33 Very few letters are ever lost in the mails. The writer one time addressed a letter to a friend living in Sydney, Australia. It was mailed at Iowa City, Iowa, and was sent east. That letter went by way of New York, England, France, Italy, the Suez Canal, and the Indian Ocean to Sydney, Australia. The person to whom it was sent had, in the meantime, left Sydney and the letter failed of delivery. About three months after being first mailed it was returned to the writer whose return address was on the outside of the envelope. In being returned it came by way of the Pacific Ocean to San Francisco and across the United States from the west. The letter had encircled the globe and was returned safely to the original sender. Pretty good work for the International Mail System. 34 Constitution of the United States, Art. I, Sec. 8, Cl. 7. 35 There are four general theories as to the origin of the Constitution of the United States: (1) That it was an entirely new document. This theory was inspired by the statement of Gladstone. People who heard Mr. Gladstone or read of his comment on the Constitution misinterpreted his saying and came to believe he meant that that great Constitution was the work of the moment as conceived by the men in the convention at Philadelphia. No one knew better than Mr. Gladstone himself that such was not true. (2) That it was copied almost entirely after the English constitution of that time. This was the theory of Sir Henry Maine, and it was just as erroneous as was the common acceptance of Gladstone’s statement. There are many things in the Constitution of the United States that were not in the English constitution of that time. (3) That it was based entirely upon the experience of the colonists themselves. This theory is also incorrect as the facts show that many fundamentals of the Constitution were copied directly from the governments of European countries. (4) That it was due to all the above influences taken together, but that they were worked out by the colonists and the Constitution makers in their many years of experience in making Constitutions for the States after their independence from England, and during the time of the Confederation. A careful study of the debates in the convention at Philadelphia will reveal the fact that the different governments, institutions, rulers, and statesmen of Europe were referred to in the making of the Constitution.