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 30 MODERN WARS AND PERMANENT PEACE. of the Executive Authority to the Legislative Authority, and of the Legislative Authority to the people ; the creation of a broad basis of representation, by which the claims, sentiments, and desires of every class of the people will secure attention at the hands of the Legislative Assemblies ; and the enforcement of doctrines, somewhat vague in terms, but forcible enough in practical cogency, to the effect that Government is to be con- ducted in the interests of the whole people, and not of any frac- tional part of it ; that personal liberty is to be respected and hedged round with adequate guarantees ; that taxation and rep- resentation are to be coextensive ; and that the rights of free public meeting, free discussion, and a free press are to be jeal- ously guarded against legal or executive encroachments. Perhaps there is not a single country where, as yet, all these requirements can be said to be satisfactorily attained, though the constitutions of England, the United States, the Swiss Con- federation, and the Kingdoms of Belgium and Holland approach nearest to the ideal type ; while France, Italy, Germany, and Austria are constantly approaching nearer, and Spain, and even Russia, are making intermittent and tentative, but distinct, move- ments in the same direction. On the other hand, there are abundant indications, in almost every country, that the moder- ate constitutional programme above sketched out is by no means the limit of the aspirations of large classes of persons in each country. There are those who seek and work for an entire re- construction of the political and social institutions around them, and who hold that the past is too rotten and discredited to af- ford a worthy structure for building upon in the future. These persons admit, of course, of endless subdivisions among them- selves, some of them advocating doctrines only slightly removed from anarchy, others being only a little more pronounced than their sober "constitutional" brethren in calling for systematic and comprehensive reforms. It is especially noticeable, how- ever, that the reformers of various grades in different countries