One of the most insidious suggestions that can possibly be made to the people at large is that there is an insurmountable difficulty in securing amendments to our constitutions, just as misleading and dangerous as it is for them to be told that their desires are being thwarted by the judiciary and that they must accomplish reforms either by coercing the courts or by undermining the foundations of their constitutions. The future contentment of the people requires that they shall feel that the governments, state and federal, are their governments, that they themselves are ultimately the sovereign power, and that they are at liberty to amend the organic law from time to time as their mature and deliberate judgment shall deem necessary or desirable. All that the conservatives can ask or do ask is that the people shall act deliberately and under circumstances calculated to afford time and opportunity for full explanation and a full understanding of the scope and tendency of the proposed changes, to the end that errors may be discovered and exposed, that theorizing, sentimentalism, clamor and prejudice may exhaust themselves, and that the sober second thought of every part of the country may be asserted. If it be then determined to amend our constitutions, even to the extent of placing life, liberty and property at the unrestrained discretion and mercy of our legislators, the will of the sovereign people will have to be obeyed. Let us hope and pray, however, that when amendments are adopted, they will be conservative and wise, that the rights of the minority as against the majority will not be heedlessly sacrificed for the temporary advantage of one class over another, and that it will be appreciated that individual liberty should be the vital concern of every man, rich or poor, as being essential to the perpetuation of the institutions which we cherish as peculiarly and preeminently American. Let us especially try to avoid permitting any class to make use of constitutional amendments or of statutory enactments for its own special purposes. Let us, whilst meeting in full sympathy, generosity and charity the legitimate demands of the laboring classes and of the poor and humble, nevertheless keep our eyes open to prevent any such vicious results as would arise from constitutional or statutory provisions framed nominally for the benefit of labor but really for the purpose of serving the interests of a particular class against another, as we have seen was the case in the New York tenement-house legislation of 1884. In the meantime, pending such amendments in the due, orderly and reasonable course prescribed by our constitutions, let us be faithful and devoted to our constitutional system, which for more than a century has carried us through every storm and so often "in spite of false lights on the shore." Let us also be truthful and fair and, if possible, temperate in our criticism of all public officials, whether legislative, executive, or judicial.