the establishment of the Federal Judiciary, and by other changes. They also reconciled by compromise or elimination conflicting interests and jealousies. So successful were their efforts that Gladstone has declared that "The American Constitution is the most wonderful work ever struck off at a given time by the brain and purpose of man."

In the construction of the Constitution the Supreme Court have ever been guided by practical wisdom rather than abstract theory. They have interpreted that instrument to meet the wants and necessities of a great and progressive people, who were extending over a new continent, and whose social needs and national aspirations were constantly changing. They have applied to its provisions the great doctrine of reasonableness. They have placed a liberal construction upon its general powers when a national exigency demanded it. When it became absolutely vital to the safety of the Republic, during the Civil War, to issue paper money as a legal tender, the court sustained the constitutionality of the act, as coming within the implied powers of the Constitution, although the direct grant of such a power in the body of the instrument had been expressly excluded by the framers. Listen to the common-sense view of Mr. Justice Miller on this subject:

"The coin in the country, if it could all have been placed within the control of the Secretary of the

Treasury, would not have made a circulation sufficient to answer army purchases and army payments, to say nothing of the ordinary business of the country. A general collapse of credit, of payment, and of business seemed inevitable, in which faith in the ability of the government would have been destroyed, the rebellion would have triumphed, the States would have been left divided, and the people impoverished. The National Government would have perished, and, with it, the Constitution which we are now called upon to construe with such nice and critical accuracy."

The history of American diplomacy affords a most striking example of this common-sense principle of government and of its power and effectiveness. The secrecy, subtlety, and reserve which characterize the diplomacy of the Old World have been abandoned. Our intercourse with foreign nations is marked by openness, directness, simplicity, while observant of all customary proprieties and courtesies. It has been distinguished by an honesty of purpose and a high moral tone. It has also been pacific, humane, and conducted with due recognition of the rights of others. Its triumphs of the past few years in the far East and elsewhere, and notably in the recent action of President Roosevelt, have placed the United States in the very front rank among the Great Powers of the World. America has become the peacemaker of nations.

There are also numerous instances of the exercise

of the same qualities of plain wisdom and good sense by our great leaders in critical periods of the nation's history. What more sublime act of practical wisdom has the world witnessed than the conduct of Washington at the close of the Revolutionary War and at the head of a victorious army? Casting aside personal ambition and the machinations of designing men, he journeyed to Annapolis, and, entering the Hall of Congress, took the seat assigned him. The presiding officer then declared that "the United States in Congress assembled were prepared to receive his communication." Rising from his seat with a majesty and dignity beyond that of any crowned king, Washington, in his most impressive manner, said:

"The great events on which my resignation depended having at length taken place, I now have the honor of offering my sincere congratulations to Congress, and of presenting myself before them, to surrender into their hands the trust committed to me, and to claim the indulgence of retiring from the service of my country."

ence.

Turn to another instance of the highest practical wisdom by the author of the Declaration of IndependJefferson had grave doubts of the power of the United States, under the Constitution, to acquire the vast territory covered by the Louisiana Purchase. "If, however," he wrote, "our friends shall think differently, certainly I shall acquiesce with satisfaction,

confident that the good sense of our country will correct the evil of construction when it shall produce ill effect." Waiving his scruples as to the constitutionality of the measure, trusting to the good sense of the people to correct the evil, if it should prove to be such, and in obedience to the popular mandate, Jefferson took advantage of this golden opportunity, which, in the words of Grover Cleveland, "doubled the area of the young American nation, and dedicated a new and wide domain to American progress and achievement."

In the construction of the Constitution, John Marshall disdained all theories and abstractions. He cared nothing for the doctrine that a Federal Union is a mere league of sovereign States, that theoretically there can be no such thing as a sovereign over sovereigns, that theoretically a sovereign State may annul any act of the central power and withdraw from the voluntary compact whenever it deems it expedient so to do. On the contrary, he declared that the Constitution must be made to fulfil the great practical purposes for which it was designed. The Constitution was ordained by the people as the paramount law of the land, supreme over Congress and State legislatures. It organized a government complete within itself. It established a perpetual Union, and safeguarded the rights of the people. It was not "a magnificent structure,"

"totally unfit for use," "but a competent guardian of all that is near and dear to us as a nation." It was by the application of these common-sense principles in the construction of the Constitution that Marshall cemented the Union and made us one people.

We may turn for another example to that statesman and martyr President, the product of American institutions, the most American of all Americans, Abraham Lincoln. Of him it was said: "His was the genius of common sense, of common sense in action, of common sense in thought, of common sense enriched by experience and unhindered by fear." Lincoln was not only the incarnation of sound sense, but of prophetic vision. He early foresaw that the Union would be preserved and slavery abolished: "A house divided against itself cannot stand. I believe this government cannot endure permanently half free and half slave. I do not expect the Union to be dissolved; I do not expect the house to fall, but I do expect it will cease to be divided." The war came. Its primary object was to save the Union; but imbedded in that issue was slavery, -the most perplexing and seemingly insoluble problem of the time. Lincoln was convinced that slavery could not be abolished under the Constitution except as a war measure, and that it would be fatal to