Page:Joseph Story, Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States (1st ed, 1833, vol II).djvu/188

 180 of the public interests, and the same indifference to, and prostration of private rights. It will only be a duplication of the evils of oppression and rashness, with a duplication of obstructions to effective redress. In this view, the organization of the senate becomes of inestimable value. It represents the voice, not of a district, but of a state; not of one state, but of all; not of the interest of one state, but of all; not of the chosen pursuits of a predominant population in one state, but of all the pursuits in all the states.

§ 698. It is a misfortune incident to republican governments, though in a less degree than to other governments, that those, who administer it, may forget their obligations to their constituents, and prove unfaithful to their trusts. In this point of view, a senate, as a second branch of legislative power, distinct from, and dividing power with the first, must always operate as a salutary check. It doubles the security to the people, by requiring the concurrence of two distinct bodies in any scheme of usurpation or perfidy, where otherwise the ambition of a single body would be sufficient. The improbability of sinister combinations will always be in proportion to the dissimilarity of the genius of the two bodies; and therefore every circumstance, consistent with harmony in all proper measures, which points out a distinct organization of the component materials of each, is desirable.

§ 699. No system could, in this respect, be more admirably contrived to ensure due deliberation and inquiry, and just results in all matters of legislation. No law or resolution can be passed without the concurrence, first of a majority of the people, and then of