spring and by the force they exert, a force which overrides and breaks all conflicting enactments passed by the ordinary legislature. Where the Constitution consists of such a law or laws, I propose to call it a Rigid Constitution, i.e. one which cannot be bent or twisted by the action of the legislature, but stands stiff and solid, opposing a stubborn resistance to the attacks of any majority who may desire to transgress or evade its provisions. As the English Constitution is the best modern instance of the flexible type, so is the American of the rigid type.
It will at once be asked, How can any constitution be truly rigid? Growth and decay are the necessary conditions of the life of institutions as well as of individual organisms. One constitution may be altered less frequently or easily than another, but an absolutely unchangeable constitution is an impossibility.[1]
The question is pertinent; the suggestion is true. No constitution can be made to stand unsusceptible of change, because if it were, it would cease to be suitable to the conditions amid which it has to work, that is, to the actual forces which sway politics. And being unsuitable, it would be weak, not rooted in the nature of the State and in the respect of the citizens for whom it exists; and being weak, it would presently be overthrown. If therefore we find a rigid constitution tenacious of life, if we find it enjoying, as Virgil says of the gods, a fresh and green old age, we may be sure that it has not stood wholly changeless, but has been so modified as to have adapted
- ↑ The constitutions of the ancient world were all or nearly all flexible, because the ancient republics were governed by primary assemblies, all whose laws were of equal validity. By far the most interesting and instructive example is the Constitution of Rome. It presents some striking resemblances to the Constitution of England—both left many points undetermined, both relied largely upon semi-legal usages and understandings—and any constitutional lawyer who should compare the practical workings of the two in a philosophical way would render a service to political science.
However, one finds here and there in Greek constitutions provisions intended to secure certain laws from change. At Athens, for instance, there was a distinction between Laws (νόμοι) which required the approval of a committee called the Nomothetae, and Decrees (ψηφίσματα), passed by the Assembly alone, and any person proposing a decree inconsistent with a law was liable to an action (γραφὴ παρανόμων) for having, so to speak, led the people into illegality. His conviction in this action carried with it a declaration of the invalidity of the decree.
