'^nC't^vv/ 
 
 
 Unforeseen Tendencies 
 of Democracy 
 
 BY 
 
 EDWIN LAWRENCE GODKIN 
 
 WESTMINSTER 
 
 ARCHIBALD CONSTABLE & CO. 
 2 WHITEHALL GARDENS
 
 J. PETlR MAYER 
 LIBRARY
 
 CIBRARY 
 
 IttflMERSITY OF CALIFORNR 
 ftAKXA BABBA&A 
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 turn 
 
 FORMER DEMOCRACIES 1 
 
 EQUALITY 29 
 
 THE NOMINATING SYSTEM 48 
 
 THE DECLINE OF LEGISLATURES 96 
 
 PECULIARITIES OF AMERICAN MUNICIPAL GOVERNMENT . 145 
 
 THE GROWTH AND EXPRESSION OF PUBLIC OPINION . 183 
 
 THE AUSTRALIAN DEMOCRACY ... . 226
 
 INTRODUCTION 
 
 I HAVE endeavored in the following pages, 
 not to describe democracy, something which 
 has been done by abler hands than mine, but 
 to describe some of the departures it has made 
 from the ways which its earlier promoters ex- 
 pected it to follow. It has done a great many 
 things which they never thought it would do, 
 and has left undone a great many things which 
 they thought it would do. Not nearly all the 
 deductions from the principle of equality have 
 been correct. The growth of democracy has dis- 
 sipated a good many fears about the "mob;" 
 but on the other hand it has failed to realize 
 a good many expectations about its conduct of 
 government. Nearly all the philosophers, from 
 Tocqueville down, and especially the English 
 Radicals of the earlier part of the century, 
 would be surprised by some of its developments. 
 No democratic state comes anywhere near their 
 ideal. Unexpected desires and prejudices have 
 revealed themselves.
 
 iv INTRODUCTION 
 
 Democracies have discovered new ways of do- 
 ing things, and have discarded many old ones. 
 More particularly they have not shown that 
 desire to employ leading men in the manage- 
 ment of their affairs which they were expected 
 to show. In fact, that wish of the people to 
 control their own business, which tormented the 
 Old World for so many centuries, has been fully 
 gratified, but the people are not managing them 
 in the ways that were expected. Nearly all the 
 recent writers on democracy, however, have as- 
 sumed an inability on its part to correct mis- 
 takes, which the facts do not seem to me to 
 warrant. Had it no such ability, the future of 
 the world would indeed be pretty dismal. On 
 the other hand, the error of its friends in de- 
 fending it lies, it seems to me, in underestimating 
 the length of time it takes a democratic commu- 
 nity to find out that it is going wrong and to 
 acknowledge it. It must be admitted, even by 
 its warmest admirers, that democracy is not very 
 teachable by philosophers and jurists. Experi- 
 ence counts with it for less than it used to count 
 for, under the old aristocratic governments, but 
 the reason seems to be that the experience of one 
 class is seldom of much use to another. Each
 
 INTRODUCTION r 
 
 is apt to think it will do better by doing differ- 
 ently. Every democracy, too, is weighted by the 
 fact that its new agents are rarely men familiar 
 with public affairs, or with human trials in mat- 
 ters of government. Those of its advisers who 
 are familiar with such things are apt to be hos- 
 tile or distrustful, and are therefore not listened 
 to with confidence or attention. It is, in fact, 
 launched on a chartless sea, and most of its 
 legislation hitherto has been mere groping. 
 
 The first danger it has encountered is the 
 enormously increased facility for money-making 
 which the modern world has supplied, and the 
 inevitably resulting corruption. I cannot help 
 doubting whether any regime would have with- 
 stood this. The power of getting money easily, 
 debauched every court and aristocracy in the Old 
 World, even when getting money easily meant 
 mere rapine. The demoralization this is pro- 
 ducing now, even among the scions of old houses, 
 is one of the wonders of our time. Neither phi- 
 losophy nor religion seems to offer much resist- 
 ance to it. It is breaking down, not simply the 
 old political, but the old social usages and stand- 
 ards. The aristocratic contempt for money as 
 compared with station and honor, of which we
 
 ri INTRODUCTION 
 
 used to hear so much, has completely vanished. 
 The thirst for gold seems to be felt now by all 
 classes equally, while the number of those among 
 whom the gold has to be divided, is greatly 
 increased. 
 
 Another disadvantage with which democracy 
 has to contend, is being called on, almost sud- 
 denly, to govern the large masses of population 
 called cities, without any experience, either of 
 their special wants or of the means of satisfying 
 them. 
 
 Our civilization has, as has been said, be- 
 come urban within the present generation, almost 
 without our knowing it. Democracy has there- 
 fore been suddenly called on to solve problems 
 by universal suffrage which an oligarchy of the 
 most select kind has never had to face. Its 
 failures, therefore, have been serious and nu- 
 merous, and there does not seem much chance 
 of its doing better without experience; expe- 
 rience is a master from whose chastening rod 
 none can escape. To suppose it will not learn 
 through mishaps and miscarriages would be to 
 despair of the human race, for it is from suffer- 
 ing or failure that we have got most of the good
 
 INTRODUCTION vii 
 
 things in civilization. The great, perhaps the 
 only, mistake optimists appear to make is, as I 
 have said, the mistake of thinking there are short 
 cuts to political happiness. 
 
 E. L. G.
 
 UNFORESEEN TENDENCIES OF 
 DEMOCRACY 
 
 FORMER DEMOCRACIES 
 
 I HAVE thought it necessary, at the risk of 
 being tedious, to preface what I am about to say 
 concerning democracy by a brief account of the 
 earlier efforts to establish it. I do this to avoid 
 the notion, -which is only too prevalent, that 
 we are in this age attempting something new 
 in the art of government, when the fact is that 
 we are continuing a very old experiment under 
 widely changed conditions. Human nature re- 
 mains the constant element in our problem, but 
 it is now surrounded with a great variety of novel 
 agencies, to which we are slowly and painfully 
 trying to adapt ourselves. 
 
 There is probably no political question which 
 has been more debated than the origin of society, 
 what it was that in the beginning brought large 
 bodies of men together under one government. 
 There is probably no subject more obscure.
 
 2 FORMER DEMOCRACIES 
 
 When it began to be looked into after the Re- 
 naissance, the view of Aristotle, that society had 
 grown naturally, was the one generally adopted. 
 Government was the product of the nature of 
 man as a gregarious or political animal, as he 
 calls him. Men loved to live in a herd, and in 
 order to live comfortably in a herd, regulations 
 were necessary; and as soon as speech came, 
 these regulations became governments, but they 
 were not at the outset really what we call gov- 
 ernment. They were, more properly, customs. 
 There is nothing more wonderful or incredible 
 in these than in the customs of the bees or of 
 the ants. These animals have certain ways of 
 acting under certain circumstances, which must 
 be considered, as long as we deny them intel- 
 lect, a true government. That is, a certain 
 course of conduct is imposed on them by some 
 power or influence superior to the individual 
 will. Whether this power be instinct or custom 
 makes little difference. It constitutes an orderly 
 way of living in society. The essential thing in 
 any government is that it should make living 
 in society easy and secure, while living alone is 
 insecure and disagreeable. The prevalence of 
 the belief among individuals that things must 
 be done in a certain way, and not in others, and 
 that unless things are done in a certain way, and 
 not in others, unpleasant results will follow,,
 
 FORMER DEMOCRACIES 3 
 
 means organized society ; and it makes no dif- 
 ference from what source the unpleasantness of 
 these results may emanate. As soon as this 
 power or influence takes hold of men, and a 
 number of them agree in submitting to it, gov- 
 ernment of some kind is instituted. 
 
 Of the origin of custom we know little, al- 
 though there has been a great deal of specula- 
 tion about it, too. But it is almost certain that 
 every custom originated either in a common 
 sense of the convenience of some practice, or in 
 a gradually formed common belief in its efficacy 
 as a protection against known ills. So it may 
 be alleged with tolerable positiveness that the 
 practice of being bound by certain customs was 
 in the beginning a natural product of men'i 
 gregariousness. 
 
 A great deal, also, has been written about the 
 origin of law. In the beginning of this century 
 Austin made some impression by the definition 
 of law as a command promulgated by an official 
 superior ; that is, he thought that there must be 
 a government, in our sense of the word, before 
 there is law, and that even custom does not be- 
 come law until it has received the sanction or 
 affirmation of this political superior, or of its 
 courts or judges. But, as has been pointed out 
 by Maine and Holland and Pollock, the courts 
 decide what customs are binding and what are
 
 4 FORMER DEMOCRACIES 
 
 not, showing that a custom may be a law before 
 the political superior takes any notice of it. la 
 fact, it is now generally recognized, as Maine 
 suggests, that law begins in custom or religion ; 
 that law is the product either of custom or of 
 belief. As far as we can go back into the mists 
 of time, we find men living under the domain of 
 custom. We find them doing some things and 
 avoiding others, simply because their fathers be- 
 fore them have done them or have avoided them. 
 We find this long before we can catch sight of 
 any political authority whatever. Even to-day, 
 according to Mr. Lumholst, there are Australian 
 savages who have no political or social superiors, 
 and whom nobody commands. But they have 
 rules of living. Superiority of physical strength 
 seems to lead, in process of time, to the predomi- 
 nance of one man, which predominance finally 
 brings with it moral influence. But political 
 authority, apparently, does not come for a good 
 while. Among American Indians, the chief is 
 not always a political superior. He leads in a 
 war party those who choose to follow him from 
 confidence in his ability, but when the expedition 
 is over he becomes simply a distinguished man, 
 whose advice is valuable and whose prowess is 
 great. What holds the tribe together is a collec- 
 tion of customs which fix the date and character 
 of its doings, and which none dares to disobey.
 
 Not unnaturally, when a chief of more than 
 ordinary force and character is able, in a more 
 advanced state of society, to convert this influ- 
 ence into positive rule, that is, to make him- 
 self a Homeric or Roman " king," and perhaps 
 a hereditary king, to become a real political 
 chief, and to give his family a semi-sacred char- 
 acter in the popular eyes, we have the foundation 
 of a state. 
 
 But we meet with no sign in antiquity of the 
 conscious foundation of a state by agreement. 
 In all that we see or know of the foundations of 
 society, we find no trace of conscious organiza- 
 tion. Certain arrangements grow out of exist- 
 ing conditions. They are not made, and they 
 differ infinitely as the previous circumstances 
 differ. So that the Aristotelian view appears to 
 have been founded on all that was known or 
 could be learnt of the early history of mankind. 
 The contract theory represented society as we 
 see it, as having been founded by discussion be- 
 tween rulers and people, and the formation by 
 mutual agreement of rules by which the govern- 
 ment was to be carried on. This was, in the 
 seventeenth century, the chief weapon of the 
 friends of constitutional liberty against the abso- 
 lutists. Sir Robert Filmer, on behalf of the 
 absolutists, founded the monarch's claim to rule 
 on the paternal character of Adam. As Adam.
 
 6 FORMER DEMOCRACIES 
 
 ruled all that then existed of the human race in 
 virtue of his fathership, so the kings ruled his 
 descendants as his successors, in virtue of their 
 fathership. Grotius went halfway towards this 
 theory by founding the monarch's title, not on a 
 contract with the governed, but on the consent 
 of the governed. They gave themselves to the 
 monarch without conditions. Hobbes held that 
 men formed society through fear of each other : 
 each, being afraid the others would kill or rob 
 him, thought it best for safety to enter into 
 an alliance with somebody, and thus tribes, and 
 finally societies, grew up. But all agreed that 
 in the original state of nature men lived as indi- 
 viduals, without relations with other men. Gro- 
 tius made his theory support the existing condi- 
 tion of things on the continent of Europe. Sir 
 Robert Filmer used his to defend the cause of 
 King James, and Hobbes his to exalt the power 
 of " the state," or " Leviathan," in behalf of 
 King Charles. Hooker, as a moralist, used his 
 theory to inculcate the duty and advantages of 
 mutual love and assistance, whatever the form 
 of government might be. Locke held to the 
 contract theory on behalf of King William ; but 
 the only government he could have known to 
 result, as Hooker says, from " the deliberate 
 advice, consultation, and composition between 
 men," was that of the New England colonies,
 
 FORMER DEMOCRACIES 7 
 
 and more particularly that of Plymouth. What 
 happened in " the state of nature," though de- 
 scribed by nearly all these writers with minute- 
 ness, is pure guesswork. 
 
 Although Locke and Hooker described a 
 free commonwealth or a " perfect democracy " 
 with tolerable accuracy as the " majority making 
 laws for the community from time to time, and 
 executing those laws by officers of their own 
 appointment," we really get no glimpses of a 
 " people " as we understand the word in the 
 modern world. A people, in the political sense, 
 has to be not simply a collection of individuals 
 or families living in a certain region in a certain 
 way, and making common cause against enemies, 
 but a body conscious of its own existence as a 
 political organism, and of the existence of cer- 
 tain duties of individuals to one another with- 
 out blood relationship, and of rights of its own, 
 and of control over its own affairs as a whole, 
 and of the power to dispose of itself as a whole. 
 When this self-consciousness first arose we do 
 not know. We find all writers on government, 
 down to the French Revolution, treating the 
 states of antiquity, and especially the Hebrews, 
 Greeks, and Romans, as illustrations or proofs 
 of their theories. What was right politically 
 was generally found in the Bible ; what was 
 wise or admirable was generally found in Plu-
 
 8 FORMER DEMOCRACIES 
 
 tarch's Lives or in Livy. Indeed, it may be said 
 that before Montesquieu there was no political 
 speculation worth serious attention. He was the 
 first since Aristotle to base his theories on the 
 nature of man, and to some extent on the expe- 
 rience of existing states. As he says in his pre- 
 face, " I have not drawn my principles from my 
 prejudices, but from the nature of things." He 
 was, in fact, the first to consider the effects of 
 character on government, and to look on gov- 
 ernment as modifying character. But he con- 
 tinued, like his predecessors, to find most of his 
 illustrations in antiquity. This gave much of 
 the writing on politics of the pre-Revolutionary 
 period an academic air. Even Rousseau and 
 Voltaire and the Encyclopedists seemed to be 
 making literature rather than exerting an influ- 
 ence on government. It was not until the Rev- 
 olution had sought to embody these speculations 
 in practice that democracy, or the rule of the 
 people, came out of the closets of the philoso- 
 phers, either as a beneficent force or as a new 
 kind of danger, and that discussions about gov- 
 ernment took on an air of real business. The 
 Revolution sought to embody the speculations of 
 the philosophers in practice, not so much because 
 it fancied their theories as because the nation 
 was miserable. Had the French people been 
 happy and prosperous, or well governed, the
 
 FORMER DEMOCRACIES 9 
 
 probabilities are that we should have heard 
 little or nothing of the influence of the writers. 
 
 There is no doubt that the pre-Revolutionary 
 writers were in the right way in relying on 
 Greece and Rome for their illustrations. Up 
 to that time the modern world, if we except 
 England, had contributed little or nothing to 
 the science of government. Certain customary 
 bodies had grown up, such as the States-General 
 in France and the House of Commons in Eng- 
 land, which kept alive the theory that the people 
 had something to do with the management of 
 their own affairs. But as a rule government was 
 in all countries a congeries of customs, maxims, 
 or proverbs, literally without form and inexpli- 
 cable, for which little could be said except that 
 they had grown up, and that people were used 
 to them and liked them. Symmetry was the last 
 thing they sought. The ignorance and barbar- 
 ism of the Middle Ages lingered in the laws 
 and governmental arrangements of every Euro- 
 pean country. To get an idea of the orderly 
 growth of states, as the result of manners, cir- 
 cumstances, and religion, readers have to go 
 back to Greece and Rome. 
 
 Greece and Rome are, in truth, our politi- 
 cal ancestors. From them have come to us, 
 through some process of descent, the idea of 
 nearly all our political arrangements. The habit
 
 10 FORMER DEMOCRACIES 
 
 of taking counsel together is a natural result of 
 man's gregariousness. But the practice of per- 
 suasion by discussion, and decision by a major- 
 ity after a hearing, is Greek. The use of checks 
 in the exercise of authority by law, and indeed 
 the habit of trying experiments in politics, are 
 Greek and Roman. The Greeks and Romans 
 were the first we know of to make special ma- 
 chinery of government, to see how it would 
 work, and to change it deliberately if it was 
 unsuitable. The Greeks may be said to have 
 been the founders of what is called " diplo- 
 macy ; " that is, of the art of conducting nego- 
 tiations and transacting business through argu- 
 ment between equal states. The Romans set us 
 the example of basing political arrangements on 
 manners and religion. They took the family as 
 their political model, and created the political 
 father called the " king," or leader ; but they 
 kept in mind that as there were many fathers, 
 there must be discussion and agreement. They 
 were the first, too, to embody in their polity a 
 full recognition of the value of experience and 
 deliberation by creating a body of seniors, or 
 older men, called the " Senate." The early Ro- 
 man Senate was composed simply of older men. 
 To compose it mainly of distinguished public 
 servants was the idea of a much later period. 
 In fact, what strikes one most, in reading the
 
 FORMER DEMOCRACIES 11 
 
 history of either ancient Greece or Rome, is its 
 political activity, the incessantness with which 
 the people sought after better ways of living in 
 society. Greece was, for this purpose, some- 
 what in our position ; that is, it was made up 
 of a number of small states, in which constant 
 experimentation in politics was going on, within 
 limits set by a certain number of Hellenic cus- 
 toms which roughly corresponded to our Fed- 
 eral Constitution. Every one of the small states 
 tried something new, monarchy, democracy, 
 or aristocracy, military or peaceful habits, and 
 accepted or rejected it after trial. What is in 
 our eyes most singular in these trials is the part 
 distinguished men played in them. In nothing 
 political do we differ more from the ancient 
 world than in the disappearance from among 
 us of the " lawgiver," Moses, Solon, Lycurgus, 
 Minos, the single statesman to whom the 
 people commit the construction of a social and 
 political regime by which they agree to live, or at 
 least to try to live. We can hardly conceive of 
 a state of mind in which we should be willing to 
 leave to one man, however revered, the construc- 
 tion of a plan of life both civil and political, 
 sometimes, as in the case of Sparta, of great 
 severity, and then accept it, without question, 
 for an indefinite period. According to Plutarch, 
 the Spartans lived for five hundred years under
 
 12 FORMER DEMOCRACIES 
 
 laws of extraordinary rigidity contrived by Ly- 
 curgus. Solon at Athens, too, appears to have 
 had no difficulty in enforcing the seisachtheia, 
 or general release of debtors, in order to make 
 way for his code of laws, and Moses, or some 
 one of somewhat similar authority, supplied the 
 Hebrews with a moral code of the most endur- 
 ing character. It is to be observed, however, 
 that the lawgiver always acted with the aid of 
 religion. He was always supposed to have God 
 or his oracles behind him; that is, he had to be 
 in some sense divinely appointed. There is more 
 or less uncertainty about the exact nature of the 
 kind of legislation which each provided, but 
 no matter how mythical his character or doings 
 might be, the mere conception of the lawgiver 
 indicates a readiness to defer to individual wis- 
 dom, which has long departed from the world, 
 the most remarkable feature of ancient poli- 
 tics. 
 
 But what was really almost as striking was 
 the capacity for general political progress of the 
 communities which sprang up in the numerous 
 islands and valleys of Greece, and of the vari- 
 ous villages of shepherds and husbandmen who 
 founded Rome. We can hardly imagine similar 
 communities in our day doing more than live by 
 a small set of customs, tending their flocks, cul- 
 tivating their small farms, and only too happy
 
 FORMER DEMOCRACIES 13 
 
 to walk quietly and unostentatiously in their 
 ancient ways. The Greeks and Romans, on the 
 contrary, were remarkable for continuous search 
 after better ways. The village on the Palatine 
 grew into an empire through a series of experi- 
 ments in war and peace. There were constant 
 changes in the structure of the government from 
 Romulus down to Augustus, to meet some exist- 
 ing ill. In like manner, every little community 
 in Greece was occupied in steady pursuit of a 
 better regime than that which it had. As a 
 rule, each was a little democracy, engaged more 
 or less frequently in resisting the attempts of 
 rich men to set up either a monarchy or an 
 aristocracy. These attempts were often success- 
 ful for a time, but never permanently successful. 
 Down to the end, in spite of their early respect 
 for family, the Greeks appear to have remained 
 thoroughly democratic in their ideas and man- 
 ners. But the rich class were rarely content 
 with the existing state of things, always felt they 
 could do better if they had their way, and were 
 as purely selfish as aristocracies are apt to be. 
 They were convinced that the most important 
 interest of the state was that they, not the 
 many, should be happy and content. Aristotle 
 furnishes several illustrations of this, the most 
 remarkable being the oath which he says was 
 taken by some of the oligarchies : " I will be
 
 14 FORMER DEMOCRACIES 
 
 evil-minded towards the people, and bring on 
 them by my counsel whatever mischief I can." 
 
 In Aristotle's " Politics," in fact, may be found 
 the best thought of the ancient world about 
 politics, and, in general, about life in an organ- 
 ized state. It is somewhat startling to see how 
 small is the advance we have made on his ideas. 
 That the great end of men in society should be, 
 not simply to live, but to live well; that a free 
 state should be composed of freemen; that a 
 state in which the good of the rulers is sought 
 rather than that of the many, is not a free state; 
 that private property is essential; that no man 
 is a citizen who does not share in the govern- 
 ment; that a good citizen and a good man are 
 synonymous terms ; that no man should be judge 
 in his own cause; that government should be 
 adapted to the mental and moral condition of 
 the governed; that every class in a state, if it 
 gets possession of the government, is apt to seek 
 its own advantage exclusively, these are prin- 
 ciples which have not been improved upon, and 
 lie at the basis of all modern political constitu- 
 tions. 
 
 The only matters on which we should be dis- 
 posed, in modern life, to dissent from Aristotle 
 are the judiciary and slavery. Judges, he thinks, 
 in a democracy, should be numerous and elec- 
 tive, and he recognizes slavery as ordained by
 
 FORMER DEMOCRACIES 15 
 
 nature. But his description of the internal dan- 
 gers of a state, of the different kinds of govern- 
 ment which have been tried, of the objections to 
 each, and of the things necessary to the success- 
 ful practice of either monarchy, oligarchy, or 
 democracy, has hardly been surpassed in our 
 day, even with our vastly longer experience. 
 From him we get the Greek idea of citizenship 
 without qualification ; that is, government by 
 universal suffrage, without regard to rank or 
 property. But this has to be received with some 
 allowance, owing to the existence of slavery. 
 In every Greek republic the laboring class were 
 slaves and were excluded from all share in the 
 government, so that we cannot say that any one 
 state made the experiment of democracy, in the 
 sense in which we understand it. Even in the 
 successful democracies, the voters or citizens 
 were, in a certain degree, an oligarchy, were pos- 
 sessed of property and independence, and had 
 ample time to occupy themselves with politics 
 and to go to the assemblies, or, as we say, "to 
 attend to their political duties." 
 
 This points to other important differences be- 
 tween our idea of democracy and that of the 
 ancients. With Aristotle, smallness was an essen- 
 tial condition of democracy. It was considered 
 desirable that no democracy should be so large 
 that all the citizens could not attend the general
 
 16 FORMER DEMOCRACIES 
 
 assembly and take a personal part in legislating 
 and judging; also, that all citizens should be in 
 some measure known to one another and to the 
 magistrates. As the representative system had 
 not been invented, our plan of committing the 
 work of government to a class, while the rest of 
 the population give the bulk of their time to 
 some sort of bread-earning, was not known to 
 the ancients as democracy. Such a state of 
 things was not in their eyes a democracy, but an 
 oligarchy or a monarchy. The personal parti- 
 cipation of the citizen in all deliberations was 
 essential. To secure this, as democracies grew 
 larger, and the poor found presence at the meet- 
 ings of the assembly a hardship, they were paid 
 a small sum for their attendance, like our jury- 
 men. Moreover, for the same reasons, every 
 democracy was supposed to consist of a city sim- 
 ply, with all citizens living within easy reach of 
 the agora or forum. Strangers and sojourners 
 and slaves, however numerous, were excluded 
 from citizenship, so that at Athens and Rome, 
 in the later days, the real citizens were in a small 
 minority, constituting what the French call the 
 pays legal ; that is, the city or country recog- 
 nized by or known to the law. This presence of 
 a body of persons sharing the life and interests 
 of the place, but not allowed to share in its gov- 
 ernment, was transmitted to the modern world,
 
 FORMER DEMOCRACIES 17 
 
 and became a feature in all the municipalities of 
 the Middle Ages, and even of the democratic 
 cantons of Switzerland. The citizens or bur- 
 gesses owned the state or city as property, and 
 transmitted it to their children. They gave 
 nothing to the non-citizens but permission to 
 reside and protection. The idea that mere birth 
 and residence ought to give citizenship gained 
 ground only after the French Revolution, and 
 was really not received in England until the 
 reform of the municipalities in 1832. The old 
 confinement of the citizenship to a small body 
 of property-holders, or descendants of property- 
 holders, undoubtedly gave the property qualifi- 
 cation to such of the modern European states as 
 set up an elected legislature or council. Down 
 to the passage of the Reform Bill in England, 
 the exclusion of all but freeholders from the 
 franchise seemed a perfectly natural arrange- 
 ment. It was very difficult for most English- 
 men, and the same thing is true of the earlier 
 Americans, to suppose that any one could take 
 a genuine interest in the welfare of the country, 
 or be willing to make sacrifices for its sake, 
 who did not own land in it. The central idea 
 of the ancient city was in this way made to cover 
 the larger area of a modern kingdom. 
 
 This idea of citizenship, too, accounts in some 
 measure for the important place assigned in the
 
 18 FORMER DEMOCRACIES 
 
 Greek system to the " demagogue." Not only 
 the name, but the picture of the demagogue 
 comes to us from antiquity. He is literally a 
 man who exerts great influence over the people, 
 it may be for good as well as for bad purposes. 
 We use the word in a bad sense, but originally 
 the sense was not always bad. The demagogue 
 was distinctly the product of oratory. It was 
 oratory at Athens, for instance, which is said to 
 have created him ; and of course, to give weight 
 to oratory, the body to be influenced must be 
 small. To employ the common expression of 
 our orators, those whom he addresses must be 
 "within the sound of his voice." In the absence 
 of a periodical press this was essential. The 
 people must have been a body which a man 
 could address even in the open air. His distin- 
 guishing trait, however, as Aristotle describes 
 him, was his correspondence to the flatterer or 
 courtier of the monarch or tyrant. He always 
 extolled the wisdom and other good qualities 
 of the people, and claimed in virtue of this 
 wisdom very great powers for it. He was the 
 great enemy of checks and balances. Aristotle 
 describes one sort of democratic government 
 as "allowing the people, not the law, to be 
 supreme." " And this takes place," he says, 
 " when everything is determined by a majority 
 of voters, and not by a law, a thing which
 
 FORMER DEMOCRACIES 19 
 
 happens by reason of the demagogues." They 
 might, in fact, be described as the great cham- 
 pions, on every occasion, of government by sim- 
 ple majority, a characteristic which they possess 
 in our day. Most demagogues maintain the 
 wisdom of the people, not generally, but with 
 regard to the particular matter under considera- 
 tion ; this wisdom is superior to all experience, 
 to all checks imposed by antecedent laws or con- 
 stitutions, and even to the moral ideas of any 
 preceding generation. Their audience is always 
 treated as either omnipotent or allwise within 
 the sphere of legislation, and as much wronged 
 by the restriction of its powers by any outward 
 influence. 
 
 It is the remembrance of this fact which has 
 led, in modern times, to the adoption of consti- 
 tutions changeable only at fixed times or in a 
 prescribed way. The main object of them all is 
 to put restrictions on the power of the majority 
 vote, which vote is an object of great dread to 
 nearly all political philosophers in our day. On 
 the other hand, the object of nearly all dema- 
 gogues, as they are called, is to establish this 
 power. This has perhaps never been more re- 
 markably illustrated than by the recent presiden- 
 tial canvass in this country. All, or nearly all, 
 Mr. Bryan's adherents wished, with regard to 
 the currency and various other matters, to dis-
 
 20 FORMER DEMOCRACIES 
 
 regard the experience of the race and of the rest 
 of the world, and to treat the wishes of the 
 majority as sufficient to determine finally the 
 action which the nation ought to take. This 
 caution due to the fear of external resistance, 
 which in previous democracies has generally been 
 operative, was notably absent, owing to the un- 
 precedented size of the democracy. The dema- 
 gogues said that we were so large and powerful 
 that we could do what we pleased. No ancient 
 democracy was able to say this or think it. It 
 always had neighbors of nearly equal strength, 
 whose enmity was to be feared or whose good 
 will had to be courted. What other neighbor- 
 ing states thought, or would be likely to think, 
 of most measures under discussion, was generally 
 a consideration of more or less weight. Then, 
 the possibility of emigration on the part of any 
 class or set of men whom legislation might op- 
 press or discriminate against, had to be taken 
 into account. The ancient world along the 
 shores of the Mediterranean was constantly agi- 
 tated by movements of discontented people in 
 search of new homes. Seneca's explanation of 
 the causes of the foundation of colonies would 
 apply almost exactly to the seventeenth and 
 eighteenth centuries. It would apply even to 
 the emigration of this century, with this dif- 
 ference, however : that the ancient colonists
 
 FORMER DEMOCRACIES 21 
 
 never went very far away, but settled in what 
 might be called Greek or Roman regions, while 
 ours, as a rule, have planted themselves in the 
 wilderness, where the work of civilization had 
 to be begun from the very foundations. The 
 Swiss, from the earliest times, enjoyed this ad- 
 vantage of having powerful neighbors, whose 
 presence exerted a more or less moderating in- 
 fluence on all democratic schemes or enterprises. 
 Even their extraordinary military success in the 
 sixteenth century did not rid them of the fear 
 of foreign critics. 
 
 In all ancient democracies, including early 
 Rome under this term, the internal history is 
 generally an account of contests between the 
 poor and the rich ; meaning by " poor " persons 
 who are not rich, not the extremely poor. An 
 oligarchy always consists of rich men ; a demo- 
 cracy, of what may be called people of moderate 
 means. For the most part, the rich seem never 
 to be thoroughly content with the rule of the 
 many, and long to rid themselves of it. Nor do 
 they share the democratic or Aristotelian idea 
 of the state as a community of freemen. They 
 think themselves entitled to rule, and think 
 their contentment the chief object of the state. 
 There consequently prevailed between them and 
 the masses a somewhat fierce animosity. When 
 a revolution took place in a Greek state, it was
 
 22 FORMER DEMOCRACIES 
 
 generally either a rising against an oligarchy of 
 rich men, or else an attempt on the part of rich 
 men to overthrow democratic government : hence 
 the attempts of the lawgiver to enforce equality 
 in living, so as to prevent the rich man from 
 making, in his mode of life, any outward display 
 of his wealth. In Sparta Lycurgus went so far 
 as to make all eat at the same table. But the 
 idea of the sacredness of property, as we hold 
 it, can hardly be said to have existed in the 
 ancient communities. Dispossessions, confisca- 
 tions, redistributions, were not uncommon. The 
 power of the lender over the borrower's person 
 was from the earliest times, both in Greece and 
 in Rome, very great, and kept alive the discon- 
 tent of the poor, making it extremely important 
 for the rich man everywhere to get and keep 
 possession of the government. It was only by 
 getting hold of the administration of the law 
 that he could feel absolutely secure. 
 
 To understand this more completely, we have 
 to bear in mind that there is no record of a poor 
 aristocracy having long retained possession of 
 any state. In spite of the definition of the 
 word which makes aristocrats the best men in 
 the community, all attempts to maintain an aris- 
 tocracy very long in power without wealth have 
 proved failures. A poor nobility, even when it 
 has a court and a standing army to support it, is
 
 FORMER DEMOCRACIES 23 
 
 never well able to justify itself in the popular 
 eye. The people expect a powerful man to live 
 with a certain ostentation. He has to have very 
 commanding talents or to render great services, 
 in order to live simply, without loss of political 
 prestige. Consequently, notwithstanding what 
 long and illustrious descent might do for a man, 
 the Greek definition of oligarchy or aristocracy 
 as rich men was not far wrong. There is 
 something a little ridiculous about the poor no- 
 bleman, and he has been in all ages extensively 
 caricatured, and his pretensions to eminence have 
 been mocked at. 
 
 When, in the beginning of this century, the 
 result of the French Revolution had discredited 
 democracy as a cure for modern ills, there natu- 
 rally and speedily arose among the champions of 
 aristocracy a desire to discredit ancient demo- 
 cracy also as an example for the modern world, 
 and modern writers speedily took sides between 
 the Greek rich and the Greek poor. More par- 
 ticularly, a history of Greece written by Mr. 
 Mitford, and published in 1810, seemed to have 
 for its special object to show the failure of Athe- 
 nian democracy, and to warn the modern advo- 
 cates of popular government of the danger of 
 their theories. He was apparently producing 
 a good deal of effect, and was having his own 
 way, when George Grote, then a young man,
 
 24 FORMER DEMOCRACIES 
 
 appeared on the scene with an article criticising 
 him (in the " Westminster Review " of April, 
 1826) that excited a sensation which we in later 
 days find it difficult to understand. He over- 
 whelmed the historian with Greek learning, 
 with his minute knowledge of all that could be 
 known concerning Greek manners, ideas, history, 
 geography, and literature. The article was not 
 very long, but it was conclusive, and after its 
 appearance Mitford ceased to have authority. 
 But in spite of Thirlwall's more impartial view 
 and of Grote's own vindication of Greek popular 
 government in his history, Athens continued to 
 be, in the eyes of many conservatives, an ex- 
 ample of the dangers of a government of the 
 majority, until a comparatively recent period. 
 Democracy had certainly to contend with power- 
 ful illustrations of the superiority of the govern- 
 ment of the few in the matter of continuity of 
 policy, to be found in the history of states like 
 Venice, Berne, and Geneva, where public affairs 
 were administered with apparent success for cen- 
 turies, by a minority of patricians. All these 
 fell, not directly through their own weakness so 
 much as through the French Revolution, which 
 may be said to have swept them away by force. 
 But in any case they could not have survived 
 the gradual growth of cheap literature. The 
 success of aristocratic policy everywhere is due,
 
 FORMER DEMOCRACIES 25 
 
 in large part, to the possibility of secrecy, and 
 to the possibility of administering through few 
 counselors and without much discussion. The 
 existence and expression of such a thing as 
 " public opinion " that is, the opinion of a 
 great number of people, most of them ill in- 
 formed as to the matter in hand, are fatal to 
 it. The boldness which has always been one of 
 the marks of aristocratic government is, in fact, 
 due largely to the belief that it knows exactly 
 how the few feel, -whose feeling about any mat- 
 ter is of importance. If the multitude had to 
 be consulted, this boldness would be impossible, 
 owing to uncertainty as to what the final tribu- 
 nal would think. Consequently, the rise of the 
 newspaper press furnishing to every man the 
 materials for an opinion of some sort about pub- 
 lic affairs, and the opportunity to say something 
 about them, whether well or ill judged had 
 naturally a paralyzing effect on aristocratic pol- 
 icy, and would have led to the downfall of aris- 
 tocratic states even if the French Revolution had 
 never occurred. The contentment with material 
 conditions, such as the careful administration 
 of the finances and of justice, and the general 
 security that were characteristics of a govern- 
 ment like that of Berne, would have disappeared 
 rapidly before the popular desire to share in the 
 government. This would have been the inevita-
 
 26 FORMER DEMOCRACIES 
 
 ble result of popular knowledge of what author- 
 ity was doing which the cheap press brought 
 with it. When every man in the state knew, or 
 thought he knew, what ought to be done, the 
 period of government by small trained minori- 
 ties had passed away. 
 
 But as I have said, independently of this 
 influence of the printing-press, the eighteenth 
 century closed with the revelation of great aris- 
 tocratic failures all over Europe. The states 
 which Napoleon overthrew were all adminis- 
 tered by a few men of aristocratic birth with but 
 indifferent success. The break-down of their 
 regime in France was made notorious by the 
 terrible way in which popular discontent found 
 expression. But in nearly every country on the 
 Continent, outside Switzerland, privilege reigned 
 supreme, with harsh, even contemptuous treat- 
 ment of the poor, and with little or no economy 
 in the administration of the finances, except for 
 military purposes. Indeed, in every state on 
 the Continent the government may be said to 
 have failed, even as an instrument for carrying 
 on war with its neighbors. All its political 
 arrangements seem to have been made simply 
 for the purpose of enabling a small class to en- 
 joy themselves, and to indulge in their favorite 
 amusement of commanding armies. 
 
 In the discussion which arose out of the great
 
 FORMER DEMOCRACIES 27 
 
 uprising at the end of the century, therefore, 
 there was little or nothing to be said for the old 
 regime. The most was made of the excesses of 
 the Revolution, but no defense was possible of 
 what the Revolution overturned. It was not 
 surprising, then, that the supporters of the old 
 regime should turn to Athens for examples of 
 what the popular movement was likely to lead to 
 if the world chose to abandon its ancient ways. 
 What this abandonment would mean it is diffi- 
 cult for us to conceive now, in an age when 
 birth has lost its prestige, and the distinction 
 between the manant and the nobleman has 
 become almost diverting. The only places in 
 which it survives with any power are Austria 
 and Germany, particularly Austria, in which the 
 noble class, or class with a " sixteen quarterings," 
 still lives apart, and monopolizes many of the 
 offices of state and much of the command of 
 the army, as it did in France before the Revolu- 
 tion. 
 
 Nearly everywhere, however, even in as demo- 
 cratic states as ours, aristocracy leaves traditions 
 which are strong enough to make the rich desire 
 to inherit them. All over the modern world the 
 desire to belong to a class apart, with other 
 needs than those of the masses, and with claims 
 to consideration not possessed by the not-rich, 
 the tendency to consider themselves in some way
 
 28 FORMER DEMOCRACIES 
 
 superior to the rest of the community, is one of 
 the marks of the wealthy. And this claim on 
 the part of the rich to be the heirs of the old 
 aristocracy, and to possess the same social though 
 perhaps not the same political value, constitutes 
 one of the dangers of the time. Everywhere 
 the rich man seeks in some way, generally by 
 marriage, to ally himself with the old aristocracy 
 and be absorbed into it, and he demands what- 
 ever social deference used to be accorded to 
 birth. Tocqueville makes some gentle fun of 
 the American's disposition to trace his descent 
 from a noble family of the same name in Eng- 
 land ; and the tendency of well-to-do Americans 
 to ally themselves, immediately on landing in 
 Europe, with the old order of nobility is de- 
 scribed by Laboulaye in the pleasantry, " Un 
 Yankee a Paris se croit ne gentilhomme."
 
 EQUALITY 
 
 THE event which first gave the idea of demo- 
 cracy a recognized place in the modern world was 
 the embodiment of the American Declaration of 
 Independence in political revolution. There 
 has been a great deal of discussion as to the 
 origin of the doctrine of the equality of men 
 which it proclaims, and it is a point of some in- 
 terest for the political philosopher, as Sir Henry 
 Maine has shown. But its history as a political 
 dogma is not really important, because it must 
 have been in the air all over modern Europe 
 after the spread of Christianity. It was impos- 
 sible to teach Christianity to any man without 
 leading him to think himself as good as any- 
 body. The great importance which the Chris- 
 tian religion attaches to the future of the soul, 
 and its bold affirmation of the equality of souls 
 after death, must have led even slaves, in the 
 earlier ages, to put themselves secretly on the 
 same plane, before the Creator, with kings and 
 senators and noblemen. Macaulay's florid de- 
 scription of the Puritan's attitude towards " kings 
 and priests " fairly represented, doubtless, the 
 state of mind of thousands, if not of millions,
 
 30 EQUALITY 
 
 for centuries. What was wanting was the phy- 
 sical power to procure recognition of the doctrine 
 from the state, so dominating was the influence 
 of prescription, tradition, and custom. So that 
 there is every likelihood that its production by a 
 community in arms, no matter for what reason, 
 was simply the expression of a thought which 
 was already popular in the sense of being widely 
 held. 
 
 That it had at that time the signification 
 which we are now so apt to attach to it not 
 only that all men are born equal, but that for 
 public purposes one man's opinion is as good as 
 that of any other man, and that there is as much 
 reason for consulting him regarding common 
 affairs as any other man is not probable. The 
 state of the world in the eighteenth century war- 
 rants the belief that what men meant by equality 
 at that time was equality of burdens, the aboli- 
 tion of all exemptions from the common liabili- 
 ties and of all privileges in running the race of 
 life. This was really the kind of equality of 
 which both the American and the French Revo- 
 lution were the expression in the beginning. I 
 conclude this from the readiness in both, at the 
 outset, to follow and obey the lead of men of 
 mark; the recognition of the wider range of 
 experience which education and property give a 
 man, or may give him, and his generally greater
 
 EQUALITY 31 
 
 fitness to lead in politics, which prevailed at that 
 time. This was a characteristic, in particular, 
 of the American Ke volution. It was conducted 
 largely with loyal support from the masses, un- 
 der the direction of men of some social distinc- 
 tion. The class of " notables " seems to have 
 held its place in the community, undisturbed by 
 political events. The English tradition that a 
 prominent social station entitles a man to some 
 sort of political leadership, or at all events to 
 high office, does not seem to have been really 
 broken down, or even to have been strongly 
 assailed, until Andrew Jackson's time, when the 
 doctrine of equality took on a new form, and 
 found for the first time full expression in our 
 politics. 
 
 Equality, as every one acknowledges, is the 
 foundation of democracy. It means democracy 
 when it gets itself embodied in law. When all 
 are equal, there is no reason why all should not 
 rule. But the equality of the French in 1792, 
 when the revolutionary government was estab- 
 lished, was something different from the equality 
 of 1789. In 1789 the equality which was asked 
 for was, in the main, simply an equality of rights 
 and burdens between the nobility and the tiers 
 etat. Equality, as Montesquieu uses the term, 
 means simply love, not of one's order, but of 
 one's country, and as such he made it the equiva-
 
 32 EQUALITY 
 
 lent of democracy. Democracy, he says, is 
 equality. But the word " equality " for him 
 evidently had no social signification. It meant 
 rather equality of service to the country : that 
 every one was held to the same amount of pub- 
 He duty, according to his means, and that every 
 one was entitled to the same opportunities of 
 taking part in the government. That being born 
 of particular parents made any one essentially of 
 better quality than anybody else; that if one 
 hundred babies of different conditions were 
 brought up in the same manner, the sons of 
 noblemen or gentlemen among them would show 
 their superiority to the others in their character, 
 was a doctrine which, after the Middle Ages, 
 was probably never fully accepted even by the 
 most ardent believers in heredity. Every gen- 
 eration was witness of the break-down, if I may 
 use the expression, of the principle of heredity. 
 That is to say, a large number of noble or gentle 
 families in every generation lost their position or 
 property, because the founder did not transmit 
 his qualities of mind or character to his descend- 
 ants. The folly or extravagance or imprudence 
 which led to this social decheance was generally 
 due to marked departures in intellect or morals 
 from the original type. The believers in heredity 
 were misled by the analogy of the breeding of 
 animals. Horses transmitted speed and bottom,
 
 EQUALITY 33 
 
 birds peculiar appearance, with extraordinary 
 certainty. Therefore, it was concluded, a man 
 was likely to have his father's wisdom, or fore- 
 sight, or mental strength. But his descendants 
 rarely inherit from a father more than one or 
 two mental peculiarities, valuable when united 
 with other things, but, standing alone, of little 
 use in the battle of life, a fact which may be 
 verified anywhere by observing the families of 
 distinguished men. A man eminent in politics, 
 or law, or medicine, or commerce, or finance, or 
 war, is seldom succeeded by a son who recalls the 
 msemble of qualities which have secured the 
 father's success, although he may have one or 
 two of his characteristics. Heredity obtained 
 its stronghold in the popular imagination in the 
 Middle Ages, owing to the fact that the son was 
 in possession of the father's power when he died, 
 and that in a rude age, when things were mainly 
 decided by fighting, it offered the readiest means 
 of settling peaceably questions of succession. 
 But as soon as the question of the right of a 
 class to rule in virtue of heredity became a sub- 
 ject of discussion, heredity broke down. It was 
 a custom which was valuable in the time of its 
 origin, but, like most customs, found it impos- 
 sible to justify itself by any better argument than 
 that, under some circumstances, it had produced 
 good results.
 
 34 EQUALITY 
 
 But in America, from the settlement of the 
 colonies, the English doctrine that distinction 
 should serve in place of heredity seems to have 
 held its place in the popular imagination. The 
 founding of colonies, the making of conquests, 
 the growth of trade and commerce, and the earlj 
 practice of admitting able lawyers to the House 
 of Lords had familiarized Englishmen with the 
 idea of a man's making his fortune by some sort 
 of adventure, no matter what his origin. The 
 peers, too, sapped their own power unconsciously 
 by making legislators of young men of promise, 
 no matter of what extraction, and giving them 
 seats in the House of Commons. The result wa& 
 that the association, in the English mind, of men 
 of mark of some kind with office-holding and 
 the work of government took deep root after the 
 revolution of 1640, and was transferred to Amer- 
 ica. It was generally leading men of promi- 
 nence and character who were made governors 
 and judges, and were sent to the legislature and 
 to Washington. The Revolution was carried 
 through, and the Constitution formed and its 
 adoption brought about, by men of this kind. 
 The idea of an obscure man, of a man who was 
 not lifted above the crowd in some way, being 
 fit for the transaction of public affairs was still 
 unfamiliar. All the members of the Constitu- 
 tional Convention were men of some local note,
 
 EQUALITY 35 
 
 and so were the earlier administrators of the 
 new government. 
 
 This, too, down to that period, had been the 
 strongest tradition of all previous democracies. 
 All democracies, both ancient and modern, had 
 made a practice of electing to office, not always 
 their best men, but their most prominent men. 
 In none of them had a man who was not in 
 some way raised above the mass of his fellow 
 citizens who had not succeeded in life, in 
 short much chance of filling a high or an 
 important place. This was eminently true of 
 Greece and Rome and Switzerland. In a small 
 state, where everybody knows everybody well, 
 and where elections and other public affairs are 
 transacted in the market-place, within sound of 
 an orator's voice, this is not difficult. Office- 
 seekers are, in a measure, compelled to be elo- 
 quent, or distinguished for something. An ob- 
 scure man, or a man whose character bears 
 serious blemishes of some kind, will hardly dare 
 to ask the confidence of the citizens in his fitness 
 for great duties. The composition of the Ro- 
 man Senate, which from the beginning consisted 
 of notables who had in some manner rendered 
 the state marked service, and the selection for 
 which the people for centuries committed to a 
 magistrate, showed better than almost anything 
 else the desire of the ancient democracies to
 
 36 EQUALITY 
 
 avail themselves of their best talent. What 
 they seem to have insisted on above all things, 
 in the management of the state, was not the 
 right of filling offices with anybody they pleased, 
 but the right of filling them with their most 
 competent men. It may be said that this was 
 not so great a mark of wisdom as appears, be- 
 cause every ancient democracy was in a position 
 of some danger. It was continually exposed to 
 war and subjugation by some stronger neighbor, 
 and the penalty of defeat in those days was tre- 
 mendous. The vanquished were killed or sold 
 into slavery, and their women were appropriated 
 by the conquerors. So that the cultivation and 
 recognition of ability were conditions of exist- 
 ence. In the case of Rome this necessity was 
 even stronger than elsewhere, for she entered on 
 a career of conquest from the very beginning, 
 and this called for the filling of the Senate, 
 which decided what was to be conquered and 
 selected generals for the work, with the ablest 
 men in the state. 
 
 In nothing does modern democracy differ so 
 much from the ancient democracy as in this in- 
 difference to distinction, owing in a large degree 
 to the size of the two communities which fully 
 practice it, and to the great preponderance of 
 the less instructed class in the elections. The 
 Greek democracy, and in a less degree that of
 
 EQUALITY 37 
 
 Rome, were composed of a selected body the 
 principal occupation of which was politics, and 
 they were brought in almost daily contact with 
 the leading men of the community, and were 
 consulted by them in the forum concerning both 
 war and peace. We can hardly imagine a better 
 education than this, touching the management 
 of affairs and the qualities which it requires. 
 The consequence was that the people were daily 
 engaged in forming judgments as to the capacity 
 of men with whom they were familiar, and the 
 men were daily engaged in giving viva voce 
 reasons for their advice, or explaining and de- 
 fending their conduct, or setting forth their own 
 claims to an office. Our democracies, on the 
 other hand, are composed of vast bodies of men 
 who have but small acquaintance with the ma- 
 chinery of public affairs, or with the capacity of 
 individuals for managing it. 
 
 This brings me to what is probably the great- 
 est danger of modern democracy, if, like all 
 previous regimes, it should lose its hold on popu- 
 lar affections and fall into decay. The spread 
 of democracy that is, the participation of the 
 whole community in the work of government 
 has been accompanied by a great increase in the 
 complexity of human affairs. The interdepen- 
 dence of nations through the growth of trade, 
 the increase of literature, the incessant conversa-
 
 38 EQUALITY 
 
 tion with one another kept up by the press, the 
 greatly improved facilities of travel, has grown 
 to a degree undreamt of even a century ago. 
 A debate in a legislative body, the careless speech 
 of a chief magistrate, a slight change in the 
 system of taxation of even one nation, a small 
 discovery by a man of science in any country, in 
 our time produce an almost instantaneous effect 
 over the whole civilized world ; and one might 
 say, the whole world, whether civilized or not, 
 for civilization now asserts the dominion of its 
 ideas everywhere. In truth, the extent to which 
 all news, no matter whence it comes, affects or 
 may affect the lives of most of us is present to 
 every man when he opens his newspaper in the 
 morning. And all private business partakes of 
 this public complexity. The size of all under- 
 takings, either of production or exchange or 
 transportation, is tasking the human faculty of 
 administration to the uttermost, and leads a 
 great many people to suppose that individuals 
 are no longer equal to the task, and that it must 
 be hereafter assumed by the state. For success 
 in any business now, an amount of knowledge is 
 necessary which in the last century hardly one 
 man in a million possessed ; decisions must now 
 be made on the moment, for which, a hundred 
 years ago, a merchant might take half a year. 
 The result is that the government of such a
 
 EQUALITY 39 
 
 world need an increase in intellectual equip- 
 ment corresponding to the increase in business. 
 The amount of property, too, which is placed at 
 the disposal of the modern legislator is some- 
 thing beyond calculation. Since the exclusion 
 of the old landed class from the work of govern- 
 ment, a process which began soon after the 
 French Revolution, the growth of personal pro- 
 perty, which to be enjoyed or increased has in 
 some way to be displayed, and thus comes within 
 the reach of the government, is one of the most 
 remarkable phenomena of the modern world. 
 When the old ruler had taxed land, his resources 
 were well-nigh exhausted. To-day the number 
 of movables out of each of which the public 
 treasury can extract tens of millions, in every 
 civilized country, has made taxation one of the 
 nicest of arts. In fact, one has but to read 
 such a book as Mr. Wells's "Recent Economic 
 Changes" to see that within a century we have 
 entered a new material world, a description of 
 which would have been deemed fantastic even 
 in 1800. In every field of human activity we 
 have drawn heavily on the supply of adminis- 
 trative talent. Whether it wishes to command 
 a great army or a great fleet, or to conduct a 
 great business, every state has to search its entire 
 population to get a man fit for the work. In 
 some things in which capacity is not easy to
 
 40 EQUALITY 
 
 test, such as war, most countries remain, pend- 
 ing the outbreak of hostilities, in anxious uncer- 
 tainty as to the capacity of their military men, 
 by sea or by land. 
 
 We must remember, too, that this great in- 
 crease of affairs, this vast growth of trade and 
 commerce, is made possible by the creation of 
 what is called " credit." Without credit, in 
 spite of the improvements in transportation and 
 in the transmission of intelligence, we could not 
 have had this expansion of business. All the 
 gold and silver in the world would not have been 
 sufficient. We have had to call into use men's 
 faith in the fulfillment of one another's pledges, 
 so that modern prosperity has come to rest, in 
 the main, on written promises or letters of pri- 
 vate individuals, saying they will pay a certain 
 amount of money, or deliver a certain quantity 
 of goods, on a day named. The result is a 
 great structure of what may be called mutual 
 faith, of extraordinary delicacy, which the 
 slightest suspicion that the world will not con- 
 tinue to go on in the way in which it is going 
 on, that there will be a war or an earthquake or 
 a startling piece of legislation, may overthrow 
 at any moment. In fact, it would perhaps be 
 more accurate to compare it to a network cover- 
 ing the whole earth, than to a building. The 
 slightest derangement or break in it anywhere is
 
 EQUALITY 41 
 
 felt everywhere else, and may involve great de- 
 preciation of property, and the postponement or 
 abandonment of enterprises of great importance. 
 The care of it, the avoidance of all measures or 
 movements likely to disturb it, has, therefore, 
 in our day, to be one of the first cares of a 
 statesman. To be fully aware, however, of the 
 importance of credit, either actual experience of 
 the work of exchange or theoretical knowledge 
 of it from study is necessary. An ignorant man 
 or a small farmer, who knows nothing of any 
 dealings but cash dealings, finds it difficult to 
 understand its importance, and may be fre- 
 quently tempted to take steps in administration 
 and legislation seriously detrimental to it, with- 
 out meaning or foreseeing any harm. 
 
 As I have already said, the really alarming 
 feature connected with the growth of democracy 
 is, that it does not seem to make adequate pro- 
 vision for the government of this new world. 
 Its chief function, like the chief function of the 
 monarch whom it has succeeded, is to fill offices. 
 This is the chief function of the sovereign 
 power everywhere, no matter by what name it is 
 called. To find the right men for the public 
 places is almost the only work which falls, or has 
 ever fallen, to the ruler. It is by the manner in 
 which this is done, more than by the laws which 
 are passed, that the goodness or badness of a
 
 42 EQUALITY 
 
 government is tested. If the functionaries are 
 honest and faithful, almost any kind of political 
 constitution is endurable. If they are ignorant 
 or tyrannical or corrupt, the best constitution is 
 worthless. If we listen to the conversation of 
 any group of men who are condemning a politi- 
 cal system, we shall find that their talk consists 
 mainly of reports of malfeasance in office, of 
 officials having done things which they ought 
 not to have done, and of their having failed to 
 do things which they ought to have done. Gov- 
 ernment is an impalpable abstraction except as 
 it makes itself felt through functionaries, which 
 is about the same thing as saying that adminis- 
 tration is even more important than legislation, 
 that even bad laws well executed hardly work as 
 much unhappiness as good laws badly executed. 
 The first effect of this great change on de- 
 mocracy was delight at finding that government 
 places. and commissions in the army were no 
 longer the monopoly of the aristocracy, that 
 family or wealth was no longer a necessary qual- 
 ification for them, and that the influences 
 through which they might be procured were 
 within the reach of the poor or lowly born. The 
 tide of democratic opinion has ever since been 
 in favor of the increase of offices. In France, 
 in Italy, and in the United States, every govern- 
 ment has found that this increase was a popular
 
 EQUALITY 43 
 
 measure, and has given way to the temptation 
 of strengthening itself by the bestowal of them. 
 The passion for them, even where the tenure is 
 brief or insecure, has apparently grown with 
 their number. The tradition of the old regime, 
 that a man who represented the government was 
 in some way superior to the people with whom 
 he came in contact, has apparently, in the popu- 
 lar eye, clung to the places. Then, the cer- 
 tainty of the salary to the great multitude who 
 in every country either fail in life, or shrink 
 from the conflicts which the competitive system 
 makes necessary, is very attractive ; it soon con- 
 verted the civil service into what has been called 
 " spoils ; " that is, booty won by victories at the 
 polls. 
 
 It is easy to see that the only way to meet this 
 necessary growth of demand for offices was to 
 adhere to the old system of applying to the man- 
 agement of state affairs the principle which 
 reigns in business, that of securing the best tal- 
 ent available ; and of giving the chief places, 
 at least, to men who had already made a mark in 
 the world by success in some field of activity. 
 This, as I have said, was the rule of the de- 
 mocracies of the ancient world. To preserve for 
 the democratic government the old respect and 
 authority which used to surround the monarchi- 
 cal government, it was absolutely necessary to
 
 44 EQUALITY 
 
 compete vigorously, through hoth money and 
 honors, in the labor market, with private busi- 
 ness, the demands of which on the community's 
 store of talent became very great as soon as 
 steam and electricity were brought into the ser- 
 vice of commerce and manufactures. But the 
 tendency has not run in this direction. As re- 
 gards the lower offices, the duties of which are 
 easily comprehensible by everybody, and are 
 merely matters of routine, in which discretion 
 or judgment plays little part, there has been in 
 this country a decided return to the tests of 
 ordinary business, such as character and com- 
 petency, and a decided revival of confidence in 
 such motives as security of tenure and the pro- 
 spect of promotion. But as regards the higher 
 or elective offices, such as those of legislators 
 and governors, the tendency to discredit such 
 qualifications as education and special experience 
 has been marked. In the popular mind there is 
 what may be called a disposition to believe not 
 only that one man is as good as another, but 
 that he knows as much on any matter of general 
 interest. In any particular business the superi- 
 ority of the man who has long followed it is 
 freely acknowledged, but in public affairs this 
 is not perhaps so much denied as disregarded. 
 One of the oddest characteristics of the silver 
 movement was the general refusal to accept the
 
 EQUALITY 45 
 
 experience of any country or age as instructive, 
 and this in a matter in which all light comes 
 from experience. Bryan's proclamation that the 
 opinion of all the professors in the United States 
 would not affect his opinions in the least was 
 an illustration of this great self-confidence of 
 a large democracy. In a small democracy this 
 could hardly have occurred. 
 
 All the great modern democracies have to 
 contend almost for existence against the popular 
 disposition to treat elective offices as representa- 
 tive, and to consider it of more importance that 
 they should be filled by persons holding certain 
 opinions or shades of opinion than by persons 
 most competent to perform their duties. The 
 distinction between representing and administer- 
 ing seems plain enough ; and yet, since the 
 French Revolution, the democratic tendency has 
 been everywhere to obscure it. This has not 
 unnaturally led to the idea that the offices are 
 rewards for the persons who have done most to 
 propagate or defend certain views, and ought to 
 be given to them independently of their fitness. 
 To this confusion of two different functions I 
 must ascribe the deterioration which has been 
 remarked so frequently in the legislatures of all 
 democratic countries in modern times. The 
 number of men of experience or special know- 
 ledge, as well as of conspicuous men, which they
 
 46 EQUALITY 
 
 contain, seems to decline steadily, and the num- 
 ber of interests committed to their charge as 
 steadily to increase. 
 
 The disregard of special fitness, combined 
 with unwillingness to acknowledge that there 
 can be anything special about any man, which 
 is born of equality, constitutes the great defect 
 of modern democracy. That large communities 
 can be successfully administered by inferior men 
 is a doctrine which runs directly counter not only 
 to the experience of the race, but to the order 
 appointed for the advance of civilization, which 
 has been carried forward almost exclusively by 
 the labor of the fittest, despite the resistance 
 or reluctance of the unfit. This order of na- 
 ture, too, has been recognized fully in private 
 affairs of every description. In all of them 
 competency on the part of administrators is the 
 first thing sought for, and the only thing 
 trusted. But in private affairs the penalty of 
 any disregard of this rule comes quickly ; in 
 public affairs the operation of all causes is much 
 slower, and their action is obscure. Nations 
 take centuries to fall, and the catastrophe is pre- 
 ceded by a long period of the process called 
 " bad government," in which there is much suf- 
 fering and alarm, but not enough to make the 
 remedy plain. France furnishes the best mod- 
 ern illustration of this rule. The causes of the
 
 EQUALITY 47 
 
 Revolution undoubtedly began to operate at the 
 majority of Louis XIV., but for over one hun- 
 dred years their nature and certain results were 
 not perceived, in spite of the great popular suf- 
 fering which prevailed during the whole period. 
 The worst of the slowness of this decadence 
 is that it affects national character to a degree 
 which makes recovery more difficult, even after 
 the origin and nature of the disease have be- 
 come plain. Men soon get accustomed to the 
 evils of their condition, particularly if there is 
 nobody in particular to blame. The inaction or 
 negligence or shortcomings of great numbers 
 assume the appearance of a law of nature, or of 
 repeated failures or attempts at the impossible. 
 The apparent difficulty of reform, except by 
 catastrophe or revolution, begets either despond- 
 ency or over-cheerf ulness.
 
 THE NOMINATING SYSTEM 
 
 IT would hardly be possible to write a better 
 description of the actual machinery of our nomi- 
 nating system than Mr. James Bryce's in his 
 "American Commonwealth." In what I am 
 about to say of it, therefore, I shall take for 
 granted that the reader is familiar with it, or has 
 abundant means of making himself acquainted 
 with its working. Every American has either 
 practical or theoretical knowledge of the process 
 by which we select men for office. There are 
 probably few Americans who have not either 
 participated in it, or been exhorted to do so by 
 writers on political morality. In fact, presence 
 at the primary meetings, under the general name 
 of " attending to his political duties," has been 
 much preached as the chief political duty of the 
 busy man who does not otherwise take an active 
 part in politics. It used to be held more strongly 
 than it is now that if a man had taken part in 
 a primary, he might always, with a good con- 
 science, vote for the candidate whom the primary 
 and its resulting conventions presented to him. 
 The primary has gradually assumed in our sys- 
 tem the air of a scheme or device on which the
 
 THE NOMINATING SYSTEM 49 
 
 republic rests. Of course it has differed in its 
 character and composition in different parts of 
 the country ; but under whatever name, for at 
 least half a century, it has been treated by most 
 political philosophers, as well as by practical poli- 
 ticians, as the fundamental fact of our politics, 
 indifference to which on the part of the intel- 
 ligent is the cause of nearly all our woes. For 
 some years, in many of the discussions which 
 abuses have excited, writers have been apt to 
 ascribe, especially in the cities, the particular 
 trouble under consideration to the refusal of 
 respectable citizens to take part in the primaries. 
 This refusal has even been more dwelt on than 
 the abstention at elections, which this class have 
 practiced on a large scale. Yet the primary 
 meeting, as the source of the nominating con- 
 vention, is a novelty in democracy. It is, strictly 
 speaking, simply part of a new system of select- 
 ing candidates for office, as such is evidently an 
 experiment, and is not necessarily a part of the 
 democratic scheme of government. It is of the 
 essence of the democratic system that the major- 
 ity shall decide who shall hold and administer 
 the ^various administrative and legislative offices, 
 but the mode of choosing candidates for these 
 offices is a matter which democracy leaves com- 
 pletely open. Nomination is the offer to the 
 people of the services of certain persons. But
 
 60 THE NOMINATING SYSTEM 
 
 the democratic principle does not define the 
 manner in which these persons shall be picked 
 out. 
 
 Accordingly, almost every kind of nomination 
 for office has prevailed in democratic countries. 
 The earliest and most natural is the one which 
 has for the most part been in use in small de- 
 mocracies, the selection for places of dignity 
 or responsibility of persons eminent in the eyes 
 of their fellow-citizens for what is called " social 
 station ; " that is, generally acknowledged supe- 
 riority of some kind, in private life. This is the 
 plan to which nearly all communities resort in 
 their more primitive and simpler stage. They 
 single out men who have in some satisfactory 
 manner raised themselves above their fellows, 
 and have become what is called " distinguished." 
 These are supposed to have a kind of moral 
 right to offices which impose responsibility. In 
 this stage, and in this stage only, is it true that 
 the office, as the saying is, seeks the man, not the 
 man the office. The agreement of his fellow-citi- 
 zens that he is the person whom the place or the 
 work demands is a kind of recognition which the 
 great man waits for, as most agreeable to him. 
 This system prevailed in the beginning in all the 
 small democracies of Greece and of Switzerland. 
 And we have a suggestion as to the manner of 
 nominations in New England in the early days,.
 
 THE NOMINATING SYSTEM 61 
 
 in the account by Gordon, the historian, of the 
 life of Samuel Adams, the New England agi- 
 tator, -where he says that in 1724 Adams's father 
 " and about twenty others, one or two from the 
 north end of the town, where all ship business 
 was carried on, used to meet, make a caucus, 
 and lay their plans for introducing certain per- 
 sons to places of trust and power." 
 
 In the next stage the candidate does not wait 
 for this recognition; he offers himself for the 
 place or honor. Both recognition and honor are 
 desired, and he therefore nominates himself; 
 that is, he calls public attention to his own fit- 
 ness, and sets forth with what fidelity and effi- 
 ciency he would perform the duties which the 
 office might devolve on him. In a small demo- 
 cracy, this, as a rule, is all that is necessary. 
 Having heard what the rival candidates, if there 
 are rivals, have to say for themselves, the voters 
 make their choice. The election comes quickly, 
 if not immediately, after the nomination. Peo- 
 ple are supposed to be able to form a prompt 
 judgment on the matter in hand. There may 
 be intrigues in the candidate's behalf, but what 
 we call the " canvass," or long process of per- 
 suasion, is not necessary and does not exist. 
 
 As the number of voters grows larger, the 
 candidate is not left wholly to his own merits, or 
 exertions, or reputation. A committee is ap-
 
 52 THE NOMINATING SYSTEM 
 
 pointed to look after his interests, and a canvass 
 begins, for which the committee make arrange- 
 ments. The members go themselves among the 
 electors, or employ others to do so, to make sure, 
 first, that the electors will vote for somebody, 
 and then that this somebody shall be their own 
 man. The nature of the arguments employed 
 in his favor has probably never varied since the 
 practice of electing candidates began. They are 
 the arguments by which the voter is most likely 
 to be influenced, no matter of what kind. It 
 was through the canvass that the great and 
 powerful first learned to conciliate the poor and 
 lowly, and from the earliest times the various 
 modes employed to cajole them have been a 
 favorite subject of satirists. The first large de- 
 mocracy with which we have any acquaintance 
 was that of England in the eighteenth century. 
 Elections had been held before that tune, and 
 the democratic spirit had prevailed in them, but 
 it was only in the eighteenth century that they 
 became really an important instrument of gov- 
 ernment, and the wealthy began to think it 
 worth their while to use their money to influence 
 the result. The contests were generally between 
 landed proprietors and their connections, and 
 the intrusion of a man like Burke into politics, 
 on the ground of mere eloquence or ability, was 
 a rare incident. Very soon elections began to
 
 THE NOMINATING SYSTEM 53 
 
 determine the fate of ministries and influence 
 the complexion of the House of Commons. Per- 
 suasion by argument was largely abandoned for 
 bribery, and the use of the mob of non-electors 
 for purposes of violence and intimidation became 
 common. It was only in great cities, like Lon- 
 don and Bristol, that men like Burke and Wilkes 
 were able to displace the men of property or 
 high connections, and we have in Burke's ad- 
 dress to the electors of Bristol probably the first 
 specimen of a real argumentation from a candi- 
 date to the voters of a large constituency, with- 
 out appeals to some sort of prejudice. 
 
 In America, the old method of the candidacy 
 of local magnates, selected for the purpose by 
 other men like themselves, their neighbors and 
 friends, seems to have prevailed long after the 
 settlement of the country. The practice of the 
 English counties was preserved; that is, the 
 selection by some people of influence some- 
 times, in New England, the clergy of a good 
 person to send to the legislature or to fill any 
 other elective office. In all the colonies, and 
 for some years in all the states, offices were 
 reserved naturally for men of local mark, gener- 
 ally created by property and social position. In 
 all small communities, it is property which gives 
 most distinction. In fact, from the fall of the 
 Roman Empire almost to our time, the world was
 
 64 THE NOMINATING SYSTEM 
 
 governed by property, and property was mainly 
 land, and was associated in the popular mind, to 
 a degree which we now find it difficult to under- 
 stand, with political power and prominence. A 
 landless man was held to have no " stake in the 
 country," and therefore to have no right to man- 
 age public affairs. "Broad acres" became a 
 synonym for wealth, and a natural title to politi- 
 cal authority and confidence. This idea pre- 
 vailed in the settlement of America, and found 
 expression in large grants of land in several of 
 the colonies. Probably nothing did as much to 
 democratize America as the abundance of land 
 and the ease of its acquisition. People began 
 to perceive that a large landowner was not neces- 
 sarily a great man, and the idea of government 
 by landholders, which had held possession of the 
 world for a thousand years, was killed by the 
 perception. Of course this dispossession of the 
 landholder was aided by the growth of personal 
 property, through the progress of trade, com- 
 merce, and invention. The freeholder has never 
 stood as high in politics as he did during the 
 seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. There- 
 after, realty had to contend with personalty for 
 influence in government. 
 
 America thus came out of the Revolution 
 with the old and, one may say, human plan of 
 treating some kind of previous social distinction,
 
 THE NOMINATING SYSTEM 55 
 
 already known to the voters, as giving a title to 
 nomination for office. The neighbors met and 
 talked over the proper persons to fill certain 
 places, and the ministers and persons in office 
 gave advice. This is, as I have said, the human 
 plan, which has always had recognition in busi- 
 ness. Commercial agents and persons charged 
 with trusts were always chosen in this way. 
 Personal knowledge of the man by those hold- 
 ing the power of appointment was considered 
 necessary. It seemed difficult, in small commu- 
 nities, to think of any other way. That a man 
 was fit for office who was not already raised 
 above his fellows, either by character or by the 
 possession of property, was an unfamiliar idea. 
 Nearly all the Revolutionary leaders were men 
 of this kind. The signers of the Declaration of 
 Independence and the drafters of the Constitu- 
 tion were all local notables. They were marked 
 out for their work by some sort of prominence 
 in their own homes. For nearly fifty years after 
 the new government had been set up, nominees 
 were known to everybody. Even nominees for 
 the presidency were suggested by Congress, as 
 state officers were in like manner suggested by 
 the legislatures, the members of which were gen- 
 erally the men most prominent in their own 
 localities. Why legislators had this weight and 
 were allowed to assume this function may be
 
 66 THE NOMINATING SYSTEM 
 
 conjectured from the size of the vote. In 1792 
 the vote for the governor of New York was 
 only about 16,000, but by 1824 it had risen to 
 83,000. The growth of population diminished 
 the number of well-known men, and the congres- 
 sional caucus, which was simply a private meet- 
 ing for the purpose of talking over common 
 affairs, took on itself, not unnaturally, the duty 
 of suggesting to the constituencies the names 
 of candidates for the presidency. This practice 
 appears to have begun as early as 1796, and by 
 1800 it had become so overbearing that the 
 presidential electors provided for by the Consti- 
 tution, virtually ceased to have power or author- 
 
 ity. 
 
 But the constituencies rapidly grew restless 
 under congressional dictation. In 1808, a sum- 
 mons issued by Senator Bradley, of Vermont, 
 "in pursuance of the power vested in him as 
 president of the late convention of the Republi- 
 can members of both Houses of Congress," was 
 violently resented by Mr. Gray, a Virginia mem- 
 ber, who " took the earliest opportunity to de- 
 clare his abhorrence of the usurpation of power 
 declared to be vested in him (Bradley), of his 
 mandatory style and the object contemplated," 
 and claimed for " the people " the right of 
 " selecting persons to fill the important offices." 
 In 1800, when a few members met and pledged
 
 THE NOMINATING SYSTEM 57 
 
 themselves to use their influence in support 
 of Jefferson, they were denounced as a " Jaco- 
 binical conclave," l an expression for which the 
 publisher was brought to the bar of the Senate. 
 The congressional caucus, however, continued 
 for twenty years to do the work of nomination, 
 though with increasing hesitation and timidity, 
 and amidst growing discontent with its action. 
 The Clintonian platform in New York in 1812 
 declared " its opposition to nomination of chief 
 magistrates by congressional caucus, as well 
 because such practices are the exercise of un- 
 delegated authority, as of .their repugnance to 
 the freedom of elections." The caucus tried to 
 defend itself by proclaiming that its members 
 met only in their individual capacity, and that 
 its nominations were simply suggestions. The 
 attendance on it, also, by individual members 
 of the party, was fitful. Meetings seldom con- 
 tained more than two thirds of those who might 
 have been present. 
 
 The first suggestion of a nominating conven- 
 tion seems to have come from the " New York 
 American," which in 1822 proposed a general 
 convention of Republican delegates to assemble 
 in Washington a few months before election day, 
 and nominate a candidate for the presidency. 
 " Coming immediately from their constituents," 
 
 's Register, December, 1823.
 
 58 THE NOMINATING SYSTEM 
 
 it said, " they would bring with them the sense 
 of the people, and they would express that sense 
 without being influenced by motives that might 
 sway the representatives in Congress, who dur- 
 ing the sessions at the seat o government may 
 be supposed, without derogation to their purity, 
 to have formed personal attachments and party 
 combinations which would render them less fit 
 for the important duty." It will thus be seen 
 that the convention was expected to be a body 
 which, like the constitutional conventions and 
 the Hartford convention, would meet to discuss, 
 without foregone conclusions or pledges. After 
 this, nomination by the congressional caucuses 
 passed out of use. As late as 1823-24 the 
 friends of Mr. Crawford, of Georgia, tried to 
 call a congressional caucus for his nomination ; 
 but very few members attended, and the project 
 failed. Nomination by the state legislatures 
 then began, as a recommendation or mark of 
 local commendation, in cases where there was 
 not a general agreement on a particular man, 
 owing to his eminence in the party. The use 
 of the nominating convention is ascribed by 
 Alexander Johnston to the fact that " the new 
 politicians, whom the rising democratic spirit 
 and the extension of the suffrage were together 
 bringing to the front, were determined to try 
 the issue with the old party leaders in a new
 
 THE NOMINATING SYSTEM 59 
 
 form." l In short, the voters wished to have a 
 share in the work of choosing the candidates 
 whom they were to elect. Social knowledge of 
 these had ceased. It was no longer possible to 
 presume on it. The United States had entered 
 on a new era in its politics. 
 
 The establishment and growth of the nomi- 
 nating convention, in truth, constitute the capi- 
 tal fact of modern democracy in America. Of 
 no other political phenomenon has the influence 
 on the government and on the character of pub- 
 lic men been so powerful. It is effecting a 
 change in our political manners of which there 
 is no parallel. But there is nothing in Ameri- 
 can history, of the progress and consequences of 
 which there appears to have been so little pre- 
 science. There is no mention or allusion, either 
 in Tocqueville or in any of our early writers, to 
 its probable or possible effect. One finds no 
 allusion to it in any of the commentators on the 
 Constitution, early or late. The fact seems to 
 be that its tendencies were hidden from the 
 country during the reign of men of influence in 
 our politics, such as Clay and Webster and Cal- 
 houn, by their own overwhelming importance, 
 and subsequently by the absorbing political in- 
 terest developed among all classes by the anti- 
 
 1 Cyclopaedia of Political Science: article, "Nominating Con- 
 ventions."
 
 60 THE NOMINATING SYSTEM 
 
 slavery contest. This interest, it may be said, 
 forced foregone conclusions on the conventions. 
 Their work was done before they met, by pub- 
 lic sentiment. They simply registered decrees 
 already issued. It is since the war that the real 
 working of the convention has been made mani- 
 fest, and the vastness and complication of the 
 machinery necessary for its production have be- 
 come fully understood. 
 
 It was made necessary in the beginning, as I 
 have said, by the size of the population. We 
 were making the first attempt in the history of 
 the world to govern a very large population by 
 universal suffrage, and the previous modes of 
 nominating candidates for office either by per- 
 sonal knowledge or by the recommendation of 
 notables, had broken down. The people had 
 grown too numerous to have personal knowledge 
 of candidates,- and they were too democratic to 
 accept the recommendation of any one claiming 
 superior powers of discrimination. A system of 
 nomination in which every one could take some 
 part seemed to have been made necessary by the 
 circumstances of the country, and the elected 
 convention seemed the fairest and easiest. In- 
 deed, it was hard then, as it is now, to conceive 
 of any other. 
 
 Another fact speedily appeared, and that was 
 that universal suffrage was made more difficult,
 
 THE NOMINATING SYSTEM 61 
 
 as a political agency, through the mere growth 
 of society. When it was first established, the 
 electors were a small body who were animated 
 by great eagerness to vote. In nearly all discus- 
 sions about the suffrage, in the early part of the 
 century, it was taken for granted that a great 
 number of electors would feel the same eager- 
 ness to exercise it, as a few. The strong desire 
 
 ' O 
 
 of the excluded masses to make their will known 
 in this way was the fundamental assumption of 
 what was called radical politics. It does not 
 appear to have entered any one's head that there 
 would ever be difficulty in getting the bulk of 
 the electors to come to the polls. There were 
 many fears about the bad influence of their vote 
 on the government, but there were no fears that 
 they would not immediately and fully exercise 
 the privilege conferred on them. In like man- 
 ner, the canvass, as we call it, or the work of 
 persuading them to vote in a particular way, did 
 not seem likely to be arduous. Their number 
 not being great, it was supposed they could be 
 easily reached by influential speakers whose 
 opinions had weight. There was no trouble, for 
 instance, in getting at the 16,000 of the State 
 of New York in 1792, except the trouble of 
 traveling, which really gave electioneering a 
 gravity in those days of which we now know 
 nothing. A man who conies by an express train
 
 02 THE NOMINATING SYSTEM 
 
 to talk to us cannot seem as serious an apostle 
 as the man who comes by stage, or on horse- 
 back. His place, in our day, is only inadequately 
 filled by the swarm of young orators whom each 
 party lets loose at the opening of a political 
 campaign, who are rarely known to the body of 
 the electors, and are listened to with the luke- 
 warm attention which is all that a man who has 
 not already made his mark can claim. 
 
 As the number of electors increased, too, the 
 mere machinery of elections became more com- 
 plicated. The early practice of viva voce voting, 
 which was simple and natural in the days when 
 each man either was entitled to vote as he 
 pleased, or owed his vote to somebody else, 
 threw a large part of the trouble on the voter. 
 But the ballot, which was well known in the 
 ancient world, and was adopted by most of the 
 American colonies, as numbers grew, threw 
 greatly enlarged responsibility on governments. 
 The provision of ballots and their distribution, 
 and the enactment of precautions against fraud, 
 which is much easier with ballots than in viva 
 voce voting, made elections more complicated 
 than they were in earlier days. 
 
 All this helped to increase the importance of 
 the nominating convention. The work of find- 
 ing candidates to please this growing multitude, 
 and of making it seem worth their while to par-
 
 THE NOMINATING SYSTEM 63 
 
 ticipate in the contest, became more and more 
 heavy. One result of this work was to raise the 
 value of party in the popular estimation. It 
 was soon discovered that party spirit was a great 
 assistance in managing large bodies of voters. 
 For one thing, it greatly diminished the active 
 work of canvassing. It was found, as voters 
 increased in number, that the work of persuad- 
 ing or influencing was much lightened by party 
 fidelity. To have a party, and be accustomed 
 to act with it, helps the great body of voters in 
 modern tunes in making up their minds what to 
 do at elections, and in fact what to do in any 
 matter of common concern with others. It is only 
 the few who have firm opinions about anything 
 but their own affairs. About public affairs 
 the majority need the strengthening influence 
 of agreement with others, a fact of human 
 nature in which, probably, party takes its rise. 
 There is a certain feeling of pride and of strength 
 and importance in belonging to an organized 
 body of any sort, whether a regiment, a club, or 
 a union, as we see in the multitude of associa- 
 tions which spring up in a free country, and 
 which the mass of men love to join. As soon 
 as you have secured a man's devotion to his 
 party, either through respect for its principles, 
 or through pride in its action on some great 
 occasion, or through admiration of its leaders, or
 
 64 THE NOMINATING SYSTEM 
 
 through liking for that portion of it with which 
 he comes in contact, the task of getting him to 
 support its platform or candidates is greatly 
 lightened. Indeed, argument ceases to be neces- 
 sary. A presumption that the party is always 
 right, even when it seems to him at the first 
 blush wrong, arises in his mind. He becomes 
 what is known as " a lifelong Democrat " or " a 
 lifelong Republican ; " that is, a Democrat or a 
 Republican who does not need to be convinced 
 at every election, but who, having been satisfied 
 early in life that his party was the best party, 
 remains convinced, no matter how the platform 
 may at first run counter to his beliefs, or how 
 much he may disapprove of the candidates. In 
 this way, large numbers of persons who have 
 not time or head for politics, remain always con- 
 firmed and unshakable conservatives or radicals. 
 This is interesting as throwing some light on 
 the nature and origin of what is called "loyalty," 
 a feeling of attachment to a ruler in virtue of 
 
 o 
 
 his ofiB.ce that was unknown to the ancient world, 
 but has played a prominent part in the politics 
 of the mediaeval and modern world. Loyalty 
 does not really depend upon the character of a 
 ruler, but upon his filling a certain office through 
 hereditary title. The prince still remains enti- 
 tled to as much devotion as the follower is capa- 
 ble of, no matter what the royal conduct may
 
 THE NOMINATING SYSTEM 65 
 
 be. To meet the chance of his behaving badly, 
 the fiction of bad advisers was invented, and 
 grew into the ministerial responsibility of limited 
 monarchies. The king can do no wrong except 
 through the suggestions of bad men, whose re- 
 moval from his councils restores the power of 
 his natural inclination to do right. The trans- 
 fer of this feeling of loyalty to party has been 
 accomplished within the present century in the 
 American democracy. There is no doubt that 
 in the early days of the government what is 
 called " party spirit " ran high, but it consisted 
 mainly in abhorrence or detestation of the prin- 
 ciples of the other party, rather than in devotion 
 to or admiration of one's own. That the party 
 had not become the power it now is, we see from 
 the ease and swiftness with which both the Fed- 
 eralist and Whig parties disappeared under the 
 influence of mistakes or adversity. The history 
 of both Whigs and Democrats at a later period, 
 however, shows that the feeling of party devo- 
 tion was rapidly growing. Down to the out- 
 break of the war, the number of those who were 
 hereditary Whigs or hereditary Democrats 
 that is, Whigs or Democrats because their fathers 
 were, just like the old Jacobites in England or 
 the Legitimists in France was large. Men 
 told you how they were brought up to admire 
 Jackson or admire Clay, and were therefore
 
 66 THE NOMINATING SYSTEM 
 
 under a sort of romantic obligation to vote the 
 Democratic ticket or the Whig ticket, and to 
 approve of measures fathered by either of the 
 parties. 
 
 After the war, the Republican party, which 
 had really taken the place of the Whig party, 
 came out of the conflict with claims on popular 
 confidence and gratitude for which there is no 
 parallel in political history except those of the 
 English Whigs after the Revolution of 1688. 
 It had saved from an immense disaster a great 
 number of things which the nation valued, and 
 there followed from this a strong presumption of 
 its wisdom and virtue. It consequently retains 
 the devotion of a large body of the nation in 
 spite of errors or mishaps ; but so does the Demo- 
 cratic party; men vote both tickets in large 
 bodies, without reference to measures or men, 
 under the influence of simple party loyalty. 
 Even in the government of cities, when affairs 
 in no way connected with national politics are 
 under discussion, it is found very difficult to get 
 them considered from any but the federal party 
 point of view. Men vote as Democrats or as 
 Republicans about the police or the gas or the 
 mayor, and can give no reason except that this 
 is what they have always done. 
 
 Now, this party loyalty, this confidence that 
 one's own party is the best party to have power,.
 
 THE NOMINATING SYSTEM 67 
 
 is the basis of the present mode of management, 
 and the origin of what is called " the machine.'* 
 It is the confidence of the managers that they 
 may rely on loyalty to the party to secure votes, 
 however weak may be their title, which makes 
 the machine possible. The machine consists of 
 one or a dozen men in each county or district, 
 charged with the duty of seeing that party 
 loyalty is kept alive under all circumstances, of 
 seeing that all persons entitled to vote do vote 
 in a certain way, and of protecting them against 
 the influence of hostile arguments, or it may be 
 of giving them a taste of these advantages of 
 loyalty at once, by promises of employment, or 
 of advertising, or of cash, or of custom, or of 
 patronage. The machine, therefore, is con- 
 stantly working against and discrediting discus- 
 sion, either of men or of measures. Loyalty 
 does not discuss ; it acts, and it has a certain 
 contempt for the balancing of arguments. Given 
 party loyalty and the nominating convention, 
 and the creation of the machine becomes easy. 
 
 But in creating the machine a beginning is 
 made with the primary. The hypothesis that 
 one's own party is always the best party rests on 
 another hypothesis : that in every district the 
 primary is attended by all those who have a 
 right to attend it, and that they take part in its 
 proceedings. The falsehood of this assumption
 
 68 THE NOMINATING SYSTEM 
 
 is notorious. A fair sample of what may or does 
 happen in the cities was afforded by an exami- 
 nation made by twenty-five leading Republicans 
 into the conduct of the Republican primaries in 
 New York in 1895. It was thereby shown that 
 frauds in the proceedings were practiced on a 
 very great scale ; that large numbers of persons 
 voted at the primaries who had no right to do 
 so ; and that an enrollment secured in this way 
 was, the investigators said, unworthy of " seri- 
 ous attention." That this happens continuously 
 in the great cities there is no reason to doubt. 
 But exposures of this kind are made only occa- 
 sionally, because exposures come from internal 
 dissensions, the quarrels of two factions within 
 the party. These differences rarely arise about 
 measures. They are generally caused by dis- 
 putes about offices. As long as there is no dis- 
 agreement on this point, little is revealed about 
 the constitution or procedure of the primaries in 
 the cities. In the case here cited, although the 
 frauds were brought to light after an elaborate 
 investigation, nothing was ever done to punish 
 them or prevent their having effect. The dele- 
 gates thus elected took part in the presidential 
 nomination almost without remonstrance. 
 
 But the attendance of persons who have no 
 right to vote at primaries is not more remarkable 
 or frequent than the non-attendance of those
 
 THE NOMINATING SYSTEM 69 
 
 who have the right. In the cities the proportion 
 of the actual vote cast to the total enrollment is 
 rarely over one third. In the country the same 
 thing happens. From inquiries I have made of 
 competent authorities, it would appear that even 
 in New England the attendance of the voters at 
 the party primaries is very small. 
 
 I mention New England because it is the part 
 of the country in which American political cus- 
 toms have arisen, and in which the most serious 
 view has always been taken of politics. New 
 York and Pennsylvania may be said to represent 
 more distinctly than any other part of the coun- 
 try what America is to be hereafter in the mat- 
 ter of wealth and population, and complexity of 
 interests, and the growth of great cities. The 
 cities are everywhere gaining on the country in 
 number of inhabitants ; that is, the population 
 is becoming more and more urban, and we may 
 therefore conclude that the smaller towns, as 
 they grow, will become more and more assimi- 
 lated in political manners and customs to New 
 York, Philadelphia, and Chicago, and will exer- 
 cise a controlling influence on the government. 
 To check this prospective preponderance, the 
 recently amended Constitution of New York 
 contains a provision that what is to be the 
 Greater New York shall never contribute more 
 than half the members of the Senate. So that
 
 70 THE NOMINATING SYSTEM 
 
 the difficulty of securing the attendance of 
 voters at the primaries, in so far as it is affected 
 by numbers, is likely to increase rather than 
 diminish, and the importance of party loyalty to 
 the managers of parties is likely to grow, pro- 
 viding the present system of nomination con- 
 tinues. 
 
 This failure on the part of the bulk of the 
 voters to attend the primaries for the purpose of 
 participating in the choice of candidates ap- 
 pears to be due to causes not foreseen by the 
 earlier Democrats. One is the decreased interest 
 in politics caused by increased individual activity 
 and complexity of private affairs. The contrast 
 between the world at the beginning of this cen- 
 tury and the world in our day consists not less 
 in increase of population than in increase in the 
 number of occupations, in facilities for making 
 money, and in ease of moving from place to 
 place. It is simply impossible, considering the 
 limits of human powers, for a man living in 
 1897 to feel the same interest in the working of 
 the machinery of his political party as the man 
 living in 1817. The demands of other things 
 on his attention are infinitely greater ; so are his 
 opportunities of improving his condition ; so is 
 the area over which he may extend his activity. 
 The whole world, one may say, is his field. 
 Literature, science, art, invention, philanthropy,
 
 THE NOMINATING SYSTEM 71 
 
 make drafts on his attention of which his great- 
 grandfather never dreamed. A good illustra- 
 tion of this change in the world's outlook may be 
 found in Pepys's u Diary." When Pepys, living 
 in the latter part of the seventeenth century, 
 met friends, they were apt to adjourn to a tav- 
 ern and sing songs together or to one another. 
 This meant scarcity of topics of conversation. 
 Their world was a very small one, in which few 
 things occurred worth talking about. At that 
 time attendance on political primaries would 
 have been a distraction as well as a duty, and 
 the merits of candidates would have been dis- 
 cussed with keen zest. In our day, song-sing- 
 ing to one another, among men, would be looked 
 upon as an extremely silly and uninteresting 
 practice. To the agricultural communities 
 which composed the civilized world at the begin- 
 ning of this century it would not have seemed 
 so. In brief, private affairs have assumed, in 
 these later days, an importance as compared to 
 public affairs which our forefathers never could 
 have anticipated. This state of things is caus- 
 ing everywhere a demand for government with- 
 out trouble, or with very little trouble. The 
 demand for good and enlightened government is 
 as great as ever; but the desire for simple gov- 
 ernment, which can be carried on without draw- 
 ing largely on the time and attention of the pri-
 
 72 THE NOMINATING SYSTEM 
 
 vate citizen, is greater than ever. Government 
 was never so much considered as a means to an 
 end, and not as an end in itself, as it is to-day, 
 a mode of looking at it which goes far to 
 explain the success of " the man on horseback," 
 or dictator, in troubled communities. 
 
 From the time of the Reformation until about 
 1830, men were mainly occupied upon political 
 freedom ; the great concern of our day is do- 
 mestic comfort, what is called success in life, or, 
 in other words, pecuniary independence. We 
 are mainly interested in this. We are eager 
 that all should enjoy it, even the poor. Our 
 questions are social questions. Political liberty 
 has passed into the category of natural and 
 usual things, like railroad traveling. We are 
 now troubled about lodgings, diet, reading- 
 rooms, old age, pensions, and the " living wage." 
 Consequently, there has for a long while been a 
 decreasing interest in politics, except on great 
 occasions, on the part of the busy, active, intel- 
 ligent portion of the community. This tendency 
 has been strengthened in our country by the 
 slow or imperfect action of the vote on the con- 
 duct of public affairs. It is not exciting to vote 
 in November for a congressman who will have 
 no influence on legislation or administration for 
 a year to come. This is the arrangement of an 
 older world, and one very different from ours.
 
 THE NOMINATING SYSTEM 73 
 
 This is also true of the election of legislators or 
 executive officers. One election is as much as 
 the bulk of citizens in the great centres of in- 
 dustry and population are willing to give time 
 to. The number of abstentions from the polls 
 among the intelligent classes in cities is very 
 great. But the mere selection of candidates un- 
 der our present system involves two elections, a 
 double demand on time and attention. Experi- 
 ence has shown that the average citizen will not 
 answer this demand. The effect of his vote on 
 a result which is not final is too uncertain to 
 interest him. He dismisses from his mind the 
 whole process of selection, and falls back upon 
 loyalty to his party as a sufficient guide in ordi- 
 nary times. It is only at periods of great excite- 
 ment, or great party excess, such as 1860 or 
 1884, that he troubles himself about, or rises 
 in revolt against, the choice of candidates. 
 
 The result of this is that the work of choos- 
 ing party candidates through the nominating 
 machinery has fallen, as it were naturally, into 
 the hands of an idle class, which either loves 
 political intrigue or does not look further in 
 politics than salaried offices, and a large portion 
 of which consists of men who either have failed 
 in life, or have never had any regular occupa- 
 tion. In their hands the work of nomination 
 has been reduced to a sort of game, of cousid-
 
 74 THE NOMINATING SYSTEM 
 
 erable complication, beginning with the holding 
 of primaries, fraudulent or very thinly attended, 
 and conducted solely with the view of turning 
 out a result secretly determined beforehand, 
 either by a small knot of persons termed " the 
 machine," or by a single person known as " the 
 boss," who directs the whole operation. The 
 object of the primaries is no longer to express 
 the will of the party, but to secure for certain 
 designated persons the support of party loyalty. 
 The process is based on the confidence of those 
 who conduct it that, whatever the result may be, 
 the voters will accept it, for the sake of the 
 party. The consequence is that the objections 
 made originally to nomination by Congress or by 
 the legislatures that the nominators are self- 
 constituted, and that the bulk of the party is 
 not consulted are fully applicable to the pre- 
 sent mode of nomination. We have come back, 
 under much more unfavorable conditions, to the 
 earlier system, with more than all its faults. 
 
 It is a dangerous thing to attempt to describe 
 causes in politics; that is, to say exactly to what 
 particular cause any political phenomenon is due. 
 In truth, it may be said that nothing in politics 
 has only one cause. Everything is due to a com- 
 position or combination of causes. The utmost 
 we can aver is that, of the several agencies which 
 bring a thing about, one has been unusually
 
 THE NOMINATING SYSTEM 75 
 
 powerful. What we call the machine, for in- 
 stance, has undoubtedly affected public life and 
 political manners unfavorably; but then the ma- 
 chine could hardly have grown to its present 
 proportions without public apathy; and public 
 apathy, in turn, is due partly to the machine, 
 and partly to the size of the masses which have 
 to be handled and must be persuaded, before 
 any direct effect can be produced. So we find 
 ourselves almost in a vicious circle in accounting 
 for any of the leading features of our demo- 
 cracy. Government is, undoubtedly, the product 
 of the national character ; but, on the other hand, 
 it does much to mould the national character. 
 The machine has assumed functions which have 
 to be discharged by somebody, but in dischar- 
 ging them it produces indifference or dislike of 
 the work among the rest of the community. The 
 machine does not persuade. It acts, it arranges, 
 it provides candidates and platforms, but it 
 rather discourages persuasion. It does not sup- 
 port its candidates by arguments, but by appeals 
 to party loyalty. The voter is asked to support 
 this or that candidate, not on account of his 
 principles or character, but because he is the 
 party candidate. But there is nothing in a 
 democracy so important as persuasion. That 
 this work should be well done, and done con- 
 tinuously, is one of the conditions of healthy
 
 76 THE NOMINATING SYSTEM 
 
 national life. Indeed, it may be called the heart 
 of democracy, which sends the blood through all 
 the national arteries. As soon as it ceases, circu- 
 lation becomes languid or intermittent, the polit- 
 ical institutions of a country become aneemic, 
 and a dictator, or single ruler of some sort, 
 appears in the distance. 
 
 The machine undertakes the work of provid- 
 ing the voter with candidates and getting him to 
 come to the polls, but it does not undertake the 
 previous process of keeping him informed about 
 the rights and wrongs of public questions. It 
 undertakes, if I may say so, to keep party spirit, 
 but not public spirit, alive. It does not attempt 
 any regular work of public instruction. In fact, 
 it discourages discussion, and presents for leader- 
 ship men clever in management rather than men 
 clever in oratory, men skillful in a certain kind 
 of intrigue for the party benefit, rather than men 
 skillful in propagating ideas of any kind. To 
 this change in the type of the public men I ven- 
 ture to ascribe the frequency of what are called 
 " crazes," of late years ; that is, the sudden seiz- 
 ure of the popular mind by enthusiasm for some 
 extravagant idea, or some scheme opposed to 
 human experience and unwarranted by human 
 knowledge. This disappears after a while be- 
 fore what is called " a campaign of education." 
 A campaign of education, such as we have had
 
 THE NOMINATING SYSTEM 77 
 
 to carry on against the greenback movement of 
 1875, or the excessive tariff of 1890, or the sil- 
 ver craze of 1896, is in reality an attempt to do 
 in a few months, under stress of some pressing 
 danger, the work of instruction which should be 
 constantly going on. This constant persuasion 
 or instruction must be a condition of all safe 
 and successful democracy, and to be carried on 
 fruitfully should be carried on by public men. 
 In the English democracy, one of the most 
 wholesome signs of the times, is the incessant 
 appearance, both before and during the meeting 
 of Parliament, of public men on the stump. In 
 fact, addressing his constituents on all the lead- 
 ing questions of the day, home and foreign, is 
 as much a part of an English leading politician's 
 functions as sitting in his place in the legisla- 
 ture during the session. It is part, and a most 
 important part, of popular education. The dis- 
 continuance of this practice among us is one of 
 the bad signs of our times. There are but few 
 of our public men who ever address an audience 
 except during some exciting canvass, and they 
 then deal mainly in generalities, such as praise 
 of their own party or denunciations of the other. 
 Thorough discussion of distinct measures or 
 events from all points of view, such as the dis- 
 cussions of the currency question which took 
 place during the campaign of education in 1896, 
 is very rare, almost unknown.
 
 78 THE NOMINATING SYSTEM 
 
 It may be said that this work is done by our 
 press, but nothing could be further from the 
 truth. There are but few newspapers which are 
 conducted by men equipped for such work, and 
 there are but few editors, however well equipped, 
 who undertake it ; nor does the public expect it 
 of them. The ephemeral and superficial char- 
 acter of the newspaper is so deeply impressed 
 on the popular American mind, that the editor 
 who attempts anything of the kind may al- 
 most be said to face a hostile or an indifferent 
 audience. Even if the newspapers do it, they 
 cannot do it with the authority of a speaker 
 actively engaged hi the work of legislation. The 
 work of newspapers is really most effective when 
 it consists in enforcing or spreading the views 
 of distinguished public men, always supposing 
 that such men have the weight and authority 
 they ought to have. The virtual disappearance 
 of these men from our political arena is compara- 
 tively recent. If I said that it commenced with 
 the appearance and growth of the machine, I 
 should not be far wrong. There are plenty of 
 men living who in earlier days did not make 
 up their minds about any public question with- 
 out hearing from Webster, or Clay, or Calhoun, 
 or Silas Wright, or Marcy, or Seward ; and they 
 never had to wait very long. These leaders 
 spoke on the question, either in Congress or on
 
 THE NOMINATING SYSTEM 79 
 
 the platform, with a distinctness, reasonableness, 
 and thoughtfulness which make their collected 
 speeches, even to-day, very valuable fountains of 
 information and suggestion. I myself can re- 
 member the time when the opinion of his party in 
 New York was not fully formed until William 
 H. Seward had said his say ; when the business 
 of the newspapers was mainly to comment upon 
 and enforce his views; and when the nearest 
 approach we had to a boss was a devoted fol- 
 lower of an eminent public man, steadily engaged 
 in spreading his fame and pushing his political 
 fortunes. 
 
 Now, what is the reason of this change, of the 
 disappearance of this class of men from public 
 life, and of the comparative silence of those we 
 have left? In answering this question I bear in 
 mind the caution I have already expressed against 
 giving only one cause for political effects ; but I 
 can myself make no analysis of American politi- 
 cal manners which does not prove that the con- 
 trol of all entrance to public life by the boss and 
 the machine is the chief reason why we are cut 
 off from political instruction by people actually 
 engaged in the work of government. There is 
 no term of politics more frequently used than 
 the term " responsibility," but the popular notion 
 of its meaning is very vague. Men in office live 
 under two kinds of responsibility. One is the
 
 80 THE NOMINATING SYSTEM 
 
 theoretical responsibility, under all political con- 
 stitutions, of officials to the people who elect 
 them and pay them. But the other, and the one 
 far more strongly felt, is responsibility to those 
 from whom they get the permission to contend 
 for the prizes of public life. These, and not the 
 people, are their real masters. It is they who 
 permit them to enter on the public stage ; it is 
 they who can dismiss them or close their politi- 
 cal career. The one is a vague, theoretical, or 
 literary responsibility; the other is real, practi- 
 cal, and constantly present to every office-holder's 
 mind. The boss and the machine hold the keys 
 to all our leading offices. It is they who say 
 whether a man shall even be allowed to compete 
 for public favor. It is they who decide whether 
 a second term in office shall be accorded to him, 
 whether his career in public life shall be closed 
 or continued. This question, as he knows well, 
 is determined by considerations which have little 
 to do with the real value of his public services. 
 It is determined by secret rules of distribution in 
 the matter of offices, of which every boss has a 
 code. Whether the man shall have a nomina- 
 tion depends largely, not on his exposition of 
 political doctrine or on his advocacy of certain 
 measures, but on his services as an instrumen- 
 tality for the division of patronage ; for it is with 
 patronage simply, and but rarely with measures
 
 THE NOMINATING SYSTEM 81 
 
 of policy, that the boss occupies himself. It is 
 he who decides what kind of office one who 
 wishes to enter public life shall hold; whether 
 he shall be a state legislator or congressman, a 
 superintendent of insurance or the governor of a 
 state. I have a case in mind where a man of 
 some ability was ordered by the boss to resign 
 his seat in Congress in order to become a city 
 treasurer, and the order was immediately obeyed. 
 It is to the boss that such a man has to render 
 an account of his official career. It is the boss 
 whom he has to please by his votes and speeches. 
 It is the boss whose dissatisfaction may ruin 
 him. 
 
 This power of the boss, too, is rendered all 
 the more effective by our custom of insisting 
 upon the candidate's residence in the particular 
 district or locality which he seeks to represent. 
 In France and England all constituencies can 
 choose their representatives among all the politi- 
 cians in the kingdom, no matter where they live. 
 It is thus nearly impossible for the dissatisfac- 
 tion of one constituency to exclude a man from 
 political life. If he offends or fails to satisfy 
 one, he can, if a man of distinction, almost cer- 
 tainly find another. If he quarrels with one 
 local boss or caucus, some other is generally 
 glad to take him up. But with us, a quarrel 
 Avith the boss of his residence or home is fatal
 
 82 THE NOMINATING SYSTEM 
 
 to a politician's prospects. This residential quali- 
 fication is the one thing needed to make the 
 boss's power over him complete. 
 
 Thus I am forced to the conclusion that it is 
 this real responsibility to the boss and the cau- 
 cus, and not to the public, which accounts for 
 the disappearance of distinguished men from 
 public life, and for the decline of instructive 
 political oratory. The inducement to public 
 speaking is a desire to affect the opinion of 
 those who have real power over a man's career. 
 There are probably few men who would under- 
 take it for the mere purpose of showing that 
 they have something to say. They speak to in- 
 crease their influence with the public ; to prove 
 their fidelity as public servants ; to insure a con- 
 tinuance of public confidence in them, and thus 
 to insure their continuance in the official posi- 
 tions they occupy. When the public has ceased 
 to possess any power over their political career,, 
 when their renomination no longer depends upon 
 public favor, the necessity of conciliating or im- 
 pressing the public is naturally less felt, if felt 
 at all. The boss controls every office in the 
 principal states. He does not unite these officer 
 in his own person, as Augustus or Tiberius did, 
 but he designates the persons who are to hold 
 them, and they accept his dicta with increasing 
 docility. It is, therefore, not surprising that
 
 THE NOMINATING SYSTEM 83 
 
 the boss's wishes, his idiosyncrasies, his stand- 
 ards of political efficiency and duty, and not 
 those of the public, should be constantly pre- 
 sent to the candidate's mind ; that he should 
 seek most of all to please the boss. For oratory 
 the boss has no use or admiration. His ideal of 
 a public man is one who votes right, but does 
 not talk, while the public has but little taste for 
 or interest in the man who does not put him- 
 self in frequent and interesting communication 
 with it. I dare say there are few in New York 
 to-day who know the names of more than one or 
 two of the Representatives in Congress from the 
 city. The man in office feels but one responsi- 
 bility ; for no man can serve two masters, and 
 the power which gave him his place and can 
 take it away, is the master whom he seeks to 
 serve in the ways the master prefers. 
 
 It is hardly necessary to dwell on the effect 
 of this on the tone of public life. But there is 
 one point connected with the making of what is 
 called " tone " which ought not to be passed 
 without mention, and that is the necessity, for 
 its maintenance, of complete publicity as to the 
 reasons for which a man gets office. There is 
 nothing more necessary for the maintenance of 
 what I may call political health than that all 
 the world should know why a certain man gets 
 a certain place. The distribution of place for
 
 84 THE NOMINATING SYSTEM 
 
 secret reasons is one of the worst abuses of des- 
 potism, and the possibility of its return among 
 us used to be dwelt on with a certain terror by 
 the earlier commentators on the Constitution. 
 Of course, I speak only of the larger and more 
 responsible places concerning which public cu- 
 riosity is excited. If these are even partially 
 filled by men who do not appear to have reached 
 them by what Burke called "manly arts," 
 that is, by public services or openly ascertained 
 qualifications, the effect on tone is very rapid 
 and very marked; for tone consists not more in 
 self-respect than in respect for those with whom 
 one has to act. All attainment of public places 
 by secret favor or intrigue, and the sudden ap- 
 pearance in responsible positions, for reasons 
 unknown to the community, of men of patent 
 unfitness, naturally lowers in their own estima- 
 tion all the rest of the body to which they 
 belong. 
 
 It is hardly within my plan to speak of reme- 
 dies, and yet no discussion even of the tenden- 
 cies of our nominating system would be adequate 
 which did not make some attempt to say whether 
 any substitute for it can be provided. I do not 
 conceal my belief that the present system is the 
 great canker of American institutions. I do not 
 believe it can be long practiced without chang- 
 ing the structure of the government. It is
 
 THE NOMINATING SYSTEM 85 
 
 accustoming the less intelligent class to what is 
 really a new form, and is reducing the more 
 intelligent to the despair of helplessness ; and 
 yet the maintenance intact of any government 
 depends largely on popular habit and confidence. 
 No constitution can retain its vigorous vitality 
 which exists on paper simply; it must also be 
 rooted in popular customs and ideas. The type 
 of statesmanship which a democratic constitution 
 calls for must be carefully preserved, and so must 
 the orthodox sources of distinction. Any growing 
 willingness to be content with inferior men has 
 to be combated ; the old ideals must be upheld. 
 But when we come to speak of substitutes, we are 
 met at the outset by the difficulty that the persons 
 to be reformed are in the possession of power, and 
 are thoroughly satisfied with the present system. 
 They predominate in Congress and in most of 
 the legislatures in the country, and would resist 
 vigorously any attempt at change. People seek- 
 ing something different at their hands would be 
 likely to meet with the same reception as the 
 European democrats who, after the downfall of 
 Napoleon, sought constitutions at the hands of 
 despotic monarchs. The class called the politi- 
 cians have the strongest interest in the mainte- 
 nance of the existing state of things. Moreover, 
 the elected convention has effected such a lodg- 
 ment in our political manners that any attempt
 
 86 THE NOMINATING SYSTEM 
 
 at change would possibly be met with a good 
 deal of popular indifference or dislike. 
 
 But in considering remedies we have of course 
 to take note of the evils to be remedied. The 
 primary meeting is defective : first, in that the 
 party voters attend it in only very small num- 
 bers, and consequently it has ceased to express 
 the party will, or expresses it only very inade- 
 quately ; second, in that, as we know it at pre- 
 sent, it offers no obstacles to the carrying out 
 of arrangements made secretly and beforehand 
 by the boss or managers. The delegates to 
 be elected are generally decided on before the 
 primary meets, and they are rarely persons who 
 represent the intelligence or morality of the 
 party. Any sufficient remedy, therefore, would 
 either furnish inducements to voters to attend 
 the party primaries, or furnish some substitute 
 for the primaries, or in some way prevent such 
 secret selections as are now made by the boss in 
 advance of the meeting. 
 
 Dr. Clarke, of Oswego, who has labored on 
 this question for a great many years, and has 
 produced a plan of reform which he has in vain 
 tried to get embodied in legislation, proposes to 
 overcome the difficulty of popular indolence and 
 indifference by dividing the voters into small 
 district constituencies, of the same size as regards 
 numbers, and drawn by lot from the total num-
 
 THE NOMINATING SYSTEM 87 
 
 ber of registered voters. These small constitu- 
 encies, say of one hundred apiece, are each to 
 choose an electoral delegate, and the assembly 
 of all these delegates is, in a city, to elect the 
 mayor or other elective officers. This is in effect, 
 as far as the size of the constituencies is con- 
 cerned, really the present system in a rougher 
 shape. Each district is treated as a separate 
 entity, and controlled by "a leader," who gen- 
 erally gets his living by holding some inferior 
 public place, and keeps the voters of his party 
 in discipline and order. The difference comes 
 when Dr. Clarke proceeds to choose the " elec- 
 toral delegates." The machine insists on desig- 
 nating them beforehand, and prescribing for 
 whom they shall vote in any election in which 
 they may take part. Dr. Clarke would conceal 
 them from the machine by selecting them by 
 lot, like jurymen, and making their services 
 compulsory. The plan, then, has the two great 
 merits of diminishing the size of the constitu- 
 encies in an orderly manner, and of concealing 
 from the boss the delegates who would be 
 chosen. But the difficulty of its adoption lies 
 not only in the latter fact, but also in the fact 
 that it obscures or hinders the direct action, 
 through party organization, of the free popu- 
 lar will which the masses still fondly believe to 
 be within their reach and which they strongly
 
 88 THE NOMINATING SYSTEM 
 
 desire. Its adaptation to our system of govern- 
 ment, too, is therefore not so simple. 1 
 
 Another of the great difficulties of party pri- 
 maries is the difficulty of determining who has a 
 right to vote at them. The present mode of 
 nominating assumes that a man always belongs 
 to the same party, and always votes its ticket 
 under all circumstances. Consequently, the 
 usual qualification for a party voter is having 
 
 1 Dr. Clarke has complained to me that I have done him in- 
 justice in this description of his system, and has sent me some 
 further elucidations of it, which I have read carefully. But I 
 am still unable to see where I have gone wrong. I acknowledge 
 freely the very great improvement it would effect in our mode 
 of nominating. I have simply said that the selection of the 
 nominating caucus or convention by lots cast by the whole body 
 of the voters would not satisfy party preferences which are 
 very strong, too strong I admit, among Americans. It might 
 often result in Democrats having to vote for Republicans, or 
 vice versa. In other words, it involves the disappearance of 
 party distinctions from elections. " The names of all the voters 
 in a ward are deposited in a panel. They are drawn therefrom 
 by lot in equal companies or lots, say, of 100 each. Each of 
 these lots is a " primary electoral constituency," and chooses 
 " an electoral delegate." The delegates thus chosen meet " and 
 elect the mayor and such other officers of the city at large as 
 are chosen by the people." This would be an excellent system 
 in a city won over to non-partisanship, but it would be impossi- 
 ble to call it to a reform in our nominating system unless it 
 could be used for state and national elections. I have asked 
 Dr. Clarke what provision he makes for party preferences. 
 He answers, " I make none ; what I seek is to restore the people 
 to freedom." What I fear is, that the people will insist on 
 provision for party preference in any nominating system, or in 
 other words refuse freedom on Dr. Clarke's terms.
 
 THE NOMINATING SYSTEM 89 
 
 voted the party presidential ticket at the pre- 
 vious election. But he may not have done so, 
 for various reasons that no longer have any 
 force ; or he may since then have changed his 
 mind, and may honestly desire to change his 
 party. Party belongings are matters of opinion. 
 We can only know from a man's own statement 
 to which party he really belongs, and it is 
 against public policy to throw obstacles hi the 
 way of any citizen's going freely from one party 
 to another. It is through this possibility of 
 change that public opinion acts on government. 
 Yet in our nominating system we treat party as 
 a permanent status, the loss of which excludes a 
 man from all share in the work of nomination. 
 For instance, unless I voted for Elaine in 1884 
 I could not participate in the selection of Harri- 
 son in 1888, and unless I voted for Cleveland in 
 1888 I should have been incompetent to aid in 
 selecting him as the party candidate in 1892. 
 So that in devising any reform, the existence and 
 utility of parties have to be acknowledged, and 
 means have to be provided for recognizing a 
 genuine party man and for the protection of 
 primary meetings or conventions against bogus 
 voters. I have not heard of any such practical 
 available test, and the invention of one, as long 
 as people insist on government through party, 
 will be difficult.
 
 90 THE NOMINATING SYSTEM 
 
 The only mode of escape from this difficulty 
 as yet devised is what is called "independent 
 voting;" that is, refusal to belong to any party, 
 and free passage from one to another, as the 
 circumstances may seem to require. But this 
 necessarily involves the abandonment of any 
 share in the work of selecting party candidates, 
 and shuts the voter up to choice between two 
 on whose nomination he has had no influence. 
 Moreover, it takes out of each party, if it is to 
 be effective, a large body of the most thoughtful 
 and patriotic of the voters ; that is, of persons 
 who still retain a keen sense of the fact that 
 party is an instrument, not an end, and whose 
 aid would be most valuable in raising the char- 
 acter of nominations. I do not think I err in 
 saying that the power of the machine and of the 
 boss over nominations has increased pari passu 
 with the growth of independent voting. Each 
 party, in getting rid of its more mutinous or 
 recalcitrant members, solidifies the power of the 
 machine, makes insurrection less frequent, and 
 renders " kicking," as it is called, more odious. 
 It weeds out of the party management, too, the 
 element most sensitive to public opinion, and 
 most anxious to secure the approbation of the 
 more thoughtful class of the community. What 
 remains is composed of men hardened against 
 criticism, indifferent to all approbation or dis-
 
 THE NOMINATING SYSTEM 91 
 
 approbation but that of their own fellows, and 
 knowing little of any political virtue except that 
 of fidelity to party friends. In the State of 
 New York, which may be said to be the arena 
 in which all political tendencies first show them- 
 selves, this has been strikingly true. In no 
 other state is the independent vote so powerful 
 and active as in New York, and in none is the 
 machine so audacious or so insensible to warn- 
 ing. The overthrow of one party by this vote 
 seems only to suggest imitation to the other. 
 Each follows closely the very ways which have 
 brought ruin on its predecessor, so that the 
 independent vote is brought almost to the end 
 of its resources. It can punish one party only 
 by putting the other in power, but this party 
 takes care that the condition of things which 
 brought on the punishment shall continue un- 
 changed, and even finds means to negotiate with 
 the other for a division of patronage. 
 
 " Independent voting " then has clearly ceased 
 to be a remedy. Something better has still to 
 be found. The most popular remedy is throw- 
 ing the protection of law around the caucus or 
 primary meeting, and making frauds in its com- 
 position, or in the conduct of the proceedings, 
 criminal offenses. This, it is true, would pre- 
 vent such cheating as took place in New York 
 in 1895, but it would not secure a larger attend-
 
 92 THE NOMINATING SYSTEM 
 
 ance of the voters, which is the chief need of 
 the primary meeting. The meeting would still 
 fail to represent the bulk of the party, though 
 the law might make those who were present 
 more decorous. And as assuredly as the attend- 
 ance continued to be small, it would be con- 
 trolled and its proceedings be prearranged by 
 those who had personal interest in being present. 
 Legalization would not overcome the reluctance 
 of indolent or busy voters to take part in a pro- 
 ceeding which was not conclusive, and in which 
 any opposition to a programme previously ar- 
 ranged by active party managers would make 
 them unpopular, and expose them to discussions 
 to which they would feel unequal. It would 
 prevent gross frauds on the spot and make 
 attendance safe and orderly, but it would do 
 nothing towards making the primary a f ull repre- 
 sentative of party opinion and feeling. In other 
 words, it would still continue to grind out results 
 carefully prepared by the boss, and the art of 
 politics would continue to be taught to our 
 youth, not as the art of government, but as the 
 art of " getting delegates." 
 
 Is the situation then hopeless ? Are we tied 
 up inexorably simply to a choice of evils? I 
 think not. It seems to me that the nomination 
 of candidates is another of the problems of 
 democracy which are never seriously attacked
 
 THE NOMINATING SYSTEM 93 
 
 without prolonged perception and discussion of 
 their importance. One of these was the forma- 
 tion of the federal government; another was 
 the abolition of slavery ; another was the reform 
 of the civil service. Every one of them looked 
 hopeless in the beginning ; but the solution 
 came, in each case, through the popular deter- 
 mination to find some better way. In all ages 
 this has been one of the democratic character- 
 istics. It is the only regime in which there is 
 no disposition to stagnate. It may improve or 
 it may deteriorate, but it is an incessant move- 
 ment, and has a passion for experiments, some 
 of which end badly, but those which have be- 
 hind them the general human instinctive longing 
 for efficiency are apt to succeed in the end. 
 
 Since the foregoing observations were written, 
 an attempt at a remedy has been made in New 
 York, which has met with a very encouraging 
 measure of success. The supporters of Mr. Low, 
 the independent candidate for the mayoralty of 
 the " Greater New York," having broken loose 
 from all party organizations, determined on try- 
 ing the plan of nomination by petition, that is 
 of procuring in each district of the city the 
 legally requisite number of signatures of voters 
 to a petition requesting Mr. Low to become a 
 candidate. Mr. Low's compliance was followed 
 by a highly instructive canvass, because it was
 
 94 THE NOMINATING SYSTEM 
 
 necessarily free from irrelevant matter, such as 
 appeals to party loyalty, or warnings of the bad 
 effect of party defeat on other than municipal 
 matters. All the speeches made and documents 
 issued necessarily bore on the issues raised by 
 the contest for the mayoralty. The condition 
 of the city government, its causes and remedies, 
 were almost the only matters discussed. The 
 candidate, having no party support to rely on, or 
 party preferences to appeal to, was compelled to 
 appear personally on the stump, and make good 
 his own claims to the place. The campaign was, 
 in fact, in the best sense " educational." It 
 was violently opposed by a large body of voters 
 who professed to have the same aims in the 
 affairs of the city, on the ground of want of 
 " regularity," that is, a departure from party 
 rules and precedents, or in other words, of dis- 
 regard of the caucus system of nomination. But 
 the result was a vote of 151,000 in a total of 
 526,000, or nearly one third. As a first at- 
 tempt at a better way, this must be considered 
 very encouraging. It has shown clearly that the 
 caucus, in cities at least, is not necessary, and 
 thus has got rid of the idea, which in cities is 
 the greatest obstacle to the discovery of a rem- 
 edy, that for purposes of nomination there must 
 be a meeting, in a certain place, at a certain 
 time. Nearly all efforts now being made, or
 
 THE NOMINATING SYSTEM 95 
 
 which have been made to " reform the primary," 
 assume this necessity. They all arrange for an 
 assemblage of some sort. But a primary in a 
 city or large town consists of a number of 
 people unknown to each other, of various classes 
 and conditions and of various ages, and is al- 
 most certain to be managed by those who make 
 it a business to attend to " politics," and there- 
 fore, like all meetings, is sure to be confronted 
 by a preconcerted programme prepared by those 
 who are most interested in the result. Opposi- 
 tion to this programme is something which most 
 voters will be unwilling to undertake publicly, 
 either through timidity, or want of practice in 
 public speaking, or ignorance of the facts* 
 They will therefore either remain silent, or 
 more probably remain at home and allow the 
 plan of the managers to be carried out without 
 opposition, so that no matter how many guaran- 
 tees the law may provide for the orderliness or 
 fairness of a primary, it is sure, in cities or large 
 centres of population, to fall into the hands of 
 the professional politicians. Other classes will 
 cease to attend, for the simple reason that they 
 will find the result determined on before they 
 reach the place. Therefore, it is to be feared 
 that no matter how often we reform the primary, 
 the non-appearance of the better class of voters 
 is pretty sure, in the end, to leave the work of 
 nomination in the same hands as before.
 
 THE DECLINE OF LEGISLATUEES 
 
 THE Roman Senate was the prototype of all 
 modern legislatures. It had two great func- 
 tions, auctoritas and consilium. The former 
 was practically what we call the " veto ; " that 
 is, the Senate could forbid any legislation not 
 originating with itself, whether proposed by the 
 people in the comitia or by the magistrates. 
 Nothing became a law without its sanction. The 
 latter, consiUum, was nearly what we call " ad- 
 vice and consent ; " that is, the Senate had to 
 pass on all proposals submitted to it by the exec- 
 utive officers, and approve or amend, as the case 
 might be. In considering the proposals of the 
 people, it decided whether they were wise and 
 Roman ; but it consulted with the magistrates 
 concerning every important action or enterprise 
 about to be undertaken. In all this it acted 
 under two powerful restraints, partly like the 
 theocracy in the early days of New England, 
 partly like our constitutions to-day, namely, 
 the mos majorum and the auguries. It saw 
 that everything was done in the Roman or
 
 THE DECLINE OF LEGISLATURES 97 
 
 ancient way, and that the unseen forces were 
 likely to favor it. 1 Now, how did this system 
 succeed ? On this point I cannot do better than 
 quote the testimony of Mommsen : 
 
 " Nevertheless, if any revolution or any usur- 
 pation appears justified before the bar of history 
 by exclusive ability to govern, even its rigorous 
 judgment must acknowledge that this corpora- 
 tion duly comprehended and worthily fulfilled 
 its great task. Called to power, not by the 
 empty accident of birth, but substantially by the 
 free choice of the nation ; confirmed every fifth 
 year by the stern moral judgment of the wor- 
 thiest men ; holding office for life, and so not 
 dependent on the expiration of its commission or 
 on the varying opinion of the people ; having its 
 ranks close and united even after the equaliza- 
 tion of its orders ; embracing in it all the politi- 
 cal intelligence and practical statesmanship that 
 the people possessed ; absolute in dealing with 
 all financial questions and in the control of for- 
 eign policy; having complete power over the 
 executive by virtue of its brief duration and of 
 the tribunitian intercession which was at the ser- 
 vice of the Senate after the termination of the 
 quarrels between the orders, the Roman Sen- 
 ate was the noblest organ of the nation, and in 
 consistency and political sagacity, in unanimity 
 i Willema' Senat et RcpuUique Romaine, pp. 34, 35.
 
 98 THE DECLINE OF LEGISLATURES 
 
 and patriotism, in grasp of power and unwaver- 
 ing courage, the foremost political corporation of 
 all times; still even now an ' Assembly of Kings,' 
 which knew well how to combine despotic energy 
 with republican self-devotion." * 
 
 As I have said, the Senate was the prototype 
 of all modern legislatures ; but only two, since 
 the fall of the Roman Empire, have at all re- 
 sembled it, the Venetian Grand Council and the 
 British Parliament. No others in the modern 
 world have attempted to discharge so great a 
 variety of duties, such as holding large extents 
 of conquered territory and ruling great bodies of 
 subject population, or carrying on foreign wars. 
 Its chief distinction was that, as a rule, subjects 
 for consideration, on which it had to take posi- 
 tive action, did not originate with it, but were 
 brought before it by the executive officers en- 
 gaged in the active conduct of the government. 
 So that it may be called a consultative rather 
 than a legislative body. How this came about 
 and how it continued, it is not necessary to dis- 
 cuss here. The general result was that, through 
 the whole course of Roman history, the admin- 
 istrative officers remained actually in charge of 
 the government, subject to the advice and con- 
 trol of the legislature. The same system has 
 prevailed in the British Parliament ever since it 
 
 1 History of Rome, voL i. pp. 410-412.
 
 THE DECLINE OF LEGISLATURES 99 
 
 became a real power in the state. Its proceed- 
 ings are controlled and regulated by the execu- 
 tive officers. They submit measures to it, and 
 ask its advice and consent ; but if they cannot 
 carry them, the matter drops and they resign, 
 and others undertake the task. Practically, a 
 private member cannot originate a bill, or get it 
 discussed, or procure its passage, except with 
 their consent. Indeed, as a legislator he is al- 
 ways in a certain sense an intruder. The func- 
 tion of the two Houses is essentially, not the 
 drafting or proposing of laws, but seeing that 
 no law is passed which is not expedient and 
 " constitutional ; " " constitutional " being, in the 
 British sense, what the Romans meant by being 
 in accordance with the mos majorum and having 
 the approval of the auguries. The British min- 
 istry, in fact, legislates as well as administers. 
 Every bill is fathered by the man who is en- 
 gaged in the active work of the department 
 which it touches. If it relate to the finances, 
 it is framed and introduced by the Chancellor of 
 the Exchequer ; if it relate to shipping, by the 
 President of the Board of Trade ; if to the 
 army, by the Secretary of War, and so on. Any 
 private member who should attempt to regu- 
 late these things would be frowned down and 
 silenced. His business is to hear what the min- 
 istry proposes, and to pass judgment on it.
 
 100 THE DECLINE OF LEGISLATURES 
 
 The reason why the English have been able to 
 preserve what is called the " cabinet system " in 
 their proceedings that is, the dominance of 
 the executive officers in the deliberation of Par- 
 liament is, I need hardly say, historical. Par- 
 liaments may be said to have originated as a 
 check on the royal authority. In the House of 
 Commons government was represented by the 
 king. The ministry was emphatically his minis- 
 try ; the opposition was held together partly by 
 fear, and partly by dislike of him. It never 
 reached the point of seeking to take the admin- 
 istration of the government out of his hands or 
 out of those of his officers, except in the rebel- 
 lion of 1640. Its highest ambition was to be 
 consulted about what was going to be done, and 
 to be allowed to ask questions about it and to 
 vote the money for it. It never thought of 
 taking on itself the function of administration. 
 It confined itself to the exercise of a veto. The 
 ministry never parted with its power of initia- 
 tion, and it strengthened its position by what 
 may be called the solidarity of the cabinet ; that 
 is, the practice of treating each act of any par- 
 ticular minister as the act of the whole body, 
 and standing or falling by it as such. The occa- 
 sions have been rare, in English history, in 
 which any one member has been surrendered to 
 the dissatisfaction or reprobation of the oppo-
 
 THE DECLINE OF LEGISLATURES 101 
 
 sition. When Puritan and Cavalier were suc- 
 ceeded by Whig and Tory, or Whig and Tory 
 by Conservative and Liberal, the new order 
 merely substituted one executive for another in 
 the House of Commons, and did not create a 
 new kind of executive. No matter what the 
 relative strength of parties in the country might 
 be, the dominant party appeared in the House of 
 Commons simply as administrative officers, seek- 
 ing and taking advice and approval from the 
 representative body. 
 
 Now, the value of the preservation of the 
 consultative rather than the legislative function 
 by the House of Commons, the auctoritas and 
 consilium rather than the initiative, has been 
 brought out more clearly than ever by the his- 
 tory of legislative bodies on the Continent since 
 the revival of popular government in 1848, and 
 by the history of legislatures in this country 
 since the war. The English House of Com- 
 mons, one may say, has grown up under the 
 consultative system. No other system has ever 
 been seen or thought of. Private members have 
 learnt to sit and listen, to have their opinions 
 asked for on certain proposals, and, if their 
 advice is not taken, to seek their remedy in 
 choosing other agents. They act on all propo- 
 sals submitted by the ministry, in parties, not 
 singly. The experience of three centuries has
 
 102 THE DECLINE OF LEGISLATURES 
 
 taught each member to be of the same mind, in 
 every case, as those with whom he ordinarily 
 agrees on other subjects. When the House of 
 Commons was taken as a model on the Conti- 
 nent, especially after 1848, what was set up was 
 not really the English Parliament, but a set of 
 councils for discussion, in which every man had 
 the right of initiative, or, at all events, the right 
 to say his say without sharing with any one else 
 the responsibility for what he said. The new 
 governments all had ministries, after the Eng- 
 lish fashion, but no one in the legislature felt 
 bound to approve, or felt bound to join others 
 in disapproving, of their policy. In other 
 words, the cabinet system did not take root in 
 the political manners. In his Journals, during 
 a visit to Turin in 1850,* Senior records a con- 
 versation with Cesare Balbo, a member of the 
 Chamber in the first Piedmontese Parliament, in 
 which Balbo said, after an exciting financial de- 
 bate : " We have not yet acquired parliamentary 
 discipline. Most of the members are more anx- 
 ious about their own crotchets or their own con- 
 sistency than about the country. The ministry 
 has a large nominal majority, but every member 
 of it is ready to put them in a minority for any 
 whim of his own." * This was probably true 
 of every legislative body on the Continent, and 
 
 1 Senior's Journals, vol. i. p. 323.
 
 THE DECLINE OF LEGISLATURES 103 
 
 it continues true to this day in Italy, Greece, 
 France, Austria, Germany, and the new Austra- 
 lian democracies. 
 
 Parliamentary discipline has not gained in 
 strength. On the contrary, the tendency to give 
 new men a taste of parliamentary life, which is 
 very strong particularly in France and Italy, has 
 stimulated the disposition to form " groups," or 
 to act independently. A man who is likely to 
 serve for only one term is unwilling to sink him- 
 self either in the ministerial majority, or in the 
 opposition. He wishes to make a reputation for 
 himself, and this he cannot do by voting silently 
 under a chief. A reputation has to be made by 
 openly expressed criticism, or by open hostility, 
 or by the individual exercise of the initiative. 
 To make an impression on his constituents, he 
 has to have a programme of his own and to 
 push it, to identify himself with some cause 
 which the men in power either ignore, or treat 
 too coolly. As a rule, the Continental legisla- 
 tures, while modeled on the British or cabinet 
 system, have really not copied its most important 
 feature, the dominance of the executive in the 
 legislative body. In Austria and Germany, 
 where the king or emperor is still a power, this 
 is not so apparent, but in France and Italy and 
 in Australia, where the Parliament is well-nigh 
 omnipotent, the result is incessant changes of
 
 104 THE DECLINE OF LEGISLATURES 
 
 ministry, and a great deal of legislation, in- 
 tended not so much to benefit the country as to 
 gather up and hold a majority. 
 
 In America we have never tried the cabinet 
 system, partly because our legislatures were 
 started before this system became fairly estab- 
 lished in England, and partly because, in colo- 
 nial times, the executive was never in thoroughly 
 friendly relations with the legislative department 
 of any colony. Americans entered on their na- 
 tional existence with the only sort of legislature 
 that was then known, a council of equals, where 
 one man had as much right to originate legisla- 
 tion as another, subject, of course, to the gen- 
 eral policy of the party to which he belonged. 
 The device with which we have striven to meet 
 the confusion thus created, is the formation of 
 committees to examine and report upon every 
 project of law submitted by individual members. 
 Every legislature, including Congress, is now 
 divided into these committees. With the execu- 
 tive it has no open or official relations, for pur- 
 poses of discussion. No administrative officer 
 is entitled of right to address, or advise, or con- 
 sult it. He is exposed to constant criticism, but 
 he cannot explain or answer. His presence, 
 even, in the legislative chambers is an intrusion. 
 He can communicate in writing any information 
 which the legislature demands, but this is the
 
 THE DECLINE OF LEGISLATURES 105 
 
 limit of his relations with it. The President 
 and every Governor of a state have the right to 
 send what we call " messages " to the legisla- 
 ture, directing its attention to certain matters 
 and recommending certain action, but it is very 
 rare for these recommendations to have much 
 effect. The messages are rhetorical perform- 
 ances, intended to give the public an idea of 
 the capacity and opinions of the writers rather 
 than to furnish a foundation for law-making. 
 
 There is nothing more striking in our system 
 than the perfunctoriness which has overtaken 
 both these documents and the party platforms, 
 and there can be no better illustration of the 
 effect of the absence of the executive from the 
 legislative chambers. If there were a ministry, 
 or if there were members of a cabinet sitting in 
 the chambers and charged with the initiation of 
 legislation, they would naturally be charged also 
 with the duty of carrying out the President's or 
 the Governor's recommendations, and embodying 
 the party platform in laws. But under the com- 
 mittee system nobody is burdened with this duty, 
 and after the messages and platforms have been 
 printed, they do not often receive any further 
 attention. Few can remember what a party plat- 
 form contains, a month after its adoption, and it 
 is very seldom that any legislative notice is taken 
 of it, except by the opposition press, which occa-
 
 106 THE DECLINE OF LEGISLATURES 
 
 sionally uses it to twit the party in power with 
 its inconsistency or negligence. In fact, legisla- 
 tion, both in Congress and in the state legisla- 
 tures, may be said to have become government by 
 committee. The individual member has hardly 
 more to do with it than he has in England. Yet 
 this does not prevent his making attempts to 
 legislate. He does not ask permission to intro- 
 duce bills, but he introduces them by thousands 
 every session. His right to legislate is recog- 
 nized as good and valid, but the rules which 
 regulate the course of his bill through the House 
 make the right of little more value than that of 
 the private member of the House of Commons. 
 His bill, as soon as it is presented, passes into 
 the custody of one of the committees. He is not 
 allowed to say a word in its behalf, and he has 
 no knowledge of what its fate will be. He is 
 literally cut off from debate, no less by the rules 
 than by the Speaker's favor. This functionary, 
 by simply refusing to see him, can condemn him 
 to perpetual silence, and has no hesitation in 
 exercising his power to advance or retard such 
 business of the House as he approves or dislikes. 
 But there is this difference between the posi- 
 tion of the English and that of the American 
 member. In England, the persons who take 
 his bill out of his hands, or refuse him permis- 
 sion to introduce it, are themselves engaged in
 
 THE DECLINE OF LEGISLATIVES 107 
 
 the work of legislation. They are responsible 
 for the conduct of the government. They pro- 
 fess to be supplying all the legislation that is 
 necessary. They simply deny the private mem- 
 ber any participation in their work. In America, 
 the committee which takes his bill from him and 
 seals its fate is composed of his own equals. 
 They have no more to do with the executive than 
 he has. They are no more charged with legis- 
 lation on any particular subject than he is. Their 
 main function is to examine and " report," but 
 whether they will ever report is a matter entirely 
 within their discretion. They are not bound to 
 substitute anything for what they reject or 
 ignore. They have so much to pass upon, that 
 their duty of initiation is reduced to a minimum. 
 Moreover, when they report favorably on any 
 bill in their custody, or originate one of their 
 own, they are not bound to allow full discussion 
 of it in the open House. All needful discussion 
 of it is supposed to have taken place in their 
 chamber. If any one is allowed to say much 
 about it in the House, it is rather as a matter of 
 grace ; and unless he is an orator of reputation, 
 but few listen to him. Consequently, there is in 
 practice a wide difference between the control of 
 legislation in the British Parliament, and the 
 control in our Congress. With us it is exercised 
 by an entirely different class of persons, who are
 
 108 THE DECLINE OF LEGISLATURES 
 
 not accountable for the fate of any bill. If they 
 choose not to report it, they are not bound to 
 give their reasons. The function of the British 
 ministry is to provide the necessary legislation, 
 and as a rule, the ministry is composed of men 
 well known to the public and of more than usual 
 experience. The function of the American com- 
 mittee, on the other hand, is simply to sift or 
 impede the efforts of a large assembly, composed 
 of persons of equal authority, to pass laws, with 
 the execution of which, if they were passed, they 
 would have nothing to do. As everybody has 
 a right to introduce bills, without being in any 
 way responsible for their working, there must be 
 some power to examine, revise, choose, or reject, 
 and this need is supplied by the committee sys- 
 tem. 1 
 
 The great change in the position and powers 
 of the Speaker in Congress and in all American 
 legislatures has been due to the same causes as 
 the institution of the committees. He has been 
 changed from his prototype, the judicial officer 
 who presides over debates in the House of Com- 
 mons, into something like the European prime 
 minister, so that he has charge of the legislation 
 
 1 The working of this system and the actual functions of the 
 Speaker are well described in Wilson's Congressional Govern- 
 ment, and in Miss Follett's Speaker of the House of Representa- 
 tives.
 
 THE DECLINE OF LEGISLATURES 109 
 
 of his party. He appoints the various commit- 
 tees, and can in this way make himself feared 
 or courted by members. By his power of " re- 
 cognition " he can consign any member to obscu- 
 rity. He can encourage or hinder a committee 
 in any species of legislation. He can check or 
 promote extravagance. He makes no pretension 
 to impartiality; he professes simply to be as im- 
 partial as a man can be who has to look after 
 the interests of his own party and see that its 
 " policy " is carried out. In fact, he differs but 
 little from the " leader " of the House of Com- 
 mons, except that he has nothing to do with the 
 execution of the laws after he has helped to 
 make them. He may have to hand them over 
 to a hostile Senate or to a hostile executive, after 
 he has secured their passage in his own assembly, 
 and the country does not hold him responsible 
 for them. No matter how badly they may work, 
 the blame is laid, not on him, but on " the 
 House " or on the party. He has nothing per- 
 sonal to fear from their failure, however active 
 he may have been in securing their enactment. 
 But the steady acquiescence in his increased 
 assumption of power in every session of Congress 
 or of the legislatures is clearly an admission that 
 modern democratic legislatures need leaders. 
 
 There are two committees which may be said 
 to be charged with the work of legislation, and
 
 110 THE DECLINE OF LEGISLATURES 
 
 these are the Committee of Ways and Means 
 and the Committee on Appropriations. But 
 neither of them supplies what may be called a 
 " budget ; " that is, a statement of necessary ex- 
 penditure and of probable revenue. These cal- 
 culations are made, it is true, in the various 
 administrative offices, but the committees are not 
 bound to take notice of them. The Committee 
 of Ways and Means fixes the revenue, as a rule, 
 mainly with regard to the state of public opinion 
 touching the principal source of revenue, the 
 taxes on imports. If the public is deemed to be 
 at that moment favorable to protection, these 
 taxes are put high; if favorable to free trade, 
 they are put low. The relation to the public 
 outlay is not made the chief consideration. In 
 other words, " taxation for revenue only " is not 
 an art practiced by either party. Taxation is 
 avowedly practiced as the art of encouraging 
 domestic industry in some degree. The Com- 
 mittee on Appropriations has no relations with 
 the Ways and Means Committee. It does not 
 concern itself about income. It adds to the 
 necessary expenditure of the government such 
 further expenditure as is likely to be popular, as 
 that for river and harbor improvements and for 
 pensions. In this way, neither committee is re- 
 sponsible for a deficit, for neither is bound to 
 make ends meets.
 
 THE DECLINE OF LEGISLATURES 111 
 
 This absence of connection between the levy- 
 ing and the spending authorities would work 
 speedy ruin in any European government. The 
 danger or inconvenience of it here has been con- 
 cealed by the very rapid growth of the country 
 in wealth and population, and the resulting rapid 
 increase of the revenue under all circumstances. 
 It is not too much to say that the first serious 
 deficiency of revenue was experienced on the 
 outbreak of the civil war. After the war, there 
 was no difficulty in meeting all reasonable ex- 
 penses, until the yearly recurring and increasing 
 surplus bred a frame of mind about expenditure 
 which led to enormous appropriations for pen- 
 sions and domestic improvements. These have 
 at last brought about, and for the first time in 
 American history, a real difficulty in devising 
 sources of revenue. At this writing the ques- 
 tion under debate is what taxes will be most 
 popular in the country, when it ought to be 
 what taxes will bring in most income. This has 
 been largely due to the appropriations for pur- 
 poses not absolutely necessary, but the Commit- 
 tee of Ways and Means is compelled to treat 
 them as if they were legitimate expenses. This 
 separation between the power which lays taxes 
 and the power which spends them is probably 
 the boldest of our experiments, and one which 
 has never before been tried. Its inconveniences
 
 112 THE DECLINE OF LEGISLATURES 
 
 are likely to be felt increasingly, as the habits 
 bred by easy circumstances become more fixed. 
 
 The tendency to lavish expenditure has been 
 stimulated, too, by he temptation of the protec- 
 tive system to make a large revenue collected 
 from duties on imports seem necessary. All 
 governments are prone to make taxation serve 
 some other purpose than to raise revenue ; that 
 is, to foster or maintain some sort of polity. It 
 was used for ages to promote inequality; now 
 it is frequently used to promote certain special 
 interests. In England, the import duties on 
 corn were meant to benefit the landed interest 
 and foster large estates. In America, the duties 
 on imports are meant to benefit native manufac- 
 tures indirectly ; but by showing that they are 
 also essential to the government, a great deal of 
 the opposition to them as a benefit to the manu- 
 facturers is disarmed. In no way can the needs 
 of the government be made so conspicuous as by 
 keeping the treasury empty. Since protection 
 for industry was, after the war, incorporated in 
 the fiscal system of the government, therefore 
 it has begotten extravagance almost as an in- 
 evitable accompaniment. The less money there 
 is on hand, the higher does it seem that duties 
 ought to be ; and the way to keep little on hand 
 is to spend freely. 
 
 The difficulty of getting rid of the protective
 
 THE DECLINE OF LEGISLATURES 113 
 
 system, in any modern country, is to be found 
 in part in the growth of democracy. To the 
 natural man, protection for his products against 
 competition is one of the primary duties of gov- 
 ernment. Every citizen or mechanic would fain 
 keep the neighboring market to himself, if he 
 could. The shoemaker wishes to make all the 
 shoes of his village, the carpenter to do all the 
 carpentering. In fact, protection is the eco- 
 nomical creed which the " uninstructed political 
 economist " always lays hold of first. Its bene- 
 fits seem clearest, and its operation in his own 
 interest is most visible and direct. This un- 
 doubtedly goes far to account for the failure of 
 the free-trade theory to make more way in the 
 world since the days of its early apostles. The 
 arguments by which it is supported are a little 
 too abstract and complex for the popular mind. 
 The consequence is that a distinct revival of pro- 
 tectionism has accompanied the spread of popu- 
 lar government in Europe and Australia, as well 
 as in this country. The use of the government 
 to keep the market for his products, and the 
 theory that the market is a privilege for the 
 seller which he ought not to be expected to 
 share with an alien, will long meet with ready 
 acceptance from the workingman. Whatever be 
 its industrial or economical merits or demerits, 
 its effect politically, in stimulating expenditure
 
 114 THE DECLINE OF LEGISLATURES 
 
 in the United States, has been plain ; and as- 
 long as taxpayers respond so readily to pecuni- 
 ary demands on them as they have always hith- 
 erto done, close calculation of outgoings and 
 incomings will not be easy to bring about. At 
 present, the " elasticity " of our revenue, owing 
 to the rapid increase of our population and the 
 magnitude of our undeveloped resources, is one 
 of the great wonders of European financiers, and 
 renders the education of financial experts diffi- 
 cult. Any source of taxation which even the 
 most inexperienced of our economists reaches, is 
 apt to pour forth results so abundantly as to 
 make the caution, the anxiety, and the nice 
 adjustments on which the financial system of 
 the Old World is based, appear unnecessary or 
 even ridiculous. 
 
 But the most serious defect in the committee 
 system, and the one that is hardest to remedy, is 
 the stopper it puts on debate. The objection is 
 often made, and with a show of reason, to the 
 cabinet system, and its practice of deciding 
 things only after open discussion, that it un- 
 duly stimulates mere talk, and postpones actual 
 business for the purpose of allowing a large 
 number of persons to produce arguments which 
 are found not to be worth listening to, and 
 which have no real influence on the results. 
 This is true, in particular, of all countries in
 
 THE DECLINE OF LEGISLATURES 115 
 
 which, as on the Continent, an attempt has been 
 made to govern assemblies without parliamentary 
 discipline, and without practice in acting by par- 
 ties rather than singly or in groups. Various 
 forms of " closure " have been invented in order 
 to check this habit. It may be found in an 
 extreme degree in our own Senate, which has 
 no closure, and in which irrelevant speeches are 
 inflicted by the hour, and even by the day, on 
 unwilling listeners. 
 
 But our demand on legislative bodies for 
 " business " has carried us to the other extreme, 
 which may be seen in the House of Representa- 
 tives. There is nothing, after all, more impor- 
 tant to the modern world than that the intelli- 
 gence and character of the nation should find 
 their way into the legislatures ; and for this 
 purpose the legislatures should be made some- 
 thing more than scenes of obscurity, hard work, 
 and small pay. The English House of Commons 
 owed its attractiveness for two centuries, in spite 
 of the non-payment of members, to the fact that 
 it was " the pleasantest club in Europe." It was 
 also a place in which any member, however hum- 
 ble his beginnings, had a chance to make fame 
 as an orator. In recent days, legislatures in all 
 the democratic countries have been made repul- 
 sive to men of mark by the pains taken " to get 
 business done" and to keep down the flood of
 
 116 THE DECLINE OF LEGISLATURES 
 
 speech. Everybody who enters a legislature now 
 for the first time, especially if he is a man of 
 talent and character, is bitterly disappointed by 
 finding that the rules take from him nearly 
 every opportunity of distinction, and, in addi- 
 tion, condemn him to a great deal of obscure 
 drudgery. It is only by the rarest chance that 
 he finds an opening to speak, and his work on 
 the committees never shows itself to the public. 
 It consists largely in passing on the merits of 
 the thousands of schemes concocted by inexpe- 
 rienced or ignorant men, and has really some 
 resemblance to a college professor's reading of 
 " themes." In fact, the committee room may be 
 called the grave of honorable ambition. 
 
 We find, accordingly, that only few men of 
 real capacity, who have once gone to the legis- 
 lature or to Congress, are willing to return for a 
 second term, simply because they find the work 
 disagreeable and the reward inadequate ; for it 
 is one of the commonplaces of politics that, in 
 every country, the number of able men who will 
 serve the public without either pay or distinc- 
 tion is very small. Even the most patriotic 
 must have one or the other; and to set up 
 legislatures, as all the democratic countries have 
 done, in which no one can look for either, is an 
 experiment fraught with danger. If I am not 
 greatly mistaken, the natural result is beginning
 
 THE DECLINE OF LEGISLATURES 117 
 
 to show itself. There is not a country in the 
 world, living under parliamentary government, 
 which has not begun to complain of the decline 
 in the quality of its legislators. More and more, 
 it is said, the work of government is falling 
 into the hands of men to whom even small pay 
 is important, and who are suspected of adding 
 to their income by corruption. The withdrawal 
 of the more intelligent class from legislative du- 
 ties is more and more lamented, and the com- 
 plaint is somewhat justified by the mass of crude, 
 hasty, incoherent, and unnecessary laws which 
 are poured on the world at every session. It is 
 increasingly difficult to-day to get a man of 
 serious knowledge on any subject to go to Con- 
 gress, if he have other pursuits and other sources 
 of income. To get him to go to the state legis- 
 lature, in any of the populous and busy states, is 
 well-nigh impossible. If he has tried the experi- 
 ment once, and is unwilling to repeat it, and 
 you ask him why, he will answer that the secret 
 committee work was repulsive ; that the silence 
 and the inability to accomplish anything, im- 
 posed on him by the rules, were disheartening ; 
 and that the difficulty of communicating with 
 his constituents, or with the nation at large, 
 through the spoken and reported word, deprived 
 him of all prospects of being rewarded by celeb- 
 rity.
 
 118 THE DECLINE OF LEGISLATURES 
 
 It is into the vacancies thus left that the boss 
 steps with full hands. He summons from every 
 quarter needy young men, and helps them to 
 get into places where they will be able to add to 
 their pay by some sort of corruption, however 
 disguised, perhaps rarely direct bribery, but 
 too often blackmail or a share in jobs. To such 
 it is not necessary that the legislature should be 
 an agreeable place, so long as it promises a live- 
 lihood. This system is already working actively 
 in some states ; it is spreading to others, and is 
 most perceptible in the great centres of affairs. 
 It is an abuse, too, which in a measure creates 
 what it feeds upon. The more legislatures are 
 filled with bad characters, the less inducement 
 there is for men of a superior order to enter 
 them ; for it is true of every sort of public ser- 
 vice, from the army up to the cabinet, that men 
 are influenced as to entering it by the kind of 
 company they will have to keep. The statesman 
 will not associate with the Boy, if he can help it, 
 especially in a work in which conference and 
 persuasion play a large part. 
 
 If it be true that the character and compe- 
 tency of legislators are declining, the evil is ren- 
 dered all the more serious by the fact that the 
 general wealth has increased enormously within 
 the present century. Down to the French Revo- 
 lution, and we might almost say down to 1848,
 
 THE DECLINE OF LEGISLATURES 119 
 
 the western world, speaking broadly, was ruled 
 by the landholding or rich class. Its wealth 
 consisted mainly of land, and the owners of the 
 land carried on the government. In commercial 
 communities, like Genoa or Venice, or the Hanse 
 Towns, the governing class was made up of 
 merchants, but it was still the rich class. Within 
 fifty years a great change has occurred. The 
 improvement in communication has brought all 
 the land of the world into the great markets, 
 and as a result the landowners have ceased to be 
 the wealthy, and the democratic movement has 
 taken the government away from them. From 
 the hands of the wealthy, the power has passed 
 or is passing into the hands of men to whom the 
 salary of a legislator is an object of some con- 
 sequence, and who are more careful to keep in 
 touch with their constituents than to afford ex- 
 amples of scientific government, even if they 
 were capable of it. It cannot be said, in the 
 light of history, that the new men are giving 
 communities worse government than they used to 
 have, but government in their hands is not pro- 
 gressing in the same ratio as the other arts of 
 civilization, while the complexity of the interests 
 to be dealt with is steadily increasing. Science 
 and literature are making, and have made, much 
 more conspicuous advances than the manage- 
 ment of common affairs. Less attention is given
 
 120 THE DECLINE OF LEGISLATURES 
 
 to experience than formerly, while the expecta- 
 tion of some new idea, in which the peculiarities 
 of human nature will have much slighter play, is 
 becoming deeper and more widespread. 
 
 No effect of this passage of legislative work 
 into less instructed hands is more curious than 
 the great stimulus it has given to legislation 
 itself. Legislators now, apparently, would fain 
 have the field of legislation as wide as it was in 
 the Middle Ages. The schemes for the regula- 
 tion of lif e by law, which are daily submitted to 
 the committees by aspiring reformers, are innu- 
 merable. One legislator in Kansas was seeking 
 in the winter of 1896 to procure the enactment 
 of the Ten Commandments. In Nebraska, an- 
 other has sought to legislate against the wearing 
 of corsets by women. Constant efforts are made 
 to limit the prices of things, to impose fresh 
 duties on common carriers, to restrain the growth 
 of wealth, to promote patriotic feeling by greater 
 use of symbols, or in some manner to improve 
 public morals by artificial restraints. There is 
 no legislature in America which does not con- 
 tain members anxious to right some kind of 
 wrong, or afford some sort of aid to human 
 character, by a bill. Sometimes the bill is intro- 
 duced to oblige a constituent, in full confidence 
 that it will never leave the committee room ; at 
 others, to rectify some abuse which happens to
 
 THE DECLINE OF LEGISLATURES 121 
 
 have come under the legislator's eye. Some- 
 times, again, the greater activity of one member 
 drives into legislation another who had previ- 
 ously looked forward to a silent session. Then 
 it has to be borne in mind that, under the com- 
 mittee system, which has been faithfully copied 
 from Congress in all the legislatures, the only 
 way in which a member can make his constit- 
 uents aware that he is trying to earn his salary, is 
 by introducing bills. It does not much matter 
 that they are not finished pieces of legislation, 
 or that there is but little chance of their passage. 
 Their main object is to convince the district that 
 its representative is awake and active, and has an 
 eye to its interests. The practice of " log-roll- 
 ing," too, has become a fixed feature in the pro- 
 cedure of nearly all the legislatures ; that is, of 
 making one member's support of another mem- 
 ber's bill conditional on his receiving the other 
 member's support for his own. In the attempted 
 revolt against the boss, during the recent sena- 
 torial election in New York, a good many mem- 
 bers who avowed their sense of Platt's unfitness 
 for the Senate acknowledged that they could 
 not vote against him openly, because this would 
 cause the defeat of local measures in which they 
 were interested. This recalls the fact that many 
 even of the best men go to the legislature for 
 one or two terms, not so much to serve the
 
 122 THE DECLINE OF LEGISLATURES 
 
 public as to secure the passage of bills in which 
 they, or the voters of their district, have a spe- 
 cial concern. Their anxiety about these makes 
 their subserviency to the majority complete, on 
 larger questions, however it is controlled. You 
 vote for an obviously unfit man for Senator, for 
 instance, because you cannot risk the success 
 of a bill for putting up a building, or erecting 
 a bridge, or opening a new street, in your own 
 town. You must give and take. These men 
 are reinforced by a large number by whom the 
 service is rendered for simple livelihood. The 
 spoils doctrine that public office is a prize, or 
 a "plum," rather than a public trust has 
 effected a considerable lodgment in legislation. 
 Not all receive their places as the Massachusetts 
 farmer received his membership in the legisla- 
 ture, a few years ago, because he had lost some 
 cows by lightning, but a formidable number 
 young lawyers, farmers carrying heavy mort- 
 gages, men without regular occupation and tem- 
 porarily out of a job find service in the legis- 
 lature, even for one term, an attractive mode of 
 tiding over the winter. 
 
 The mass of legislation or attempts at legisla- 
 tion due to this state of affairs is something 
 startling. I have been unable to obtain records 
 of the acts and resolutions of all the States for 
 the same year. I am obliged to take those of
 
 THE DECLINE OF LEGISLATURES 123 
 
 Arkansas for the year 1893, four other states 
 for 1894, ten for 1896, and the rest for 1895. 
 But I have taken only one year for each state. 
 The total of such acts and resolutions is 15,730, 
 and this is for a population of 70,000,000. In 
 addition, Congress in 1895-96 passed 457 acts 
 and resolutions. But the amount of work 
 turned out is really not very surprising, when 
 we consider the number of the legislators. There 
 are no less than 447 national legislators and 
 6578 state legislators, in all 7025, exclusive 
 of county, city, and all other local authorities 
 capable of passing rules or ordinances. At this 
 ratio of legislators to population, 4000 at least 
 would be engaged on the laws of Great Britain, 
 without any provision for India and the colonies, 
 3800 on those of France, about 5000 on those 
 of Germany, and 3000 on those of Italy. It 
 will be easily seen what a draft this is on the 
 small amount of legislative capacity which every 
 community contains. There is no country which 
 has yet shown itself capable of producing more 
 than one small first-class legislative assembly. We 
 undertake to keep going forty-five for the states 
 alone, besides those for territories. All these 
 assemblies, too, have to do with interests of the 
 highest order. As a general rule, in all govern- 
 ments, the chief legislative body only is intrusted 
 with the highest functions. Its jurisdiction
 
 124 THE DECLINE OF LEGISLATURES 
 
 covers the weightiest interests of the people who 
 live under it. The protection of life and pro- 
 perty, the administration of civil and criminal 
 justice, and the imposition of the taxes most 
 severely felt, are among its duties. All minor 
 bodies exist as its subordinates or agents, and 
 exercise only such powers as it is pleased to dele- 
 gate to them. This draws to the superior as- 
 sembly, as a matter of course, the leading men 
 of the country, and by far the larger share of 
 popular attention. 
 
 In the formation of our federal Constitution, 
 this division, based on relative importance to the 
 community, was not possible. The states sur- 
 rendered as little as they could. The federal 
 government took what it could get, and only 
 what seemed absolutely necessary to the creation 
 of a nation. The consequence is that, though 
 Congress appears to be the superior body, it is 
 not really so. It is more conspicuous, and, if I 
 may use the word, more picturesque, but it does 
 not deal with a larger number of serious public 
 interests. The states have reserved to them- 
 selves the things which most concern a man's 
 comfort and security as a citizen. The protec- 
 tion of his property, the administration of civil 
 and criminal justice, the interpretation of con- 
 tracts and wills, and the creation and regulation 
 of municipalities, are all within their jurisdic-
 
 THE DECLINE OF LEGISLATURES 125 
 
 tion. Most of the inhabitants pass their lives 
 without once coming into contact with federal 
 authority. As a result, an election to Congress 
 is only seeming political promotion. It gives 
 the candidate more dignity and importance, but 
 he really has less to do with the every-day hap- 
 piness of his fellow citizens than the state leg- 
 islator. If he were deprived of the power of 
 raising and lowering the duties on foreign im- 
 ports and of bickering with foreign powers, his 
 influence on the daily life of Americans would 
 be comparatively small. When he goes to 
 Washington, he finds himself in a larger and 
 more splendid sphere, but charged with less of 
 important governmental work. The grave polit- 
 ical functions of the country are discharged in 
 the state legislatures, but by inferior men. In 
 so far as Congress makes a draft on the legis- 
 lative capacity of the nation, it makes it at the 
 expense of the local governments. 
 
 For this anomaly it would be difficult to sug- 
 gest a remedy. The division of powers between 
 the confederation and the states, though not a 
 logical one, was probably the only possible one 
 at the time it was made. The main work of gov- 
 ernment was left to the states, but the field at 
 Washington was made by its conspicuousness 
 more attractive to men of talent and energy in 
 politics; so that it may be said that we give an
 
 126 THE DECLINE OF LEGISLATURES 
 
 inordinate share of our parliamentary ability to 
 affairs which concern us in only a minor degree. 
 This, however, can hardly be considered as the 
 result of a democratic tendency. The federal 
 arrangement has really nothing to do with de- 
 mocracy. It was made as the only practicable 
 mode of bringing several communities into 
 peaceful relations, and enabling them to face the 
 world as a nation, though it might as readily 
 have been the work of aristocracies as of de- 
 mocracies ; but in so far as it has in any degree 
 lowered the character of legislative bodies, de- 
 mocracy has been made and will be made to 
 bear the blame. 
 
 This opinion has been strengthened by the 
 discredit which has overtaken two very promi- 
 nent features of the federal arrangement, the 
 election of the President by the electoral college 
 and the election of Senators by the state legisla- 
 tures. The fact is that the complete disuse of 
 their electoral functions within forty years after 
 the adoption of the Constitution was one of the 
 most striking illustrations that history affords of 
 the futility of political prophecy. Here is the 
 judgment on this feature of their work by the 
 f ramers of the Constitution, as set forth in " The 
 Federalist : " 
 
 " As the select assemblies for choosing the 
 President, as well as the state legislatures who
 
 THE DECLINE OF LEGISLATURES 127 
 
 appoint the Senators, will in general be composed 
 of the most enlightened and respectable citizens, 
 there is reason to presume that their attention 
 and their votes will be directed to those men 
 only who have become the most distinguished by 
 their abilities and virtue, and in whom the peo- 
 ple perceive just grounds for confidence. The 
 Constitution manifests very particular attention 
 to this object. By excluding men under thirty- 
 five from the first office, and those under thirty 
 from the second, it confines the electors to men 
 of whom the people have had time to form a 
 judgment, and with respect to whom they will 
 not be liable to be deceived by those brilliant 
 appearances of genius and patriotism which, like 
 transient meteors, sometimes mislead as well as 
 dazzle. If the observation be well founded, that 
 wise kings will always be served by able minis- 
 ters, it is fair to argue that as an assembly of 
 select electors possess, in a greater degree than 
 kings, the means of extensive and accurate in- 
 formation relative to men and characters, so will 
 their appointments bear at least equal marks of 
 discretion and discernment. The inference is 
 that President and Senators so chosen will always 
 be of the number of those who best understand 
 our national interests, whether considered in re- 
 lation to the several states or to foreign nations, 
 who are best able to promote those interests, and
 
 128 THE DECLINE OF LEGISLATURES 
 
 whose reputation for integrity inspires and mer- 
 its confidence. With such men the power of 
 making treaties may be safely lodged." * 
 
 And here is the opinion of the earliest and 
 most philosophic of our foreign observers, M. de 
 Tocqueville : 
 
 " When you enter the House of Representa- 
 tives at Washington, you are struck with the 
 vulgar aspect of this great assembly. The eye 
 looks often in vain for a celebrated man. Nearly 
 all its members are obscure personages, whose 
 names suggest nothing to the mind. They are 
 for the most part village lawyers, dealers, or even 
 men belonging to the lowest classes. In a coun- 
 try in which education is almost universal, it is 
 said there are representatives of the people who 
 cannot always write correctly. Two steps away 
 opens the hall of the Senate, whose narrow area 
 incloses a large part of the celebrities of America. 
 One hardly sees there a single man who does not 
 recall the idea of recent fame. They are eloquent 
 advocates, or distinguished generals, or able ma- 
 gistrates, or well-known statesmen. Every word 
 uttered in this great assembly would do honor 
 to the greatest parliamentary debates in Europe. 
 
 " Whence comes this strange contrast ? Why 
 does the elite of the nation find itself in one of 
 these halls more than in the other ? Why does 
 
 1 The Federalist, No. LXIII.
 
 THE DECLINE OF LEGISLATURES 129 
 
 the first assembly unite so many vulgar elements, 
 while the second seems to have a monopoly of 
 talents and intelligence? Both emanate from 
 the people, and both are the product of universal 
 suffrage, and no voice, until now, has been raised 
 in the United States to say that the Senate was 
 the enemy of popular interests. Whence comes, 
 then, this enormous difference? I see only one 
 i'act which explains it : the election which pro- 
 duces the House o Representatives is direct; 
 that which produces the Senate is submitted to 
 two degrees. The whole of the citizens elect the 
 legislature of each state, and the federal Consti- 
 tution, transforming these legislatures in their 
 turn into electoral bodies, draws from them the 
 members of the Senate. The Senators, then, 
 express, although indirectly, the result of the 
 popular vote ; for the legislature, which names 
 the Senators, is not an aristocratic or privileged 
 body, which derives its electoral rights from it- 
 self ; it depends eventually on the whole of the 
 citizens. It is, in general, elected by them every 
 year, and they can always govern its decisions 
 by electing new members. But the popular will 
 has only to pass through this chosen assembly to 
 shape itself in some sort, and issue from it in a 
 nobler and finer form. The men thus elected 
 represent, then, always exactly the majority of 
 the nation which governs; but they represent
 
 130 THE DECLINE OF LEGISLATURES j 
 
 only the more elevated ideas which circulate 
 among them, the generous instincts which ani- 
 mate them, and not the small passions which 
 often agitate them and the vices which disgrace 
 them. It is easy to foresee a time when the 
 American Republic will be forced to multiply 
 the two degrees in their electoral system, on pain 
 of wrecking themselves miserably on the shores 
 of democracy. I do not hesitate to avow it. I 
 see in the double electoral degree the only means 
 of bringing political liberty within the reach of 
 all classes of the people." l 
 
 It is more than half a century since the elec- 
 toral college, thus vaunted by its inventors, ex- 
 erted any influence in the choice of the President. 
 An attempt on the part of one of its members to 
 use his own judgment in the matter would be 
 treated as an act of the basest treachery. It has 
 become a mere voting machine in the hands of 
 the party. The office of " elector " has become 
 an empty honor, accorded to such respectable 
 members of the party as are unfit for, or do not 
 desire, any more serious place. The candidates 
 for the presidency are now chosen by a far larger 
 body, which was never dreamed of by the makers 
 of the Constitution, rarely bestows any thought 
 on fitness as compared with popularity, and sits 
 in the presence of an immense crowd which, 
 
 1 De la Democratic en Amerique, t. ii. p. 53.
 
 THE DECLINE OF LEGISLATURES 131 
 
 though it does not actually take part in its pro- 
 ceedings, seeks to influence its decisions by every 
 species of noise and interruption. In fact, all 
 show of deliberation has been abandoned by it. 
 Its action is settled beforehand by a small body 
 of men sitting in a private room. The choice of 
 the delegates is prescribed, and may be finally 
 made under the influence of a secretly conducted 
 intrigue, of a " deal," or of a wild outburst of 
 enthusiasm known as a "stampede." A greater 
 departure from the original idea of the electoral 
 college could hardly be imagined than the mod- 
 ern nominating convention. 
 
 Much the same phenomena are to be witnessed 
 in the case of the election of Senators by state 
 legislatures. The machinery on which Tocque- 
 ville relied so confidently, the use of which he 
 expected to see spread, has completely broken 
 down. The legislators have not continued to be 
 the kind of men he describes, and their choice 
 is not governed by the motives he looked for. 
 There is no longer such a thing as deliberation 
 by the legislatures, over the selection of the 
 Senators. The candidate is selected by others, 
 who do not sit in the legislature at all, and they 
 supply the considerations which are to procure 
 him his election. He is given the place either 
 on account of his past electioneering services to 
 the party, or on account of the largeness of his
 
 132 THE DECLINE OF LEGISLATURES 
 
 contributions to its funds. The part he will play 
 in the Senate rarely receives any attention. The 
 anticipations of the framers of the Constitution, 
 as set forth in the passage from " The Federalist" 
 which I have quoted, have been in no way ful- 
 filled. The members of the legislature, as a 
 general rule, when acting as an electoral college, 
 are very different from those whom the fathers 
 of the republic looked for. In fact, the break- 
 down of their system is widespread, and appears 
 to have exerted such a deteriorating influence on 
 the character of the Senate, that we are witness- 
 ing the beginnings of an agitation for the elec- 
 tion of Senators by the popular vote. 
 
 ii 
 
 Why the founders and Tocqueville were mis- 
 taken about the double election as a check is 
 easily explained. The founders knew little or 
 nothing about democracy except what they got 
 from Greek and Roman history ; Tocqueville 
 saw it at work only before the English traditions 
 had lost their force. Democracy really means a 
 profound belief in the wisdom as well as the 
 power of the majority, not on certain occa- 
 sions, but at whatever time it is consulted. All 
 through American history this idea has had to 
 struggle for assertion with the inherited polit- 
 ical habits of the Anglo-Saxon race, which made
 
 THE DECLINE OF LEGISLATURES 133 
 
 certain things " English " or " American " just as 
 to the Romans certain things were "Roman," 
 for no reason that could be easily stated, except 
 that they were practices or beliefs of long stand- 
 ing. In England these habits have always com- 
 posed what is called " the British Constitution," 
 and in America they have made certain rights 
 seem immemorial or inalienable, such as the 
 right to a speedy trial by jury, the right to com- 
 pensation for property taken for public use, the 
 right to the decision of all matters in contro- 
 versy by a court. This vague and ill-defined 
 creed existed before any constitution, and had 
 to be embodied in every constitution. The near- 
 est approach to a name for it, in both countries, 
 is the " common law," or customs of the race, of 
 which, however, since it formed organized civil- 
 ized societies, the courts of justice have always 
 been the fountains or exponents. We have had 
 to ask the judges in any given case what the 
 " common law " is, there being no written state- 
 ment of it. It was consequently a comparatively 
 easy matter, in America, to get all questions in 
 any way affecting the life, liberty, or property 
 of individuals put into a fundamental law, to be 
 interpreted by the courts. Against this notion 
 of the fitness of things, democracy, or the wis- 
 dom of the majority, has beaten its head in 
 vain. That it should be hindered or delayed in
 
 134 THE DECLINE OF LEGISLATURES 
 
 carrying out its will by a written instrument, 
 expounded and applied by judges, has, therefore, 
 always seemed natural. 
 
 In all the countries of Continental Europe, 
 at the beginning of this century, it would have 
 appeared a scandal or an anomaly that every- 
 body should be liable to be called into court, no 
 matter what office he held, on the plaint of a 
 private man. With us the thing has always been 
 a simple and inherent part of our system. But 
 in the matter of appointment to office, which 
 could have no effect upon or relation to private 
 rights, pure democracy has never shown any dis- 
 position to be checked or gainsaid. It has never 
 shown any inclination to treat public officers, 
 from kings down, as other than its servants or 
 the agents of its will. It revolted very early 
 against Burke's definition of its representatives, 
 as statesmen set to exercise their best judgment 
 in watching over the people's interests. The 
 democratic theory of the representative has al- 
 ways been that he is a delegate sent to vote, not 
 for what he thinks best, but for what his con- 
 stituents think best, even if it controverts his 
 own opinion. The opposition to this view has 
 been both feeble and inconstant ever since the 
 early years of the century. The " delegate " 
 theory has been gaining ground in England, 
 and in America has almost completely succeeded
 
 THE DECLINE OF LEGISLATURES 135 
 
 in asserting its sway, so that we have seen many 
 cases recently, in which members of Congress 
 have openly declared their dissent from the mea- 
 sure for which they voted in obedience to their 
 constituents. 
 
 It was this determination not to be checked 
 in the selection of officers, but to make the peo- 
 ple's will act directly on all nominations, which 
 led to the early repudiation of the electoral col- 
 lege. That college was the device of those who 
 doubted the wisdom and knowledge of the ma- 
 jority. But the majority was determined that 
 in no matter within its jurisdiction should its 
 wisdom and knowledge be questioned. It re- 
 fused to admit that if it was competent to choose 
 electors and members of Congress, it was not 
 competent to choose the President. It accord- 
 ingly set the electoral college ruthlessly aside at a 
 very early period in the history of the republic. 
 Tocqueville's idea that, in recognition of its own 
 weakness and incompetence, it would spread the 
 system of committing the appointing power to 
 small select bodies of its own people, shows how 
 far he was from comprehending the new force 
 which had come into the world, and which he 
 was endeavoring to analyze through observation 
 of its working in American institutions. 
 
 It may seem at first sight as if this explana- 
 tion does not apply to the failures of the legis-
 
 136 THE DECLINE OF LEGISLATURES 
 
 latures to act upon their own judgment in the 
 election of Senators. But the election of Sena- 
 tors has run exactly the same course as the 
 nomination of Presidents; the choice has been 
 taken out of the hands of the legislatures by 
 the political party, and in each political party the 
 people are represented by its managers, or " the 
 machine," as it is called. They insist on nomi- 
 nating, or, if in a majority, on electing the Sen- 
 ators, just as they insist on nominating, or, if in 
 a majority, on electing the President. Nearly 
 every legislator is elected now with a view to 
 the subsequent election of the Senators when- 
 ever there is a vacancy. His choice is settled 
 for him beforehand. The casting of his vote is 
 a mere formality, like the vote of the presiden- 
 tial electors. The man he selects for the place 
 is the man already selected by the party. With 
 this man's goodness or badness, fitness or unfit- 
 ness, he does not consider that he has anything 
 to do. Nothing can less resemble the legisla- 
 ture which filled the imagination of the framers 
 of the Constitution than a legislature of our time 
 assembled in joint convention to elect a Senator. 
 It has hardly one of the characteristics which 
 the writers of " The Federalist " ascribed to their 
 ideal ; it is little affected by any of the consid- 
 erations which these gentlemen supposed would 
 be predominant with it.
 
 THE DECLINE OF LEGISLATURES 137 
 
 Any change, to be effective, must be a change 
 in the mode of nomination. All attempts to 
 limit or control the direct choice of the people, 
 such as the use of the lot or of election by sev- 
 eral degrees, as in Venice, must fail, and all 
 machinery created for the purpose will probably 
 pass away by evasion, if not by legislation. 
 The difficulties of constitutional amendment are 
 so great that it will be long before any legal 
 change is made in the mode of electing Senators. 
 It is not unsafe to assume that if any change be 
 made in the mode of nomination, one of its first 
 uses will be the practical imposition on all legis- 
 latures of the duty of electing to the Senate 
 persons already designated by the voters at the 
 polls. 
 
 As regards the state legislators themselves, it 
 is well to remember that all political prophets 
 require nearly as much time as the Lyell school 
 of geologists. It is difficult enough to foresee 
 what change will come about, but it is still more 
 difficult to foretell how soon it will come about. 
 No writer on politics should forget that it took 
 five hundred years for Rome to fall, and fully a 
 thousand years to educe modern Europe from 
 the mediaeval chaos. That the present legislative 
 system of democracy will not last long there are 
 abundant signs, but in what way it will be got 
 rid of, or what will take its place, or how soon
 
 138 THE DECLINE OF LEGISLATURES 
 
 democratic communities will utterly tire of it, he 
 would be a very rash speculator who would ven- 
 ture to say confidently. The most any one can 
 do is to point out the tendencies which are likely 
 to have most force, and to which the public 
 seems to turn most hopefully. 
 
 At present, as far as one can see, the demo- 
 cratic world is filled with distrust and dislike of 
 its parliaments, and submits to them only under 
 the pressure of stern necessity. The alternative 
 appears to be a dictatorship, but probably the 
 world will not see another dictator chosen for 
 centuries, if ever. Democracies do not admit 
 that this is an alternative, nor do they admit 
 that legislatures, such as we see them, are the 
 last thing they have to try. They seem to be 
 getting tired of the representative system. In 
 no country is it receiving the praises it received 
 forty years ago. There are signs of a strong 
 disposition, which the Swiss have done much to 
 stimulate, to try the "referendum" more fre- 
 quently, on a larger scale, as a mode of enacting 
 laws. One of the faults most commonly found 
 in the legislatures, as I have already said, is the 
 fault of doing too much. I do not think I 
 exaggerate in saying that all the busier states in 
 America, in which most capital is concentrated 
 and most industry carried on, witness every 
 meeting of the state legislature with anxiety and
 
 THE DECLINE OF LEGISLATIVES 139 
 
 alarm. I have never heard such a meeting 
 wished for or called for by a serious man outside 
 the political class. It creates undisguised fear 
 of some sort of interference with industry, some 
 sort of legislation for the benefit of one class, or 
 the trial of some hazardous experiment in judi- 
 cial or administrative procedure, or in public 
 education or taxation. There is no legislature 
 to-day which is controlled by scientific methods, 
 or by the opinion of experts in jurisprudence or 
 political economy. Measures devised by such 
 men are apt to be passed with exceeding diffi- 
 culty, while the law is rendered more and more 
 uncertain by the enormous number of acts passed 
 on all sorts of subjects. 
 
 Nearly every state has taken a step towards 
 meeting this danger by confining the meeting of 
 its legislature to every second year. It has said, 
 in other words, that it must have less legislation. 
 In no case that I have heard of has the opposi- 
 tion to this change come from any class except 
 the one that is engaged in the working of politi- 
 cal machinery; that is, in the nomination or 
 election of candidates and the filling of places. 
 The rest of the community hails it with delight. 
 People are beginning to ask themselves why legis- 
 latures should meet even every second year; why 
 once in five years would not be enough. An 
 examination of any state statute-book discloses
 
 140 THE DECLINE OF LEGISLATURES 
 
 the fact that necessary legislation is a rare thing; 
 that the communities in our day seldom need a 
 new law; and that most laws are passed without 
 due consideration, and before the need of them 
 has been made known, either by popular agita- 
 tion, or by the demand of experts. It would 
 not be an exaggeration to say that nine tenths 
 of our modern state legislation will do no good, 
 and that at least one tenth of it will do positive 
 harm. If half the stories told about state legisla- 
 tures be true, a very large proportion of the mem- 
 bers meet, not with plans for the public good, 
 but with plans either for the promotion of their 
 personal interests, or for procuring money for 
 party uses, or places for party agents. 
 
 The collection of such a body of men, not en- 
 gaged in serious business, in the state capital, is 
 not to be judged simply by the bills they intro- 
 duce or pass. We have also to consider the 
 opportunities for planning and scheming which 
 the meetings offer to political jobbers and adven- 
 turers; and the effect, on such among them as 
 still retain their political virtue, of daily contact 
 with men who are there simply for illicit pur- 
 poses, and with the swarm who live by lobbying, 
 and get together every winter in order to trade 
 in legislative votes. If I said, for instance, that 
 the legislature at Albany was a school of vice, 
 a fountain of political debauchery, and that few
 
 THE DECLINE OF LEGISLATURES 141 
 
 of the younger men came back from it without 
 having learned to mock at political purity and 
 public spirit, I should seem to be using unduly 
 strong language, and yet I could fill nearly 
 a volume with illustrations in support of my 
 charges. The temptation to use their great 
 power for the extortion of money from rich men 
 and rich corporations, to which the legislatures 
 in the richer and more prosperous Northern 
 states are exposed, is great; and the legislatures 
 are mainly composed of very poor men, with no 
 reputation to maintain, or political future to look 
 after. The result is that the country is filled 
 with stories of scandals after every adjournment, 
 and the press teems with abuse, which legislators 
 have learned to treat with silent contempt or 
 ridicule, so that there is no longer any restraint 
 upon them. Their reelection is not in the hands 
 of the public, but in those of the party man- 
 agers, who, as is shown in the Payn case in New 
 York, find that they can completely disregard 
 popular judgments on the character or history 
 of candidates. 
 
 Side by side with the annual or biennial legis- 
 lature, we have another kind of legislature, the 
 " Constitutional Convention," which retains every- 
 body's respect, and whose work, generally marked 
 by care and forethought, compares creditably 
 with the legislation of any similar body in the
 
 142 THE DECLINE OF LEGISLATURES 
 
 world. Through the hundred years of national 
 existence it has received little but favorable criti- 
 cism from any quarter. It is still an honor to 
 have a seat in it. The best men in the commu- 
 nity are still eager or willing to serve in it, no 
 matter at what cost to health or private affairs. 
 I cannot recall one convention which has incurred 
 either odium or contempt. Time and social 
 changes have often frustrated its expectations, 
 or have shown its provisions for the public wel- 
 fare to be inadequate or mistaken, but it is very 
 rare indeed to hear its wisdom and integrity 
 questioned. In looking over the list of those 
 who have figured in the conventions of the State 
 of New York since the Revolution, one finds the 
 name of nearly every man of weight and promi- 
 nence ; and few lay it down without thinking 
 how happy we should be if we could secure such 
 service for our ordinary legislative bodies. 
 
 Now, what makes the difference? Three 
 things, mainly. First, the Constitutional Con- 
 vention, as a rule, meets only once in about 
 twenty years. Men, therefore, who would not 
 think of serving in an annual legislature, are 
 ready on these rare occasions to sacrifice their 
 personal convenience to the public interest. Sec- 
 ondly, every one knows that the labors of the 
 body, if adopted, will continue in operation with- 
 out change for the best part of one's lifetime.
 
 THE DECLINE OF LEGISLATURES 143 
 
 Thirdly, its conclusions will be subjected to the 
 strictest scrutiny by the public, and will not be 
 put in force without adoption by a popular vote. 
 All this makes an American state constitution, 
 as a rule, a work of the highest statesmanship, 
 which reflects credit on the country, tends power- 
 fully to promote the general happiness and pros- 
 perity, and is quoted or copied by foreign countries 
 in the construction of organic laws. The Consti- 
 tutional Convention is as conspicuous an example 
 of successful government as the state legislatures 
 are of failure. If we can learn anything from 
 the history of these bodies, therefore, it is that 
 if the meetings of the legislature were much 
 rarer, say once in five or ten years, we should 
 secure a higher order of talent and character for 
 its membership and more careful deliberation for 
 its measures, and should greatly reduce the num- 
 ber of the latter. But we can go further, and 
 say that inasmuch as all important matter de- 
 vised by the convention is submitted to the peo- 
 ple with eminent success, there is no reason why 
 all grave measures of ordinary legislation should 
 not be submitted also. In other words, the 
 referendum is not confined to Switzerland. 1 We 
 have it among us already. All, or nearly all our 
 state constitutions are the product of a referen- 
 dum. The number of important measures with 
 
 1 Oberholtzer's Referendum in America, p. 15.
 
 144 THE DECLINE OF LEGISLATURES 
 
 which the legislature feels chary about dealing, 
 which are brought before the people by its direc- 
 tion, increases every year. Upon the question 
 of the location of the state capital and of some 
 state institutions, of the expenditure of public 
 money, of the establishment of banks, of the 
 maintenance or sale of canals, of leasing public 
 lands, of taxation beyond a certain amount, of 
 the prohibition of the liquor traffic, of the exten- 
 sion of the suffrage, and upon several other sub- 
 jects, a popular vote is often taken in various 
 states. 
 
 In short, there is no discussion of the question 
 of legislatures in which either great restriction 
 in the number or length of their sessions, or the 
 remission of a greatly increased number of sub- 
 jects to treatment by the popular vote, does not 
 appear as a favorite remedy for their abuses and 
 shortcomings. If we may judge by these signs, 
 the representative system, after a century of 
 existence, under a very extended suffrage, has 
 failed to satisfy the expectations of its earlier 
 promoters, and is likely to make way in its turn 
 for the more direct action of the people on the 
 most important questions of government, and a 
 much-diminished demand for all legislation what- 
 ever. This, at all events, is the only remedy 
 now in sight, which is much talked about or is 
 considered worthy of serious attention.
 
 PECULIARITIES OF AMERICAN MUNICI- 
 PAL GOVERNMENT 
 
 IN trying to deduce from American examples 
 some idea of the probable influence of modern 
 democracy on city government, we have to bear 
 in mind that the municipal history of America 
 differs greatly from that of Europe. In Europe, 
 as a general rule, municipalities either existed 
 before the state, or grew up in spite of the 
 state ; that is, they were fresh attempts to keep 
 alive the sparks of civilization in the Middle 
 Ages, before anything worthy of the name of a 
 state had been organized, or else they sprang 
 into being as a refuge from or a protest against 
 state despotism. In either case they always 
 had a life of their own, and often a very vig- 
 orous and active life. No European city can 
 be said to have owed its growth to the care or 
 authority of the central power. Both kings 
 and nobles looked on cities with suspicion and 
 jealousy; charters were granted, in the main, 
 with reluctance, and often had to be retained or 
 extorted, by force of arms. These classes re- 
 cognized liberties or franchises which already
 
 146 AMERICAN MUNICIPAL GOVERNMENT 
 
 existed, rather than granted new privileges or 
 powers. Municipal life was either an inherit- 
 ance from the Roman Empire, or an attempt at 
 social reorganization in a period of general an- 
 archy. 
 
 American cities, on the contrary, are without 
 exception the creations of a state ; they have 
 grown up either under state supervision or 
 through state instigation ; that is, they owe 
 their origin and constitution to the government. 
 Their charters have usually been devised or in- 
 fluenced by people who did not expect to live in 
 them, and who had no personal knowledge of 
 their special needs. In other words, an Ameri- 
 can municipal charter has been rather the em- 
 bodiment of an a priori view of the kind of 
 thing a city ought to be, than a legal recogni- 
 tion of preexisting wants and customs. The 
 complete predominance of the state has been a 
 leading idea in the construction of all American 
 charters. No legislature has been willing to 
 encourage the growth of an independent munici- 
 pal life. No charter has been looked on as a 
 finality or as organic law. In fact, the modifi- 
 cation or alteration of charters has been a favor- 
 ite occupation of legislatures, stimulated by the 
 rapid growth of the cities and by the absence 
 of all historical experience of municipal life. 
 
 The idea most prominent in American muni-
 
 AMERICAN MUNICIPAL GOVERNMENT U7 
 
 cipal history is that cities are simply places in 
 which population is more than usually concen- 
 trated. Down to the outbreak of the war this 
 view worked fairly well in most cases. The cities 
 were small, their wants were few, and the inhabi- 
 tants had little or no thought of any organiza- 
 tion differing much from ordinary town govern- 
 ment. Gas, water, police, and street-cleaning 
 had not become distinct municipal needs. Pigs 
 were loose in the streets of New York until 
 1830, and Boston had no mayor until 1822. 
 Generally, too, the government was administered 
 by local notables. Immigration had not begun 
 to make itself seriously felt until 1846, and 
 down to 1830, at least, it was held an honor to 
 be a New York alderman. For the work of gov- 
 erning cities or making charters for them, the 
 average country legislator was considered abun- 
 dantly competent. It presented none of what 
 we now call " problems." The result was that 
 new or altered charters were very frequent. The 
 treatment of the city as a separate entity, with 
 wants and wishes of its own and entitled to a 
 voice in the management of its own affairs, was 
 something unknown or unfamiliar. In 1857, 
 when, under the influence of the rising tide of 
 immigration, the affairs of New York as a mu- 
 nicipality seemed to become unmanageable, the 
 only remedy thought of was the appointment of
 
 148 AMERICAN MUNICIPAL GOVERNMENT 
 
 state commissioners to take into their own hands 
 portions of the city business, such as the police, 
 the construction of a park, and so on. 
 
 The crisis in the affairs of the city of New 
 York which is known as the Tweed period was 
 simply the complete breakdown of this old plan 
 of managing the affairs of the city through the 
 legislature. Tweed could hardly have succeeded 
 in his schemes if he had not had the state legis- 
 lature at his back, and had not been able to 
 procure such changes in the charter as were 
 necessary for his purpose. He pushed his regime 
 to its legitimate consequences. In fact, his 
 career is entitled to the credit of having first 
 made city government a question, or " problem," 
 of American politics. I doubt much whether, 
 previous to his day, any American had consid- 
 ered it as being, or likely to become, a special 
 difficulty of universal suffrage. But his success- 
 ful rise and troublesome career now presented to 
 the public, in a new and startling light, the im- 
 possibility of governing cities effectively by treat- 
 ing them as merely pieces of thickly peopled 
 territory. Ever since his time the municipal 
 difficulty has been before men's minds as some- 
 thing to be dealt with somehow ; but for a long 
 time no one knew exactly how to deal with it. 
 
 There was an American way, already well 
 known, of meeting other difficulties of govern-
 
 AMERICAN MUNICIPAL GOVERNMENT 149 
 
 ment, but the American way of governing large 
 cities under a pure democracy, no one seemed to 
 have considered. The American way of curing 
 all evils had hitherto been simply to turn out 
 the party in power, and try the other. It had 
 always been assumed that the party hi power 
 would dread overthrow sufficiently to make it 
 " behave well ; " or, if it did not, that its over- 
 throw would act as a warning which would pre- 
 vent its successor's repeating its errors. This 
 system had always been applied successfully to 
 federal and state affairs ; why should it not be 
 applied to city affairs ? Accordingly it was so 
 applied to city affairs, without a thought of any 
 other system, down to 1870. But in 1870 it 
 began to dawn on people that party government 
 of great cities would hardly do any longer. 
 City government, it was seen, is in some sense 
 a business enterprise, and must be carried out 
 either by the kind of men one would make direc- 
 tors of a bank or trustees of an estate, or else by 
 highly trained officials. 
 
 The first of these methods is not open any 
 longer in America. One can hardly say that 
 the respect for notables no longer exists in 
 American cities, but it does not exist as a politi- 
 cal force or expedient. The habit of consider- 
 ing conspicuous inhabitants as entitled to lead- 
 ing municipal places must be regarded as lost.
 
 160 AMERICAN MUNICIPAL GOVERNMENT 
 
 In a large city conspicuousness is rare, and wide- 
 spread knowledge of a man's character or fitness 
 for any particular office is difficult. Moreover, 
 among the class which has already made proof 
 of ability in other callings, readiness to under- 
 take onerous public duties is not often to be 
 met with. Consequently, with few exceptions, 
 the government of successful modern cities has 
 to be intrusted to experts, and to get experts 
 salaries must be large, and tenure permanent. 
 A competent professional man cannot, as a rule, 
 be induced to accept a poorly paid place for a 
 short term. Almost as soon as public attention 
 began to be turned to the subject, the practice 
 began of seeking these experts through party 
 organizations. But the most important offices 
 in cities are elective, and the idea that any elec- 
 tive office could be divorced from party, or could 
 be made non-partisan, was wholly unfamiliar to 
 the American mind. Ever since the Union was 
 established, men had always filled offices, if they 
 could, with persons who agreed with them, and 
 with whom they were in the habit of acting in 
 federal affairs. That city offices could be an 
 exception to this rule was an idea which, when 
 first produced twenty-five years ago, was deemed 
 ridiculous, and is even yet not thoroughly estab- 
 lished among the mass of the voters. The be- 
 lief that offices were " spoils " or perquisites was,
 
 AMERICAN MUNICIPAL GOVERNMENT 151 
 
 unfortunately, most dominant during the years 
 of great immigration which preceded and imme- 
 diately followed the war, and became imbedded 
 in the minds of the newcomers as peculiarly 
 " American." With this came, not unnaturally, 
 the notion that no one would serve faithfully, in 
 any official place, the party to which he did not 
 belong. Full party responsibility, it was said, 
 required that every place under the government, 
 down to the lowest clerkship, should be filled by 
 members of the party in power. 
 
 In no place did this notion find readier accept- 
 ance than in cities, because the offices in them 
 were so numerous, and the elections so frequent, 
 and the salaries, as compared with those of the 
 country, so high. The possession of the city 
 government, too, meant the possibility of grant- 
 ing a large number of illicit favors. For the 
 laborer, there was sure employment and easy 
 work in the various public departments ; for the 
 public-house keeper, there was protection against 
 the execution of the liquor laws by the police ; 
 for the criminal classes, there was slack prosecu- 
 tion by the district attorney, or easy "jury fix- 
 ing" by the commissioner of jurors; for the 
 contractor, there were profitable jobs and much 
 indulgence for imperfect execution ; for the 
 police, there were easy discipline and impunity 
 for corrupt abuses of power. In fact, the cities
 
 152 AMERICAN MUNICIPAL GOVERNMENT 
 
 furnished a perfect field for the practice of the 
 spoils system, and the growth in them of rings 
 and organizations like Tammany was the natural 
 and inevitable consequence. No such organiza- 
 tion could be created for charitable purposes, or 
 for the mere diffusion of religious or political 
 opinions. It was made possible in New York 
 by the number of places and benefits at its 
 disposal. The effect on the imagination of the 
 newly arrived emigrant, whether Irish or Ger- 
 man, was very great. It shut out from his view 
 both city and state as objects of his allegiance, 
 and made recognition by the " leader " of the 
 district in which he lived the first object of his 
 ambition in his new country. 
 
 What is true of New York is true, mutatis 
 mutandis, of all the other large cities, Phila- 
 delphia, Chicago, Cincinnati, St. Louis. They 
 all have an organization resembling Tammany, 
 created and maintained by the same means ; and 
 at the head of the organization there is a man, 
 ignorant perhaps of all other things, but gifted 
 with unusual capacity for controlling the poor 
 and dependent, who has come since Tweed's day 
 to be known as a "boss." He arises naturally as 
 a condition of success, and if he has favors to 
 bestow he arises ah 1 the more rapidly. The boss 
 is, in short, the inevitable product of the spoils 
 system. He must have sensible advantages to
 
 AMERICAN MUNICIPAL GOVERNMENT 153 
 
 give away in order to retain his power, and he is 
 necessary for their effective distribution. There 
 has to be some one to say decisively who is to 
 have this or that office or prize, who deserves 
 it, and whose services cannot be had without it. 
 There could hardly be a better proof and illus- 
 tration of this than the way in which the boss 
 system has spread all over the country. In all 
 cities and in many states every political organi- 
 zation now has a similar officer at its head. It 
 remained for some time after Tweed's day the 
 reproach of the Democrats that they submitted 
 to an arbitrary ruler of this kind, but the Re- 
 publicans are nearly everywhere imitating them. 
 There are but few states, and there is no large 
 city, in which the offices or nominations for 
 office are not parceled out by one man acting in 
 the name of an " organization." Tweed's con- 
 trol of the city and legislature was not more 
 complete than is Platt's in New York or Quay's 
 in Pennsylvania. The system is evidently one 
 which saves trouble, and makes it easier to 
 secure the blind obedience of large masses of 
 men. Its end is bad, but that it attains this end 
 there can be no doubt. 
 
 It can thus be easily seen that no American 
 city has ever been administered with reference 
 to its own interests. In not one, until our own 
 time, has there been even a pretense of non-par-
 
 154 AMERICAN MUNICIPAL GOVERNMENT 
 
 tisanship ; that is, the filling of the offices solely 
 with a view to efficiency in the discharge of their 
 duties. As a rule, they have been filled with a 
 view to the promotion of opinions on some fed- 
 eral question, such as the tariff, or as a reward 
 for services rendered at federal elections. The 
 state of things thus produced in American cities 
 closely resembles the state of things produced in 
 the Middle Ages by religious intolerance, when 
 the main concern of governments was not so 
 much to promote the material interests of their 
 subjects, as to maintain right opinions with re- 
 gard to the future life. The filling of a city 
 office by a man simply because he holds certain 
 views regarding the tariff, or the currency, or 
 the banks, is very like appointing him to an 
 office of state because he is a good Catholic or 
 can conscientiously sign the Thirty-Nine Arti- 
 cles ; that is to say, his fitness for his real duties 
 is not a consideration of importance in filling 
 the place. No private business could be carried 
 on in this way, and it is doubtful whether any 
 attempt to carry it on in this way was ever made. 
 But the temptation to resort to it under party 
 government and universal suffrage is strong, for 
 the reasons which I have tried to set forth in 
 treating of the nominating system. The task of 
 inducing large bodies of men to vote in a par- 
 ticular way is such, that it is hardly wonderful
 
 AMERICAN MUNICIPAL GOVERNMENT 155 
 
 that party managers should use every means 
 within their reach for its performance. 
 
 One of the effects of the system, and possibly 
 the worst and most difficult to deal with, is the 
 veiling of the city from the popular eye, as the 
 main object of allegiance and attention, by what 
 is called " the organization," namely, the club or 
 society, presided over by the boss, which man- 
 ages party affairs. The tendency among men 
 who take a strong interest in politics to look 
 upon the organization as their real master, to 
 boast of their devotion to it as a political virtue, 
 to call themselves " organization men," and to 
 consider the interests of the organization as para- 
 mount to those of the city at large, is an inter- 
 esting development of party government. All 
 political parties originate in a belief that a cer- 
 tain idea can be best spread, or a certain policy 
 best promoted, by the formation of an organi- 
 zation for the purpose. The other belief, that 
 one's own party is fittest for power, and deserves 
 support even when it makes mistakes, easily 
 follows. This is very nearly the condition of 
 the public mind about federal parties. A large 
 number of votes are cast at every federal elec- 
 tion merely to show confidence in the party, 
 rather than approval of its position with regard 
 to any specific question. There is a still further 
 stage in the growth of party spirit, in which the
 
 156 AMERICAN MUNICIPAL GOVERNMENT 
 
 voter supports his party, right or wrong, no 
 matter how much he may condemn its policy or 
 its acts, on the ground that it is made up of 
 better material than the other party, and that 
 the latter, if in power, would be more dangerous. 
 The Republican party, in particular, commands a 
 great deal of support, especially from the profes- 
 sional and educated classes throughout the coun- 
 try, on these grounds. They vote for it as the 
 least wrong or least likely to be mischievous, even 
 if they feel unable to vote for it as wise or pure. 
 But in the cities still another advance has 
 been made, and the parties have really been 
 separated from politics altogether, and treated, 
 without disguise, as competitors for the disposal 
 of a certain number of offices and the handling 
 of a certain amount of money. The boss on 
 either side rarely pretends to have any definite 
 opinions on any federal question, or to concern 
 himself about them. He proclaims openly that 
 his side has the best title to the offices, and the 
 reason he gives for this is, generally, that the 
 other side has made what he considers mistakes. 
 He hardly ever pleads merits of his own. In 
 fact, few or none of the bosses have ever been 
 writers or speakers, or have ever been called on 
 to discuss public questions or have opinions 
 about them. The principal ones, Tweed, Kelly, 
 Croker, Platt, and Quay, have been either silent
 
 AMERICAN MUNICIPAL GOVERNMENT 157 
 
 or illiterate men, famed for their reticence, and 
 have plumed themselves on their ability to do 
 things without talk. In New York, they have 
 succeeded in diffusing among the masses, to a 
 certain extent, the idea that a statesman should 
 not talk, hut simply " fix things," and vote the 
 right way ; that is, they have divorced discussion 
 from politics. One of the boss's amusements, 
 when he is disposed to be humorous, is doing 
 something or saying something to show how 
 little influence voters and writers have on af- 
 fairs. In the late senatorial canvass in New 
 York, a number of letters commending one of 
 the candidates, who happened to be the Repub- 
 lican boss, were published, most of them from 
 young men, and it was interesting to see how 
 many commended silence as one of the best at- 
 tributes of a Senator. 
 
 Consequently, nearly all discussions of city 
 affairs are discussions about places. What place 
 a particular man will get, what place he is trying 
 to get, and by what disappointment about places 
 he is chagrined, or " disgruntled," as the term 
 is, form the staple topics of municipal debates. 
 The rising against Tammany in 1894, which re- 
 sulted in the election of Mayor Strong, to some 
 extent failed to produce its due effect, owing to 
 his refusal to distribute places so as to satisfy 
 Mr. Platt, the Republican leader ; or, in other
 
 158 AMERICAN MUNICIPAL GOVERNMENT 
 
 words, to give Mr. Platt the influence in dis- 
 tributing the patronage to which he held that 
 he was entitled. This led to the frustration, or 
 long delay, of the legislation which was neces- 
 sary to make the overthrow of Tammany of 
 much effect. Some of the necessary bills the 
 legislature, which was controlled by Platt, re- 
 fused to pass, and others it was induced to pass 
 only by great effort and after long postpone- 
 ment. No reason was ever assigned for this 
 hostility to Strong's proposals, except failure in 
 the proper distribution of offices. No doubt a 
 certain amount of discussion of plans for city 
 improvement has gone on, but it has gone on 
 among a class which has no connection with 
 politics and possesses little political influence. 
 The class of politicians, properly so called, com- 
 monly refuses to interest itself in any such dis- 
 cussions, unless it can be assured beforehand 
 that the proposed improvements will be carried 
 out by certain persons of their own selection, 
 who are seldom fit for the work. 
 
 In addition to reliance on change of parties 
 for the improvement of city government, much 
 dependence has been placed on the old American 
 theory that when things get very bad, sufficient 
 popular indignation will be roused to put an end 
 to them ; that the evil will be eradicated by 
 something iu the nature of a revolution, as in
 
 AMERICAN MUNICIPAL GOVERNMENT 159 
 
 the case of Tweed and of the Tammany abuses 
 in 1894. But this theory, as regards cities, has 
 to be received with much modification. Popu- 
 lar indignation is excited by violent departures 
 from popular standards ; the popular conscience 
 has to be shocked by striking disregard of the 
 tests established by popular usage ; in order that 
 this may happen, the popular conscience has to 
 be kept, if I may use the expression, in a state 
 of training. Now, for the mass of such voters 
 as congregate in great cities, training for the 
 public conscience consists largely in the specta- 
 cle of good government. Their standards de- 
 pend largely on what they see. People must 
 have a certain familiarity with something better, 
 that is, must either remember or see it, in 
 order to be really discontented with their pre- 
 sent lot. But when once the mass of men have 
 obtained liberty and security, it becomes increas- 
 ingly difficult to rouse them into activity about 
 matters of apparently less consequence. In 
 other words, incompetence or corruption in the 
 work of administration being rarely visible to 
 the public eye, the masses are not as easily 
 shocked by it as they are by bad legislation, or 
 by such interferences with personal liberty as 
 liquor or other sumptuary laws. Their notion 
 of what ought to be, is largely shaped by what 
 is. The political education of the people in a.
 
 160 AMERICAN MUNICIPAL GOVERNMENT 
 
 democracy, especially in large cities, is to a con- 
 siderable degree the work of the government. 
 The way in which they see things done becomes 
 in their eyes the way in which they ought to be 
 done ; the kind of men they see in public office 
 becomes the kind of men they think fit for pub- 
 lic office. The part the actual government plays 
 in forming the political ideals of the young is 
 one of the neglected but most important topics 
 of political discussion. Our youth learn far 
 more of the real working of our institutions by 
 observation of the men elected or appointed to 
 office, particularly to the judicial and legislative 
 offices, than from school-books or newspapers. 
 The election of a notoriously worthless or cor- 
 rupt man as a judge or member of the legisla- 
 ture makes more impression on a young mind 
 than any chapter in a governmental manual, or 
 any college lecture. 
 
 For this reason, the application of the civil 
 service rules to subordinate city offices, which 
 has now been in existence in New York and Bos- 
 ton for many years, is an extremely important 
 contribution to the work of reform, however 
 slow its operation may be. To make known to 
 the public that to get city places a man must 
 come up to the standard of fitness ascertained 
 by competitive examination is not simply a 
 means of improving the municipal service, but
 
 AMERICAN MUNICIPAL GOVERNMENT 161 
 
 an educative process of a high order. The 
 same thing may be said of such matters as the 
 expulsion from office of the Tammany police 
 justices by the general removal act, passed when 
 Mr. Strong came into office in 1895, in spite of 
 all the blemishes in its execution. It made clear 
 to the popular mind, as nothing else could, that 
 a certain degree of character and education was 
 necessary to the discharge of even minor judi- 
 cial functions, and that the Tammany standard 
 of " common sense " and familiar acquaintance 
 with the criminal classes was not sufficient. The 
 covert or open opposition to what is called civil 
 service reform, on the part of nearly the whole 
 political class in cities, goes to confirm this view. 
 There could be no greater blow to the existing 
 system of political management than the with- 
 drawal of the offices from arbitrary disposal by 
 the bosses. The offices have been for half a cen- 
 tury the chief or only means of rewarding sub- 
 ordinate agents for political work and activity. 
 
 One effect, and a marked one, of this with- 
 drawal has been the introduction of the practice 
 of levying blackmail on corporations, nominally 
 for political purposes. Nothing is known certainly 
 about the amounts levied in this way, but there 
 are two thousand corporations in New York 
 exposed to legislative attack, and in the aggre- 
 gate their contributions must reach a very large
 
 162 AMERICAN MUNICIPAL GOVERNMENT 
 
 sum. Since the boss has obtained command of 
 the legislature as well as of the city, that is, 
 since Tweed's time, they are literally at the 
 mercy of the legislature, or, in other words, at 
 his mercy. Their taxes may be raised, or, in the 
 case of gas companies or railroad companies, 
 their charges lowered. The favorite mode of 
 bringing insurance companies to terms is order- 
 ing an examination of their assets, which may 
 be done through the superintendent of insur- 
 ance, who is an appointee of the governor and 
 Senate, or, virtually, of the boss. This exami- 
 nation has to be paid for by the company, and, 
 I am told, may be made to cost $200,000 ; it i& 
 usually conducted by politicians out of a job, of 
 a very inferior class. To protect themselves 
 from annoyances of this sort, the corporations, 
 which it must be remembered are creations of 
 the law, and increase in number every year, are 
 only too glad to meet the demands of the boss. 
 Any " campaign " contribution, no matter how 
 large, and it is sometimes as high as $50,000 or 
 even $100,000, is small compared to the ex- 
 pense which he can inflict on them by his mere 
 fiat. Of course this is corruption, and the cor- 
 porations know it. The officers, however high 
 they may stand in point of business character, 
 submit to it, or connive at it. In many cases, if 
 not in most, they even confess it. They defend
 
 AMERICAN MUNICIPAL GOVERNMENT 163 
 
 their compliance, too, on grounds which carry 
 one back a long way in the history of settled 
 government. That is, they say that then- first 
 duty is to protect the enormous amount of pro- 
 perty committed to their charge, a large portion 
 of which belongs to widows and orphans ; that 
 if they have any duty at all in the matter of 
 reforming municipal and state administration, it 
 is a secondary and subordinate one, which should 
 not be performed at the cost of any damage to 
 these wards ; that, therefore, the sum they pay 
 to the boss may be properly considered as given 
 to avert injury against which the law affords no 
 protection. They maintain that in all this mat- 
 ter they are victims, not offenders, and that the 
 real culprit is the government of the State, 
 which fails to afford security to property in the 
 hands of a certain class of owners. 
 
 I will not attempt to discuss here the sound- 
 ness of this view in point of morality. It is to 
 be said, in extenuation at least, that the prac- 
 tices of which the corporations are accused pre- 
 vail all over the Union, in city and in country, 
 East and West. I have had more than one ad- 
 mission made to me by officers of companies 
 that they kept an agent at the state capital dur- 
 ing sessions of the legislature for the express 
 purpose of shielding them, by means of money, 
 against legislative attacks, and that without this
 
 164 AMERICAN MUNICIPAL GOVERNMENT 
 
 they could not carry on business. It has been 
 the custom, I am afraid, to a greater or less ex- 
 tent, for corporations to keep such agents at the 
 state capitals ever since corporations became at 
 all numerous and rich, for fully fifty years. 
 What is peculiar and novel about the present 
 situation is that the boss has become a general 
 agent for all the companies, and saves them the 
 trouble of keeping one at their own cost, in Al- 
 bany or Harrisburg, or in any other state capi- 
 tal. He receives what they wish or are expected 
 to pay, and in return he guarantees them the 
 necessary protection. He is thus the channel 
 through which pass all payments made by any 
 one for " campaign " purposes. If his party is 
 not in office he receives very little, barely enough 
 to assure him of good will. When his party is 
 in power, as the power is his, there need be prac- 
 tically no limit to his demands. 
 
 If it be asked why the corporations do not 
 themselves revolt against this system and stop it 
 by exposure, the answer is simple enough. In 
 the first place, most of the corporations have 
 rivals, and dread being placed at a disadvan- 
 tage by some sort of persecution from which 
 competitors may have bought exemption. The 
 thing which they dread most is business failure 
 or defeat. For this they are sure to be held 
 accountable by stockholders or by the public ;
 
 AMERICAN MUNICIPAL GOVERNMENT 165 
 
 for submitting to extortion, they may not be 
 held accountable by anybody. In the next place, 
 the supervision exercised by the state officers be- 
 ing lax or corrupt, the corporations are likely to 
 be law-breakers in some of their practices, and to 
 dread exposure or inquiry. In many cases, there- 
 fore, they are doubtless only too glad to buy peace 
 or impunity, and this their oppressors probably 
 know very well. Last of all, and perhaps the 
 most powerful among the motives for submis- 
 sion, is the fear of vengeance in case they should 
 not succeed. A corporation which undertook 
 to set the boss at defiance, would enter on a 
 most serious contest, with little chance of suc- 
 cess. All the influences at his command, politi- 
 cal and judicial, would be brought into play for 
 its defeat. Witnesses would disappear, or refuse to 
 answer. Juries would be " fixed ; " judges would 
 be technical and timid ; the press would be bought 
 up by money or advertising, or by political in- 
 fluence ; other motives than mere resistance to 
 oppression would be invented and imputed ; the 
 private character of the officers would be assailed. 
 In short, the corporation would probably fail, or 
 appear to fail, in proving its case, and would 
 find itself substantially foiled in its undertaking, 
 after having expended a great deal of money, 
 and having excited the bitter enmity of the boss 
 and of all the active politicians among his fol-
 
 lowers. It can hardly be expected that a com- 
 pany would make such an attempt without far 
 stronger support than it would receive from the 
 public, owing to the general belief that no cor- 
 poration would come into court with clean hands. 
 How little effect public support would give in 
 such a contest, as long as the power of the boss 
 over the legislators and state officials continues, 
 through the present system of nomination, may 
 be inferred from what has happened in the case 
 of the enlargement of the city of New York, 
 known as the Greater New York Bill. 1 
 
 1 The history of this measure has been so concisely written 
 by Mr. J. B. Bishop that I cannot avoid quoting him : 
 
 " The most impressive demonstration of the despotic power 
 behind these decisions was made in connection with the proposed 
 charter for Greater New York. This had been drawn by the 
 commission created by the act of 1896. It had been prepared 
 in secret, and only very inadequate opportunity had been given 
 for public inspection of it before it was sent to the legislature ; 
 yet, in the brief time afforded, it had been condemned in very 
 strong terms by what I may truthfully call the organized 
 and individual intelligence of the community. The Bar Asso- 
 ciation, through a committee which contained several of the 
 leading lawyers of the city, subjected it to expert legal examina- 
 tion, and declared it to be so full of defects and confusing pro- 
 visions as to be ' deplorable,' and to give rise, if made law, ' to 
 mischiefs far outweighing any benefits which might reasonably 
 be expected to flow from it.' The Chamber of Commerce, the 
 Board of Trade, the Clearing House Association, the City Club, 
 the Union League Club, the Reform Club, the Real Estate Ex- 
 change, all. the reputable ex-mayors and other officials, expressed 
 equally strong condemnation, especially of certain leading pro- 
 visions of the instrument ; and the legislature was formally re-
 
 AMERICAN MUNICIPAL GOVERNMENT 167 
 
 The subjection of the city to the person who 
 controls the legislature is secured in part by the 
 use of federal and possibly city offices, and in 
 part by the extortion of money from property- 
 quested to give more time to the subject by postponing the date 
 on which the charter should become operative. Not the slight- 
 est attention was paid at Albany to any of these requests. The 
 Bar Association's objections were passed over in silence, as in- 
 deed were all the protests. The charter, excepting a few trifling 
 changes, was passed without amendment by both Houses of the 
 legislature by an overwhelming vote. Only six of the one hun- 
 dred and fourteen Republican members voted against it in the 
 Assembly, and only one of the thirty-six Republican members in 
 the Senate. There was no debate upon it in the Assembly. The 
 men who voted for the charter said not a word in its favor, and 
 not a word in explanation of their course in voting against all 
 proposals to amend it. In the Senate, the charter's chief advo- 
 cates declared frankly their belief that it was a measure of 
 ' political suicide,' since it was certain to put the proposed en- 
 larged city into the hands of their opponents, the Democrats ; 
 yet they all voted for it because it had been made a party mea- 
 sure, that is, the despot had said it must pass. After its first 
 passage, it was sent, for public hearings and approval, to the 
 mayors of the three cities affected by its provisions. The oppo- 
 sition developed at the hearings in New York city was very im- 
 pressive, so much so that Mayor Strong, who, as an ex officio 
 member of the charter commission, had signed the report which 
 had accompanied it when it went to the legislature, was moved 
 "by a ' strong sense of public duty ' to veto it because of ' serious 
 and fundamental defects.' When the charter, with his veto 
 message, arrived in Albany, the two Houses passed it again by 
 virtually the same vote as at first, and without either reading 
 the mayor's message, or more than barely mentioning his name. 
 One of the members who voted for it said privately, % ' If it were 
 not for the fact that the " old man " wants it, I doubt if the 
 charter would get a dozen votes in the legislature outside the 
 Brooklyn and Long Island members.' "
 
 168 AMERICAN MUNICIPAL GOVERNMENT 
 
 holders, for purposes of corruption ; and all 
 remedy for this is impeded or wholly hindered 
 by the interest of city voters in matters other 
 than municipal. 
 
 The earliest remedy, the substitution of one 
 party in the city government for another, 
 which has been employed steadily by each party 
 for the last half century with singular acquies- 
 cence on the part of the public, has been to some 
 degree supplanted, since the war, by another, 
 namely, the modification of the charter, so as to 
 secure greater concentration of power in few 
 hands. More and more authority has been with- 
 drawn from the bodies elected for purposes of 
 legislation, and has been transferred to the 
 bodies elected for purposes of administration. 
 Before the late change in the city charter, the 
 New York board of aldermen, by a process of 
 deprivation pursued through long years, was be- 
 reft of all but the most insignificant powers. 
 The preparation of the city estimates and the 
 imposition of the city taxes, two peculiarly legis- 
 lative duties, were transferred bodily to a small 
 board composed of the mayor and heads of de- 
 partments. Nearly every change in charters has 
 armed the mayor with more jurisdiction. This 
 movement has run on lines visible in almost all 
 democratic communities. The rise of the boss 
 is distinctly one of its results. There is every-
 
 AMERICAN MUNICIPAL GOVERNMENT 169 
 
 where a tendency to remit to a single person the 
 supreme direction of large bodies of men ani- 
 mated with a common purpose or bound together 
 by common ideas. One sees in this person dim 
 outlines of the democratic Csesar of the Napole- 
 onic era, but he differs in that he has to do his 
 work under the full glare of publicity, has to be 
 able to endure " exposure " and denunciation by 
 a thousand newspapers, and to bear overthrow 
 by combinations among his own followers with 
 equanimity, and has to rely implicitly on " man- 
 agement " rather than on force. 
 
 The difficulty of extracting from a large demo- 
 cracy an expression of its real will is, in fact, 
 slowly becoming manifest. It is due partly to 
 the size of the body, and partly to the large 
 number of voters it must necessarily contain who 
 find it troublesome to make up their minds, or 
 who fail to grasp current questions, or who love 
 and seek guidance in important transactions. On 
 most of the great national questions of our day, 
 except in exciting times, a large proportion of 
 the voters do not hold their opinions with much 
 firmness or tenacity, or with much distinctness. 
 On one point in particular, which has great im- 
 portance in all modern democracies, the effect 
 of any specific measure on the party prospects, 
 the number of men who have clear ideas is very 
 small. The mass to be influenced is so large,
 
 170 AMERICAN MUNICIPAL GOVERNMENT 
 
 and the susceptibilities of different localities 
 differ so widely, that fewer and fewer persons, 
 except those who " have their hand on the ma- 
 chine," venture on a confident prediction as to 
 the result of an election. The consequence is 
 that those who do hold clean-cut opinions, and 
 pronounce them with courage, speedily acquire 
 influence and authority, almost in spite of them- 
 selves. Indeed, almost every influence now in 
 operation, both in politics and in business, tends 
 to the concentration of power. The disposition 
 to combine several small concerns into one large 
 one, to consolidate corporations, and to convert 
 private partnerships into companies, is but an 
 expression of the general desire to remit the 
 work of management or administration to one 
 man or to a very few men. In all considerable 
 bodies who wish to act together for common 
 objects, the many are anxious to escape the re- 
 sponsibility of direction, and, naturally enough, 
 this has shown itself in city government as well 
 as in party government. 
 
 This tendency has been temporarily obscured 
 in New York by the consolidation of the suburbs 
 into what is called the Greater New York. In 
 order to secure this, that is, to obtain the consent 
 of " the politicians," it has been found necessary 
 to revive the old, long-tried, and much-condemned 
 plan of a city legislature with two branches, a
 
 AMERICAN MUNICIPAL GOVERNMENT 171 
 
 number of boards, and a wide diffusion of re- 
 sponsibility. There is about this new machinery 
 an appearance of local representative self-govern- 
 ment, but it is only an appearance. The real 
 power of interference, change, or modification 
 still resides in the legislature at Albany, and the 
 habit of interference is already formed and 
 active. 
 
 What modern municipalities need, especially 
 in America, is a regime in which, without hesi- 
 tation, without study, without lawyers' or ex- 
 perts' opinions, the humblest laborer can tell who 
 is responsible for any defect he may discover 
 in the police of the streets, in the education of 
 his children, or in the use and mode of his taxa- 
 tion. 
 
 To secure such a regime, however, the control 
 of state legislatures in America over cities must 
 be either reduced or destroyed, and this seems 
 the task which, above all, has first to be ac- 
 complished by municipal reforms ; it is really 
 the one in which they are now engaged, though, 
 apparently, sometimes unconsciously. The "hear- 
 ings " of leading citizens by legislative commit- 
 tees, which almost invariably accompany the 
 passage by state legislatures of measures affect- 
 ing municipal government, are in the nature of 
 protests against legislative action, or assertions 
 of the incompetency of the legislature to deal
 
 172 AMERICAN MUNICIPAL GOVERNMENT 
 
 with the matter in hand. The contemptuous 
 indifference with which they are generally treated 
 is simply an assertion that, under no circum- 
 stances, will the legislature surrender its power. 
 This has heen curiously illustrated by the recent 
 complete refusal of the New York legislature to 
 pay any attention to the power of veto given to 
 the mayors of New York cities hy the late con- 
 stitutional convention. This provision has had 
 so little effect that a mayor's objections to any 
 particular piece of legislation are not even dis- 
 cussed, much less answered. It has seemed as 
 if the legislature were unwilling to allow it to 
 be supposed that it could ever be in any way 
 influenced by the criticism or suggestion of local 
 notables. All American legislatures have long 
 shown unwillingness to adopt suggestions or sub- 
 mit to interference from the outside. Few, if 
 any, of the numerous reports of commissions on 
 taxation or municipal government or other sub- 
 jects made during the last thirty years, have 
 received any attention. 
 
 There is another reason why state legislatures 
 are unwilling to relinquish their control of cities, 
 and it is nearly as potent as any ; that is, the 
 accumulation of wealth in the cities as compared 
 to the country. One of the peculiarities of an 
 agricultural population is the small amount of 
 cash it handles. Farmers, as a general rule, live
 
 AMERICAN MUNICIPAL GOVERNMENT 173 
 
 to some extent on their own produce, wear old 
 clotlies, as people are apt to do in the country, 
 pay no house-rent, very rarely divert themselves 
 by " shopping," and seldom see any large sum 
 of money except at their annual sales after har- 
 vest. In short, as compared with an urban pop- 
 ulation, they live with what seems great economy. 
 The temptations to small expenses which so con- 
 stantly beset a city man seldom come in their way. 
 Their standard of living in dress, food, clothing, 
 and furniture is much lower than that of a city 
 population of a corresponding class. The result 
 is that money has a much greater value in their 
 eyes than in those of the commercial class. 
 They part with a dollar more reluctantly ; they 
 think it ought to go farther. They look on a 
 city man's notion of salaries as utterly extrava- 
 gant or unreasonable, and to receive such salaries 
 seems to them almost immoral. City life they 
 consider marked throughout by gross extrava- 
 gance. 
 
 Moreover, the farmer finds it very difficult to 
 place a high value on labor which is not done 
 with the hands and does not involve exposure to 
 weather. Difference of degree in value of such 
 labor it is hard, if not impossible, to estimate. 
 The expense of training for an intellectual occu- 
 pation, such as a lawyer's or a doctor's, he is not 
 willing to take into account. One consequence
 
 174 AMERICAN MUNICIPAL GOVERNMENT 
 
 of this has been that, though almost all servants 
 of the government judges, secretaries, collec- 
 tors live in cities or by city standards, their 
 salaries are fixed not so much by the market 
 value of their services, as by the farmer's notion 
 of what is reasonable ; for the farmer is as yet 
 the ruling power in America. The salaries of 
 the federal judges, for instance, were fixed at 
 the establishment of the government by the 
 largest annual earnings of a lawyer of the high- 
 est standing of that day ; they are now about 
 one fourth of what such a lawyer earns, and it 
 would be difficult or impossible to increase them. 
 The farmer's inability, too, to estimate degrees 
 in the value of such services leads him to sup- 
 pose that what they are worth is the sum for 
 which anybody will undertake to render them, 
 and that if any member of the bar offered to 
 discharge the duties of a judge of the Supreme 
 Court for one thousand dollars a year, it would 
 be proper enough to accept his services at that 
 rate. This great difference has some important 
 political consequences also. It leads to agricul- 
 tural distrust of urban views on finance, and 
 produces in country districts a deep impression 
 of city recklessness and greed. City exchanges, 
 whether stock or produce, are supposed by the 
 farmer to be the resorts of gamblers rather than 
 instruments of legitimate business.
 
 AMERICAN MUNICIPAL GOVERNMENT 175 
 
 In truth, the difference in needs and interests 
 and points of view between the city and the 
 country arises almost as soon as anything which 
 can be called a city comes into existence. Close 
 contact with many other men, familiarity with 
 the business of exchanging commodities, the 
 necessity for frequent cooperation, all help to 
 convert the inhabitant of cities into a new 
 type of man. The city man has always been a 
 polished or " urbane " man. The distinction 
 between him and the " rustic," in mind and 
 manners, has in all ages been among the com- 
 monplaces of literature. One material effect of 
 this difference is that the urban man has been 
 an object of slight dislike or jealousy to the 
 country man. His greater alertness of mind, 
 which comes from much social intercourse, and 
 familiarity with trade and commerce, makes him 
 in some degree an object of suspicion to the 
 latter, who constantly dreads being outwitted by 
 him. Cities, too, have always been to the coun- 
 try man resorts of vice of one sort or another, 
 and all that he hears of the temptations of city 
 life fills him with a sense of his own moral supe- 
 riority. To the poet and to the farmer the 
 country has been the seat of virtue, simplicity, 
 and purity ; the one moralist who practiced his 
 own precepts was the rustic moralist. It has 
 been very natural, therefore, that in America,
 
 176 AMERICAN MUNICIPAL GOVERNMENT 
 
 in which the country has had the power before 
 the city, and not, as in Europe, the city before 
 the country, the country should have tried with 
 peculiar care to retain its free domination over 
 the city. 
 
 This process has been made easy, not only by 
 the fact that the city was generally created by 
 the state, but by our practice of selecting our 
 state capitals, not for judicial, or commercial, or 
 historical, but for topographical considerations. 
 No other people has been in the habit, or has 
 had the opportunity, of choosing places for its 
 political capitals at all. In all other countries, 
 if I am not mistaken, the capitals were made by 
 trade, or commerce, or manufactures, or some 
 ancient drift of population. But in many of 
 our states the political capital is not the chief 
 city in wealth or population ; it owes its political 
 preeminence to the fact that it was within easy 
 reach from all parts of the state, in the days 
 when travel was slow and difficult, a circum- 
 stance now of no importance whatever. Were 
 capitals selected with us by the agencies to 
 which they owe their existence in the Old 
 World, New York would be the capital of the 
 State of New York, Philadelphia of Pennsylva- 
 nia, Cincinnati of Ohio, Chicago of Illinois, and 
 Detroit of Michigan. 
 
 The present arrangement has proved unfor-
 
 AMERICAN MUNICIPAL GOVERNMENT 177 
 
 innate in two ways : it has helped to confirm 
 the rural mind in a belief in the inferiority and 
 insignificance of cities as compared to the coun- 
 try ; and it has kept legislators, when in session, 
 secluded from the observation of the most ac- 
 tive-minded portion of the population, and from 
 intercourse with them, and has deprived them of 
 the information and the new ideas which such 
 intercourse brings with it. Members of Con- 
 gress and of the state legislatures suffer seri- 
 ously in mind and character from our practice 
 of cutting them off, during their official lives, 
 from communion with the portion of the popu- 
 lation most immersed in affairs, and of keeping 
 them out of sight of those who are most com- 
 petent to understand their action and to criticise 
 it. No one who has paid much attention to our 
 political life can have helped observing the in- 
 jurious effect on the legislative mind of massing 
 legislators together in remote towns, in which 
 they exchange ideas only with one another, and 
 get no inkling of the real drift of public opinion 
 about a particular measure until it has been irre- 
 vocably acted upon. There is no question that 
 this has been in all parts of the country a power- 
 ful aid to the boss in preserving his domination. 
 Nothing can suit his purpose better than to get 
 his nominees together in some remote corner of 
 the state, in which he can instruct them in their
 
 178 AMERICAN MUNICIPAL GOVERNMENT 
 
 duties and watch their action without disturb- 
 ance from outside currents of criticism or sug- 
 gestion. Every legislature is the better, and its- 
 tone is the healthier, for being kept in close 
 contact with the leading centres of business in 
 the community, and hearing daily or hourly 
 from its men of affairs. Much of the ignorance 
 about exchange, credit, and currency, and of the 
 suspicion of bankers and men of business, which 
 has shown itself in our legislative capitals in 
 late years, has been due to the isolation of the 
 rural legislator from social intercourse with men 
 engaged in other pursuits than his own. 
 
 But the most serious drawback in the practice 
 of making political capitals to order is undoubt- 
 edly its tendency to lessen the rural legislator's 
 sense of the importance of cities, and to in- 
 crease his readiness to interfere in their govern- 
 ment without any real knowledge of their needs. 
 This readiness is one of the greatest difficulties 
 of American municipal government. It arises, 
 as I have said, partly from the historical ante- 
 cedents of our cities ; partly from the country- 
 man's sense of moral superiority, in which the 
 clergy and the poets try to confirm him ; and 
 partly from the fear inspired by the rapid 
 growth of the cities in population, and the belief 
 that their interests are in some manner different 
 from those of the country. This belief found
 
 AMERICAN MUNICIPAL GOVERNMENT 179 
 
 expression in the provision of the New York 
 Constitution that the new city and county of 
 New York should never be represented by more 
 than half the state Senate. There is a vague 
 fear diffused through the rural districts that if 
 the cities should get the upper hand in the state 
 government, or should succeed in achieving even 
 a quasi-independence, some serious consequence 
 to the whole community would follow. But to 
 have any fear on the subject is to question the 
 whole democratic theory. The system of politi- 
 cal division into states and districts and counties, 
 with separate representation, is an admission that 
 different localities have different interests, of 
 which other localities are not competent to take 
 charge. It is on this idea that local self-govern- 
 ment is based. It is the principal reason why 
 New York does not govern Massachusetts, or 
 Buffalo govern New York. 
 
 In the case of cities this difference is simply 
 magnified, and the incompetency of other dis- 
 tricts or counties for the work of their manage- 
 ment is made more than usually plain. To sup- 
 pose that a city is less fit to govern itself than 
 are more thinly peopled districts, or that its 
 political ascendency would contain danger to the 
 state, is to abandon the democratic theory. In 
 a democratic community there is really no con- 
 flict of interests between city and country ; the
 
 180 AMERICAN MUNICIPAL GOVERNMENT 
 
 prosperity of one makes the prosperity of the 
 other. Neither can grow rich by the impoverish- 
 ment of the other. From the democratic point 
 of view, a city is merely a very large collection 
 of people in one spot, with many wants peculiar 
 to such large collections. To deny its fitness to 
 govern itself is to deny the majority principle 
 with strong emphasis. Nevertheless, the at- 
 tempts hitherto made in America to secure re- 
 form in the administration of cities have been 
 almost exclusively efforts to wrest greater powers 
 of local administration from the state legisla- 
 tures, which consist in the main of farmers, who 
 have no special interest in cities whatever, but 
 who are indomitable champions of local self- 
 government in all other political divisions. In 
 three states only, as yet, Missouri, California, 
 and Washington, have the cities succeeded in 
 securing a constitutional right to approve their 
 own charters before they go into operation, 
 which is the furthest step in advance that has 
 been made. In twenty-three states they are 
 constitutionally secured against having special 
 charters made for them by the legislature, with 
 or without their consent. Whatever sort of or- 
 ganic law is imposed in one city in these states 
 must be imposed in all. But in ten states the 
 cities are still at the mercy of the legislature, 
 which may govern them by special legislation,
 
 AMERICAN MUNICIPAL GOVERNMENT 181 
 
 and make, amend, or annul charters at its dis- 
 cretion, without pity or remorse. 
 
 In looking at the history and condition of 
 municipalities in America, one consideration 
 meets us at every stage ; that is, that in no other 
 civilized country is municipal government so 
 completely within the control of public opinion. 
 Everywhere else there are deeply rooted tradi- 
 tions, long-established customs, much-respected 
 vested rights and cherished prejudices, to be 
 dealt with, before any satisfactory framework of 
 city government can be set up. Here the whole 
 problem is absolutely at the disposal of popular 
 sentiment. Our cities, therefore, might most 
 easily have been the model cities of the modern 
 world. Birmingham and Glasgow and Berlin, 
 in other words, ought to have been in America. 
 It is we who ought to have shown the Old 
 World how to live comfortably in great masses 
 in one place. We have no city walls to pull 
 down, or ghettos to clear out, or guilds to buy 
 up, or privileges to extinguish. We have sim- 
 ply to provide health, comfort, and education, in 
 our own way, according to the latest experience 
 in science, for large bodies of free men in one 
 spot. 
 
 This is as much as saying that in talking of 
 the municipal question we describe a state of the 
 popular mind, and not a state of law. Charters
 
 182 AMERICAN MUNICIPAL GOVERNMENT 
 
 are nowhere else in the world an expression of 
 popular thought as much as in America. They 
 are merely what people believe or permit at any 
 given period. Very often they are well adapted 
 to our needs, like the late New York charter, 
 but fail to give satisfaction, because, having pro- 
 vided the charter, we take no pains to secure 
 competent officials. Finding that it does not 
 work well, we seek a remedy by making a change 
 in its provisions rather than in the men who 
 administer it. In this way our municipal woes 
 are perpetuated, and we continue to write and 
 talk of charters as if they were self-acting ma- 
 chines, instead of certain ways of doing busi- 
 ness. No municipal reform will last long or 
 prove efficient without a strong and healthy 
 public spirit behind it. With this almost any 
 charter would prove efficient.
 
 THE GROWTH AND EXPRESSION OF 
 PUBLIC OPINION 
 
 PUBLIC opinion, like democracy itself, is a 
 new power which has come into the world since 
 the Middle Ages. In fact, it is safe to say that 
 before the French Revolution nothing of the 
 kind was known or dreamt of in Europe. There 
 was a certain truth in Louis XIV.'s statement, 
 which now sounds so droll, that he was himself 
 the state. Public opinion was his opinion. In 
 England, it may be said with equal safety, there 
 was nothing that could be called public opinion, 
 in the modern sense, before the passage of the 
 Reform Bill. It began to form itself slowly 
 after 1816. Sir Robert Peel was forced to re- 
 mark in a letter to Croker in March, 1820 : 
 
 " Do you not think that the tone of England, 
 of that great compound of folly, weakness, pre- 
 judice, wrong feeling, right feeling, obstinacy, 
 or newspaper paragraphs, which is called public 
 opinion, is more liberal to use an odious but 
 intelligible phrase than the policy of the 
 government ? Do not you think that there is a 
 feeling becoming daily more general and more
 
 184 PUBLIC OPINION 
 
 confirmed that is independent of the pressure 
 of taxation, or any immediate cause in favor 
 of some undefined change in the mode of govern- 
 ing the country? It seems to me a curious 
 crisis, when public opinion never had such influ- 
 ence in public measures, and yet never was so 
 dissatisfied with the share which it possessed. 
 It is growing too large for the channels that it 
 has been accustomed to run through. God 
 knows it is very difficult to widen them equally 
 in proportion to the size and force of the current 
 which they have to convey, but the engineers 
 that made them never dreamed of various streams 
 that are now struggling for vent." 
 
 In short, Peel perceived the growth of the 
 force, and he recognized it as a new force. In 
 America public opinion can hardly be said to 
 have existed before the Revolution. The opin- 
 ions of leading men, of clergymen and large 
 landholders, were very powerful, and settled 
 most of the affairs of state ; but the opinion of 
 the majority did not count for much, and the 
 majority, in truth, did not think that it should. 
 In other words, public opinion had not been 
 created. It was the excitement of the Revolu- 
 tionary War which brought it into existence, 
 and made it seem omnipotent. It is obvious, 
 however, that there are two kinds of public 
 opinion. One kind is the popular belief in the
 
 PUBLIC OPINION 185 
 
 fitness or rightness of something, -which Mr. 
 Balfour calls "climate," a belief that certain 
 lines of conduct should be followed, or a certain 
 opinion held, by good citizens, or right-thinking 
 persons. Such a belief does not impose any 
 duty on anybody beyond outward conformity to 
 the received standards. The kind I am now 
 talking of is the public opinion, or consensus of 
 opinion, among large bodies of persons, which 
 acts as a political force, imposing on those in 
 authority certain legislation, or certain lines of 
 policy. The first of these does not change, and 
 is not seriously modified in much less than fifty 
 years. The second is being incessantly modified 
 by the events of the day. 
 
 All the writers on politics are agreed as to the 
 influence which this latter public opinion ought 
 to have on government. They all acknowledge 
 that in modern constitutional states it ought to 
 be omnipotent. It is in deciding from what 
 source it should come that the democrats and 
 the aristocrats part company. According to the 
 aristocratic school, it should emanate only from 
 persons possessing a moderate amount of pro- 
 perty, on the assumption that the possession of 
 property argues some degree of intelligence and 
 interest in public affairs. According to the 
 democratic school, it should emanate from the 
 majority of the adult males, on the assumption
 
 186 PUBLIC OPINION 
 
 that it is only in this way that legislators can be 
 made to consult the greatest good of the great- 
 est number, and that, in the long run, the major- 
 ity of adult males are pretty sure to be right 
 about public questions. President Lincoln came 
 near defining this theory when he said, " You 
 can fool part of the people all the time, and all 
 the people part of the time, but you cannot fool 
 all the people all the time." This probably 
 meant that under the democratic system public 
 opinion forms slowly, and has to be clarified by 
 prolonged discussion, but that it is sure to prove 
 correct eventually. 
 
 What appears most to concern us in the ten- 
 dencies of democratic government is not so 
 much the quality of public opinion, as the way 
 in which it exercises its power over the conduct 
 of affairs. I was struck recently by a remark in 
 a private letter, that " public opinion is as sound 
 as ever, but that the politicians " that is, the 
 men in control of affairs "pay just as little 
 attention to it as ever." There is an assump- 
 tion here that we can get at public opinion in 
 some other way than through elections ; that is, 
 that we may know what the public thinks on 
 any particular question, without paying attention 
 to what men in power, who seek to obey the 
 political will, do or say, as a condition of their 
 popular existence. Is this true of any demo-
 
 PUBLIC OPINION 187 
 
 cratic country ? Is it true, in particular, of the 
 United States of America ? 
 
 There are only two ways in which public 
 opinion upon political questions finds expression, 
 or is thought to find it. One is the vote at 
 elections, the other is journalism. But public 
 opinion declares itself through elections only at 
 intervals of greater or less length : in England, 
 once in five or six years; in America, once in 
 two years, or at most in four; in France, once 
 in four years. It is only at these periods that 
 public opinion must be sought ; at others, it is 
 consulted at the will of the minister or sovereign, 
 and he rarely consults it when he can help it, if 
 he thinks that its decision will be against him, 
 and that the result will be a loss of power. The 
 imperfection of elections, however, as a means 
 of making public opinion known, is very ob- 
 vious. It is seldom, indeed, that a definite issue 
 is submitted to the public, like the Swiss refer- 
 endum, and that the voters are asked to say yes 
 or no, in answer to a particular question. As 
 a rule, it is the general policy of the party in 
 power, on all sorts of subjects, which appears to 
 determine the action of the voters. The bulk 
 of them, on both sides, vote for their own party 
 in any event, no matter what course it has pur- 
 sued, on the principle that if what it has done 
 in a particular case is not right, it was as nearly
 
 188 PUBLIC OPINION 
 
 right as circumstances would permit. The rem- 
 nant, or " independents," who turn the scale to 
 one side or the other, have half a dozen reasons 
 for their course, or, in other words, express by 
 their vote their opinions on half a dozen sub- 
 jects, besides the one on which the verdict of 
 the majority is sought. During the last thirty 
 years, for instance, in the United States, it would 
 have been almost useless to consult the voters 
 on any subject except the tariff. No matter 
 what question might have been put to them, it 
 would almost surely have been answered with 
 reference mainly to the effect of the answer on 
 the tariff. All other matters would have been 
 passed over. In like manner, it has probably 
 been impossible in England, for ten or twelve 
 years, to get a real expression of opinion on any 
 subject except Irish home rule. To the inquiry 
 what people thought about the Armenian mas- 
 sacres, or education, or liquor regulation, the 
 voters were pretty sure to answer, " We are op- 
 posed to Irish home rule." Accordingly, after 
 every election there are disputes as to what it 
 means. The defeated party seldom acknow- 
 ledges that its defeat has been due to the mat- 
 ters on which the other side claims a victory. 
 The great triumph of the Conservatives in 1894 
 was ascribed by them to home rule, but by the 
 Liberals to local option and clerical hostility
 
 PUBLIC OPINION 189 
 
 to the common schools. Similarly, the Repub- 
 lican defeat in America in 1890 was due, ac- 
 cording to one party, to the excesses of the 
 McKinley tariff, and, according to the other, to 
 gross deceptions practiced on the voters as to its 
 probable effect on prices. 
 
 What are called " electioneering devices " or 
 " tricks " are largely based on this uncertainty. 
 That is, they are meant to influence the voters 
 by some sort of matter irrelevant to the main 
 issue. This is called " drawing a red herring 
 across the scent." A good example of it is to 
 be found in the practice, which has prevailed 
 during nearly the whole tariff agitation, of citing 
 the rage, or disgust, or misery of foreigners due 
 to our legislation, as a reason for persisting in 
 it, as if any legislation which produced this 
 effect on foreigners must be good. But, obvi- 
 ously, there might be much legislation which 
 would excite the hostility of foreigners, and be 
 at the same time injurious to this country. In 
 voting on the tariff, a large number of voters 
 the Irish for instance might be, and doubtless 
 were, influenced in favor of high duties by the 
 fact that, to a large extent, they would exclude 
 British goods, and thus they appeared to be 
 approving a protective policy in general. No- 
 body believes that in Germany the increasing 
 Socialist vote represents Socialist ideas, properly
 
 190 PUBLIC OPINION 
 
 so called. It expresses discontent generally 
 with the existing regime. In Ireland, too, the 
 vote at a general election does not express sim- 
 ply an opinion on the question which has dis- 
 solved Parliament. Bather, it expresses gen- 
 eral hostility to English rule. In Italy, elections 
 mostly turn on the question of the temporal 
 power of the Pope. In fact, wherever we look 
 at the modes of obtaining expressions of public 
 opinion, we find that elections are not often 
 reliable as to particular measures, except through 
 the referendum. In all democratic countries, it 
 is the practice of the bulk of the voters to indi- 
 cate by their votes their confidence in, or distrust 
 of, the party in power, rather than their opinions 
 on any particular measure. It is the few who 
 turn the scale who are really influenced by the 
 main question before the voters. The rest fol- 
 low their party prepossessions, or rely on the 
 party managers to turn the majority, if they 
 secure it, to proper account. 
 
 In England, some reliance is placed on what 
 are called " bye elections," or elections caused 
 by vacancies occurring between two general elec- 
 tions, as indications of the trend of public 
 opinion touching the acts or policy of the min- 
 istry. But these elections very seldom show 
 more than slight diminution or slight increase 
 of preceding majorities, and the result, as an
 
 PUBLIC OPINION 191 
 
 instruction, is very often made uncertain by local 
 causes, such as the greater or less popularity of 
 one of the candidates. They may, and gener- 
 ally do, reveal the growing or declining popu- 
 larity of the party in power in the constituency 
 in which they occur, but rarely can be held to 
 express the opinion of the majority on any par- 
 ticular matter. There are several ways of ac- 
 counting for any changes which have occurred 
 in the total vote, all equally plausible. In 
 America, town or county elections serve some- 
 what the same purpose. They are watched, not 
 so much with reference to their influence on 
 local affairs, as with reference to the light they 
 throw on the feelings of the voters toward the 
 administration for the time being. It is taken 
 for granted that no local wants or incidents will 
 prevent the bulk of the voters from casting their 
 ballots as members of federal parties. 
 
 It is probably this disposition to vote on the 
 general course of the administration, rather than 
 on any particular proposal, which causes what it 
 is now the fashion to call the " swinging of the 
 pendulum," that is, the tendency both in 
 England and in America to vote in a different 
 way at alternate elections, or never to give any 
 party more than one term in power. If public 
 attention were apt to be concentrated on one 
 measure, this could hardly occur so frequently.
 
 192 PUBLIC OPINION 
 
 It doubtless indicates, not positive condemna- 
 tion of any particular thing, so much as disap- 
 proval or weariness of certain marked features 
 of the government policy. The voters get tired 
 both of praise and of blame of particular men, 
 and so resolve to try others ; or they get tired 
 of a certain policy, and long for something new. 
 It is a little difficult to fix on the exact cause of 
 such changes, but it seems pretty certain that 
 they cannot be considered definite expressions of 
 opinion on specific subjects. Then, owing to the 
 electoral divisions through which every country 
 chooses legislators, a far greater change may 
 often be made in the legislature than the vote 
 in the separate constituencies warrants. For in- 
 stance, a President may readily be chosen in the 
 United States by a minority of the popular vote ; 
 and in England, an enormous majority in the 
 House of Commons may rest on a very small 
 aggregate majority of the electors. There never 
 was a more striking illustration of the difficulty 
 of getting at popular opinion than the defeat of 
 the Disraeli ministry in 1880. It was the con- 
 fident belief of all the more instructed portion 
 of the community the gentry, the clergy, and 
 the professional class that, rightly or wrongly, 
 public opinion was on the side of the ministry, 
 and approved what was called its " imperial 
 policy," the provocation given to Afghanistan,
 
 PUBLIC OPINION 193 
 
 and the interference in the Russo-Turkish war 
 on the side of Turkey. One heard, it was said, 
 nothing else in the clubs, the trains, the hotels, 
 and the colleges. But the result showed that 
 these indications were of little value, that the 
 judgment of the classes most occupied in observ- 
 ing political tendencies was at fault, and that 
 the bulk of the constituencies had apparently 
 taken quite a different view of the whole matter. 
 A striking example of the same thing was 
 afforded in the State of New York in 1892. 
 The leaders of the Democratic party at that 
 time were men of more than usual astuteness 
 and political experience. It was of the last im- 
 portance to them to learn the popular judgment 
 on the more recent acts of the party, particularly 
 on the mode in which it had secured control of 
 the state Senate. Up to the day of election they 
 seem to have had the utmost confidence in an 
 overwhelming popular verdict in their favor. 
 The result, however, was their overwhelming 
 defeat. They apparently had but a very slight 
 knowledge of the trend of public opinion. In 
 truth, it may be said that the great political rev- 
 olutions wrought by elections, both in England 
 and in America, have been unexpected by the 
 bulk of observers, either wholly or as to their 
 extent. No change at all was looked for, or the 
 change was not expected to be so great.
 
 194 PUBLIC OPINION 
 
 Why this should be so, why in a democratic 
 society people should find so much difficulty 
 in discovering beforehand what the sovereign 
 power is thinking, and what it is going to do, is 
 not so difficult to explain as it seems. We must 
 first bear in mind that the democratic societies 
 prodigiously increased in size almost at the 
 moment at which they acquired control of the 
 State. There was no previous opportunity for 
 examining their tastes, prejudices, weaknesses, 
 or tendencies. Most of the descriptions of de- 
 mocracies within the present century, as I have 
 already pointed out, have been only guesses, or 
 deductions from the history of those of anti- 
 quity. Nearly every modern writer on this sub- 
 ject has fallen into mistakes about democratic 
 tendencies, merely through a priori reasoning. 
 Certain things had happened in the ancient de- 
 mocracies, and were sure to happen again in 
 the modern democracies, much as the conditions 
 had changed. Singularly enough, the one abso- 
 lutely new difficulty, the difficulty of consulting 
 a modern democracy, has hardly been noticed. 
 This difficulty has produced the boss, who is 
 a sufficiently simple phenomenon. But how, 
 without the boss, to get at what the people are 
 thinking, has not been found out, though it is 
 of great importance. We have not yet hit on 
 the best plan of getting at "public opinion."
 
 PUBLIC OPINION 195 
 
 Elections, as we have seen, are the medium 
 through which this force manifests itself in 
 action, but they do not furnish the reason of 
 this action, the considerations which led to it, or 
 a forecast of all the consequences it is expected 
 to produce. Moreover, at best they tell us only 
 what half the people are thinking ; for no party 
 nowadays wins an electoral victory by much over 
 half the voters. So that we are driven back, for 
 purposes of observation, on the newspaper press. 
 Our confidence in this is based on the theory, 
 not so much that the newspapers make public 
 opinion, as that the opinions they utter are those 
 of which their readers approve. But this ground 
 is being made less tenable every year by the fact 
 that more and more newspapers rely on adver- 
 tising, rather than on subscriptions, for their 
 support and profits, and agreement with then: 
 readers is thus less and less important to them. 
 The old threat of "stopping my paper," if a 
 subscriber came across unpalatable views hi the 
 editorial columns, is therefore not so formidable 
 as it used to be, and is less resorted to. The 
 advertiser, rather than the subscriber, is now 
 the newspaper bogie. He is the person before 
 whom the publisher cowers and whom he tries 
 to please, and the advertiser is very indifferent 
 about the opinions of a newspaper. What in- 
 terests him is the amount or quality of its circu-
 
 196 PUBLIC OPINION 
 
 lation. What he wants to know is, how many 
 and what class of persons see it, not how many 
 persons agree with it. The consequence is that 
 the newspapers of largest circulation, published 
 in the great centres of population where most 
 votes are cast, are less and less organs of opin- 
 ion, especially in America. In fact, in some 
 cases the advertisers use their influence which 
 is great, and which the increasing competition 
 between newspapers makes all the greater to 
 prevent the expression in newspapers of what is 
 probably the prevailing local view of men or 
 events. There are not many newspapers which 
 can afford to defy a large advertiser. 
 
 Nothing is more striking in the reading pub- 
 He to-day, in our democracy, than the increasing 
 incapacity for continuous attention. The power 
 of attention is one that, just like muscular 
 power, needs cultivation or training. The abil- 
 ity to listen to a long argument or exposition, or 
 to read it, involves not only strength but habit 
 in the muscles of the eye or the nerves of the 
 ear. In familiar language, one has to be used 
 to it, to do it easily. 
 
 There seems to be a great deal of reason for 
 believing that this habit is becoming much rarer. 
 Publishers complain more and more of the refu- 
 sal of nearly every modern community to read 
 books, except novels, which keep the attention
 
 PUBLIC OPINION 197 
 
 alive by amusing incidents and rapid changes 
 of situation. Argumentative works can rarely 
 count on a large circulation. This may doubt- 
 less be ascribed in part to the multiplicity of 
 the objects of attention in modern times, to the 
 opportunities of simple amusement, to the large 
 area of the world which is brought under each 
 man's observation by the telegraph, and to the 
 general rapidity of communication. But this 
 large area is brought under observation through 
 the newspaper ; and that the newspaper's mode 
 of presenting facts does seriously affect the way 
 in which people perform the process called 
 " making up their minds," especially about pub- 
 lic questions, can hardly be denied. The near- 
 est approach we can make to what people are 
 thinking about any matter of public interest is 
 undoubtedly by " reading the papers." It may 
 not be a sure way, but there is no other. It is 
 true, often lamentably true, that the only idea 
 most foreigners and observers get of a nation's 
 modes of thought and standards of duty and 
 excellence, and in short of its manners and 
 morals, comes through reading its periodicals. 
 To the outsider the newspaper press is the na- 
 tion talking about itself. Nations are known 
 to other nations mainly through their press. 
 They used to be known more by their public 
 men ; but the class of public men who repre-
 
 198 PUBLIC OPINION 
 
 sent a country is becoming every day smaller, 
 and public men speak less than formerly ; with 
 us they can scarcely be said to speak at all. Our 
 present system of nomination and the loss of 
 the habit of debating in the legislature, have 
 almost put an end to oratory, except during ex- 
 citing canvasses. Elsewhere than in England, 
 the names of the leading men are hardly known 
 to foreigners ; their utterances, not at all. If I 
 want to learn the drift of opinion in any coun- 
 try, on any topic, the best thing I can do, there- 
 fore, is to read the papers ; and I must read a 
 large number. 
 
 In America more than in any other country, 
 the collection of " news " has become a business 
 within half a century, and it has been greatly 
 promoted by the improvements in the printing- 
 press. Before this period, " news " was gener- 
 ally news of great events, that is, of events 
 of more than local importance ; so that if a man 
 were asked, " What news ? " he would try, in 
 his answer, to mention something of world-wide 
 significance. But as soon as the collection of 
 it became a business, submitted to the ordinary 
 laws of competition, the number of things that 
 were called " news " naturally increased. Each 
 newspaper endeavored to outdo its rivals by the 
 greater number of facts it brought to the public 
 notice, and it was not very long before " news "
 
 PUBLIC OPINION 199 
 
 Became everything whatever, no matter how un- 
 important, which the reader had not previously 
 heard of. The sense of proportion about news 
 was rapidly destroyed. Everything, however 
 trifling, was considered worth printing, and the 
 newspaper finally became, what it is now, a col- 
 lection of the gossip, not only of the whole world, 
 but of its own locality. Now, gossip, when 
 analyzed, consists simply of a collection of actual 
 facts, mostly of little moment, and also of sur- 
 mises about things, of equally little moment. 
 But business requires that as much importance 
 as possible shall be given to them by the manner 
 of producing each item, or what is called " typo- 
 graphical display." Consequently they are pre- 
 sented with separate and conspicuous headings, 
 and there is no necessary connection between 
 them. They follow one another, column after 
 column, without any order, either of subject or 
 of chronology. 
 
 The diligent newspaper reader, therefore, gets 
 accustomed to passing rapidly from one to an- 
 other of a series of incidents, small and great, 
 requiring simply the transfer, from one trifle to 
 another, of a sort of lazy, uninterested atten- 
 tion, which often becomes sub-conscious ; that 
 is, a man reads with hardly any knowledge or 
 recollection of what he is reading. Not only 
 does the attention become habituated to frequent
 
 200 PUBLIC OPINION 
 
 breaches in its continuity, but it grows accus- 
 tomed to short paragraphs, as one does to- 
 passers-by in the street. A man sees and ob- 
 serves them, but does not remember what he sees 
 and observes for more than a minute or two. 
 That this should have its effect on the editorial 
 writing is what naturally might be expected. 
 If the editorial article is long, the reader, used 
 to the short paragraphs, is apt to shrink from 
 the labor of perusing it ; if it is brief, he pays 
 little more attention to it than he pays to the 
 paragraphs. When, therefore, any newspaper 
 turns to serious discussion in its columns, it is 
 difficult, and one may say increasingly difficult, 
 to get a hearing. It has to contend both against 
 the intellectual habit of its readers, which makes 
 prolonged attention hard, and against a priori 
 doubts of its honesty and competency. People 
 question whether it is talking in good faith, or 
 has some sinister object in view, knowing that 
 in one city of the Union, at least, it is impossible 
 to get published any criticism on the larger ad- 
 vertisers, however nefarious their doings ; know- 
 ing also that in another city there have been 
 rapid changes of journalistic views, made for 
 party purposes or through simple changes of 
 ownership. 
 
 The result is that the effect of newspaper 
 editorial writing on opinion is small, so far as
 
 PUBLIC OPINION 201 
 
 one can judge. Still, it would be undeniably 
 large enough to possess immense power if the 
 press acted unanimously as a body. If all the 
 papers, or a great majority of them, said the same 
 thing on any question of the day, or told the 
 same story about any matter in dispute, they 
 would undoubtedly possess great influence. But 
 they are much divided, partly by political affilia- 
 tion, and partly, perhaps mainly, by business 
 rivalry. For business purposes, each is apt to 
 think it necessary to differ in some degree from 
 its nearest rivals, whether of the same party or 
 not, in its view of most questions, or at all events 
 not to support a rival's view, or totally to ignore 
 something to which the rival is attaching great 
 importance. The result is that the press rarely 
 acts with united force, or expresses a united 
 opinion. Nor do many readers subscribe to more 
 than one paper; and consequently few readers 
 have any knowledge of the other side of any 
 question on which their own paper is, possibly, 
 preaching with vehemence. The great importance 
 which many persons attach to having a news- 
 paper of large circulation on their side is due 
 in some degree to its power in the presentation 
 of facts to the public, and also to its power of 
 annoyance by persistent abuse or ridicule. 
 
 Another agency which has interfered with 
 the press as an organ of opinion is the greatly
 
 202 PUBLIC OPINION 
 
 increased expense of starting or carrying on a 
 modern newspaper. The days when Horace 
 Greeley or William Lloyd Garrison could start 
 an influential paper in a small printing-office, 
 with the assistance of a boy, are gone forever. 
 Few undertakings require more capital, or are 
 more hazardous. The most serious item of ex- 
 pense is the collection of news from all parts of 
 the world, and this cannot be evaded in our day. 
 News is the life-blood of the modern newspaper. 
 No talent or energy will make up for its ab- 
 sence. The consequence is that a very large 
 sum is needed to establish a newspaper. After 
 it is started, a large sum must be spent without 
 visible return, but the fortune that may be ac- 
 cumulated by it, if successful, is also very large. 
 One of the most curious things about it is that 
 the public does not expect from a newspaper 
 proprietor the same sort of morality that it ex- 
 pects from persons in other callings. It would 
 disown a bookseller and cease all intercourse with 
 him for a tithe of the falsehoods and petty 
 frauds which it passes unnoticed in a newspaper 
 proprietor. It may disbelieve every word he 
 says, and yet profess to respect him, and may 
 occasionally reward him ; so that it is quite pos- 
 sible to find a newspaper which nearly everybody 
 condemns, and whose influence most men would 
 repudiate, circulating very freely even among
 
 PUBLIC OPINION 203 
 
 religious and moral people, and making hand- 
 some profits. A newspaper proprietor, therefore, 
 who finds that his profits remain high, no matter 
 what views he promulgates and what kind of mo- 
 rality he practices, can hardly, with fairness to 
 the community, be treated as an exponent of its 
 opinions. He will not consider what it thinks, 
 when he finds he has only to consider what it 
 will buy, and that it will buy his paper without 
 agreeing with it. 
 
 But it is as an exponent of the nation's feel- 
 ing about other nations that the press is most 
 defective. The old diplomacy, in which, as 
 Disraeli said, " sovereigns and statesmen " regu- 
 lated international affairs in secret conclave in 
 gorgeous salons, has all but passed away. The 
 " sovereigns and statesmen " and the secret con- 
 clave and the gorgeous salons remain, but of 
 the old indifference to what the world outside 
 thought of their work, not very much remains. 
 Now and then a king or an emperor gratifies his 
 personal spites, in his instructions to his diplo- 
 matic representatives, like the Emperor of Ger- 
 many in the case of the unfortunate Greeks ; 
 but most governments, in their negotiations with 
 foreign powers, now listen closely to the voice 
 of their own people. The democracy sits at 
 every council board, and the most conservative 
 of ministers, consciously or unconsciously, con-
 
 204 PUBLIC OPINION 
 
 suits it as well as he can. He tries to find out 
 what it wishes in any particular matter, or, if 
 this be impossible, he tries to find out what will 
 most impress its imagination. Whether he 
 brings peace or war, he tries to make it appear 
 that the national honor has been carefully looked 
 after, and that the national desires, and even the 
 national weaknesses, have been considered and 
 provided for. But it is from the press that he 
 must learn all this ; and it is from the press, too, 
 that each diplomatist must learn whether his 
 opponent's country is really behind him. The 
 press is never silent, and it has the field to itself ; 
 any one who wishes to know what the people 
 are feeling and thinking has to rely on it for the 
 want of anything better. 
 
 In international questions, however, the press 
 is often a poor reliance. In the first place, 
 business prudence prompts an editor, whether 
 he fully understands the matter under discussion 
 or not, to take what seems the patriotic view ; 
 and tradition generally makes the selfish, quar- 
 relsome view the patriotic view. The late editor 
 of the " Sun " expressed this tersely by advising 
 young journalists " always to stand by the Stars 
 and Stripes." It was long ago expressed still 
 more tersely by the cry, " Our country, right 
 or wrong ! " All first-class Powers still live 
 more or less openly, in their relations with one
 
 PUBLIC OPINION 205 
 
 another, under the old dueling code, which the 
 enormous armaments in modern times render 
 almost a necessity. Under this code the one 
 unbearable imputation is fear of somebody. 
 Any other imputation a nation supports with 
 comparative meekness; the charge of timidity 
 is intolerable. It has been made more so by 
 the conversion of most modern nations into 
 great standing armies, and no great standing 
 army can for a moment allow the world to doubt 
 its readiness, and even eagerness, to fight. It 
 is not every diplomatic difference that is at first 
 clearly understood by the public. Very often 
 the pros and cons of the matter are imperfectly 
 known until the correspondence is published, 
 but the agitation of the popular mind continues; 
 the press must talk about the matter, and its 
 talk is rarely pacific. It is bound by tradition 
 to take the ground that its own government is 
 right ; and that even if it is not, it does not 
 make any difference, the press has to maintain 
 that it is right. 
 
 The action of Congress on the recent Vene- 
 zuelan complication well illustrated the position 
 of the press in such matters. When Mr. Cleve- 
 land sent his message asking Congress to vote 
 the expense of tracing the frontier of a foreign 
 power, Congress knew nothing of the merits of 
 the case. It did not even know that any such
 
 206 PUBLIC OPINION 
 
 controversy was pending. As the message was 
 distinctly one that might lead to war, and as 
 Congress was the war-making power, the Consti- 
 tution presumptively imposed on it the duty of 
 examining the causes of the dispute thoroughly, 
 before complying with the President's request. 
 In most other affairs, too, it would have been 
 the more disposed to discharge this duty, because 
 the majority was hostile to Mr. Cleveland. But 
 any delay or hesitation, it feared, would be con- 
 strued by the public as a symptom of fear or 
 of want of patriotism, so it instantly voted the 
 money without any examination whatever. The 
 press was in an almost similar condition. It 
 knew no more of the merits of the case than 
 Congress, and it had the same fear of being 
 thought wanting in patriotism, so that the whole 
 country in twenty-four hours resounded with 
 rhetorical preparation for, and justification of, 
 war with England. 
 
 As long as this support is confined to argumen- 
 tation, no great harm is done. The diplomatists 
 generally care but little about the dialectical 
 backing up that they get from the newspapers. 
 Either they do not need it, or it is too ill in- 
 formed to do them much good. But the news- 
 papers have another concern than mere victory 
 in argument. They have to maintain their place 
 in the estimation of their readers, and, if pos-
 
 PUBLIC OPINION 207 
 
 sible, to increase the number of these readers. 
 Unhappily, in times of international trouble, the 
 easiest way to do this always seems to be to 
 influence the public mind against the foreigner. 
 This is done partly by impugning his motives in 
 the matter in hand, and partly by painting his 
 general character in an odious light. Undoubt- 
 edly this produces some effect on the public 
 mind by begetting a readiness to punish in arms, 
 at any cost, so unworthy an adversary. The 
 worst effect, however, is that which is produced 
 on the ministers conducting the negotiations. It 
 frightens or encourages them into taking ex- 
 treme positions, in putting forward impossible 
 claims, or in perverting history and law to help 
 their case. The applause and support of the 
 newspapers seem to be public opinion. They 
 bring honor at home, no matter how the con- 
 troversy ends. In short, it may be said, as a 
 matter of history, that in few diplomatic contro- 
 versies in this century has the press failed to 
 make moderate ground difficult for a diploma- 
 tist, and retreats from untenable positions almost 
 impossible. The press makes his case seem so 
 good, that abandonment of it looks like treason 
 to his country. 
 
 Then there is another aspect of the case which 
 cannot be passed without notice, though it puts 
 the press in a less honorable light. Newspapers
 
 208 PUBLIC OPINION 
 
 are made to sell ; and for this purpose there is 
 nothing better than war. "War means daily sen- 
 sation and excitement. On this almost any kind 
 of newspaper may live and make money. Whether 
 the war brings victory or defeat makes little dif- 
 ference. The important thing is that in war 
 every moment may bring important and exciting 
 news, news which does not need to be accurate 
 or to bear sifting. What makes it most market- 
 able is that it is probable and agreeable, although 
 disagreeable news sells nearly as well. In the 
 tumult of a great war, when the rules of evi- 
 dence are suspended by passion or anxiety, inven- 
 tion, too, is easy, and has its value, and is pretty 
 sure never to be punished. Some newspapers, 
 which found it difficult to make a livelihood in 
 times of peace, made fortunes in our last war; 
 and it may be said that, as a rule, troublous times 
 are the best for a newspaper proprietor. 
 
 It follows from this, it cannot but follow, 
 that it is only human for a newspaper proprietor 
 to desire war, especially when he feels sure that 
 his own country is right, and that its opponents 
 are enemies of civilization, a state of mind 
 into which a man may easily work himself by 
 writing and talking much during an interna- 
 tional controversy. So that I do not think it an 
 exaggeration or a calumny to say that the press, 
 taken as a whole, of course with many honor-
 
 PUBLIC OPINION 2p9 
 
 able exceptions, has a bias in favor of war. 
 It would not stir up a war with any country, but 
 if it sees preparations made to fight, it does not 
 fail to encourage the combatants. This is par- 
 ticularly true of a naval war, which is much more 
 striking as a spectacle than a land war, while it 
 does not disturb industry or distribute personal 
 risk, to nearly the same extent. 
 
 Of much more importance, however, than the 
 manner in which public opinion finds expression 
 in a democracy is the manner in which it is 
 formed, and this is very much harder to get at. 
 I do not mean what may be called people's stand- 
 ing opinion about things in general, which is 
 born of hereditary prejudice, and works itself 
 into the manners of the country as part of each 
 individual's moral and intellectual outfit. There 
 is a whole batch of notions about things public 
 and private, which men of every nation hold be- 
 cause they are national, once called " Roman " 
 by a Roman, now " English " by an Englishman, 
 and " American " by an American, and which 
 are defended or propagated simply by calling 
 the opposite " un-English " or " un-American." 
 These views come to people by descent. They 
 are inherited rather than formed. What I have 
 in mind is the opinions formed by the community 
 about new subjects, questions of legislation and 
 -of war and peace, and about social needs or sins
 
 210 PUBLIC OPINION 
 
 or excesses, in short, about anything novel, 
 which calls imperatively for an immediate judg- 
 ment of some kind. What is it that moves large 
 bodies or parties in a democracy like ours, for 
 instance, to say that its government should do 
 this, or should not do that, in any matter that 
 may happen to be before them ? 
 
 Nothing can be more difficult than an answer 
 to this question. Every writer about democracy, 
 from Montesquieu down, has tried to answer it 
 by a priori predictions as to what democracy will 
 say, or do, or think, under certain given circum- 
 stances. The uniform failure naturally suggests 
 the conclusion that the question is not answer- 
 able at all, owing largely to the enormously 
 increased number of influences under which all 
 men act in the modern world. It is now very 
 rare to meet with one of the distinctly defined 
 characters which education, conducted under the 
 regime of authority, used to form, down to the 
 close of the last century. There are really no 
 more " divines," or " gentlemen," or " Puritans," 
 or "John Bulls," or "Brother Jonathans." In 
 other words, there are no more moral or intel- 
 lectual moulds. It used to be easy to say how 
 a given individual or community would look at a 
 thing ; at present it is well-nigh impossible. We 
 can hardly tell what agency is exercising the 
 strongest influence on popular thought on any
 
 PUBLIC OPINION 211 
 
 given occasion. Most localities and classes are 
 subject to some peculiar dominating force, but if 
 you discover what it is, you discover it almost by 
 accident. One of the latest attempts to define a 
 moral force that would be sure to act on opinion 
 was the introduction into the political arena in 
 England of the " Nonconformist conscience," or 
 the moral training of the dissenting denomina- 
 tions, Congregationalists, Methodists, and Bap- 
 tists. In the discussion of Irish home rule and 
 various cognate matters, much use has been made 
 of the term, but it is difficult to point to any 
 particular occasion in which the thing has dis- 
 tinctly made itself felt. One would have said, 
 twenty years ago, that the English class of coun- 
 try squires would be the last body in the world, 
 owing to temperament and training, to approve 
 of any change in the English currency. We be- 
 lieve they are to-day largely bimetallists. The 
 reason is that their present liabilities, contracted 
 in good times, have been made increasingly 
 heavy by the fall in agricultural produce. 
 
 The same phenomena are visible here in Amer- 
 ica. It would be difficult to-day to say what is 
 the American opinion, properly so called, about 
 the marriage bond. One would think that in 
 the older states, in which social life is more set- 
 tled, it would strongly favor indissolubility, or, 
 at all events, great difficulty of dissolution. But
 
 212 PUBLIC OPINION 
 
 this is not the case. In Connecticut and Rhode 
 Island divorce is as easy, and almost as little 
 disreputable, as in any of the newer Western 
 states. In the discussion on the currency, most 
 observers would have predicted that the power 
 of the government over its value would be most 
 eagerly preached by the states in which the 
 number of foreign voters was greatest. As a 
 matter of fact, these states proved at the elec- 
 tion to be the firmest friends of the gold stand- 
 ard. Within our own lifetime the Southern 
 or cotton states, from being very conservative, 
 have become very radical, in the sense of being 
 ready to give ear to new ideas. What we might 
 have said of them in 1860 would be singularly 
 untrue in 1900. One might go over the civil- 
 ized world in this way, and find that the public 
 opinion of each country, on any given topic, had 
 escaped from the philosophers, so to speak, 
 that all generalising about it had become diffi- 
 cult, and that it was no longer possible to divide 
 influences into categories. 
 
 The conclusion most readily reached about 
 the whole matter is that authority, whether in 
 religion or in morals, which down to the last 
 century was so powerful, has ceased to exert 
 much influence on the affairs of the modern 
 world, and that any attempt to mould opinion 
 on religious or moral or political questions, by
 
 PUBLIC OPINION 213 
 
 its instrumentality, is almost certain to prove 
 futile. The reliance of the older political 
 writers, from Grotius to Locke, on the sayings 
 of other previous writers or on the Bible, is now 
 among the curiosities of literature. Utilitarian- 
 ism, however we may feel about it, has fully 
 taken possession of political discussion. That is 
 to say, any writer or speaker on political subjects 
 has to show that his proposition will make peo- 
 ple more comfortable or richer. This is tanta- 
 mount to saying that historic experience has not 
 nearly the influence on political affairs it once 
 had. The reason is obvious. The number of 
 persons who have something to say about politi- 
 cal affairs has increased a thousandfold, but the 
 practice of reading books has not increased, and 
 it is in books that experience is recorded. In 
 the past, the governing class, in part at least, 
 was a reading class. One of the reasons which 
 are generally said to have given the Southern 
 members special influence in Congress before the 
 war is that they read books, had libraries, and 
 had wide knowledge of the experiments tried by 
 earlier generations of mankind. Their succes- 
 sors rarely read anything but the newspapers. 
 This is increasingly true, also, of other de- 
 mocratic countries. The old literary type of 
 statesmen, of which Jefferson and Madison and 
 Hamilton, Guizot and Thiers, were examples,
 
 214 PUBLIC OPINION 
 
 is rapidly disappearing, if it has not already dis- 
 appeared. 
 
 The importance of this in certain branches 
 of public affairs is great, the management 
 of currency, for example. All we know about 
 currency we learn from the experience of the 
 human race. What man will do about any kind 
 of money, gold, silver, or paper, under any 
 given set of conditions, we can predict only 
 by reading of what man has done. What will 
 happen, if, of two kinds of currency, we lower 
 or raise the value of one, what will happen if 
 we issue too much irredeemable paper, why we 
 must make our paper redeemable, what are the 
 dangers of violent and sudden changes in the 
 standard of value, are all things which we can 
 ascertain only from the history of money. 
 What any man now thinks or desires about the 
 matter is of little consequence compared with 
 what men in times past have tried to do. The 
 loss of influence or weight by the reading class 
 is therefore of great importance, for to this loss 
 we undoubtedly owe most of the prevalent wild 
 theories about currency. They are the theories 
 of men who do not know that their experiments 
 have been tried already and have failed. In 
 fact, I may almost venture the assertion that the 
 influence of history on politics was never smaller 
 than it is to-day, although history was never
 
 PUBLIC OPINION 215 
 
 before cultivated with so much acumen and in- 
 dustry. So that authority and experience may 
 fairly be ruled out of the list of forces -which 
 seriously influence the government of democratic 
 societies. In the formation of public opinion 
 they do not greatly count. 
 
 The effect of all this is not simply to lead to 
 hasty legislation. It also has an injurious effect 
 on legislative decision, in making every question 
 seem an " open " or " large " question. As 
 nothing, or next to nothing, is settled, all prob- 
 lems of politics have a tendency to seem new to 
 every voter, matters of which each man is as 
 good a judge as another, and as much entitled 
 to his own opinion. He is likely to consider him- 
 self under no special obligation to agree with 
 anybody else. The only obligation he feels is 
 that of party, and this is imposed to secure vic- 
 tories at the polls, rather than to insure any par- 
 ticular kind of legislation. For instance, a man 
 may be a civil service reformer when the party 
 takes no action about it, or a gold man when 
 the party rather favors silver, or a free-trader 
 when the party advocates high tariff, and yet be 
 a good party man as long as he votes the ticket. 
 He may question all the opinions in its platform, 
 but if he thinks it is the best party to administer 
 the government or distribute the offices, he may 
 and does remain in it with perfect comfort. In
 
 216 PUBLIC OPINION 
 
 short, party discipline does not insure uniform- 
 ity of opinion, but simply uniformity of action 
 at election. The platform is not held to impose 
 any line of action on the voters. Neither party 
 in America to-day has any fixed creed. Every 
 voter believes what is good in his own eyes, and 
 may do so with impunity, without loss of party 
 standing, as long as he votes for the party nomi- 
 nee at every important election. 
 
 The pursuit of any policy in legislation is 
 thus, undoubtedly, more difficult than of old. 
 The phrase, well known to lawyers, that a thing 
 is " against public policy," has by no means the 
 same meaning now that it once had, for it is 
 very difficult to say what " public policy " is. 
 National policy is something which has to be 
 committed to the custody of a few men who 
 respect tradition and are familiar with records. 
 A large assembly which is not dominated by 
 a leader, and in which each member thinks he 
 knows as much as any other member, and does 
 not study or respect records, can hardly follow a 
 policy without a good deal of difficulty. The 
 disappearance from the governments of the 
 United States, France, and Italy of commanding 
 figures, whose authority or character imposed on 
 minor men, accordingly makes it hard to say 
 what is the policy of these three countries on 
 most questions. Ministers who do not carry
 
 PUBLIC OPINION 217 
 
 personal weight always seek to fortify themselves 
 by the conciliation of voters, and what will con- 
 ciliate voters is, under every democratic regime, 
 a matter of increasing uncertainty, so free is the 
 play of individual opinion. 
 
 Of this, again, the condition of our currency 
 question at this moment is a good illustration. 
 Twenty-five years ago, the custody and regula- 
 tion of the standard of value, like the custody 
 and regulation of the standard of length or of 
 weight, were confided to experts, without objec- 
 tion in any quarter. There was no more thought 
 of disputing with these experts about it than of 
 disputing with mathematicians or astronomers 
 about problems in their respective sciences. It 
 was not thought that there could be a " public 
 opinion " about the comparative merits of the 
 metals as mediums of exchange, any more than 
 about the qualities of triangles or the position 
 of stars. The experts met now and then, in 
 private conclave, and decided, without criticism 
 from any one else, whether silver or gold should 
 be the legal tender. All the public asked was 
 that the standard, whatever it was, should be the 
 steadiest possible, the least liable to fluctuations 
 or variations. 
 
 With the growing strength of the democratic 
 regime all this has been changed. The standard 
 of value, like nearly everything else about which
 
 218 PUBLIC OPINION 
 
 men are concerned, has descended into the polit- 
 ical arena. Every man claims the right to have 
 an opinion about it, as good as that of any other 
 man. More than this, nearly every man is eager 
 to get this opinion embodied in legislation if he 
 can. Nobody is listened to by all as an author- 
 ity on the subject. The most eminent finan- 
 ciers find their views exposed to nearly as much 
 question as those of any tyro. The idea that 
 money should be a standard of value, as good 
 as the nature of value will permit, has almost 
 disappeared. Money has become a means in 
 the hands of governments of alleviating human 
 misery, of lightening the burdens of unfortu- 
 nate debtors, and of stimulating industry. On 
 the best mode of doing these things, every man 
 thinks he is entitled to his say. The result is 
 that we find ourselves, in the presence of one 
 of the most serious financial problems which has 
 ever confronted any nation, without a financial 
 leader. The finances of the Revolution had 
 Alexander Hamilton, and subsequently Albert 
 Gallatin. The finances of the civil war had first 
 Secretary Chase, and subsequently Senator Sher- 
 man, both of whom brought us to some sort of 
 conclusion, if not always to the right conclusion, 
 by sheer weight of authority. To Senator Sher- 
 man we were mainly indebted for the return to 
 specie payment in 1879. At present we have
 
 PUBLIC OPINION 219 
 
 no one who fills the places of these men in the 
 public eye. No one assumes to lead in this cri- 
 sis, though many give good as well as bad ad- 
 vice; but all, or nearly all, who advise, advise 
 as politicians, not as financiers. Very few who 
 speak on the subject say publicly the things they 
 say in private. Their public deliverances are 
 modified or toned down to suit some part of the 
 country, or some set or division of voters. They 
 are what is called "politically wise." During 
 the twenty years following the change in the 
 currency in 1873 no leading man in either party 
 disputed the assertions of the advocates of silver 
 as to the superiority of silver to gold as a stand- 
 ard of value. Nearly all politicians, even of the 
 Republican party, admitted the force of some 
 of the contentions of those advocates, and were 
 willing to meet them halfway, by some such mea- 
 sure as the purchase of silver under the Sherman 
 Act. The result was that when Mr. Bryan was 
 nominated on a silver platform, his followers 
 attacked the gold standard with weapons drawn 
 from the armory of the gold men, and nearly 
 every public man of prominence was estopped 
 from vigorous opposition to them by his own 
 utterances on the same subject. 
 
 It is easy to see that under circumstances like 
 these a policy about finance the most impor- 
 tant matter in which a nation can have a policy
 
 220 PUBLIC OPINION 
 
 is hardly possible. There are too many opin- 
 ions in the field for the formation of anything 1 
 that can be called public opinion. And yet, I 
 cannot recall any case in history, or, in other 
 words, in human experience, in which a great 
 scheme of financial reform was carried through 
 without having some man of force or weight 
 behind it, some man who had framed it, who 
 understood it, who could answer objections to it, 
 and who was not obliged to alter or curtail it 
 against his better judgment. The great finan- 
 ciers stand out in bold relief in the financial 
 chronicles of every nation. They may have been 
 wrong, they may have made mistakes, but they 
 spoke imperiously and carried their point, what- 
 ever it was. 
 
 Whether the disposition to do without them, 
 and to control money through popular opinion, 
 which seems now to have taken possession of the 
 democratic world, will last, or whether it will be 
 abandoned after trial, remains to be seen. But 
 one is not a rash prophet who predicts that it 
 will fail. Finance is too full of details, of un- 
 foreseen effects, of technical conditions, to make 
 the mastery of it possible, without much study 
 and experience. There is no problem of gov- 
 ernment which comes so near being strictly "sci- 
 entific," that is, so dependent on principles of 
 human nature and so little dependent on legisla-
 
 PUBLIC OPINION 221 
 
 tive power. No government can completely con- 
 trol the medium of exchange. It is a subject for 
 psychology rather than for politics. Democracy 
 has apparently been taken possession of by the 
 idea, either that a perfect standard of value may 
 be contrived, or that the standard of value may 
 be made a philanthropic instrument. But in 
 view of the incessant and rapid change of cost 
 of production which everything undergoes in 
 this age of invention and discovery, gold and 
 silver included, the idea of a perfect standard of 
 value must be set down as a chimera. Every 
 one acknowledges this. What some men main- 
 tain is that the effects of invention and discovery 
 may be counteracted by law and even by treaty, 
 which is simply an assertion that parliaments 
 and congresses and diplomatists can determine 
 what each man shall give for ^everything he 
 buys. This proposition hardly needs more than 
 a statement of it for its refutation. It is prob- 
 ably the most unexpected of all the manifesta- 
 tions of democratic feeling yet produced. For 
 behind all proposals to give currency a legal 
 value differing from the value of the market- 
 place lies a belief in the strength of law such 
 as the world has never yet seen. All previous 
 regimes have believed in the power of law to 
 enforce physical obedience, and to say what shall 
 constitute the legal payment of a debt; but never
 
 222 PUBLIC OPINION 
 
 until now has it been maintained that govern- 
 ment can create the standard of value, that is, 
 create in each head the amount of desire which 
 fixes the price of a commodity. 
 
 In short, the one thing which can be said with 
 most certainty about democratic public opinion 
 in the modern world is that it is moulded as 
 never before by economic, rather than by reli- 
 gious, or moral, or political considerations. The 
 influences which governed the world down to the 
 close of the seventeenth century were respect for 
 a reigning family, or belief in a certain form of 
 religious worship and horror of others, or na- 
 tional pride and corresponding dislike or distrust 
 of foreigners, or commercial rivalry. It is only 
 the last which has now much influence on public 
 opinion or in legislation. There is not much 
 respect, that can be called a political force, left 
 for any reigning family. There is a general in- 
 difference to all forms of religious worship, or at 
 least sufficient indifference to prevent strong or 
 combative attachment to them. Religious wars 
 are no longer possible ; the desire to spread any 
 form of faith by force of arms, which so power- 
 fully influenced the politics of the sixteenth 
 and seventeenth centuries, has completely disap- 
 peared. It is only in Spain and in Turkey that 
 this feeling can now be said to exist as a power 
 in the state.
 
 PUBLIC OPINION 223 
 
 The growth of indifference to what used to be 
 called political liberty, too, has been curiously 
 rapid. Political liberty, as the term was under- 
 stood at the beginning of this century, was the 
 power of having something to say in the election 
 of ah 1 officers of the state, and through them of 
 influencing legislation and administration ; or, 
 in other words, of enforcing strict responsibility 
 for its acts on the part of the governing body 
 towards the people. There is apparently much 
 less importance attached to this now than for- 
 merly, as is shown by the surrender of the power 
 of nomination to " the bosses " in so many 
 states ; and in New York by the growing readi- 
 ness to pass legislation without debate under 
 direction from the outside. Similarly, socialism, 
 which seems to be the political creed which has 
 strongest hold on the working classes to-day, is 
 essentially a form of domination over the whole 
 individual by the constituted authorities, with- 
 out consulting him. The only choice left him is 
 one of an occupation, and of the kind of food he 
 will eat and the kind of clothes he will wear. 
 As there is to be no war, no money, no idleness, 
 and no taxation, there will be no politics, and 
 consequently no discussion. In truth, the num- 
 ber of men who would hail such a form of society 
 with delight, as relieving them from all anxiety 
 about sustenance, and from ah 1 need of skill or
 
 224 PUBLIC OPINION 
 
 character, is probably large and increasing. For 
 similar reasons, the legislation which excites most 
 attention is apt to be legislation which in some 
 way promises an increase of physical comfort. 
 It is rarely, for instance, that a trades union pr 
 workingman's association shows much interest in 
 any law except one which promises to increase 
 wages, or shorten hours of labor, or lower fares 
 or the price of something. Protection, to which 
 a very large number of workingmen are attached, 
 is only in their eyes a mode of keeping wages 
 up. " Municipal ownership " is another name 
 for low fares; restrictions on immigration are a 
 mode of keeping competitors out of the labor 
 market. 
 
 All these things, and things of a similar nature, 
 attract a great deal of interest; the encroach- 
 ments of the bosses on constitutional govern- 
 ment, comparatively little. The first attempt to 
 legislate for the economical benefit of the masses 
 was the abolition of the English corn laws. It 
 may seem at first sight that the enactment of the 
 corn laws was an economical measure. But such 
 was not the character in which the corn laws 
 were originally advocated. They were called for, 
 ihrst, in order to make England self-supporting 
 in case of a war with foreign powers, a contin- 
 gency which was constantly present to men's 
 minds in the last century ; secondly, to keep up
 
 PUBLIC OPINION 225 
 
 the country gentry, or " landed interest," as it 
 Tvas called, which then had great political value 
 and importance. The abolition of these laws 
 was avowedly carried out simply for the purpose 
 of cheapening and enlarging the loaf. It was 
 the beginning of a series of measures in various 
 countries which aim merely at increasing human 
 physical comfort, whatever their effect on the 
 structure of the government or on the play of 
 political institutions. This foreshadowed the 
 greatest change which has come over the modern 
 world. It is now governed mainly by ideas 
 about the distribution of commodities. This dis- 
 tribution is not only what most occupies public 
 opinion, but what has most to do with forming it.
 
 THE AUSTKALIAN DEMOCRACY 
 
 THE only really democratic experiment, beside 
 our own, going on in the world to-day, is that of 
 the English Australian colonies. All others are 
 more or less disturbed by the political or social 
 traditions of an anterior regime. Nowhere else y 
 therefore, can so much instruction be obtained 
 as to the probable effect of popular government 
 on laws and manners. There is no other demo- 
 cracy whose beginning so nearly resembles ours. 
 We began, it is true, at a much earlier period^ 
 under the influence of aristocratic and religious 
 ideas which have lost their force, and we began 
 with a very different class of men. Our first 
 settlers were a selected body, with strong prepos- 
 sessions in favor of some sort of organization, 
 which, whatever it was to be, was certainly not 
 to be democratic. They sought to reproduce the 
 monarchical or aristocratic world they had left, 
 as far as circumstances would permit. It may 
 fairly be said that the society they tried to estab- 
 lish on this side of the Atlantic was the society 
 of the Old World, with some improvements, 
 notably another kind of established church. By 
 the time the Australian colonies were founded,
 
 THE AUSTRALIAN DEMOCRACY 227 
 
 however, that is, ahout a century ago, what 
 was most antiquated in the American regime 
 had fairly departed. The colonies here had 
 sloughed off a good deal of the European incrus- 
 tation, and had frankly entered on the demo- 
 cratic regime, but with social foundations such 
 as the Australians could not claim. 
 
 Australia originated with New South Wales, 
 and was first settled as a convict station. Most 
 of the earliest emigrants were men transported 
 for crime, and long treated as slaves. The first 
 step taken toward social organization was the 
 bestowal of large tracts of land on English capi- 
 talists, to he used as sheep-farms, with the con- 
 victs as herdsmen or laborers. Free emigrants 
 came slowly to open up agriculture as a field 
 of industry. As they increased, hostility to the 
 large sheep-farmers was developed in a process 
 somewhat similar to the extinction of the great 
 manors in New York. In fact, New South 
 Wales passed nearly half a century in getting 
 rid of the defects of its foundation, in clarifying 
 its social constitution, and in bringing itself into 
 something like harmony with the other civilized 
 societies of the world. In 1842 the colonies 
 received a legislature, a large proportion of the 
 members of which were nominees of the crown. 
 During the previous half-century they were gov- 
 erned despotically by governors, often broken-
 
 228 THE AUSTRALIAN DEMOCRACY 
 
 down aristocrats, sent out from England. Their 
 society was composed largely of the great sheep- 
 farmers and of actual or emancipated convicts. 
 Religion and morals were for a time at the low- 
 est ebb. The institution of marriage hardly 
 existed. The multitude of female convicts and 
 the thinness of population in the interior, ren- 
 dered concubinage easy and general. The press 
 had not begun to draw respectable talent from 
 England, and the newspapers, such as they were, 
 were largely in the hands of ex-convicts. There 
 was nothing that could be called public opinion. 
 The only appeal against any wrong-doing lay to 
 the home government, which was then six months 
 away; and so deeply seated was the belief in 
 England that Australia was simply a community 
 of criminals, that any appeals received but little 
 attention. 
 
 The first thing that could be called a political 
 party in the colony consisted of Irish Catholic 
 immigrants, who had gone out in large numbers 
 in 1841, under the stimulation of government 
 grants and bounties. They acted rather as Cath- 
 olics than as citizens, and, as usual, under the 
 leadership of their clergy. A responsible legis- 
 lature of two houses was not established until 
 1856. The colonies started with the English, or 
 cabinet system ; that is, with ministries selected 
 or approved by Parliament. This was the first
 
 THE AUSTRALIAN DEMOCRACY 229 
 
 great difference between us and them. The 
 framers of the American Constitution decided, 
 for reasons which seemed to them good, to give 
 the executive a definite term of office, independ- 
 ent of legislative approval. This they conceived 
 to be necessary to the establishment of complete 
 independence between the different departments 
 of the government. The separation of the ex- 
 ecutive, judicial, and legislative branches held 
 a very high place in the minds of all political 
 speculators in the eighteenth century, after Mon- 
 tesquieu had dwelt on its necessity. Therefore, 
 the founders of the American republic made each 
 branch independent in its own sphere, with its 
 own term of office, which the others could neither 
 lengthen nor abridge. This is what is called 
 the presidential system. The cabinet system 
 makes the executive not only part and parcel of 
 the legislative branch, but dependent on it for 
 existence. A vote of the majority can change 
 the executive, while the executive can order a 
 renewal of the legislative branch; that is, dis- 
 solve it. The presidential system is undoubtedly 
 the best defense that could be devised against 
 democratic changeableness, or the influence on 
 the government of sudden bursts of popular feel- 
 ing. But it almost goes to the other extreme. 
 It is very difficult to make any change in public 
 policy or legislation in the United States in less
 
 230 THE AUSTRALIAN DEMOCRACY 
 
 than five years. In Australia, under the cabinet 
 system, six changes may be made in a year. In 
 New South Wales, there have been forty-one 
 ministries, doubtless with entirely different views 
 on important subjects, in thirty-seven years, or 
 more than one change each year. The same 
 phenomena exhibit themselves in all the coun- 
 tries which have adopted the British system, or 
 in which the royal prerogative still remains a 
 legislative force. Unhappily, in the colonies as 
 in France, these frequent changes do not always 
 mean changes of policy. Ministries are too often 
 overthrown simply to satisfy personal rancor, or 
 disappointment, or jealousy. 
 
 Another point of difference between our be- 
 ginning and that of the Australians was that 
 they had no constitution, as we call it; that is, 
 no organic law, paramount to all other laws, and 
 which all legislators were bound to respect in legis- 
 lating. Every government was organized under 
 an English act of Parliament, but this simply pro- 
 vided a framework, and placed almost no restric- 
 tions on the subjects of legislation, because there 
 are no restrictions on the action of the Eng- 
 lish Parliament itself. The will of Parliament 
 is the British constitution, and the will of the 
 Australian legislatures is the constitution of the 
 colonies, provided they make no attack on the 
 supremacy of the British crown; that is, they
 
 THE AUSTRALIAN DEMOCRACY 231 
 
 may do anything which Parliament may do, pro- 
 vided they obey the imperial law which sets them 
 up. This has some good effects, and some bad 
 ones. It decidedly increases the sense of respon- 
 sibility, in which our legislatures are so often 
 wanting. The Australians know that any act 
 they pass will be executed, that no intervention 
 of the courts on constitutional grounds can be 
 looked for, and that if the law works badly the 
 action of public sentiment will be immediate, and 
 may lead to the overthrow of the ministry for 
 the time being. In fact, a law paramount, drawn 
 up by picked men, assembling for the purpose at 
 stated intervals of twenty years or less, and safe- 
 guarding all the primary social rights against 
 popular passion or impulse or legislative corrup- 
 tion, and interpreted by the courts, is a device 
 peculiar to the United States. It is the only 
 really valid check on democracy ever devised, 
 but it is doubtful whether it could now be set 
 up anywhere else with effect. Its Revolutionary 
 origin has surrounded it with a sanctity which 
 it would be difficult to give any court created in 
 our day and gainsaying the popular will. On 
 the other hand, this absence of constitution gives 
 legislatures a freedom in trying social experi- 
 ments greater than ours enjoy, though they en- 
 joy a good deal. There is hardly any mode of 
 dealing with private property or private rights
 
 232 THE AUSTRALIAN DEMOCRACY 
 
 which an Australian legislature may not attempt, 
 hardly any experiment in taxation which it may 
 not try. Its sole restraint lies in the quick action 
 of popular reprobation. 
 
 These two facts the adoption of the cabinet 
 system from England, and the absence of a con- 
 stitution containing restraints on legislation 
 are the main differences between our democracy 
 and that of Australia. But every Australian 
 colony, however strong its aspirations to political 
 independence, is influenced in what may be called 
 its manners by the mother country. Australia be- 
 gan its political life with as close an approach to 
 an aristocracy as a new country can make, in the 
 existence of the " squatters," most of whom were 
 capitalists or scions of good English families. 
 These men obtained large grants of land from 
 the government for sheep-farming, which in the 
 beginning they managed with convicts whom 
 they hired from the state, and whom they were 
 permitted to flog in case of misbehavior. Their 
 life, in short, was very nearly that of the old 
 cotton-planter in the South, with the "patri- 
 archal " element wanting. 
 
 The first work of the new democracy was to 
 overthrow them, and take their large tracts of 
 land away from them. But the democracy did 
 not succeed, and has not succeeded, in prevent- 
 ing the formation of an upper class of the "Eng-
 
 THE AUSTRALIAN DEMOCRACY 233 
 
 lish gentleman" type. This is what the suc- 
 cessful Australian still strives to be. He does 
 not become " a man of the people," in our sense, 
 and does not boast of his humble origin and 
 early struggles, as much as our millionaire is apt 
 to do. The influence of this type was prolonged 
 and strengthened by the large emigration to 
 Australia of university graduates from England, 
 during the fifties and sixties, after the colonies 
 had fairly entered on free government, when a 
 successful career at the bar and in public life had 
 become possible. These, again, were reinforced 
 by a still larger emigration of broken-down men 
 of good family, who, if they added but little 
 to the wealth or morality of the colonies, did a 
 good deal to preserve the predominance of Eng- 
 lish conventional ideas. For instance, one of 
 the very strong English traditions is the right 
 of men of education and prominence to public 
 offices ; that is, men previously raised above the 
 crowd by wealth or rank or education, or by 
 some outward sign of distinction. This was per- 
 petuated in the colonies by their connection with 
 England in the way I have mentioned. It made 
 the careers of such men as Robert Low and 
 Gavan Duffy and Dr. Pensores, and many others, 
 easy and natural, and made the breaking away 
 from English ideas on social questions more diffi- 
 cult. Perhaps as important was the fact that it
 
 234 THE AUSTRALIAN DEMOCRACY 
 
 preserved the English way of living as the thing 
 for the " self-made man " to aspire to. How 
 strong this influence is in the Anglo-Saxon world 
 may be inferred from the difficulty of keeping 
 English influence in these matters in due sub- 
 ordination in this country. Nearly all our rich 
 people, and people who have enjoyed any social 
 success in England, are apt to revert to English 
 life, and have to be ridiculed and denounced in 
 the press in order to make them continue " good 
 Americans." 
 
 In democracies which still look to England as 
 " home," and which receive large bodies of im- 
 migrants educated in England, it can be easily 
 understood how great must be the English in- 
 fluence on the colonial way of looking at both 
 politics and society. In later days, when the 
 democracy has fairly broken loose from the con- 
 trol of the Foreign Office, gifted men of the 
 earlier American kind that is, good speakers 
 or writers have in a large degree preserved 
 their sway. The multiplicity of new questions, 
 and the possibility of getting into power at any 
 time by overthrowing the existing ministry, have 
 naturally kept alive the art of discussion as the 
 art which leads to political eminence. Thus far, 
 undoubtedly, this has prevented the rise of any 
 system like our caucus, which attaches little im- 
 portance to speech or power of persuasion. In
 
 THE AUSTRALIAN DEMOCRACY 235 
 
 y 
 
 Australia a man can hardly get high office with- 
 out a general election. He has to produce a 
 change of opinion in the legislature, or so great 
 a change of opinion out of doors as to intimidate 
 the legislature, either in order to see his policy 
 adopted by the men actually in power, or to be 
 charged himself with the formation of a new 
 ministry. That is, the man most successful in 
 exposition, who identifies himself by speech most 
 prominently with some pending question, be- 
 comes, under the cabinet system, the man enti- 
 tled to power, and no caucus nomination could 
 either give it to him or deprive him of it. This 
 more than aught else has made easy individual 
 prominence by means of parliamentary arts. Of 
 course, there is behind all talk a good deal of 
 intrigue and chicanery, but talk there has to 
 be. The cabinet system or the possibility of 
 changing majorities in the legislature at any time 
 without waiting for a fixed term makes it 
 absolutely necessary that a successful politician 
 should be able to express himself. He may be 
 uneducated, in the technical sense of the term, 
 but he must be master of his own subject, and 
 be able to give a good account of it. He has 
 to propose something energetically, in order to 
 hold his place. Thus, Sir Charles Cowper and 
 Robert Low had to connect themselves with the 
 educational system, Sir Henry Parkes with the
 
 236 THE AUSTRALIAN DEMOCRACY 
 
 land system, and so on. The minister, whoever 
 he is, is in constant danger of losing his place ; 
 the " outs" are constantly eager to displace him, 
 and they displace him, as in England, hy bring- 
 ing up new questions, or new aspects of old 
 ones. 
 
 The system, as I have already said, has the 
 well-known defect of instability in the executive. 
 It means in Australia, as it means in France and 
 Italy, incessant change or frequent changes. It 
 is what our founders dreaded when they put the 
 President in office for four years, and Congress 
 for two years, and made each independent of 
 the other. But it has the effect of preventing 
 the formation of strict party ties, controlled hy 
 a manager who has not to render any public 
 account of his management. In other words, 
 the caucus ruled by the boss is hardly possible 
 under it. The boss is hardly possible, if he has 
 to explain the reasons of his actions, and to say 
 what he thinks the party policy ought to be. 
 "Whether this system would survive the forma- 
 tion of a confederacy like ours, and the necessity 
 of more potent machinery to get a larger multi- 
 tude to take part in elections, is something which 
 may reasonably be doubted. In large demo- 
 cracies the future probably belongs to the presi- 
 dential system, with its better arrangements for 
 the formation and preservation of strong parties,
 
 THE AUSTRALIAN DEMOCRACY 237 
 
 working under stricter discipline and with less 
 discussion. 
 
 The cabinet system, however, has had one 
 excellent effect: it compels every minister who 
 appeals to the constituencies for power to state 
 at length and with minuteness his claims on their 
 support. He sets forth his views and plans with 
 a fullness and an amount of argumentation 
 which are never met with nowadays in our party 
 platforms. He makes a real plea for confidence 
 in him personally, and he issues his programme 
 immediately before the election which is to de- 
 cide his fate. His opponent, or rival, issues a 
 counter one, and the two together place before 
 the constituencies an explanation of the political 
 situation such as our voters rarely get. Each 
 not only explains and argues in defense of his 
 programme, but makes promises, which if he 
 succeeds he may be almost immediately called 
 on to fulfill. These two documents are, in fact, 
 much more business-like than anything which 
 our political men lay before us. In our presi- 
 dential system, no one in particular is responsible 
 for legislation, and the Congress elected one year 
 does not meet till the next. The effect of these 
 two circumstances has given our party platform 
 a vagueness and a sonorousness, a sort of detach- 
 ment from actual affairs, which make it some- 
 what resemble a Pope's encyclical. It does not
 
 238 THE AUSTRALIAN DEMOCRACY 
 
 contain a legislative programme. There is, in 
 fact, no person competent to make one, because 
 no person, or set of persons, would be charged 
 with fulfilling it. It is " the party " which the 
 voter supports, and the party is a body too in- 
 determinate to be held to any sort of account- 
 ability. The platform, therefore, confines itself 
 to expressing views, instead of making promises. 
 It reveals the hopes, the fears, the dislikes, and 
 the admirations of the party rather than its inten- 
 tions. It expresses sympathy with nationalities 
 struggling for freedom, affection for workingmen 
 and a strong desire that people who hire them 
 shall pay them a "fair wage," detestation of 
 various forms of wrong-doing on the part of their 
 opponents, and denunciation of the mischiefs to 
 the country which these opponents have wrought. 
 But it gives little inkling of what the party will 
 really do if it gets into power. If it does nothing 
 at all, it cannot be called to account except in 
 the same vague and indefinite way. Nobody 
 in particular is responsible for its shortcomings, 
 because all its members are responsible in the 
 same degree. 
 
 Take as an illustration of my meaning what 
 has occurred in this country with regard to the 
 existing currency difficulties. Both the Repub- 
 lican and Democratic platforms have declared in 
 favor of having a good currency, but the Demo-
 
 THE AUSTRALIAN DEMOCRACY 239 
 
 cratic platform simply demanded the coinage of 
 silver at a certain ratio to gold, and ascribed a 
 long list of evils to the failure of the nation to 
 furnish such a coinage ; it described these evils 
 in terms of philanthropy rather than of finance. 
 It did not offer any explanation, in detail, of the 
 way free coinage of silver at the sixteen to one 
 ratio, would work ; how it would affect foreign 
 exchange, or domestic investments, or creditors, 
 or savings-banks. It simply recommended the 
 plan passionately, as a just and humane thing, 
 and treated its opponents as sharks and tyrants. 
 No business man could learn anything from it 
 as to the prospects of his ventures under a silver 
 regime. The Republican platform, on the other 
 hand, declared its desire that the various kinds 
 of United States currency (ten in number) 
 should be of equal value. But it abstained 
 from saying precisely in what manner this equal- 
 ity of value would be preserved, and what steps 
 would be taken for the purpose. In spite of 
 the fact that it was dealing with a business 
 matter, it made no proposal which a business 
 man could weigh or even understand. The 
 result was that although Congress met within 
 four months of the election, and the election 
 had turned on the currency question, nothing 
 whatever was said or done about it. No one 
 in Congress felt any particular responsibility
 
 240 THE AUSTRALIAN DEMOCRACY 
 
 about it, or could be called to account for not 
 bringing it up or trying to settle it. Yet every 
 one could, or would, express cordial agreement 
 with the platform. 
 
 Under the Australian system things would 
 have gone differently. Mr. McKinley would 
 have issued an address to the electors, saying 
 distinctly that he stood for the gold standard, 
 setting forth the precise manner in which he 
 meant to deal with the various forms of United 
 States currency in case he were elected, and 
 promising to do it immediately on his election. 
 Mr. Bryan would have issued a counter mani- 
 festo, stating not simply his objections to the 
 gold standard, but the exact way in which he 
 meant to get rid of it, and the probable effect 
 of this action on trade and industry. Conse- 
 quently, after the election, one or other of them 
 would have met a Parliament which would have 
 demanded of him immediate legislation ; and if 
 he had failed to produce it promptly, he would 
 have been denounced as a traitor or an incom- 
 petent, and a vote of want of confidence would 
 have turned him out of office. In short, the 
 winning man would have had to produce at once 
 something like the plan which our Monetary 
 Commission, composed of men not in political 
 life at all, has laboriously formed. 
 
 There occurred in Queensland, when Sir
 
 THE AUSTRALIAN DEMOCRACY 241 
 
 George Bowen was governor, in 1867, a financial 
 crisis which makes clear the difference between 
 the Australian system and ours. The minis- 
 try had borrowed 1,000,000 sterling through 
 a Sydney bank, to be spent in public works. 
 The works had been begun, and 50,000 of the 
 money had been received and a large number of 
 men employed, when the bank failed. The 
 ministers in office instantly proposed to issue 
 " inconvertible government notes," like our 
 greenbacks during the war, and make them legal 
 tender in the colony. The governor informed 
 them that he should have to veto such a bill, as 
 his instructions required him to " reserve for the 
 Queen's pleasure " every bill whereby any paper 
 or other currency might be made a legal tender, 
 4t except the coin of the realm, or other gold or 
 silver coin." But the ministers persisted. The 
 populace of Brisbane were told by a few stump 
 orators that " an issue of unlimited greenbacks 
 would create unlimited funds for their employ- 
 ment on public works, while at the same time 
 it would ruin the bankers, squatters [great 
 sheep-farmers], and other capitalists," whom the 
 people hated. A so-called indignation meet- 
 ing was held, at which the governor and a 
 majority of the legislature were denounced in vio- 
 lent terms; several leading members of Parlia- 
 ment were ill-treated in the streets, and threats
 
 242 THE AUSTRALIAN DEMOCRACY 
 
 were even uttered of burning down Government 
 House. 1 
 
 The governor held firm, and insisted on meet- 
 ing the crisis by the issue of exchequer bills; so 
 the ministry resigned, and was succeeded by an- 
 other, which did issue the exchequer bills. Had 
 the governor not held his ground, the colony 
 would have been launched on a sea of irredeem- 
 able paper, from which escape would probably 
 have been difficult. In fact, there is little doubt 
 that it is the necessity of making their loans in 
 England, and thus getting the approval of Brit- 
 ish capitalists for their financial expedients^ 
 which has saved the colonies from even worse 
 excesses in currency matters. The immediate 
 responsibility of the minister for legislation must 
 make all crises short^ if sharp. No abnormal 
 financial situation in any of the Australian colo- 
 nies could last as long as ours has done, and 
 while they retain their connection with the Brit- 
 ish crown they will be preserved from the very 
 tempting device of irredeemable paper. 
 
 An effort has been made in some of the colo- 
 nies to get rid of changefulness in the executive 
 by electing the ministers by popular suffrage, 
 instead of having them elected by Parliament ; 
 but this attempt to depart from the cabinet sys- 
 
 1 Thirty Years of Colonial Government. From the Official 
 Papers of Sir G. F. Bowen.
 
 THE AUSTRALIAN DEMOCRACY 243 
 
 tern has apparently been made only by the 
 " labor party," or workingman's party, which 
 exists and grows, without having as yet been 
 successful in getting hold of office. Its main 
 strength seems to lie, as in this country, in influ- 
 ence ; that is, in alarming members of Parlia- 
 ment about its vote. It hangs over the heads of 
 the legislators in terrorem, in closely divided 
 constituencies, but does not often make its way 
 into Parliament itself, though those of its mem- 
 bers who have been elected seem to acquit them- 
 selves very creditably. 
 
 The first strong resemblance between our 
 experience and that of the Australians is to be 
 found in the educational system. The first 
 attempts at popular education, as might have 
 been expected, were made by the clergy of the 
 Anglican Church, the only church which had 
 official recognition in the early days of the colo- 
 nies. All money voted by the government for 
 this purpose was given to the clergy and dis- 
 tributed by them. The instruction was mainly 
 religious, and the catechism and reading of the 
 Scriptures in the Protestant version played a 
 prominent part in it. From the beginning, the 
 opposition to this, on the part of all the other 
 denominations, was very strong. As in America, 
 the opposition of the Catholics was not directed 
 against denominational teaching. They were
 
 244 THE AUSTRALIAN DEMOCRACY 
 
 willing to have the state money equally divided 
 among the clergy, so that each denomination 
 might control the instruction given to its own 
 children. To this plan all the other denomina- 
 tions, except the Anglicans, were violently hos- 
 tile; so that on this question the Protestant 
 Episcopalians and the Catholics were united. 
 Their clergy wanted the state money for their 
 own Mnd of education, while those of other 
 denominations were in favor of secular educa- 
 tion, or common schools, paid for largely by the 
 state, though not wholly, as here. 
 
 It would be tedious to go over the history of 
 the struggle which resulted in the establishment 
 of state schools, with secular teaching. It bore 
 a close resemblance to our own struggle, but dif- 
 fered in having for the efforts of the Protestant 
 Episcopalians powerful support from the home 
 government, which then, as now, sympathized 
 with denominational teaching. It ended, finally, 
 in the triumph of the secular schools. Secular 
 education seems to be the established democratic 
 method of teaching the young, though the de- 
 sire of the clergy to keep control of education 
 is giving it an anti-religious trend in some coun- 
 tries, France, for instance. The agitation of 
 this subject in Australia has brought out the 
 interesting fact that the Catholic population, 
 almost wholly Irish and very large, sides with
 
 THE AUSTRALIAN DEMOCRACY 245 
 
 the priests on nearly every public question, the 
 educational question among others. This is 
 exactly what has occurred in England. In the 
 late conflict over the schools in England, the 
 Irish voted with the Tories in favor of denomi- 
 national teaching. Like most national oddities, 
 there is for this an historical explanation. The 
 banishment of the old Irish gentry, beginning 
 in Elizabeth's time, and ending with the Revo- 
 lution of 1688, deprived the Irish of their natu- 
 ral political leaders. The new gentry were for- 
 eigners in race and religion, and in political 
 sympathies. This threw the people back on the 
 priests, who became their only advisers possessing 
 any education or knowledge of the world, and 
 assumed without difficulty a political leadership 
 which has never been shaken to this day, in spite 
 of the growing activity of the lay element in Irish 
 politics. No Irish layman has, as yet, proved a 
 very successful politician, in the long run, who 
 has not managed to keep the clergy at his back. 
 It may be said that, on the whole, the educa- 
 tional movement in Australia has been controlled 
 by influences common to the rest of the civil- 
 ized world. In nearly all countries there is a 
 struggle going on which ended with us many 
 years ago to wrest the control of the popular 
 schools, wherever they exist, from the hands of 
 the clergy, who have held it for twelve hundred
 
 246 THE AUSTRALIAN DEMOCRACY 
 
 years. No characteristic of the old regime in 
 politics is more prominent than the belief that 
 the priests or ministers only should have charge 
 of the training of youth. Almost the whole his- 
 tory of the educational movement in this century 
 is the history of the efforts of the " Liberals" or 
 " Radicals " to oust them. 
 
 The Australians resemble us also in having an 
 immense tract of land at the disposition of the 
 state. They came into possession much later, 
 "when waste lands were more accessible, before 
 they were covered by traditions of any sort, and 
 when the air had become charged with the 
 spirit of experimentation. They have accord- 
 ingly tried to do various things with the land, 
 which we never thought of. South Australia, 
 for instance, had the plan of giving grants of 
 land to small cooperative associations, to be man- 
 aged by trustees, and supplied with capital by 
 a loan from the state of not more than $250 a 
 head. The state, in short, agreed to do what 
 our Populists think it ought to do, lend money 
 to the farmers at a low rate of interest. Some of 
 these associations were plainly communistic, and 
 the members were often brought together simply 
 by poverty. As a whole, they have not suc- 
 ceeded. Some have broken up; others remain 
 and pay the government its interest, but no one 
 expects that it will ever get back the principal.
 
 THE AUSTRALIAN DEMOCRACY 247 
 
 In New South Wales, the state became a land- 
 lord on an extensive scale on the Henry George 
 plan, and the question of rents then grew into a 
 great political question. Political " pressure " 
 is brought to bear on the fixing of the rents, and 
 the management, of course, gives a very large 
 field for " pulls " and " influence." In Queens- 
 land, which has a tropical sugar region, not only 
 have lands been rented by the state, but cheap 
 carriage has been provided for farm and dairy 
 produce on the state railway, bonuses have been 
 paid on the export of dairy produce, advances 
 have been made to the proprietors of works for 
 freezing meat, and it has been proposed to estab- 
 lish state depots in London for the receipt and 
 distribution of frozen meat. One act makes pro- 
 vision, under certain conditions, for a state guar- 
 antee for loans contracted to build sugar-works. 
 In New Zealand, there is a graduated tax in- 
 tended to crush out large landholders ; but any 
 landholder who is dissatisfied with his assessment 
 can require the government to purchase at its 
 own valuation, and land is rented in small hold- 
 ings. The government has also borrowed large 
 sums of money to lend to farmers on mortgage. 
 It sends lecturers on butter-making and fruit- 
 growing around the country. It pays wages to 
 labor associations who choose to settle on state 
 lands and clear or improve them, and then allows
 
 248 THE AUSTRALIAN DEMOCRACY 
 
 them to take up the holdings thus improved. It 
 keeps a " state farm," on which it gives work to 
 the unemployed. All these things, of course, 
 give it a great number of favors to bestow or 
 withhold, and open a wide field for political in- 
 trigue. 
 
 As a general rule, the suffrage is adult and 
 male, but there is a property qualification for 
 voters for the upper houses of the legislatures, 
 answering to our Senates. Members of both 
 houses are paid a small salary. At first they all 
 served voluntarily, as in England, and the pay- 
 ment of members was not brought about with- 
 out a good deal of agitation. But the argument 
 which carried the day for payment was, not, as 
 might be supposed, the justice of giving poor 
 men a chance of seats, but the necessity, in a 
 busy community, of securing for the work of 
 government the services of many competent men 
 who could not afford to give their time without 
 pay. The " plum " idea of a seat in the legisla- 
 ture can hardly be said to have made its appear- 
 ance yet. The necessity of doing something for 
 " labor " very soon became prominent in colonial 
 policy, and one of its first triumphs was the con- 
 traction of very large loans in England for the 
 construction of public works, mainly railroads 
 and common roads, the creation of village settle- 
 ments and the advance of money to them. The
 
 249 
 
 result of all this, after a while, was tremendous 
 financial collapse, and the discharge of large 
 bodies of the very laborers for whose benefit the 
 works were undertaken. This calamity seems 
 to have stimulated the tendency to tax the rich 
 heavily, and to foster the policy of protection. 
 Trade is promoted not simply by duties on im- 
 ports, but by state aid to exports. A depot in 
 London, which does not pay its own expenses, 
 takes charge of Australian goods and guarantees 
 their quality; bonuses are given to particular 
 classes of producers, and there is even talk of 
 a " produce export department " of the govern- 
 ment. The protectionist policy has taken pos- 
 session of the Australian mind even more firmly 
 than it has taken possession of the mind of the 
 Republican party here. A free-trader comes 
 nearer being looked upon as a " crank " in most 
 of the colonies than he does here. But the 
 " infant industry " there has solid claims to nur- 
 ture which it does not possess in this country. 
 In fact, the dominance of the protectionist the- 
 ory is so strong that it forms one of the obstacles 
 in the promotion of the proposed Australian con- 
 federation, as no colony is quite willing to give 
 up its right to tax imports from all the others, 
 and still less is it willing to join Mr. Chamber- 
 lain's followers and let in free the goods of the 
 mother country. We may conjecture from this
 
 250 THE AUSTRALIAN DEMOCRACY 
 
 what obstacles the policy of free internal trade 
 between our states would have met with at the 
 foundation of our government, had America been 
 more of a manufacturing community, and had 
 intercommunication been easier. The difficulty 
 of carriage a hundred years ago formed a natural 
 tariff, which made the competition of foreigners 
 seem comparatively unimportant. 
 
 From the bestowal of responsible government 
 in the fifties, down to 1893, nearly all the colo- 
 nies reveled in the ease with which they could 
 borrow money in England. There was a great 
 rush to make state railroads, in order to open 
 up the lands of the great landholders to pro- 
 jects favored by labor, and to give employment 
 to workingmen; and, after the railroads were 
 made, they carried workingmen for next to no- 
 thing. Along with this came an enormous de- 
 velopment of the civil service, somewhat like 
 our increase of pensions. New South Wales 
 alone had 200,000 persons in government offices, 
 at a salary of $13,000,000, and 10,000 railroad 
 employees to boot. This gave the ministries for 
 the time being great influence, which was in- 
 creased by the fact that the state was the owner 
 of large tracts of land, which it rented on favor- 
 able terms to favored tenants. The excitement 
 of apparent prosperity, too, brought into the 
 legislature large numbers of men to whom salary
 
 THE AUSTRALIAN DEMOCRACY 251 
 
 was important, and the result was perhaps the 
 first serious decline in the character of the Aus- 
 tralian governments. The colonies were founded 
 between 1788 and 1855. Up to this time they 
 have spent $800,000,000 on public works. 
 They have made 80,000 miles of telegraph, and 
 10,000 miles of railway. Though they have a 
 revenue of only $117,500,000, they have already 
 a debt of $875,000,000. 
 
 These "good times" came to their natural 
 end. By 1893 the money was all spent, the 
 taxation was not sufficient to meet the interest, 
 the English capitalists refused further advances, 
 the banks failed on all sides, and the colonies 
 were left with large numbers of unemployed on 
 their hands. There was nothing for it but to 
 spend more money on "relief works," and to 
 keep almost permanently in the employment of 
 the state large bodies of men, who liked it sim- 
 ply because it was easy, and because hard times 
 were a sufficient excuse for seeking it. What 
 one learns from the experience of the colonies in 
 the matter of expenditure is the difficulty, in 
 a democratic government, of moderation of any 
 description, if it once abandons the policy of 
 laissez faire, and undertakes to be a providence 
 for the masses. There is no limit to the human 
 appetite for unearned or easily earned money. 
 No class is exempt from it. Under the old
 
 262 THE AUSTRALIAN DEMOCRACY 
 
 regime, the aristocrats got all the sinecures, the 
 pensions, and the light jobs of every description. 
 One of the results of the triumph of democracy 
 has been to throw open this source of gratifica- 
 tion to the multitude, and every attempt made 
 to satisfy the multitude, in this field, has failed. 
 When the French opened the national workshops 
 in Paris in 1848, the government speedily found 
 that it was likely to have the whole working 
 class of Paris on its hands ; when we started our 
 pension list, we found that peace soon became 
 nearly as expensive as war ; and when the Aus- 
 tralians undertook to develop the country on 
 money borrowed by the state, there was no re- 
 straint on then: expenditure, except the inability 
 to find any more lenders. The Australian finan- 
 cial crisis was brought about, not by any popular 
 perception that the day of reckoning was at 
 hand, but by the refusal of the British capital- 
 ists to make further loans. 
 
 It is in devices for the protection of labor 
 that most of this experimentation occurs. New 
 Zealand affords the best example of it. It pro- 
 vides elaborate legal protection for the eight- 
 hour day. A workman cannot consent to work 
 overtime without extra pay. The state sees 
 that he gets the extra pay. It looks closely 
 after the condition of women and children in 
 the factories. It sees that servant girls are not
 
 THE AUSTRALIAN DEMOCRACY 253 
 
 overcharged by the registry offices for getting 
 them places. It prescribes one half-holiday a 
 week for all persons employed in stores and 
 offices, and sees that they take it. It will not 
 allow even a shopkeeper who has no employees 
 to dispense with his half -holiday ; because if he 
 does not take it, his competition will injure 
 those who do. The " labor department " of the 
 government has an army of inspectors, who keep 
 a close watch on stores and factories, and prose- 
 cute violations of the law which they themselves 
 discover. They do not wait for complaints; 
 they ferret out infractions, so that the laborer 
 may not have to prejudice himself by making 
 charges. The department publishes a "journal" 
 once a month, which gives detailed reports of 
 the condition of the labor market in all parts of 
 the colony, and of the prosecutions which have 
 taken place anywhere of employers who have 
 violated the law. It provides insurance for old 
 age and early death, and guarantees every policy. 
 It gives larger policies for lower premiums than 
 any of the private offices, and depreciates the 
 private offices in its documents. It distributes 
 the profits of its business as bonuses among the 
 policy holders, and keeps a separate account for 
 teetotalers, so that they may get special advan- 
 tages from their abstinence. The "journal" 
 is, in fact, in a certain sense a labor manual, in
 
 254 THE AUSTRALIAN DEMOCRACY 
 
 which everything pertaining to the comfort o 
 labor is freely discussed. The poor accommoda- 
 tion provided for servants in hotels and restau- 
 rants is deplored, and so is the difficulty which 
 middle-aged men have in finding employment. 
 More attention to the morals and manners of 
 nursemaids is recommended. All the little 
 dodges of employers are exposed and punished. 
 If they keep the factory door fastened, they are 
 fined. If housekeepers pretend that their ser- 
 vants are lodgers, and therefore not liable to a 
 compulsory half -holiday, they are fined. If 
 manufacturers are caught allowing girls to take 
 their meals in a workshop, they are fined. 
 
 As far as I can make out, too, without visit- 
 ing the country, there is as yet no sign of re- 
 action against this minute paternal care of the 
 laborer. The tendency to use the powers of 
 the government chiefly for the promotion of the 
 comfort of the working classes, whether in the 
 matter of land settlement, education, or employ- 
 ment, seems to undergo no diminution. The 
 only thing which has ceased or slackened is the 
 borrowing of money for improvements. The 
 results of this borrowing have been so disastrous 
 that the present generation, at least, will hardly 
 try that experiment again. Every new country 
 possessing a great body of undeveloped resources, 
 like those of the North American continent and
 
 THE AUSTRALIAN DEMOCRACY 255 
 
 of Australia, must rely largely on foreign capital 
 for the working of its mines and the making of 
 its railroads. In this country all that work has- 
 been left to private enterprise, or, in other words, 
 to the activity of individuals and corporations. 
 Apart from some recent land-grants to railroads 
 and the sale of public lands at low rates, it may 
 be said that our government has done nothing 
 whatever to promote the growth of the national 
 wealth and population. The battle with nature, 
 on this continent, has been fought mainly by 
 individuals. The state, in America, has con- 
 tented itself, from the earliest times, with sup- 
 plying education and security. Down to a very 
 recent period the American was distinguished 
 from the men of all other countries, for looking 
 to the government for nothing but protection 
 to life and property. Tocqueville remarked 
 strongly on" this, when he visited the United 
 States in the thirties. This habit has been a 
 good deal broken up by the growth of the wage- 
 earning class since the war, by the greatly in- 
 creased reliance on the tariff, and by the gov- 
 ernment issue of paper money during the 
 rebellion. In the eyes of many, these things 
 have worked a change in the national character. 
 But we are still a great distance from the Aus- 
 tralian policy. The development of the country 
 by the state, in the Australian sense, has only
 
 266 THE AUSTRALIAN DEMOCRACY 
 
 recently entered into the heads of our labor and 
 socialist agitators. The American plan has hith- 
 erto been to facilitate private activity, to make 
 rising in the world easy for the energetic indi- 
 vidual, and to load him with praise and influence 
 after he has risen. This policy has been pur- 
 sued so far that, in the opinion of many, the 
 individual has become too powerful, and the 
 government too subservient to private interests. 
 There are in fact few, if any, states in the Union 
 which are not said to be dominated by rich men 
 or rich corporations. 
 
 This is a not unnatural result of two things. 
 One is, as I have said, our having left the devel- 
 opment of the country almost wholly to private 
 enterprises. It is individual capitalists who 
 have worked the mines, made the railroads, in- 
 vited the immigrants, and lent them money to 
 improve their farms. The other is the restric- 
 tions which the state constitutions, and the 
 courts construing them, place on the use of the 
 taxes. There are very few things the state in 
 America can constitutionally do with its revenue, 
 compared with what European governments can 
 do. Aids to education are tolerated, because 
 education is supposed to equip men more thor- 
 oughly for the battle of life, but the American 
 public shrinks from any other use of the public 
 funds for private benefit. We give little or no
 
 THE AUSTRALIAN DEMOCRACY 267 
 
 help to art, or literature, or charity, or hospitals. 
 We lend no money. We issued legal tender 
 paper under many protests and in a time of 
 great national trial, have never ceased to regret 
 it, and shall probably never do it again. We are 
 angry when we find that any one enjoys com- 
 forts or luxury at the expense of the state. We 
 cannot bear sinecures. But our plunge into 
 pensions since the war shows that there now 
 exists among us the same strong tendency to get 
 things out of the state, and to rely on its 
 bounty, which prevails in Australia. It is diffi- 
 cult to resist the conclusion that at present we 
 owe a good deal of what remains of laissez faire 
 in our policy to our constitutions and courts. 
 We owe the constitutions and the courts to the 
 habits formed in an earlier stage of American 
 history. It was the bad or good fortune of the 
 Australian colonies to enter on political life just 
 as the let-alone policy was declining under the 
 influence of the humanitarian feeling which the 
 rise of the democracy has brought with it every- 
 where. More constitution than was supplied by 
 the enabling acts of the British Parliament was 
 never thought of, and the British Parliament 
 did not think of imposing any restraints on 
 legislation except those which long custom or 
 British opinion imposed on Parliament itself. 
 The result is that Australia is absolutely free
 
 258 THE AUSTRALIAN DEMOCRACY 
 
 to democratic experimentation under extremely 
 favorable circumstances. In each colony the 
 state has apparently existed for the benefit of 
 the working classes, who must always constitute 
 the majority of the people in every community, 
 and the masses have been provided with work 
 and protection, in complete disregard of Euro- 
 pean traditions. The experiment has turned out 
 pretty well, owing to the abundance of land, the 
 natural wealth of the country, and the fineness 
 of the climate. But each colony is forming its 
 political habits, and I cannot resist the conclu- 
 sion that some of them are habits which are 
 likely to plague the originators hereafter. For 
 instance, the task of finding work for the un- 
 employed, and borrowing money for the purpose, 
 though this generation has seen it fail utterly in 
 the first trial, will probably be resorted to again, 
 with no more fortunate results. Nor can I be- 
 lieve that the growing paternalism, the sedulous 
 care of the business interests of the masses, will 
 not end by diminishing self -reliance, and increas- 
 ing dependence on the state. 
 
 The worst effects of these two agencies, of 
 course, in a country of such wonderful resources 
 as Australia, must be long postponed. There 
 are hindrances to progress in the direction 
 of pure " collectivism " yet in existence, many 
 problems to be solved, Old World influences to
 
 THE AUSTRALIAN DEMOCRACY 259 
 
 be got rid of, before Australia finds herself per- 
 fectly free from the trammels which the regime 
 of competition still throws around every modern 
 society. But so far as I can judge from the 
 accounts of even the most impartial observers, 
 every tendency which is causing us anxiety or 
 alarm here is at work there, without any hin- 
 drance from constitutions ; though there is great 
 comfort among the people, and there is a hope- 
 fulness which cannot but exist in any new coun- 
 try with immense areas of vacant land and a 
 rapidly growing population. 
 
 One check to all leveling tendencies is the 
 extremely strong hold which the competitive sys- 
 tem has taken of the Anglo-Saxon race. There 
 is no other race in which there is still so much 
 of the rude energy of the earlier world, in 
 which men have such joy in rivalry and find it 
 so hard to surrender personal advantages. This 
 renders communal life of any kind, or any spe- 
 cies of enforced equality, exceedingly difficult. 
 It will probably endanger the permanence of all 
 the social experimentation in Australia, as soon 
 as this experimentation plainly gives evidence of 
 bestowing special advantages on the weak, or 
 lazy, or unenterprising. There is not in Austra- 
 lia the same extravagant admiration of wealth 
 as a sign of success that there is here, but there 
 are signs of its coming. The state has under-
 
 260 THE AUSTRALIAN DEMOCRACY 
 
 taken to do so many things, however, through 
 which individuals make fortunes here, that its 
 coming may be slow. The wealthy Australian, 
 who dislikes rude colonial ways, and prefers to 
 live in England, is already a prominent figure in 
 London society, and, like the rich Europeanized 
 American, he is an object of great reprobation 
 to the plain Australian, who has not yet " made 
 his pile " and cannot go abroad. Then there is 
 a steady growth of national pride, which is dis- 
 playing itself in all sorts of ways, in litera- 
 ture, art, and above all athletics, as well as in 
 trade and commerce. The development of ath- 
 letic and sporting tastes generally is greater 
 than elsewhere, and competition is the life of 
 athletics. An athlete is of little account until 
 he has beaten somebody in something. " The 
 record " is the record of superiority of somebody 
 in something over other people. The " duffer " 
 is the man who can never win anything. The 
 climate helps to foster these tastes, and the 
 abundance of everything makes the cultivation 
 of them easy ; but they are tastes which must 
 always make the sinking of superiority or, in 
 other words, any communal system difficult. 
 Australia may develop a higher type of charac- 
 ter or better equipment for the battle of life, 
 and more numerous opportunities, but it is 
 hardly likely to develop any new form of society.
 
 THE AUSTRALIAN DEMOCRACY 261 
 
 When the struggle grows keener, we are not 
 likely to see a corresponding growth of state 
 aid. 
 
 The very rapidity of the experimentation now 
 going on promises to bring about illuminating 
 crises earlier there than here. Probably we 
 shall not get our currency experience here for 
 many years to come. Were the Australians 
 engaged in trying our problem, they would reach 
 a solution in one or two years. We are likely in 
 the next hundred years to see a great many new 
 social ventures tried, something which the wreck 
 of authority makes almost inevitable ; but there 
 seems no reason to believe that the desire of the 
 Anglo-Saxon variety of human nature to profit 
 by superiority in any quality will disappear. 
 The cabinet system of government is in itself 
 a strong support to individuality, for reasons- I 
 have already given. 
 
 Another steadying influence in Australia, per- 
 haps one of the most powerful hi a democratic 
 community, is the press. The press, from all I 
 can learn, is still serious, able, and influential. 
 It gives very large space to athletics and similar 
 amusements, but seems to have retained a high 
 and potent position in the discussions of the day. 
 The love of triviality which has descended on 
 the American press like a flood, since the war, 
 has apparently passed by that of Australia. Why
 
 262 THE AUSTRALIAN DEMOCRACY 
 
 this should be, I confess I have not been able 
 to discover, and can hardly conjecture. If we 
 judge by what has happened in America, it 
 would be easy to conclude that the press in all 
 democracies is sure to become somewhat puerile, 
 easily occupied with small things, and prone to 
 flippant treatment of great subjects. This is 
 true of the French press, in a way ; but in that 
 case something of the tendency may be ascribed 
 to temperament, and something to want of prac- 
 tice in self-government. I cannot see any signs 
 of it in the country press in England. That, 
 so far as I have been able to observe, continues 
 grave, decorous, and mature. There is nothing 
 of the boyish spirit in it which pervades much of 
 our journalism. The weight which still attaches 
 to the tastes and opinions of an educated upper 
 class may account for this in some degree, but 
 the fact is that Australian journals have pre- 
 served these very characteristics, although the 
 beginnings of Australian journalism were as bad 
 as possible. Its earliest editing was done by ex- 
 convicts, and the journals which these men set 
 on foot were very like those that have the worst 
 reputation among us for venality and triviality- 
 Strange to say, the community did not sit down 
 under them. There was an immediate rising 
 against this sort of editors in New South Wales. 
 Their control of leading newspapers was treated
 
 THE AUSTRALIAN DEMOCRACY 263 
 
 as a scandal too great to be borne, and they were 
 driven out of the profession. The newspapers 
 then passed largely into the hands of young uni- 
 versity men who had come out from England to 
 seek their fortunes ; they gave journalism a tone 
 which has lasted till now. The opinions of the 
 press still count in politics. It can still discredit 
 or overthrow a ministry, because the duration of 
 a ministry depends on the opinion of the legisla- 
 ture, and that, in turn, depends on the opinion 
 of the public. There can be no defiant boss, 
 indifferent to what the public thinks, provided 
 he has " got the delegates." In fact, the Aus- 
 tralian system seems better adapted to the main- 
 tenance of really independent and influential 
 journals than ours. The fixed terms of execu- 
 tive officers and the boss system of nomination 
 are almost fatal to newspaper power. So long 
 as results cannot be achieved quickly, the influ- 
 ence of the press must be feeble. 
 
 Of course, in speaking of a country which one 
 does not know personally, one must speak very 
 cautiously. All impressions one gets from books 
 need correction by actual observation, particu- 
 larly in the case of a country in which changes 
 are so rapid as in Australia. Of this rapidity 
 every traveler and writer I have consulted makes 
 mention, and every traveler soon finds his book 
 out of date. Sir Charles Dilke visited Australia
 
 264 THE AUSTRALIAN DEMOCRACY 
 
 about 1870, but writing in 1890 he dwells on 
 the enormous differences of every kind which 
 twenty years had brought about. The latest 
 work on Australia, Mr. Walker's "Australasian 
 Democracy," gives as an illustration of this tran- 
 sientness of everything the fact that the three 
 colonies of New South Wales, South Australia, 
 and Victoria have had respectively twenty-eight, 
 forty-two, and twenty-six ministries in forty years. 
 One can readily imagine how many changes of 
 policy on all sorts of subjects, and how many 
 changes of men, these figures represent. All 
 travelers, too, bear testimony to the optimism of 
 the people in every colony. Nothing is more 
 depressing in a new country than officialism, or 
 management of public affairs by irresponsible 
 rulers. From this the Anglo-Saxons have always 
 enjoyed freedom in their new countries. The 
 result has always been free play for individual 
 energy and initiative; and with boundless re- 
 sources, as in America and Australia, these quali- 
 ties are sure to bring cheerfulness of tempera- 
 ment. The mass of men are better off each 
 year, mistakes are not serious, mutual helpfulness 
 is the leading note of the community, nobody is 
 looked down on by anybody, and public opinion 
 is all powerful. In Australia there is more 
 reason for this, as yet, than with us. The Aus- 
 tralians are not tormented by a race question,
 
 THE AUSTRALIAN DEMOCRACY 265 
 
 they have never had any civil strife, and they 
 have not yet come into contact with that greatest 
 difficulty of large democracies, the difficulty of 
 communicating to the mass common ideas and 
 impulses. 
 
 NOTE. As I have endeavored to give in this chapter impres- 
 sions rather than facts, I have not thought it worth while to cite 
 authorities for all my statements. I will simply say that I have 
 formed these impressions from the perusal of the following 
 works : The Australian Colonies in 1896, E. A. Petherick, 1897 ; 
 New Zealand Rulers and Statesmen, 1840-97, Williajn Gisborne ; 
 Oceana, J. A. Froude, 1886 ; Queensland, Rev. John D. Lang, 
 D. D., 1864 ; The Coming Commonwealth, R. R. Garlan, 1897 ; 
 The Australians, Francis Adams, 1893 ; The Land of Gold, 
 Julius M. Price, 1896 ; New Zealand Official Year Book, 1897 ; 
 Reports of Department of Labor, 1893-97 ; Journal of 1897; 
 Problems of Greater Britain, Sir Charles Dilke, 1890 ; Historical 
 and Statistical Account of New South Wales, Dr. Lang, 1875 ; 
 Thirty Years of Colonial Government, Sir G. F. Bowen, 1889 ; 
 Australian Democracy, Henry de R. Walker, 1897 ; History of 
 New Zealand, G. W. Rusden, 1891 ; Western Australian Blue 
 Book.
 
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