eld for illustrations. A few samples
will suffice. "It was natural," says Mill (_Rep. Gov._, p. 311), "to
feel strong doubts before trial had been made how such a provision [as
the Supreme Court of the United States] would work; whether the tribunal
would have the courage to exercise its constitutional power; if it did,
whether it would exercise it wisely, and whether the Government would
consent peaceably to its decision. The discussions on the American
Constitution, before its final adoption, give evidence that these
natural apprehensions were strongly felt; but they are now entirely
quieted, since, during the two generations and more which have
subsequently elapsed, nothing has occurred to verify them, though there
have at times been disputes of considerable acrimony, and which became
the badges of parties respecting the limits of the authority of the
Federal and State Governments." The Austrian opponents of Home Rule in
Hungary predicted that it would lead straight to separation. The
opponents of the Canadian Constitution prophesied that Canada would in a
few years be annexed to the United States; and Home Rule in Australia
was believed by able statesmen to involve independence at an early date.
Mr. Dicey himself tells us "that the wisest thinkers of the eighteenth
century (including Burke) held that the independence of the American
Colonies meant the irreparable ruin of Great Britain. There were
apparently solid reasons for this belief: experience has proved it to be
without foundation." The various changes in our own Constitution, and
even in our Criminal Code, were believed by "men of light and leading"
at the time to portend national ruin. All the judges in the land, all
the bankers, and the professions generally, petitioned against
alteration in the law which sent children of ten to the gallows for the
theft of a pocket-handkerchief. The great Lord Ellenborough declared in
the House of Lords that "the learned judges were unanimously agreed"
that any mitigation in that law would imperil "the public security." "My
Lords," he exclaimed, "if we suffer this Bill to pass we shall not know
where we stand; we shall not know whether we are on our heads or on our
feet." Mr. Perceval, when leader of the House of Commons in 1807,
declared that "he could not conceive a time or change of circumstances
which would render further concessions to the Catholics consistent with
the safety of the State." (_Croker Papers_, i. 12.) Cro