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Ancient Society. Lewis Henry Morgan
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isbn 4057664649928
Автор произведения Lewis Henry Morgan
Жанр Языкознание
Издательство Bookwire
Indian tribes, and even confederacies, were weak organizations for military operations. That of the Iroquois, and that of the Aztecs, were the most remarkable for aggressive purposes. Among the tribes in the Lower Status of barbarism, including the Iroquois, the most destructive work was performed by inconsiderable war-parties, which were constantly forming and making expeditions into distant regions. Their supply of food consisted of parched corn reduced to flour, carried in a pouch attached to the belt of each warrior, with such fish and game as the route supplied. The going out of these war-parties, and their public reception on their return, were among the prominent events in Indian life. The sanction of the council for these expeditions was not sought, neither was it necessary.
The council of the tribe had power to declare war and make peace, to send and receive embassies, and to make alliances. It exercised all the powers needful in a government so simple and limited in its affairs. Intercourse between independent tribes was conducted by delegations of wise-men and chiefs. When such a delegation was expected by any tribe, a council was convened for its reception, and for the transaction of its business.
VII. A head-chief of the tribe in some instances.
In some Indian tribes one of the sachems was recognized as its head-chief; and as superior in rank to his associates. A need existed, to some extent, for an official head of the tribe to represent it when the council was not in session; but the duties and powers of the office were slight. Although the council was supreme in authority it was rarely in session, and questions might arise demanding the provisional action of some one authorized to represent the tribe, subject to the ratification of his acts by the council. This was the only basis, so far as the writer is aware, for the office of head-chief. It existed in a number of tribes, but in a form of authority so feeble as to fall below the conception of an executive magistrate. In the language of some of the early writers they have been designated as kings, which is simply a caricature. The Indian tribes had not advanced far enough in a knowledge of government to develop the idea of a chief executive magistrate. The Iroquois tribe recognized no head-chief, and the confederacy no executive officer. The elective tenure of the office of chief, and the liability of the person to deposition, settle the character of the office.
A council of Indian chiefs is of little importance by itself; but as the germ of the modern parliament, congress, and legislature, it has an important bearing in the history of mankind.
The growth of the idea of government commenced with the organization into gentes in savagery. It reveals three great stages of progressive development between its commencement and the institution of political society after civilization had been attained. The first stage was the government of a tribe by a council of chiefs elected by the gentes. It may be called a government of one power; namely, the council. It prevailed generally among tribes in the Lower Status of barbarism. The second stage was a government co-ordinated between a council of chiefs, and a general military commander; one representing the civil, and the other the military functions. This second form began to manifest itself in the Lower Status of barbarism, after confederacies were formed, and it became definite in the Middle Status. The office of general, or principal military commander, was the germ of that of a chief executive magistrate, the king, the emperor, and the president. It may be called a government of two powers, namely, the council of chiefs, and the general. The third stage was the government of a people or nation by a council of chiefs, an assembly of the people, and a general military commander. It appeared among the tribes who had attained to the Upper Status of barbarism; such, for example, as the Homeric Greeks, and the Italian tribes of the period of Romulus. A large increase in the number of people united in a nation, their establishment in walled cities, and the creation of wealth in lands and in flocks and herds, brought in the assembly of the people as an instrument of government. The council of chiefs, which still remained, found it necessary, no doubt through popular constraint, to submit the most important public measures to an assembly of the people for acceptance or rejection; whence the popular assembly. This assembly did not originate measures. It was its function to adopt or reject, and its action was final. From its first appearance it became a permanent power in the government. The council no longer passed important public measures, but became a pre-considering council, with power to originate and mature public acts, to which the assembly alone could give validity. It may be called a government of three powers; namely, the pre-considering council, the assembly of the people, and the general. This remained until the institution of political society, when, for example, among the Athenians, the council of chiefs became the senate, and the assembly of the people the ecclesia or popular assembly. The same organizations have come down to modern times in the two houses of parliament, of congress, and of legislatures. In like manner the office of general military commander, as before stated, was the germ of the office of the modern chief executive magistrate.
Recurring to the tribe, it was limited in the numbers of the people, feeble in strength, and poor in resources; but yet a completely organized society. It illustrates the condition of mankind in the Lower Status of barbarism. In the Middle Status there was a sensible increase of numbers in a tribe, and an improved condition; but with a continuance of gentile society without essential change. Political society was still impossible from want of advancement. The gentes organized into tribes remained as before; but confederacies must have been more frequent. In some areas, as in the Valley of Mexico, larger numbers were developed under a common government, with improvements in the arts of life; but no evidence exists of the overthrow among them of gentile society and the substitution of political. It is impossible to found a political society or a state upon gentes. A state must rest upon territory and not upon persons, upon the township as the unit of a political system, and not upon the gens which is the unit of a social system. It required time and a vast experience, beyond that of the American Indian tribes, as a preparation for such a fundamental change of systems. It also required men of the mental stature of the Greeks and Romans, and with the experience derived from a long chain of ancestors to devise and gradually introduce that new plan of government under which civilized nations are living at the present time.
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