478 HARVARD LAW REVIEW. the other islands now acquired or coming in. They suggest the need of more outside control for the new possessions. " The underlying theory of our government," they say, " is the right of self-government, and a people must be fitted for self-government before they can be trusted with the responsibilities and duties attaching to free government." And again they say that " the American idea of universal suffrage presupposes that the body of citizens who are to exercise it in a free and independent manner have by inheritance or education such knowledge and apprecia- tion of the responsibilities of free suffrage, and of a full participa- tion in the sovereignty of the country, as to be able to maintain a republican government." What I have said, so far, tends to show that there is no consti- tutional difficulty in our acquiring, holding, and permanently gov- erning territory of any sort and situated anywhere. Whatever restraints may be imposed on our congress and the executive by the Constitution of the United States, they have not made impossible a firm and vigorous administration of government in the territories. Witness especially the case of the District of Columbia and the Territory of Utah. It is not to be anticipated that they will have any such effect in our island dependencies. But what exactly is the operation of the Constitution in the territories? A difficult question, and very fit to be deliberately and fully considered by Congress and by the Supreme Court : a question never yet satisfactorily disposed of; perhaps one not to be answered finally by a court. It would be easy to cite dicta and even decisions that extend the Constitution and what we call its bill of rights to the territories ; but no judicial decision yet made has thoroughly dealt with the matter, or can be regarded as at all final on a question so very grave. It is sometimes supposed that the effect of the early amendments and other parts of the Constitution which make up what is called its bill of rights, is that of absolutely withholding power from the nation to govern in the forbidden way; not merely within the States, but within the territories, and anywhere and everywhere, and under all circumstances whatever ; so that, for instance, no criminal trial could proceed anywhere under the authority of the United States without those safeguards of a grand jury and petit jury, which would be necessary within the States. But that is not so. 1 Let me explain what I mean by an illustration. Nineteen years
