No atheists, no free-thinkers, no Jews, no Roman Catholics, no man, in short, who was not a believer in some form of the Protestant faith, could ever be governor of New Jersey, New Hampshire, Connecticut, or Vermont. Any rich Christian might be the executive of Massachusetts or Maryland. Elsewhere he must be a Trinitarian and a believer in the divine authority of the Bible, or acknowledge one God, believe in heaven and hell, and be ready to declare openly that every word in the Testaments, both old and new, was divinely inspired. Not content with restrictions such as these, many states went further, and required that the governor should not only be pious but rich. In one he must have an estate of £100, in another of £500, in another of £5000, in another of £10,000.
All these limitations have disappeared. Some of our states have governors who are not rich. And there are some governors who are not pious. In short, the number of men legally eligible to that high oflfice has largely increased. There are very few men of full age in this audience who, should they be elected, could not be governor of this state, or a member of either house of our general assembly.
I suppose that the essence of a republic lies in the absence of hereditary tenure of public office. And it is quite true that we are not blessed in this country with a Prince of Wales who will become chief magistrate of the nation merely because his great-grandfather held that exalted station; or with an upper house of the national legislature constructed on the same wise plan. It has been said that to educate a boy one should begin with his grandfather. It is not so sure that that is the best way to make a congressman. In short, rightly or wrongly, the republic chooses live men as its officers. The monarchy submits to dead men. It is the mouldering bones of old George the First which in fact fill the English throne. But it would not be easy for the plain man to prove that our President ever had a grandfather.
Here, then, is a form of government to all whose offices many thousands of men are eligible, and to whose elective franchise nearly every man of full age is entitled. It is a democratic republic. And from its inception in 1776 to the present day it
