Page:Letters to a friend on votes for women.djvu/82

 unchanged for some 140 years? The answer is that this work of Whig statesmanship on the whole satisfied the large landowners, the merchants, and the traders, who constituted the true strength of England.

Consider for a moment the experiment, tried in our own times by the American democracy, of conferring full political rights on the negroes of the South. There was much to be said in its favour. In a democratic Republic, men argued, no class could obtain respect or secure its own civil rights unless it had its share in political sovereignty. This was the conviction of most, though not of all. Abolitionists. It was entertained by some of the best and wisest of American statesmen. In the decision finally adopted, noble enthusiasm and philanthropy played a far greater part than partisanship or the shallow astuteness of party managers. The generous experiment has turned out a dubious success, if not a failure. The negro vote is a sham and a fraud. Some candid observers will assert that the state of feeling between the whites and the blacks is worse than ever, though others happily draw a brighter picture