Page:Joseph Story, Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States (1st ed, 1833, vol II).djvu/37

 CH. VIII.] has, in a few pages of pregnant sense and brevity, condensed a decisive argument. There is danger, however, that it may hereafter be revived; and indeed it is occasionally hinted by gifted minds, as a problem yet worthy of a fuller trial.

§ 549. It may not, therefore, be uninstructive to review some of the principal arguments, by which this division is vindicated. The first and most important ground is, that it forms a great check upon undue, hasty, and oppressive legislation. Public bodies, like private persons, are occasionally under the dominion of strong passions and excitements; impatient, irritable, and impetuous. The habit of acting together produces a strong tendency to what, for want of a better word, may be called the corporation spirit, or what is so happily expressed in a foreign phrase, l'esprit du corps. Certain popular leaders often acquire an extraordinary ascendency over the body, by their talents, their eloquence, their intrigues, or their cunning. Measures are often introduced in a hurry, and debated with little care, and examined with less caution. The very restlessness of many minds produces an utter impossibility of debating with much deliberation, when a measure has a plausible aspect, and enjoys a momentary favour. Nor is it infrequent, especially in cases of this sort, to overlook well-founded objections to a measure, not only because the advocates of it have little desire to bring them in review, but because the opponents are often seduced into a credulous silence. A legislative body is not ordinarily apt to mistrust its own powers, and far