Page:Mexico and its reconstruction.djvu/46



of the United States take a certain pride in stating that the governments of the new world are republican, that they are set up under constitutions, and depend upon popular vote. Probably the great majority, when they make such statements, think of our own political institutions and assume that those of the other republics from the Mexican frontier to Cape Horn are similar in their organization. But republican government, democratic institutions, and popular elections in the sense in which the people of the United States are accustomed to use such terms flourish only under special conditions, conditions that the majority of the republics of the new world have not attained.

Even in the most advanced states the rules under which citizens actually live are determined by the administration of the laws as well as by their spirit; but if republican institutions and democracy mean anything in practical affairs, they mean a rule of practice as well as an ideal to which the leaders of public life profess allegiance. They mean that the standards set forth in the law must correspond at least approximately to those observed in the everyday life of the community, and that neither the executive nor any other part of the government can act contrary to the popular will as