ic" means a thing, affair, or
matter, closely related to, and touching the "public;" and that the
"public" are the "people"--not a small proportion of them, but "the
people at large," the whole community, the Nation, the commonalty, the
generality. Hence, "a Republican form of government" is, in their
opinion, plainly that form which is most closely identified with, and
representative of, the generality or majority of the people; or, in the
language of Dr. J. E. Worcester, it is "That form of government or of a
State, in which the supreme power is vested in the people, or in
representatives elected by the people."

It is obvious that there can be no such thing as "a republic," which is,
at the same time, "an aristocracy;" for the moment that which was "a
republic" becomes "an aristocracy," that moment it ceases to be "a
republic." So also can there be no such thing as "a republic" which is
"an oligarchy," for, as "a republic" is a government of the many, or, as
President Lincoln well termed it, "a government of the people, by the
people, for the people"--so it must cease to be "a republic," when the
supreme power is in the hands of the oligarchic few.

There can be but two kinds of republics proper--one a democratic
republic, which is impossible for a great and populous Nation like ours,
but which may have answered for some of the small republics of ancient
Greece; the other, a representative republic, such as is boasted by the
United States. And this is the kind palpably meant by the Fathers,
when, for the very purpose of nipping in the bud any anti-republican
Conspiracy likely to germinate from Slavery, they inserted in the Great
Charter of American Liberties the solemn and irrevocable mandate: "The
United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican
Form of Government." That they meant this majority rule--this
government by the many, instead of the few--this rule of the People, as
against any possible minority rule, by, or through, oligarchs or
aristocrats, is susceptible of proof in other ways.

It is a safe guide, in attempting to correctly expound the Constitution
of the United States, to be careful that the construction insisted on,
is compatible and harmonious with the spirit of that great instrument;
so that--as was said by an eloquent and distinguished Massachusetts
statesman of twenty years ago, in discussing this very point--"the
guarantee of a Republican form of government must hav