written in 1772, Rousseau endeavors to carry his principles into practical effect. There is nothing in that pamphlet that concerns us here. There is no suggestion of a Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen to be found in any of Rousseau's writings. Indeed, as we have seen, such a declaration is not in accord with his political philosophy. He does not believe that individuals reserve rights when they agree to form political society. On the contrary, they surrender all their natural rights to the sovereign volonté générale. On the other hand, the enthusiasm with which Frenchmen hailed the American idea of a Declaration of the Rights of Man was in no small part due to the influence of Rousseau's writings. He had familiarized them with the doctrines of the sovereignty of the people, of liberty and equality. Though he conceived these ideas in a different sense from what the Americans did, the difference in conception probably escaped most French men. The great mistake of Rousseau is the error committed by all writers who believed in the contract theory. Like them Rousseau proceeds from the individual to the State. His view is entirely unhistorical. He fails to see that the State is an organism; that a collection of individuals can never become a unity.1 1 On Rousseau: Gierke, Althusius, pp. 201-5; Franck, Ref. et Publ.; Bluntschli, Gesch. d. neueren Staatswiss., pp. 334-363; Fester, Rousseau u. d. deut. Geschichtsphilosophie, 1890; Höffding, Rousseau; John Morley, Rousseau; Janet, II. 415 et seq. THE AMERICAN BILLS OF RIGHTS CHAPTER VIII THE POLITICAL INSTITUTIONS AND DOCTRINES OF THE AMERICAN COLONISTS THE theory of natural rights was already known to the Greeks; that of the sovereignty of the people was put forth frequently during ancient and mediæval times, and yet in Europe neither of these theories had given rise to a Declaration of the Rights of Man. Not even during the seventeenth century, when both these theories were in England held by the Levellers, by Milton, Sidney, Locke, and others, did such a declaration result. The question naturally arises, Why did the Declaration originate in America? The answer must be sought in the character, history, and peculiar conditions of the American colonists. Most of the colonists had been driven from their native land by political or religious oppression. They were men to whom their liberties were dear. They were mainly Englishmen, than whom no other people was more devoted to freedom. Furthermore, the time when they had emigrated was one of great ferment in England; a time when the spirit of opposition to the assertions of royal prerogative and to the encroachments upon popular rights made by autocratic kings was at its height. They held the most liberal religious and political views of their time. Many were Independents who opposed the union of Church and State and demanded liberty of conscience as a sacred right. Their democratic principles of church government gave rise to a democratic political spirit. Each congregation was a miniature republic, electing its pastor and church officers and, while independent of all others, having absolute control over its own affairs. There were many other dissenters besides the Independents scattered throughout the colonies-Baptists, Presbyterians, Quakers, and others. This was a fact of great importance for the subsequent history of America. Religious liberty and political freedom have ever gone hand in hand. There is but a step from religious dissent to political opposition. Men who had suffered persecution for their beliefs, who had braved the dangers of the sea, and had undergone the privations and sufferings incident to the settlement of a new and uncultivated land, were not likely to submit to oppression and infringement of their political liberties. The colonists tried to procure the most liberal charters possible, and a large part of their early history relates to the attempts made to obtain such charters and to compel the enforcement of their stipulations after they had been secured. All the colonies possessed their own local legislatures, |