The militia is supposed to consist of all men capable of bearing arms, under forty-five years of age. But no one need be enrolled, who from scruples of conscience is averse to bearing arms. At the present moment such scruples do not seem to be very general. Then follows, in Article XI., a detailed enactment as to the choosing of militia officers. It may be perhaps sufficient to say that the privates are to choose the captains and the subalterns; the captains and subalterns are to choose the field officers; and the field officers the brigadier-generals and inspectors of brigade.
The Governor, however, with the consent of the Senate, shall nominate all major-generals. Now that real soldiers have unfortunately become necessary, the above plan has not been found to work well.
Such is the constitution of the State of New York, which has been intended to work and does work quite separately from that of the United States. It will be seen that the purport has been to make it as widely democratic as possible--to provide that all power of all description shall come directly from the people, and that such power shall return to the people at short intervals. The Senate and the Governor each remain for two years, but not for the same two years. If a new Senate commence its work in 1861, a new Governor will come in in 1862. But, nevertheless, there is in the form of government as thus established an absence of that close and immediate responsibility which attends our ministers. When a man has been voted in, it seems that responsibility is over for the period of the required service. He has been chosen, and the country which has chosen him is to trust that he will do his best.
I do not know that this matters much with reference to the legislature or governments of the different States, for their State legislatures and governments are but puny powers; but in the legislature and government at Washington it does matter very much.
But I shall have another opportunity of speaking on that subject.
Nothing has struck me so much in America as the fact that these State legislatures are puny powers. The absence of any tidings whatever of their doings across the water is a proof of this. Who has heard of the legislature of New York or of Massachusetts? It is boasted here that their insignificance is a sign of the well-being of the people; that the smallness of the power necessary for carrying on the machine shows how beautifully the machine is organized, and how well it works. "It is better to have little governors than great governors," an American said to me once. "It is our glory that we know how to live without having great men over us to rule us." That glory, if ever it were a glory, has come to an end. It seems to me that all these troubles have come upon the States because they have not placed high men in high places. The less of laws and the less of control the better, providing a people can go right with few laws and little control. One may say that no laws and no control would be best of all--provided that none were needed. But this is not exactly the position of the American people.
The two professions of law-making and of governing have become unfashionable, low in estimation, and of no repute in the States.
The municipal powers of the cities have not fallen into the hands of the leading men. The word politician has come to bear the meaning of political adventurer and almost of political blackleg.
If A calls B a politician, A intends to vilify B by so calling him.
Whether or no the best citizens of a State will ever be induced to serve in the State legislature by a nobler consideration than that of pay, or by a higher tone of political morals than that now existing, I cannot say. It seems to me that some great decrease in the numbers of the State legislators should be a first step toward such a consummation. There are not many men in each State who can afford to give up two or three months of the year to the State service for nothing; but it may be presumed that in each State there are a few. Those who are induced to devote their time by the payment of 60l. can hardly be the men most fitted for the purpose of legislation. It certainly has seemed to me that the members of the State legislatures and of the State governments are not held in that respect and treated with that confidence to which, in the eyes of an Englishman, such functionaries should be held as entitled.