We possess, therefore, not a more suitable constitution than other countries, but a constitution which is perfectly definite and which is preserved by very formidable difficulties of amendment against inconsiderate change. The difference between our own case and that of Great Britain upon which we have most reason to congratulate ourselves is that here public opinion has definite _criteria_ for its conservatism; whereas in England it has only shifting and uncertain precedent. In both countries there is the same respect for law. But there is not in England the same certainty as to what the law of the constitution is. We have a fundamental law which is written, and which in its main points is read by all alike in a single accepted sense. There is no more quarrel about its main intent than there is in England about the meaning of Magna Charta. Much of the British constitution, on the contrary, has not the support of even a common statute. It may, in respect of many vital parts of it, be interpreted or understood in half a dozen different ways, _and amended by the prevalent understanding_. We are not more free than the English; we are only more secure. The definiteness of our Constitution, nevertheless, apart from its outline of structural arrangements and of the division of functions among the several departments of the government, is negative rather than affirmative. Its very enumeration of the powers of Congress is but a means of indicating very plainly what Congress can _not_ do. It is significant that one of the most important and most highly esteemed of the many legal commentaries on our government should be entitled ‘Constitutional Limitations.’ In expounding the restrictions imposed by fundamental law upon state and federal action, Judge Cooley is allowed to have laid bare the most essential parts of our constitutional system. It was a prime necessity in so complex a structure that bounds should be set to authority. The ‘may-nots’ and the ‘shall-nots’ of our constitutions, consequently, give them their distinctive form and character. The strength which preserves the system is the strength of self-restraint. And yet here again it must be understood that mere definiteness of legal provision has no saving efficacy of its own. These distinct lines run between power and power will not of their own virtue maintain themselves. It is not in having such a constitution but in obeying it that our advantage lies. The vitality of such provisions consists wholly in the fact that they receive our acquiescence. They rest upon the legal conscience, upon what Mr. Grote would have called the ‘constitutional morality,’ of our race. They are efficient because we are above all things law-abiding. The prohibitions of the law do not assert themselves as taskmasters set over us by some external power. They are of our own devising. We are self-restrained.