can apply to their commands the full imperative sanctions of law. But their sphere is limited by the presiding and sovereign powers of a state superordinated to them, the extent of whose authority is determined, under constitutional forms and guarantees, by itself. They have dominion; but it has sovereignty. For with the federal state lie the highest powers of originative legal determination, the ultimate authority to warrant change and sanction jurisdiction. Our thought is embarrassed throughout such an analysis by the very fact which invalidates the Austinian conception and makes a fresh analysis necessary. Very little law literally originates in command, though its formulation and enforcement must unquestionably be effected through the commanding authorities of the state. It is their function to direct, to lead, rather than to command. They originate forms, but they do not discover principles. In a very profound sense law proceeds from the community. It is the result of its undeliberate as well as of its deliberate developments, of its struggles, class against class, interest against interest, and of its compromises and adjustments of opinion. It follows, slowly, its ethical judgments, more promptly its material necessities. But law issues thus from the body of the community only in vague and inchoate form. It must be taken out of the sphere of voluntary and uncertain action and made precise and invariable. It becomes positive law by receiving definition and being backed by an active and recognized power within the state. The sovereign organ of a state is, therefore, very properly said to be its law-_making_ organ. It transmutes selected tendencies into stiff and urgent rules. It exercises a sovereign choice in so doing. It determines which tendencies shall be accepted, which checked and denied efficacy. It forms the purposes of the state, avoiding revolution if it form them wisely and with a true insight. This is sovereignty:--to sit at the helm and steer, marking out such free courses for the stanch craft as wind and weather will permit. This is the only sort of sovereignty that can be exercised in human affairs. But the pilot is sovereign, and not the weather. IV CHARACTER OF DEMOCRACY IN THE UNITED STATES