Common Sense

nature, which no art can overturn, viz. that the more simple any
thing is, the less liable it is to be disordered, and the easier
repaired when disordered; and with this maxim in view, I offer a few
remarks on the so much boasted constitution of England. That it was
noble for the dark and slavish times in which it was erected, is
granted. When the world was over run with tyranny the least remove
therefrom was a glorious rescue. But that it is imperfect, subject to
convulsions, and incapable of producing what it seems to promise, is
easily demonstrated.

  Absolute governments (tho' the disgrace of human nature) have this
advantage with them, that they are simple; if the people suffer, they
know the head from which their suffering springs, know likewise the
remedy, and are not bewildered by a variety of causes and cures. But
the constitution of England is so exceedingly complex, that the
nation may suffer for years together without being able to discover
in which part the fault lies, some will say in one and some in
another, and every political physician will advise a different
medicine.

  I know it is difficult to get over local or long standing
prejudices, yet if we will suffer ourselves to examine the component
parts of the English constitution, we shall find them to be the base
remains of two ancient tyrannies, compounded with some new republican
materials.

  FIRST. The remains of monarchical tyranny in the person of the
king.

  SECONDLY. The remains of aristocratical tyranny in the persons of
the peers.

  THIRDLY. The new republican materials, in the persons of the
commons, on whose virtue depends the freedom of England.

  The two first, by being hereditary, are independent of the people;
wherefore in a CONSTITUTIONAL SENSE they contribute nothing towards
the freedom of the state.

  To say that the constitution of England is a UNION of three
powers reciprocally CHECKING each other, is farcical, either the
words have no meaning, or they are flat contradictions.

  To say that the commons is a check upon the king, presupposes two
things.

  FIRST. That the king is not to be trusted without being looked
after, or in other words, that a thirst for absolute power is the
natural disease of monarchy.

  SECONDLY. That the commons, by being appointed for that purpose,
are either wiser or more worthy of confidence than the crown.

  But as the same constitution which gives the commons a power to
check the king by withholding the supplies, gives afterwards the king
a power to check the commons, by empowering him to reject their other
bills; it again supposes that the king is wiser than those whom it
has already supposed to be wiser than him. A mere absurdity!

  There is something exceedingly ridiculous in the composition of
monarchy; it first excludes a man from the means of information, yet
empowers him to act in cases where the highest judgment is required.
The state of a king shuts him from the world, yet the business of a
king requires him to know it thoroughly; wherefore the different
parts, by unnaturally opposing and destroying each other, prove the
whole character to be absurd and useless.

  Some writers have explained the English constitution thus; the
king, say they, is one, the people another; the peers are an house in
behalf of the king; the commons in behalf of the people; but this
hath all the distinctions of an house divided against itself; and
though the expressions be pleasantly arranged, yet when examined they
appear idle and ambiguous; and it will always happen, that the nicest
construction that words are capable of, when applied to the
description of some thing which either cannot exist, or is too
incomprehensible to be within the compass of description, will be
words of sound only, and though they may amuse the ear, they cannot
inform the mind, for this explanation includes a previous question,
viz. HOW CAME THE KING BY A POWER WHICH THE PEOPLE ARE AFRAID TO
TRUST, AND ALWAYS OBLIGED TO CHECK? Such a power could not be the
gift of a wise people, neither can any power, WHICH NEEDS CHECKING,
be from God; yet the provision, which the constitution makes,
supposes such a power to exist.

  But the provision is unequal to the task; the means either cannot
or will not accomplish the end, and the whole affair is a felo de se;
for as the greater weight will always carry up the less, and as all
the wheels of a machine are put in motion by one, it only remains to
know which power in the constitution has the most weight, for that
will govern; and though the others, or a part of them, may clog, or,
as the phrase is, check the rapidity of its motion, yet so long as
they cannot stop it, their endeavors will be ineffectual; the first
moving power will at last have its way, and what it wants in speed is
supplied by time.

  That the crown is this overbearing part in the English constitution
needs not be mentioned, and that it derives its whole consequence
merely from being the giver of places and pensions is self-evident;
wherefore, though we have been wise enough to shut and lock a door
against absolute monarchy, we at the same time have been foolish