62 MEETING, MONDAY, MARCH 7. 



had taken deep root in our law. Towns and states 

 did more and more business every year. Such things 

 as were now commonly furnished, viz., free libraries, 

 free*baths, free reading rooms, would be regarded in 

 England as grossly communistic, if supported by taxa- 

 tion, although now looked upon as usual here. This bug- 

 bear of communism was, in fact, the practice more or less 

 of all countries above semi-barbarism. In republics con- 

 trolled by the common sense of the people, these princi- 

 ples were synonymous with republicanism, and had not 

 gone too far. There was great need of the localizing 

 principle with which communism started in France. As 

 matters now stood, the national administration at Paris 

 determined courses of study and selected teachers for 

 towns distant from Paris. 



In the exercise of the suffrage, the French system 

 resembled England more than America. Their executive 

 did not have fixed tenures ; even the President, though 

 chosen for a term, deemed it necessary to resign, when 

 the assembly and senate were both against him. 



The probability of the success of republicanism arose 

 out of the present tendencies of the age, enumerated as 

 the relative increase of personal property : the instability 

 this imparted to inherited position and vested interest ; 

 the educating influence of railroads and inventions ; the 

 increasing interchange of ideas. These influences tended 

 to obscure national lines, and render possible a United 

 States of western Europe. There was a growing simi- 

 larity of law and custom, and a mingling of business 

 interests which favored this. The government of Great 

 Britain was in reality an aristocratic republic. Her ex- 

 ample was a warning to all. Everything done there cost 

 two to three times as much as it did in republics. Sala- 

 ries paid to the principal officers were disproportionate, 



