[Footnote a: We observed, in examining the Federal Constitution, that
the efforts of the legislators of the Union had been diametrically
opposed to the present tendency. The consequence has been that the
Federal Government is more independent in its sphere than that of the
States. But the Federal Government scarcely ever interferes in any
but external affairs; and the governments of the State are in the
governments of the States are in reality the authorities which direct
society in America.]

The legislature is, of all political institutions, the one which is most
easily swayed by the wishes of the majority. The Americans determined
that the members of the legislature should be elected by the people
immediately, and for a very brief term, in order to subject them, not
only to the general convictions, but even to the daily passion, of their
constituents. The members of both houses are taken from the same
class in society, and are nominated in the same manner; so that the
modifications of the legislative bodies are almost as rapid and quite as
irresistible as those of a single assembly. It is to a legislature thus
constituted that almost all the authority of the government has been
entrusted.

But whilst the law increased the strength of those authorities which
of themselves were strong, it enfeebled more and more those which were
naturally weak. It deprived the representatives of the executive of all
stability and independence, and by subjecting them completely to the
caprices of the legislature, it robbed them of the slender influence
which the nature of a democratic government might have allowed them to
retain. In several States the judicial power was also submitted to the
elective discretion of the majority, and in all of them its existence
was made to depend on the pleasure of the legislative authority, since
the representatives were empowered annually to regulate the stipend of
the judges.

Custom, however, has done even more than law. A proceeding which will in
the end set all the guarantees of representative government at naught
is becoming more and more general in the United States; it frequently
happens that the electors, who choose a delegate, point out a certain
line of conduct to him, and impose upon him a certain number of positive
obligations which he is pledged to fulfil. With the exception of the
tumult, this comes to the same thing as if the majority of the populace
held its deliberations in the mark