GOVERNMENT, in political science, sometimes signifies the act of carrying the national affairs into execution ; some times the person or persons who, as a separate branch of the constitution, are lawfully charged with that function ; and sometimes it imports the whole frame of the civil po lity. In this latter and more comprehensive sense, it is synonymous with constitution ; and it is in this sense we purpose here to employ it.
In endeavouring to simplify a subject so infinitely varied and complex, Aristotle and other ancient writers have re duced all systems of government to the primary and ele mentary forms of Democracy, Aristocracy, and Despotism. Under the first, the whole body of the people are at once the sovereign and the subject; laws are enacted by them alone, and the whole business of the commonwealth, whether it be the command of armies, the judiciary and ecclesiasti cal functions, negotiations with foreign states, or any other department of affairs, is transacted by officers appointed by them, and responsible to their authority. Under the se cond form, the many are subject to the few,—on whom superior wealth, talent, and, it may be, virtue, have origin ally conferred power, and in whose descendants a still fur ther accumulation of wealth,—ambition,—and the popular sentiment in favour of illustrious birth, even where talent and virtue have no place, have, by a natural and easy transition, confirmed it. Under a Despotism, no orders are issued, no measures adopted, no affairs transacted, but with an ex clusive reference to the personal gratification of the prince, or the security of his power. Laws which, under a De mocracy, are enacted by the people themselves, and, under an Aristocracy, by the nobles, as the rule of public and private conduct, and the measure of Public and private right, have no existence under a Despotism. The will of the tyrant is the sole law,—which, therefore, fluctuates every moment, and the people, their children, and their property, exist only in subservience to his passions, his caprices, and his crimes.
Modern writers, and particularly the President Montes quieu, have regarded this arrangement of the elementary forms of government as inaccurate. According to the well known division of that eloquent philosopher, these forms are, in like manner, three ; the Republican, the Monarchi cal, and the Despotic. Under the first, he comprehends the Dcmocratical and Aristocratical of the ancients; his description of which, as well as of the Despotic form, cor responds with theirs. The description of the Monarchical form differs in nothing from that of the Aristocratical, ex cept that, in the latter, the supreme power is exercised by a combined plurality, but, in the former, by a single indi vidual. As in the Aristocratical, too, the administration of
the nobles is controlled by the laws which they have them selves enacted ; so, in the Alonarchical, that of the prince is restrained, however imperfectly, by the rules of his OW11 sovereign appointment ; and this, as in both the Republi can forms, constitutes the elementary difference between it and the Despotic.
But, according to this distritw.ion, the ancient arrange ment is not so properly inaccurate, as incomplete. The ar rangement of Montesquieu is precisely that of the Greek philosophers, with the addition of the 14Ionarchical form. The inaccuracy, it would seem, is rather chargeable upon him, since, in his enunciation of the elementary or simple forms of government, he limits, after the ancients, the number to three, whilst, in his description, he enumerates, (as they appear to us,) four essentially different systems. For though he has combined the Democratical and Aristo cratical forms under the general term republican, it is diffi cult to perceive in what sense the latter is more republican than the Monarchy of his enumeration. The characteris tic difference, according to his own description, between an Aristocracy and such a Monarchy, consists in the indi viduality in the one case, and, in the other, in the plurality of persons by whom the sovereign power is exercised. The people are absolutely excluded alike under both, from all share in the public authority; alike under both, the con cerns of the state, its interests, its property, and its rights, are in no respect subject to their controul or interference. In what sense therefore can these rights, interests, and concerns, or (which is here the same thing) the power by which they are regulated and controlled, be denominated republican, when applied to the Aristocratical form, which will not be equally applicable to the Monarchical ? Whether this enumeration of the elementary govern ments, as enlarged by Montesquieu, be complete, we shall not at present stop to inquire ;—that it is chargeable with the inaccuracy we have alluded to, can scarcely, we think, be questioned. 1Ve rather proceed to observe, (what must likewise be well known to most of our readers,) that the same writer, besides describing the nature of the different simpler forms of government, has, with no less elegance than, as it appears to us, sound philosophy, indicated the nrincipte upon which they chiefly depend for their respec tive support.