NATURE OF THE PROHIBITIONIST TYRANNY THAT there are some things which, however good they may be in themselves, the majority has no right to impose upon the minority, is a doctrine that was, I think I may say, universally understood among thinking Americans of all former generations. It was often forgotten by the unthinking; but those who felt themselves called upon to be serious instructors of public opinion were always to be counted on to assert it, in the face of any popular clamor or aberration. The most deplorable feature, to my mind, of the whole story of the Prohibition amendment, was the failure of our journalists and leaders of opinion, with a few notable exceptions, to perform this duty which so peculiarly devolves upon them. Lest any reader should imagine that this doctrine of the proper limits of majority power is something peculiar to certain political theorists, I will quote just one authority --where I might quote scores as well--to which it is impossible to apply any such characterization. It ought, of course, to be unnecessary to quote any authority, since the Constitution itself contains the clearest possible embodiment of that doctrine. In the excellent little book of half a century ago referred to in a previous chapter, Nordhoff's "Politics for Young Americans," the chapter entitled "Of Political Constitutions" opens as follows: A political Constitution is the instrument or compact in which the rights of the people who adopt it, and the powers and responsibilities of their rulers, are described, and by which they are fixed. The chief object of a constitution is to limit the power of majorities. A moment's reflection will tell you that mere majority rule, unlimited, would be the most grinding of tyrannies; the minority at any time would be mere slaves, whose rights to life, property and comfort no one who chose to join the majority would be bound to respect.