Page:The Granite Monthly Volume 10.djvu/65

 Matthew Harvey.

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��When the people of the united American colonies put off their fealty to the British government, there was a decided reaction against every phase of monarchical authority. The reac- tion was effective. The social pendu- lum swung vigorously away from one extreme point of monarchism towards another extreme point of polyarchism. In some aspects of the case this reac- tion was so intense as to hinder the success of a suitable plan of republi- can government. Let me make a local application of this remark.

By the provisions of the Federal constitution, the concessions of nine states were required to make it effec- tive. New Hampshire was the ninth state to ratify the proposed new order of things. The decisive result was obtained in Jpne, 1788. In the con- stitutional convention at Concord fifty-seven votes were recorded in the affirmative, and fortv-six in the nega- tive. The affirmative majority was not strong. Yet the constitution was only a compromise between extreme Federalists and extreme Republicans. Why this large minority? The true cause lay deeper than the confessions of public policy. There was the phe- nomenon of social dynamic reaction. The people had thrown off one gov- ernment. Hence they were slow to adopt another. An animal broken from an enclosure doesn't want to re- turn again. Men are very much like animals, though they have more meth- od in their impulses.

In the early Jiistory of this country the reactive tendency ramified exten- sively. It pervaded the rural com- munities. In the town of Hopkinton, N. H., in 1788, Lieut. Morse was chosen a delegate to the state conven-

��tion, to consider the ratification of the Federal constitution. The town took the precaution to instruct him to " reject the constitution," though it afterwards conceded his privilege to act as he thought best for the public good. The Federal constitution hav- ing become the law of the land, oppo- sition seems to have at first succumbed to indifference. The people of Hop- kinton did not care particularly to vote for presidential electors. In December, 1788, they met so to vote for the first time. The town-clerk thus records the result :

"Voted for Electors for this State I Bailey E Smith R Wallis I Calf & E Tomson Esquires 49 each of them."

AYhen we consider that in 1786 the population of Hopkinton was 1,537, while in 1790 it was 1,715, we easily comprehend the insignificance of the above vote. In the year 1792, in November, the town cast twelve votes for presidential electors. It was a unanimous ballot. In 1796, there was a unanimous cast of thirty-seven ballots at the presidential election. In 1800 the state presidential electors were chosen by the legislature. In 1804 there was an active controversy in Hopkinton over presidential ques- tions. The town cast 221 votes ; 143 were for Republican electors, and 78 for Federal ones. The reactive social element had triumphed. It held the advance in the casts for national and state supreme executive officers till 1865, when Walter Harriman received a majority of the votes of Hopkinton for governor. Thus, often slowlv though surely, does the social pendu- lum oscillate.

At first, New Hampshire was a Federal state, but it passed over to

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