Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 3, No. 18, April, 1859 | Page 2

and Jacobin, and he will soon find that he has a task before
him calculated to test his powers very severely. How much more
difficult, then, must it be to give the meaning of words that are never
used save in a reproachful sense, which originated in political battles
that were fought nearly two thousand years ago, and in a state of
society having small resemblance to anything that has ever been known
to Christendom! With some few exceptions, party-names continue to
have their champions long after the parties they belonged to are as dead
as the Jacobites. Many Americans would not hesitate to defend the
Federalists, or to eulogize the Federal party, though Federalism long
ago ceased even to cast a shadow. The prostitution of the Democratic
name has lessened in but a slight degree the charm that has attached to
it ever since Jefferson's sweeping reëlection had the effect of coupling
it the charming idea of success. But who can be expected to say a word
for Agrarian? One might as well look to find a sane man ready to do
battle for the Jacobin, which is all but a convertible term for Agrarian,
though in its proper sense the latter word is of exactly the opposite
meaning to the former. Under the term Agrarians is included, in
common usage, all that class of men who exhibit a desire to remove
social ills by a resort to means which are considered irregular and

dangerous by the great majority of mankind. Of late years we have
heard much of Socialists, Communists, Fourierites, and so forth; but
the word Agrarians comprehends all these, and is often made to include
men who have no more idea of engaging in social reforms than they
have of pilgrimizing to the Fountains of the Nile. It is a not uncommon
thing for our political parties to charge one another with Agrarianism;
and if they used the term in its proper sense, it would be found that they
had both been occasionally right, for Agrarian laws have been
supported by all American parties, and will continue to be so supported,
we presume, so long as we shall have a public domain; but in its
reproachful sense Agrarianism can never be charged against any one of
the party organizations which have been known in the United States. A
quarter of a century ago, one of the cleverest of those English tourists
who then used to contrive to go through--or, rather, over--the Republic,
seeing but little, and not understanding that little, proclaimed to his
countrymen, who had not then recovered from the agitation consequent
on the Reform contest, that there existed here a regular Agrarian party,
forming "the _extrême gauche_ of the Worky Parliament," and which
"boldly advocated the introduction of an AGRARIAN LAW, and a
periodical division of property." He represented these men as only
following out the principles of their less violent neighbors, and as
eloquently dilating "on the justice and propriety of every individual
being equally supplied with food and clothing,--on the monstrous
iniquity of one man riding in his carriage while another walks on foot,
[there would have been more reason in the complaint, had the gigless
individual objected to walking on his head,] and after his drive
discussing a bottle of Champagne, while many of his neighbors are
shamefully compelled to be content with the pure element. Only
equalize property, they say, and neither would drink Champagne or
water, but both would have brandy, a consummation worthy of
centuries of struggle to attain." He had the sense to declare that all this
was nonsense, but added, that the Agrarians, though not so numerous or
so widely diffused as to create immediate alarm, were numerous in
New York, where their influence was strongly felt in the civic elections.
Elsewhere he predicted the coming of a "panic" time, when
workingmen would be thrown out of employment, while possessed of
the whole political power of the state, with no military force to

maintain civil order and protect property; "and to what quarter," he
mournfully asked, "I shall be glad to know, is the rich man to look for
security, either of person or fortune?"
Twenty-five years have elapsed since Mr. Hamilton put forth this
alarming question, and some recent events have brought it to men's
minds, who had laughed at it in the year of grace 1833. We have seen
Agrarian movements in New York, demonstrations of "Workies," but
nothing was said by those engaged in them of that great leveller,
brandy, though its properties are probably better known to them than
those of water. They have been dignified with the name of "bread
riots," and the great English journal that exercises a sort of censorship
over governments and nations has gravely complimented us on the
national