tion and administration which are not open to the common view. It can be discerned most readily by comparing the “literary theory” of the Constitution with the actual machinery of legislation, especially at those points where that machinery regulates the relations of Congress with the executive departments, and with the attitude of the houses towards the Supreme Court on those occasions, happily not numerous, when legislature and judiciary have come face to face in direct antagonism. The “literary theory” is distinct enough; every American is familiar with the paper pictures of the Constitution. Most prominent in such pictures are the ideal checks and balances of the federal system, which may be found described, even in the most recent books, in terms substantially the same as those used in 1814 by John Adams in his letter to John Taylor. “Is there,” says Mr. Adams, “a constitution upon record more complicated with balances than ours? In the first place, eighteen states and some territories are balanced against the national government. . . . In the second place, the House of Representatives is balanced against the Senate, the Senate against the House. In the third place, the executive authority is, in some degree, balanced against the legislative. In the fourth place, the judicial power is bal anced against the House, the Senate, the execu-
