bars.
Others equally large--yes, larger--lie beyond it. It is generally
admitted now by all thorough students of the Constitution that there
is such a thing as constitutional progress--constitutional
development. The Constitution does and will grow as the American
people grow.

Half a dozen questions are now in the public mind that measure, in
importance, up to the level of Marshall's elementary decisions. Beyond
these is still the application of institutional law to the
interpretation of the Constitution. There is no book so much needed in
the present, or that will be so much needed in the future, as a great
work on our institutional law--such a work as the world sees once in
a century.

Consider this one phase of jurisprudence for only a moment, young man,
just to see what a world of thought it opens to the mind.
Institutional law is older, deeper, and even more vital than
constitutional law. Our Constitution is one of the concrete
manifestations of our institutions; our statutes are another; the
decisions of our courts are another; our habits, methods, and customs
as a people and a race are still another.

Our institutional law is like the atmosphere--impalpable,
imperceptible, but all-pervading, and the source of life itself. Most
leading decisions of our courts of last resort, involving great
constitutional questions, refer to the spirit of our institutions as
interpreting our Constitution. It is our institutional law which,
flowing like our blood through the written Constitution, gives that
instrument vitality and power of development.

Institutional law existed before the Constitution. Our institutions
had their beginnings well-nigh with the beginning of time. They have
developed through the ages. Magna Charta only marked a period in their
growth; the assertion of the rights of the Commons marked another;
our Revolution marked another; the adoption of our Constitution marked
another still.

I have no respect for constitutional learning which deals alone with
the written words of the Constitution, or even with the intention of
its framers, and ignores the sources and spirit of that great
instrument. The Constitution did not give us free institutions; free
institutions gave us our Constitution. All our progress toward liberty
and popular government, made since the adoption of the Constitution,
has been the spirit of our institutions working out its sure results,
through the Constitution when possible, modif