can only be touched (if at all) by a constituent assembly, and statutes which can be repealed by an ordinary Parliament—­the whole apparatus, in short, of artificial constitutionalism—­is utterly unknown to Englishmen.  Thus freedom has in England been found compatible at crises of danger with an energy of action generally supposed to be peculiar to despotism.  The source of strength is, in fact, in each case the same.  The sovereignty of Parliament is like the sovereignty of the Czar.  It is like all sovereignty at bottom, nothing else but unlimited power; and, unlike some other forms of sovereignty, can be at once put in force by the ordinary means of law.  This is the one great advantage of our constitution over that of the United States.  In America, every ordinary authority throughout the Union is hampered by constitutional restrictions; legislation must be slow, because the change of any constitutional rule is impeded by endless difficulties.  The vigour which is wanting to Congress, is indeed to a certain extent to be found in the extensive executive power left in the hands of the President; but it takes little acuteness to perceive that in point of pliability, power of development, freedom of action, English constitutionalism far excels the Federalism of the United States.  Nor is it less obvious that the very qualities in which the English constitution excels that of the United States are essential to the maintenance by England of the British Empire.  Home Rulers, whether they know it or not, touch the mainspring of the British constitution.  For from the moment that Great Britain becomes part of a federation, the omnipotence of Parliament is gone.  The Federal Congress might be called by the name of the Imperial Parliament.  It might possibly be made up of the same elements, be elected by the same electors, and even in the main consist of the very same persons as the existing Parliament of the United Kingdom; but its nature would be changed, and its power would be limited on all sides.  It might deal with Imperial expenditure, with foreign affairs, with peace and war, with other matters placed within its competence; on every other point the British Congress would, like the American Congress, be powerless.  Nor would all the powers taken from the Congress be necessarily given to the local assemblies.  Every analogy points the other way.  If the example of the United States is to be followed, articles of the constitution would limit the power both of the Imperial Congress and of the local representative assemblies.  This limitation of authority could not be measured by what appears on the face of the constitution.  Some council, tribunal, or other arbiter—­let us, for the sake of simplicity, call it the Federal Court—­would have authority to determine whether a law was or was not constitutional, or, in other words, whether it was or was not a law.  Let no one fancy that the restraint placed on the power of ordinary legislation by the authority of a Federal