CONSTITUTION. 
rate writers liave ever made the necessary 
distinction between them. Lord Boling- 
broke defines a constitution to be a general 
system of laws, institutions, and customs de- 
rived from tiie immutable principles of rea- 
son, and accepted by tlie people ; and go- 
vernment, the particular tenor of conduct 
pursued by a chief and subordinate magis- 
trate ; he also asserts that the constitution 
of Great Britain may remain fixed for ever, 
that it is the basis on which her princes 
ought to act, and a true criterion by which 
their government must be appreciated ; 
hence, according to the principles of the 
revolution and the present settlement, the 
degree of submission may be regulated, 
particularly as tire claim of descent is re- 
mote, and the choice of the community was 
purposely directed to preserve the consti- 
tution. 
Men in the primitive ages might live vo- 
luntarily under, or be compelled by con- 
quest to bear a government without a con- 
stitution, but they soon (as Hooker re- 
marks) rejected the yoke, or made it sit 
easy on their necks. Archdeacon Paley 
says, a constitution is so much of the laws 
of a country as mark the designation and 
form of its legislature, the rights and func- 
tions of the legislative body, and the nature 
and Jurisdiction of the courts of justice, the 
constitution therefore is the principal sec- 
tion or title of the code of public laws, and 
the terms eonstitutional, and unconstitu- 
tional, signify in this case legal and illegal. 
The jurisprudence of England is composed 
of ancient usages, acts of parliament, and 
the decisions of the courts of law, those 
then are the sources whence the nature and 
limits of her constitution are to be deduced, 
and the authorities to which appeals must 
be made in all cases of doubt. An act of 
parliament can be considered unconstitu- 
tional only when it militates against other 
laws, which regulate the form of govern- 
ment. Those who consider the British con- 
stitution as a plan made by our ancestors at 
some distant era, are deceived, the great 
Charta, and the bill of Rights were suc- 
cessful elforts to restrain the abuses of 
regal power, but they are partial modifica- 
tions of the constitution, which like others 
in Europe originated from a variety of 
causes, and may be compared to an old 
mansion repaired and altered at difterent 
' periods, according to the abilities and taste 
of its possessors. Several approved histo- 
rians conjecture that the British constitution 
mav have had its origin from the Anglo- 
Saxons, those allege, that the government of 
the northern nations founded on tlie ruins of 
that of Rome, was free, and tliough injured 
by succeeding princes, still retains a degree 
of legal administration, and an air of inde- 
pendence. The Saxons, who conquered 
Britain in the fifth century, allowed tlieir 
chiefs a very limited authority, and brought 
with them the same spirit of liberty, which 
had distinguished their ancestors. The king 
therefore depended solely on his own abi- 
lities, and possessed no ar bitrary power de- 
rived from his station ; the people subject 
to little legal restraint and less polished, 
paid great respect to the monarch and his 
family, yet were more regardless of regular 
descent, than present convenience, in 
filling the vacant tlirone. As their sove- 
reignty was neither hereditary nor elective, 
the will of the King in the appointment of 
a successor was not always accepted, for 
the concurrence of the people was required 
not only in this case but in the usual mode 
of government : tlie states might establish a 
sovereign by snlFrage, but they seldom ex- 
ercised tliis privilege. The constitution 
may have differed in tlie different kingdoms 
of the Heptarchy, and have changed be- 
tween the invasion and the Norman con- 
quest, yet in all events they maintained a 
wittenagenot or council, whose consent was 
necessary for making of laws, and ratifying 
public acts, the preambles of all those from 
Ethelbert to Edward the Confessor, and 
even those of Canute, give undoubted proofs 
of the existence of a limited legal govern- 
ment, which was however very aristocrati- 
cal, though the ancient democracy may, 
under the patronage of some distinguished 
lord have given security and dignity to the 
gentrj', and protection to the lower classes 
of people. The courts of the decennary, 
the hundred, and the county, were well cal- 
culated to defend general liberty, and re- 
strain the power of tlie nobles, and the ad- 
mission of all freeholders in the latter court 
was a great check upon the aristocracy. 
Some writers assert that the government 
of the Anglo-Saxon princes had little more 
affinity to the present constitution than in 
tlie relations between tlie king ami nobility, 
common to those founded by the northern 
nations, and place the mra of its origin at 
the conquest, when William of Normandy 
overturned the ancient form of legi,slation, 
expelled the landholders, and gave their 
lands to his chiefs, whose government was 
tyrannical, different from the constitution, 
and a mixture of the customs of Normandy 
