across the water has met these difficulties by instituting a
probationary residence of two years, after which by taking a solemn
oath renouncing all allegiance to any foreign sovereign or land,
more especially to the ruler of England and the English nation, and
declaring their wish to live and die citizens of the United States,
the new comers are, after a further residence of another three years,
fully enfranchised, and become citizens of the American Republic. In
this, as in many other cases, it would appear that the great Republic
has struck on a wise and practical solution to a complex problem; and
in this matter, as in many others, we, personally, should like to see
the action of the great sister Republic followed. But thoughtful minds
may suggest, on the other hand, that, while in America, at least at the
present day, the newly enfranchised burgher receives but one-sixteen
millionth of the State power and of governmental control on his
enfranchisement, in a small state like the Transvaal each new burgher
receives over eight hundred times that power in the government and
control of the country, and that this makes a serious difference in the
importance of making sure of the loyalty and sincerity of your citizen
before you enfranchise him. We see this, and there is something to be
said for it. It has been held by many sincerely desirous of arriving
at a just and balanced conclusion, that, in a Republic situated as the
Transvaal is, a longer residence and the votes of a certain proportion
of the already enfranchised citizens are necessary before the vast
rights conferred by citizenship in a small purely democratic State are
granted. The terms for the enfranchisement for foreigners in England
yield us no instructive analogy; for, in a country with an hereditary
sovereign and an hereditary Upper House the enfranchised foreigner
receives only a minute fraction of the power conferred on the elector
in a pure democracy. The little Russian Jew who has a vote given him in
London can never become the supreme head of the State, can never sit in
or vote for members of the Upper House, and receives only the minute
fractional power of voting for members of the Lower. It is