play has been, and still is, one of the creative and controlling factors of America.

If you should ask me for the best evidence to support this statement, I should at once name the Constitution and the Supreme Court of the United States. Here is an original institution, created and established by the people at the very birth of the nation, peculiar in its character and functions, I believe, to America, and embodying in visible form the spirit of fair play.

The laws under which a man must live in America are of three kinds. There is first the common law, which prevails in all the States except Louisiana, which is still under the Napoleonic Code. The common law, inherited from England, is contained in the mass of decisions and precedents handed down by the duly established courts from generation to generation. It is supposed to cover the principles which are likely to arise in almost all cases. But when a new principle appears, the judge must decide it according to his conscience and create the legal right.

The second source of law is found in statutes of the United States enacted by Congress, in the constitutions of the different States, and in the statutes enacted by the State legislatures. Here we have definite rules and regulations, not arising out of differences or disputes between individuals, but framed on general principles, and intended to cover all cases that may arise under them.

The third source of law is the Constitution of the United States, which is supreme and sovereign over all other laws. It is the enactment of the whole people. Congress did not create it. It created Congress. No legislation, whether of a State or of the nation, can impair or contravene its authority. It can only be changed by the same power which made it,—the people of the United States, expressing their will, first through a two-thirds majority of the national House and Senate, and then directly through the vote of three-fourths of the forty-six States.

Any statute which conflicts with the Constitution is invalid. Any State constitution which fails to conform to it is, in so far forth, non-existent. Any judicial decision which contradicts it is of no binding force. Over all the complexities of legislation and the perplexities of politics in America stands this law above the laws, this ultimate guarantee of fair play.

The thing to be noted in the Constitution is this: brief as it is for the creative document of a great nation, it contains an ample Bill of Rights, protecting every man alike. The Constitution, as originally framed in 1787, had omitted to do this fully, though it prohibited the States from passing any law to impair the validity of contracts, from suspending the writ of habeas corpus in time of peace, and from other things contrary to the spirit of fair play. But it was evident at once that the Constitution would not be ratified by a sufficient number of the States unless it went much farther. Massachusetts voiced the Spirit of America in presenting a series of amendments covering the ground of equal dealing with all men in the matters most essential to individual freedom and security. In 1790 these amendments, numbered from I to X, were passed by Congress, and in 1791 they became part of the Constitution.

What do they do? They guarantee religious liberty, freedom of speech and of the press, and the right of popular assembly and petition. They protect every man, in time of peace, from criminal indictment except by a grand jury, from secret trial, from compulsion to testify against himself, from being tried again for an offence of which he has been once acquitted, and from the requisition of excessive bail and the infliction of cruel or unusual punishments. They guarantee to him the right to be tried by an impartial jury of his peers and neighbours in criminal cases and in all suits under common law when the amount in controversy exceeds twenty dollars in value. They protect his house from search except under legal and specific warrant, and his property from appropriation for public use without just compensation. They assure him that he shall not be deprived of life, liberty, or property without due process of law.

The remarkable thing about these provisions for fair play is not so much their nature as the place where they are put. In England there is a Bill of Rights, embodied in various enactments, which covers pretty much the same ground. But these, as Mr. James Bryce says, “are merely ordinary laws, which could be repealed by Parliament at any moment in exactly the same way as it can repeal a highway act or lower the duty on tobacco.” But in America they are placed upon a secure and lofty foundation, they are lifted above the passing storms of party politics. No State can touch them. No act of Congress can touch them. They belong to the law above laws.

Nor is this all. A supreme tribunal, coÖrdinate with the national executive and legislature, independent and final in its action, is created by the Constitution itself to interpret and apply this supreme law. The nine judges who compose this court are chosen from the highest ranks of the legal profession, appointed by the President, and confirmed by the Senate. They hold office for life. Their court room is in the centre of the national Capitol, between the wings appropriated to the Senate and the House.

It is to that quiet chamber, so rich, so noble in its dignity and simplicity, so free from pomp and ostentation, so remote from turmoil and confusion, so filled with the tranquil glory of intelligence and conscience, so eloquent of confidence in the power of justice to vindicate itself,—it is to that room that I would take a foreigner who asked me why I believe that democracy in America has the promise of endurance. Those nine men, in their black judicial robes (the only officials of the nation who have from the beginning worn a uniform of office), are the symbols of the American conscience offering the ultimate guarantee of fair play. To them every case in law and equity arising under the Constitution, treaties and laws of the United States, every case of admiralty and marine jurisdiction, every case between citizens of different States, or between two States, every case in which the United States itself is a party, may be brought for final decision. For more than a hundred years this court has discharged its high functions without a suspicion of corruption or a shadow of reproach.

Twenty-one times it has annulled the action of Congress and declared it ultra vires. More than two hundred times it has found that State statutes were contrary to the Constitution and therefore practically non-existent. And these decisions are not made in the abstract, on theory, but in the concrete, on actual cases when the principle of fair play under the Constitution is at stake.

Let me illustrate this. In 1894 a law was passed by Congress taxing all incomes over a certain sum at certain rates. This was, in effect, not a tax based proportionally upon population, but a special tax upon a part of the population. It was also a direct tax levied by the national legislature. There was no necessity of discussing the abstract question of the wisdom or righteousness of such taxation. The only question was whether it was fair play under the Constitution. A citizen of New York refused to pay the tax; the case was brought to the Supreme Court and argued by Mr. Choate, the late American Ambassador to Great Britain. The court held that Congress had no power to impose such a tax, because the Constitution forbids that body to lay any direct tax, “unless in proportion to the census.” By this one decision the income-tax law became null, as if it had never been.

Again, a certain citizen had obtained from the State of Georgia a grant of land upon certain terms. This grant was subsequently repealed by the State by a general statute. A case arose out of the conveyance of this land by a deed and covenant, and was carried to the Supreme Court. The court held that the statute of the State which took the citizen’s land away from him was null, because it “impaired the obligation of a contract,” which the Constitution expressly forbids.

Again, in 1890, Congress passed a measure commonly called the Sherman Anti-Trust Act, declaring “every contract, combination in the form of trusts or otherwise, or conspiracy in restraint of trade or commerce among the several States” to be illegal. This was undoubtedly intended to prevent the merger of railroads and manufacturing concerns into gigantic trusts with monopolistic powers. The American spirit has always understood liberty as including the right of the citizen to be free in the enjoyment of all his faculties, to live and work where he will, and in so doing to move freely from State to State. So far as the trusts were combinations in restraint of this right, the statute properly declared them illegal, and the Supreme Court so interpreted and applied it. But it soon became evident that combinations of labour might restrain trade just as much as combinations of capital. A strike or a boycott might paralyze an industry or stop a railroad. The Supreme Court did not hesitate to apply the same rule to the employees as to the employers. It held that a combination whose professed object is to arrest the operation of railroads whose lines extend from a great city into adjoining States until such roads accede to certain demands made upon them, whether such demands are in themselves reasonable or unreasonable, just or unjust, is certainly an unlawful conspiracy in restraint of commerce among the States.

Again and again the Supreme Court has interfered to prevent citizens of all the States from being deprived by the action of any State of those liberties which belong to them in common. Again and again its decisions have expressed and illustrated the fundamental American conviction which is summed up in the strong words of Justice Bradley: “The right to follow any of the common occupations of life is an inalienable right.”

I have not spoken of the other federal courts and of the general machinery of justice in the United States, because there is not time to do so. If it were possible to characterize the general tendency in a sentence, I would say that it lays the primary emphasis on the protection of rights, and the secondary emphasis on the punishment of offences. Looking at the processes of justice from the outside, and describing things by their appearance, one might say that in many parts of the continent of Europe an accused man looks guilty till he is proved innocent; in America he looks innocent until his guilt is established.

The American tendency has its serious drawbacks,—legal delays, failures to convict, immunity of criminals, and so on. These are unpleasant and dangerous things. Yet, after all, when the thoughtful American looks at his country quietly and soberly he feels that a fundamental sense of justice prevails there not only in the courts but among the people. The exceptions are glaring, but they are still exceptions. And when he remembers the immense and inevitable perils of a republic, he reassures himself by considering the past history and the present power of the Supreme Court, that great bulwark against official encroachment, legislative tyranny, and mobocracy,—that grave and majestic symbol of the spirit of fair play. A republic with such an institution at the centre of its national conscience has at least one instrument of protection against the dangers which lurk in the periphery of its own passions.

If you should ask me for a second illustration of the spirit of fair play in America, I should name religious liberty and the peaceful independence of the churches within the state. I do not call it the “Separation of Church and State,” because I fear that in France the phrase might carry a false meaning. It might convey the impression of a forcible rupture, or even a feeling of hostility, between the government and the religious bodies. Nothing of that kind exists in America. The state extends a firm and friendly protection to the adherents of all forms of religious belief or unbelief, defending all alike in their persons, in the possession of their property, and in their chosen method of pursuing happiness, whether in this world or in the next. It requires only that they shall not practise as a part of their cult anything contrary to public morality, such as polygamy, or physical cruelty, or neglect of children. Otherwise they are all free to follow the dictates of conscience in worshipping or in not worshipping, and in so doing they are under the shield of government.

This is guaranteed not only by the Constitution of the United States, but also by the separate State constitutions, so far as I know, without exception. Moreover, the general confidence and good-will of the state towards the churches is shown in many ways. Property used for religious purposes is exempted from taxation,—doubtless on the ground that these purposes are likely to promote good citizenship and orderly living. Religious marriage is recognized, but not required; and the act of a minister of any creed is, in this particular, as valid and binding as if he were a magistrate. But such marriages must be witnessed and registered according to law, and no church can annul them. It is the common practice to open sessions of the legislature, national and State, with an act of prayer; but participation in this act is voluntary. The President, according to ancient custom, appoints an annual day of national thanksgiving in the month of November, and his proclamation to this effect is repeated by the governors of the different States. But here, again, it is a proclamation of liberty. The people are simply recommended to assemble in their various places of worship, and to give thanks according to their conscience and faith.

The laws against blasphemy and against the disturbance of public worship which exist in most of the States offer an equal protection to a Jewish synagogue, a Catholic cathedral, a Buddhist temple, a Protestant church, and a Quaker meeting-house; and no citizen is under any compulsion to enter any one of these buildings, or to pay a penny of taxation for their support. Each religious organization regulates its own affairs and controls its own property. In cases of dispute arising within a church the civil law has decided, again and again, that the rule and constitution of the church itself shall prevail.

But what of the religious bodies which exist under this system? Do not imagine that they are small, feeble, or insignificant; that they are content to be merely tolerated; that they feel themselves in any way impotent or slighted. They include the large majority of the American people. Twelve millions are adherents of the Catholic Church. The adherents of the Protestant churches are estimated to number between forty and fifty millions. But neither as a whole, nor in any of their separate organizations, do the religious people of America feel that they are deprived of any real rights or robbed of any just powers.

It is true that the different churches are sometimes very jealous of one another. But bad as that may be for them, from a political point of view it is rather a safeguard.

It is true that ecclesiastics sometimes have dreams, and perhaps schemes, which look towards the obtaining of special privileges or powers for their own organization. But that is because ecclesiastics are human and fallible. In the main, you may say with confidence that there is no party or sect in America that has the slightest wish to see church and state united, or even entangled. The American people are content and happy that religion should be free and independent. And this contentment arises from three causes.

First, religious liberty has come naturally, peacefully, in a moderate and friendly temper, with consideration for the conscience and the rights of all, and at the same time, if I mistake not, with a general recognition that the essence of religion, personal faith in a spiritual life and a Divine law, is a purifying, strengthening, elevating factor in human society.

Second, the churches have prospered in freedom; they are well-to-do, they are active, they are able to erect fine edifices, to support their clergy, to carry on benevolent and missionary enterprises on an immense scale, costing many millions of dollars every year. The voluntary system has its great disadvantages and drawbacks,—its perils, even. But upon the whole, religious people in America, Catholics, Protestants, and Jews alike, feel that these are more than counterbalanced by the devotion which is begotten and nourished by the very act of making gifts and sacrifices, and by the sober strength which comes into a man’s faith when he is called to support it by his works.

Men value what they pay for. But this is true only when they pay for what they really want.

Third, and chiefly, religious liberty commends itself to the Americans because they feel that it is the very highest kind of fair play. That a man should have freedom in the affairs of his soul is certainly most vital to his pursuit of happiness. The noble example of tolerance which was set to the American colonies by the Quakers of Pennsylvania, the Baptists of Rhode Island, and the Catholics of Maryland, prevailed slowly but surely over the opposite example of the Puritans of Massachusetts and the Anglicans of Virginia. The saying of William of Orange, “Conscience is God’s province,” has become one of the watchwords of America.

In a country which, as a matter of fact, is predominantly Christian and Protestant, there is neither establishment nor proscription of any form of faith. In the President’s cabinet (1908) I personally know a Jew, a Catholic, a Presbyterian, an Episcopalian, and a Methodist. The President himself is a member of one of the smallest denominations in the country, the Dutch Reformed.

Nor is unfaith penalized or persecuted. A recent writer on America has said that “an avowed atheist is not received in any social circles above that of the ordinary saloon.” Well, an atheist avowed in definite and unmistakable terms, a man who positively affirms that there is no God, is a very difficult person to find in this world of mystery. But a positivist, a free-thinker, a Voltairean, a sceptic, an agnostic, an antisupernaturalist of any kind, has the same rights and privileges as any other man. In America, if his life is clean and his manners decent, he goes everywhere. You may meet him in the best clubs, and in social circles which are at the farthest remove from the saloon. This is not because people like his opinions, but because they feel he is entitled to form them for himself. They take it for granted that it is as impossible to correct unbelief by earthly penalties as it is to deprive faith of its heavenly rewards.

I do not say that this is the right attitude, the only reasonable attitude. I do not wish to persuade any one to adopt it. I say only that it is the characteristic attitude of the Americans, and that sincerely religious people hold it, in the Catholic Church and in the Protestant Church. It may be that the spirit of fair play has blinded them. It may be that it has enlightened them. Be that as it may, they have passed beyond the point of demanding freedom of conscience for themselves to that of conceding it to others. And in this they think that they are acting in accordance with the Divine will and example.

An anecdote will illustrate this attitude better than many paragraphs of explanation. In the older American colleges, which were independent of state control, the original course of study was uniform and prescribed, and chapel services were held which the students were required to attend. Elective studies came in. The oldest of the universities made attendance at chapel voluntary. “I understand,” said a critic to the president of the university, “that you have made God an elective in your college.” The President thought for a moment. “No,” said he, “we understand that He has made Himself elective everywhere.”

There are certain singular limitations in the spirit of fair play in America of which I must say a word in order to play fair. Chief among these is the way in which the people of the colonies and of the United States dealt for many years with the races which have not a white skin.

The American Indians, in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, undoubtedly sinned as much as they were sinned against. They were treacherous, implacable, unspeakably cruel, horribly bloodthirsty. It is no wonder that the colonists regarded them as devils. It is no wonder that the feeling of mistrust and resentment persisted from one generation to another. But the strange thing is that when the Indians were subjugated and for the most part pacified, America still treated them from a hostile and alien point of view, denied them the rights of citizenship, took their property from them, and made it very difficult for them to pursue happiness in any reasonable form. For many years this treatment continued. It was so glaring that a book was written which described the Indian policy of the United States, not altogether unjustly, as A Century of Dishonor. To-day all this is changed. The scattered and diminished remnants of the red men are admitted to citizenship if they wish it, and protected in their rights, and private benevolence vies with government in seeking to better their condition.

The African race, introduced into America for industrial reasons, multiplied more rapidly there than in its native home, and soon became a large factor in the population. But it was regarded and treated from a point of view totally different from that which controlled the treatment of the white factors. It did not share in the rights enumerated in the Declaration of Independence. It was an object of commerce, a source of wealth, a necessity of agriculture. The system of domestic slavery held practically all of the negroes in bondage (in spite of the fact that the Northern States abandoned it, and many of the best men in the South disliked it and protested against it) until the third quarter of the nineteenth century. It was approved, or at least tolerated, by the majority of the people until the Civil War did away with it. It has left as a legacy of retribution the most difficult and dangerous problem of America,—perhaps the greatest and most perplexing problem that any nation has ever had to face.

Nine millions of negroes, largely ignorant and naturally ill-fitted for self-government, are domiciled in the midst of a white population which in some sections of the South they outnumber. How to rule, protect, and educate this body of coloured people; how to secure them in their civil rights without admitting them to a racial mixture—that is the problem.

The Oriental races, recently coming to America in increasing numbers, receive from the people a welcome which cannot be described as cordial. The exclusion of the Chinese from citizenship, and in some States from immigration, is but a small symptom of the general situation. If any considerable number of Burmese or East Indians or Japanese should come, the situation would be the same, and it would be intensified with the increase of the numbers. They would not find the Americans inclined to make an open career for the Oriental talents.

Understand, I am not now condemning this state of affairs, nor am I defending it. That is not my business. I am simply trying to describe it. How is it to be reconciled with the spirit of fair play? I do not know. Perhaps reconciliation is impossible. But a partial understanding of the facts is possible, if you take into account the doctrine of inferior races.

This doctrine is not held or defended by all Americans. Some on religious grounds, some on philosophic grounds, would deny it. But on the mass of the people it has a firm, though in part an unrecognized, hold. They believe—or perhaps feel would be a better word—that the white race has an innate superiority to the coloured races. From this doctrine they have proceeded to draw conclusions, and curiously enough they have put them in the form of fair play. The Indians were not to be admitted to citizenship because they were the wards of the nation. The negroes were better off under slavery because they were like children, needing control and protection. They must still be kept in social dependence and tutelage because they will be safer and happier so. The Orientals are not fit for a share in American citizenship, and they shall not be let in because they will simply give us another inferior race to be taken care of.

I do not propose to discuss the philosophical consistency of such arguments. It is difficult to imagine what place Rousseau would have found for them in his doctrine of the state of nature and the rights of man.

The truth is that the Spirit of America has never been profoundly impressed with the idea of philosophical consistency. The Republic finds herself face to face not with a theory but with a condition. It is the immense mass of the African population that creates the difficulty for America. She means to give equal civil rights to her nine million negroes. She does not mean to let the black blood mix with the white. Whatever social division may be necessary to prevent this immense and formidable adulteration must be maintained intact.

Here, it seems to me, is the supreme test which the Spirit of America has to meet. In a certain sense the problem appears insoluble because it involves an insoluble race. But precisely here, in the necessity of keeping the negro race distinct, and in the duty of giving it full opportunity for self-development, fair play may find the occasion for a most notable and noble triumph.

I have left but a moment in which to speak of the influence of the kind of democracy which exists in America upon social conditions. In a word: it has produced a society of natural divisions without closed partitions, a temper of independence which shows itself either as self-assertion or self-respect according to the quality of the man, and an atmosphere of large opportunity which promotes general good humour.

In America, as elsewhere, people who have tastes and capacities in common consort together. An uneducated man will not find himself at ease in the habitual society of learned men who talk principally about books. A poor man will not feel comfortable if he attempts to keep company with those whose wealth has led them to immerse themselves in costly amusements. This makes classes, if you like, ranks, if you choose to call them so.

Moreover you will find that certain occupations and achievements which men have generally regarded with respect confer a kind of social distinction in America. Men who have become eminent in the learned professions, or in the army or navy, or in the higher sort of politics; men who have won success in literature or the other fine arts; men who have done notable things of various kinds,—such persons are likely to know each other better and to be better known to the world than if they had done nothing. Furthermore there are families in which this kind of thing has gone on from generation to generation; and others in which inherited wealth, moderate or great, has opened the way to culture and refinement; and others in which newly acquired wealth has been used with generosity and dignity; and others in which the mere mass of money has created a noteworthy establishment. These various people, divided among themselves by their tastes, their opinions, and perhaps as much as anything else by their favourite recreations, find their way into the red book of Who’s Who, into the blue book of the Social Register. Here, if you have an imaginative turn of mind, you may discover (and denounce, or applaud, or ridicule) the beginnings of an aristocracy.

But if you use that word, remember that it is an aristocracy without legal privilege or prerogative, without definite boundaries, and without any rule of primogeniture. Therefore it seems to exist in the midst of democracy without serious friction or hostility. The typical American does not feel injured by the fact that another man is richer, better known, more influential than himself, unless he believes that the eminence has been unfairly reached. He respects those who respect themselves and him. He is ready to meet the men who are above him without servility, and the men who are beneath him without patronage.

True, he is sometimes a little hazy about the precise definition of “above” and “beneath.” His feeling that all the doors are open may lead him to act as if he had already passed through a good many of them. There is at times an “I-could-if-I-would” air about him which is rather disconcerting.

There are great differences among Americans, of course, in regard to manners, ranging all the way from the most banal formality to the most exquisite informality. But in general you may say that manners are taken rather lightly, too lightly, perhaps, because they are not regarded as very real things. Their value as a means of discipline is often forgotten. The average American will not blush very deeply over a social blunder; he will laugh at it as a mistake in a game. But to really hurt you, or to lower his own independence, would make him feel badly indeed.

The free-and-easy atmosphere of the streets, the shops, the hotels, all public places, always strikes the foreigner, and sometimes very uncomfortably. The conductor on the railway car will not touch his hat to you; but, on the other hand, he does not expect a fee from you. The workman on the street of whom you ask a question will answer you as an equal, but he will tell you what you want to know. In the country the tone of familiarity is even more marked. If you board for the summer with a Yankee farmer, you can see that he not only thinks himself as good as you are, but that he cultivates a slightly artificial pity for you as “city folks.”

In American family life there is often an absence of restraint and deference, in school and college life a lack of discipline and subordination, which looks ugly, and probably is rather unwholesome. One sometimes regrets in America the want of those tokens of respect which are the outward and visible sign of an inward and spiritual grace.

But, on the other hand, there is probably more good feeling, friendliness, plain human kindness, running around loose in America than anywhere else in the world. The sense of the essential equality of manhood takes away much of the sting of the inequalities of fortune. The knowledge of the open door reduces the offence of the stairway. It is pleasant and wholesome to live with men who have a feeling of the dignity and worth of their own occupations.

Our letter-carrier at Princeton never made any difference in his treatment of my neighbour President Cleveland and myself. He was equally kind to both of us, and I may add equally cheerful in rendering little friendly services outside of his strict duty. My guides in the backwoods of Maine and the Adirondacks regard me as a comrade who curiously enough makes his living by writing books, but who also shows that he knows the real value of life by spending his vacation in the forest. As a matter of fact, they think much more of their own skill with the axe and paddle than of my supposed ability with the pen. They have not a touch of subservience in their manner or their talk. They do their work willingly. They carry their packs, and chop the wood, and spread the tents, and make the bed of green boughs. And then, at night, around the camp-fire, they smoke their pipes with me, and the question is, Who can tell the best story?

IV
WILL-POWER, WORK, AND WEALTH