THE NATIONAL ALLIANCE. 115 



ness. Your attention is now called to the genius of the government of 

 the order. It will be found in the highest sense interesting and pecul- 

 iar. We have had a written law and an unwritten law. Two sets of 

 laws and systems of government have been in force at one and the same 

 time. Every individual member has sustained a dual relation to the 

 order, and yet all have harmonized perfectly, and there has been no 

 conflict or clash. The written law is comprised of the charter from the 

 United States government ; the constitution and legislative enactments 

 of the national order ; the charters, constitutions, and legislative enact- 

 ments of the various State organizations ; and the charters, constitutions, 

 and legislative enactments of the various county and subordinate bodies. 

 The form of government under the written law was democratic, the sub- 

 ordinate bodies each being a simple democracy in which the individual 

 is the sovereign,* and alhmembers vote on all questions. The State and 

 national bodies were each a confederated form of republican govern- 

 ment, and every step from the people, who are the supreme power, 

 lessened the power of the delegated body. The national only had such 

 powers as were expressly delegated to it by the States, and the State 

 only had such powers as were bestowed upon it by delegates from the 

 subordinate bodies. Its form of government, under the written law, 

 was modelled after, and was very similar to, the form of political govern- 

 ment under which we live. The unwritten law is the secret work, and, 

 like all other secret orders, it has necessitated and depended upon a 

 form of government closely analogous to a limited monarchy. Accord- 

 ing to it, all power and authority must emanate from the recognized 

 head, and permeate through the various branches to the individual 

 membership. Under this system of law, this is a supreme body, and 

 under the written law the membership of the subordinate were supreme, 

 because, under the written law the membership could, by the exercise 

 of their constitutional privileges, abolish the national body entirely ; and 

 under the unwritten law the national could, by the exercise of its power, 

 abolish a subordinate body by revoking its charter. This system of dual 

 sources of power and forms of government, that originate at opposite 

 extremities of the order, and encompass it as two parallel bands through- 

 out its entire extent, is wonderfully calculated to add to its strength and 

 efficiency, and furnishes a complete safeguard against any weak point in 

 either system, by always having the strength of the other system present 

 and ready to assist and maintain it. The necessity for this full and 

 complete statement of the genius of the government of the order is two- 

 fold : First, an imperfect conception of these principles has often been 

 the cause of considerable hesitation and embarrassment on the part of 



