American Political Ideas Viewed from the Standpoint of Universal History eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 110 pages of information about American Political Ideas Viewed from the Standpoint of Universal History.

American Political Ideas Viewed from the Standpoint of Universal History eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 110 pages of information about American Political Ideas Viewed from the Standpoint of Universal History.
peace of the world will ultimately be secured.  Illustrations from the early struggles of European civilization with outer barbarism, and with aggressive civilizations of lower type.  Greece and Persia.  Keltic and Teutonic enemies of Rome.  The defensible frontier of European civilization carried northward and eastward to the Rhine by Caesar; to the Oder by Charles the Great; to the Vistula by the Teutonic Knights; to the Volga and the Oxus by the Russians.  Danger in the Dark Ages from Huns and Mongols on the one hand, from Mussulmans on the other.  Immense increase of the area and physical strength of European civilization, which can never again be in danger from outer barbarism.  Effect of all this secular turmoil upon the political institutions of Europe.  It hindered the formation of closely coherent nations, and was at the same time an obstacle to the preservation of popular liberties.  Tendency towards the Asiaticization of European life.  Opposing influences of the Church, and of the Germanic tribal organizations.  Military type of society on the Continent.  Old Aryan self-government happily preserved in England.  Strategic position of England favourable to the early elimination of warfare from her soil.  Hence the exceptionally normal and plastic political development of the English race.  Significant coincidence of the discovery of America with the beginnings of the Protestant revolt against the asiaticizing tendency.  Significance of the struggle between Spain, France, and England for the possession of an enormous area of virgin soil which should insure to the conqueror an unprecedented opportunity for future development.  The race which gained control of North America must become the dominant race of the world, and its political ideas must prevail in the struggle for life.  Moral significance of the rapid increase of the English race in America.  Fallacy of the notion that centralized governments are needed for very large nations.  It is only through federalism, combined with local self-government, that the stability of so huge an aggregate as the United States can be permanently maintained.  What the American government really fought for in the late Civil War.  Magnitude of the results achieved.  Unprecedented military strength shown by this most pacific and industrial of peoples.  Improbability of any future attempt to break up the Federal Union.  Stupendous future of the English race,—­in Africa, in Australia, and in the islands of the Pacific Ocean.  Future of the English language.  Probable further adoption of federalism.  Probable effects upon Europe of industrial competition with the United States:  impossibility of keeping up the present military armaments.  The States of Europe will be forced, by pressure of circumstances, into some kind of federal union.  A similar process will go on until the whole of mankind shall constitute a single political body, and warfare shall disappear forever from the face of the earth.

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American Political Ideas Viewed from the Standpoint of Universal History from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.