Page:Works of John C. Calhoun, v1.djvu/26



How government, then, must be constructed, in order to counteract, through its organism, this tendency on the part of those who make and execute the laws to oppress those subject to their operation, is the next question which claims attention.

There is but one way in which this can possibly be done; and that is, by such an organism as will furnish the ruled with the means of resisting successfully this tendency on the part of the rulers to oppression and abuse. Power can only be resisted by power — and tendency by tendency. Those who exercise power and those subject to its exercise — the rulers and the ruled — stand in antagonistic relations to each other. The same constitution of our nature which leads rulers to oppress the ruled — regardless of the object for which government is ordained — will, with equal strength, lead the ruled to resist, when possessed of the means of making peaceable and effective resistance. Such an organism, then, as will furnish the means by which resistance may be systematically and peaceably made on the part of the ruled, to oppression and abuse of power on the part of the rulers, is the first and indispensable step towards forming a constitutional government. And as this can only be effected by or through the right of suffrage — (the right on the part of the ruled to choose their rulers at proper intervals, and to hold them thereby responsible for their conduct) — the responsibility of the rulers to the ruled, through the right of suffrage, is the indispensable and primary principle in the foundation of a constitutional government. When this right