That the Federalists who were in possession of our general government during the early years of its history appreciated the advantage of controlling the policy of the Supreme Court was pointed out in the chapter on the Federal judiciary. They accomplished their purpose, however, by selecting for membership in that body, men whose political record was satisfactory and whose views concerning judicial functions were in harmony with the general plan and purpose of the Federalist party. In fact, the scheme of government which they set up contemplated no such possibility as the democratization of the Executive or the Senate. If their expectation in this regard had been fully realized, a judicious use of the appointing power would have been all that was necessary to ensure a conservative court. Perhaps the framers of the Constitution did not imagine that the power to increase the number of judges would ever be needed to enable the President and Senate to secure the co-operation of the Supreme Court. At any rate, the power given to Congress and the President to enlarge the membership of that body was not, in the opinion of the framers, a power that could ever be employed against the conservative class, since the radical element, it was believed, would never be able to control more than one branch of the government, the House of Representatives. But, although it can not be determined whether the Federalists had in mind the possibility of using this power to control the policy of the court, it should be noted that, according to their view of the government, it might be used by, but not against, the conservative class. Nor is it likely that they would have hesitated to use this power had it been necessary to the success of their plan.

The failure of the Federalists to check the growth of democratic ideas and the success of the more liberal party in bringing about the election of Jefferson alarmed the conservative class. It was seen that if all other branches of the government should come under the influence of the liberal movement, the judicial check could be broken down. To guard against this danger, an effort was made by the conservative interests to mold a public sentiment that would protect the Supreme Court against political interference at the hands of those who might wish to override judicial opposition to radical measures. This took the form of what might be called the doctrine of judicial infallibility. The judiciary in general and the Supreme Court in particular were held up as the guardian and protector of American liberty. The security of the people was represented as bound up with the freedom of the courts from political interference. At the same time it was proclaimed that the Supreme Court exercised only judicial functions and that any attempt on the part of the President or Congress to interfere with them would make that body the organ of faction or class. But, as a matter of fact, the danger which they foresaw to the Supreme Court was not a danger growing out of its judicial, but out of its legislative functions. It was not because the Supreme Court was a purely judicial body, but because it exercised a supremely important legislative function, that they were so solicitous to guard it against anything approaching popular control. The threefold division of governmental powers into legislative, executive, and judicial, as shown in a preceding chapter, has no logical basis. There are, as Professor Goodnow has said,[195] but two functions of government, that of expressing and that of executing the will of the state. The Supreme Court, in so far as it is a purely judicial body—that is, a body for hearing and deciding cases—is simply a means of executing the will of the state. With the performance of this function there was little danger that any democratic movement would interfere. Nor was this the danger which the conservative classes really feared, or which they wished to guard against. What they desired above all else was to give the Supreme Court a final voice in expressing the will of the state, and by so doing to make it operate as an effective check upon democratic legislation. It is this power of expressing the will of the state which our conservative writers defend as the pre-eminently meritorious feature of our judicial system. Indeed, this is, in the opinion of the conservative class, the most important of all the checks on democracy. Any suggestion of using the power vested in Congress and the President to reorganize the Supreme Court is naturally enough denounced as the most dangerous and revolutionary of political heresies. It is not probable, however, that the Supreme Court would much longer be permitted to thwart the will of the majority if the other branches of the Federal government were thoroughly imbued with the belief in democracy. As explained in Chapter V, the Constitution contains no hint of this power to declare acts of Congress null and void. It was injected into the Constitution, as the framers intended, by judicial interpretation, and under the influence of a thoroughly democratic President, and Congress might be eliminated in the same way.

The most important feature of the Constitution from the standpoint of democracy is the provision contained in article V, requiring Congress "on the application of the legislatures of two-thirds of the several states" to "call a convention for proposing amendments." The progress of democracy in the various state governments is likely to compel resort to this method of changing the Federal Constitution if the Senate much longer persists in disregarding the will of the people. In fact, this is, in the opinion of the conservative class, the one fatal defect in the scheme of constitutional checks established by our forefathers. It in reality opens the door to the most revolutionary changes in our political arrangements. Congress can not refuse to call a general constitutional convention when two-thirds of the states demand it, and this convention might propose an entirely new constitution framed in accord with the most advanced ideas of democracy. It might also follow the precedent, set by the framers of our present Constitution and prescribe an entirely new method of ratification as our more conservative forefathers did when they disregarded the then existing provision governing the amendment of the Articles of Confederation. It is true that they ignored the established method of amending as well as the instructions from the states by which they were appointed, in order to bring about the adoption of a political system more acceptable to the conservative classes. But what has been done in the interest of the minority may also be done in the interest of the majority. A new Federal constitution might be framed which would eliminate the whole system of checks on the people and provide for direct ratification by a majority of the voters, as has already been done in the case of most of our state constitutions. If the Constitution does not yield sufficiently to satisfy the popular demand for reform, it is possible that the reactionary forces will, in their anxiety to defeat moderate democratic measures, arouse sufficient opposition on the part of the people to compel sweeping constitutional changes.

The fact that two-thirds of the states can require Congress to call a convention of all the states to propose changes in the Constitution is a matter of no small importance. True, even this method of initiating changes in the system would be very difficult, since the smaller states would naturally fear an attempt to establish a more equitable plan of representation, and the special and privileged interests of all sorts which have found the present system satisfactory would use every means at their command to prevent the states from resorting to this power. It is possible, if not indeed probable, that a serious and concerted attempt by the people to force changes in the Constitution by this method would sufficiently alarm the opponents of democracy to convince them of the wisdom and expediency of such amendments as would appease the popular clamor for reform without going too far in the direction of majority rule. To prevent the complete overthrow of the system, which might be the outcome if the states were compelled to assume the initiative in amending the Constitution, the minority may accept the inevitable, and, choosing what appears to them to be the lesser of two evils, allow Congress to propose such amendments as the people are determined to bring about.

It is in the state and in the municipal governments, however, that the influence of democracy has been greatest. Yet even here much still remains to be done before the practical operation of the system will be in accord with the principle of majority rule. Direct election and universal suffrage have not under our scheme of checks and balances secured any large measure of political responsibility. The logical result of this system has been the growing distrust of public officials and especially of such representative bodies as state legislatures and city councils. This lack of confidence in the local governmental machinery, due to the irresponsibility of public officials, is certain to lead to the adoption of radical changes in the organization of our state and municipal governments. Either the tenure of public officials will be made to depend in some more effective way upon the will of the majority, or the power which they now have and which they often use to further private interests at the expense of the people will be taken from them and conferred directly upon the majority of the voters.

The movement to give the people greater control over the officials whom they have elected is really just beginning. Heretofore the effort to make the government truly representative of the people has been mainly along the line of broadening the suffrage and perfecting the method of voting. This, the people are just beginning to realize, does not guarantee political responsibility. The secret ballot under present conditions is important, but it is by no means adequate. The right of the majority to elect one or the other of two men, both of whom may have been nominated through the machinations of a corrupt and selfish minority, does not give the people any real control over the officials whom they vote into office. What they need, to ensure responsibility, is the power to make a real, not a merely nominal choice, coupled with the power to remove in case the person selected should lose the confidence of the majority.

The plan for depriving the minority of the power to control the selection of public officials, which is now rapidly gaining adherents among the advocates of political reform, is the direct primary. That some such change in our method of nominating candidates is necessary to make the so-called popular election of public officials anything more than an empty form is apparent to any intelligent student of American politics. But any proposal to deprive the minority of this power must encounter the determined opposition of the party machine and the various private interests which now prosper at the expense of the people. These opponents of political reform are continually declaiming against the corruption and incapacity of the people and trying to make it appear that a government can be no better than its source—those who elect the public officials. That a government is not likely to be better than the people whom it represents may be admitted. But this is aside from the question. Our present system in its practical operation is not a democracy. It is not truly representative, but misrepresentative. To prevent this evil—this betrayal of public trust in the interest of the minority—is the aim of the direct primary. That it will go far toward breaking the power of the machine may be safely predicted, and that it will be generally adopted as soon as the people realize its significance there is scarcely room for doubt.

But while the direct nomination of candidates would doubtless go far toward making public officials respect the wishes of the people, it would not provide adequate protection against misconduct in office under our plan of election for a definite term without any effective power of removal. A corrupt official may often find that by favoring private interests at the expense of the people who have elected him, he can afford to forfeit all chance of re-election. The independence of public officials which our forefathers were so anxious to secure has been found to be a fruitful source of corruption. A realization of this fact has been responsible for the introduction of the recall system under which the people enforce official responsibility through their power to remove by a vote of lack of confidence in the form of a petition signed by a certain percentage of the voters. Such an expression of popular disapproval has the effect of suspending from office the offending official who can regain the office only by offering himself again as a candidate at an election called for that purpose. This is as yet merely an innovation in municipal government, but if it proves to be satisfactory, the principle will doubtless be incorporated, not only in municipal charters generally, but in our state constitutions as well.

Simultaneous with this movement to make government really representative by enforcing official responsibility is another movement which also aims to make the will of the majority supreme, but by a totally different method of procedure. This is the movement looking toward the establishment of the initiative and the referendum. Instead of leaving power in the hands of representative bodies and seeking to make them responsible as the first plan of reform contemplates, the second plan would guard representative bodies against temptation by divesting them of all powers which they are liable to misuse and conferring them directly upon the people. This is merely an attempt to get back to the basic idea of the old town meeting, where local measures were directly proposed and adopted or rejected by the people. It is, moreover, the logical outcome of the struggle which the advocates of majority rule have been and are now making to secure control of our state and municipal governments. The constitutional checks on democracy have greatly obstructed and delayed the progress of political reform. Some of them have been removed, it is true, but enough still remain to make it possible for the minority to defeat the will of the majority with reference to many questions of vital importance.

It must be admitted, when we review the course of our political development, that much progress has been made. But the evolution has been toward a direct rather than toward a representative democracy. The reason for this is not far to seek. The system of checks which limited the power of the majority made the legislature largely an irresponsible body; and since it could not be trusted, it was necessary to take out of its hands the powers it was most likely to abuse.

The legislature was first deprived of its power to enact constitutional legislation, though it was allowed to retain an effective veto on such changes through its refusal to take the initiative. With the progress of the democratic movement some of the legislative powers most frequently abused were, like the state constitution itself, made subject to popular ratification. This submission of constitutional and certain kinds of statutory legislation to the people before it could go into effect merely gave them to this extent a veto on the recommendations of their legislatures and constitutional conventions. There was still no way to prevent the legislature from misrepresenting the people with respect to those measures which did not require popular ratification. The tendency was to diminish the power of the legislature by including in the constitution itself much that might have taken the form of ordinary statutory legislation, as well as by requiring that some of the more important acts passed by the legislature should receive the direct assent of the voters. This merely gave to the people a partial negative. It enabled them to reject some measures which they did not approve of, but not all, since in those cases where popular ratification was not required, public sentiment could be disregarded by the law-making body. Moreover, the people did not have the right to initiate measures—a right which is indispensable if the people are to have any real power to mold the policy of the state. The logical outcome of this line of development is easily seen. As pointed out in an earlier part of this volume, constitutional development first limits and eventually destroys irresponsible power, and in the end makes the responsible power in the state supreme. The prevalent lack of confidence in our state legislatures is no indication of hostility to the principle of representative government; for representative government in the true sense means government that is responsible to the people. The popular movement has in modifying our state and municipal governments merely taken the line of least resistance, and that has involved the transfer of legislative powers to the people themselves.

Just how far this movement will go it is impossible to foresee. A government of the representative type, if responsive to public sentiment, would answer all the requirements of a democratic state. It would at the same time be merely carrying out in practice what has long been the generally accepted, if mistaken, view of our political system. The adoption of some effective plan of direct nomination and recall of officials would accomplish much in the way of restoring confidence in legislative bodies. To this extent it would check the tendency to place the law-making power directly in the hands of the people. Popular ratification of all important laws would be unnecessary, if our legislative bodies were really responsible to the people. Nevertheless, the popular veto is a power which the people should have the right to use whenever occasion demands. This would prevent the possibility of legislation in the interest of the minority as now often happens. The popular veto through the referendum is not, however, of itself sufficient. The people need the power to initiate legislation as well as the power to defeat it. The initiative combined with the referendum would make the majority in fact, as it now is in name only, the final authority in all matters of legislation.

It is in our state and municipal governments that democracy is likely to win its first victories. The minority, however, will make a desperate struggle to prevent the overthrow of the system which has been and still is the source of its power. The political machine supported by every privileged interest will oppose by every means in its power the efforts of the people to break down the checks upon the majority. To this end we must expect them to make large use in the near future, as they have in the past, of the extraordinary powers exercised by our courts. In fact the courts as the least responsible and most conservative of our organs of government have been the last refuge of the minority when defeated in the other branches of the government. The disposition so generally seen among the opponents of democracy to regard all measures designed to break down the checks upon the majority as unconstitutional points to the judiciary as the chief reliance of the conservative classes. Indeed, the people are beginning to see that the courts are in possession of political powers of supreme importance—that they can, and often do, defeat the will of the majority after it has successfully overcome opposition in all other branches of the government. If the will of the majority is to prevail, the courts must be deprived of the power which they now have to declare laws null and void. Popular government can not really exist so long as judges who are politically irresponsible have power to override the will of the majority. The democratic movement will either deprive the judicial branch of the government of its political powers or subject it to the same degree of popular control applied to other political organs. The extension of direct nomination and recall to the members of our state judiciary would deprive the special interests of the power to use the courts as the means of blocking the way to popular reforms. In any democratic community the final interpreter of the constitution must be the majority. With the evolution of complete popular government, then, the judicial veto must disappear, or the court must become a democratic body.

It is through our state governments that we must approach the problem of reforming the national government. Complete control of the former will open the door that leads to eventual control of the latter. Democratize the state governments, and it will be possible even to change the character of the United States Senate. With a state legislature directly nominated and subject to removal through the use of the recall, it will be possible to deprive that body of any real power in the selection of United States senators. Under these conditions the legislature would merely ratify the candidate receiving a majority of the popular vote just as the electoral college has come to ratify the popular choice of the President. In this way direct nomination and direct election of United States senators could be made really effective while at the same time preserving the form but not the substance of election by the state legislatures.[196]

This would make possible that much needed separation of state and municipal from national politics. Candidates for the state legislature are now nominated and elected largely with reference to the influence of that body upon the composition of the United States Senate. This has a tendency to, and in fact does, make state legislation in no small degree a by-product of senatorial elections. By divesting the legislature of this function, it would cease to be, as it is now, one of the organs of the Federal government, and in assuming its proper role of a local legislative body, it would become in fact what it has hardly been even in theory—a body mainly interested in formulating and carrying out purely local policies. Experience has shown beyond question that its function as an electoral college for the choice of United States senators is incompatible with the satisfactory exercise of local legislative functions. The latter will be sacrificed in the interest of the former. This of itself is no small evil. For if there is any advantage in our Federal form of government, it is in the opportunity thus provided for the faithful expression of local public opinion in local legislation. But in addition to this subordination of state to national politics, which might be justified under existing conditions on the ground that local measures and local interests should be sacrificed whenever by so doing it would contribute to the success of the larger and more important matters of national policy, it has become a prolific source of corruption.

It is not a mere accident that the United States Senate is to-day the stronghold of railway and other corporate interests. Possessing as it does more extended powers than the House of Representatives, it is for that very reason the body in which every privileged interest will make the greatest effort to obtain representation. Moreover, the indirect method of election is one that readily lends itself to purposes of corruption. It is a notorious fact that it is much easier to buy the representatives of the people than to buy the people themselves. Money expended in influencing elections always has in view certain benefits direct or indirect which those who contribute the funds for that purpose expect to receive. Such funds invariably come in the main from special interests which expect to get back from the people more than the amount of their political investments. If they had to deal with the people directly, the latter would demand an equivalent for any concession granted, since it would not be to their advantage to enrich special interests at their own expense. But where the concession can be granted by a small body such as a state legislature, the latter may find that it is to its advantage to co-operate with a selfish and unscrupulous class in furthering purely private interests at the expense of the public. The opportunity for the successful employment of corrupt means is greatly augmented, too, through the confusion of state and national issues under the present system. Many measures may be sacrificed by the party in control of the state legislature under the plea that it is necessary in order to advance the general interests of the party by the election of a United States senator. This possibility of evading responsibility for the nonfulfillment of its duty as a local legislative body would disappear as soon as it is deprived of the part which it now plays in the choice of United States senators.



CHAPTER XIV

EFFECT OF THE TRANSITION FROM MINORITY TO MAJORITY RULE UPON MORALITY

In tracing the influence which the growth of democracy has had upon morality, we should be careful to look below the surface of present-day affairs. The deeper and more enduring social movements and tendencies are not always obvious to the superficial observer. For this reason much that has been written in recent years concerning our alleged decline in public morality is far from convincing. Facts tending to show the prevalence of fraud and corruption in politics and business are not in themselves sufficient to warrant any sweeping conclusions as to present tendencies. Paradoxical as it may seem, an increase in crime and other surface manifestations of immorality, is no proof of a decline, but may as a matter of fact be merely a transient effect of substantial and permanent advance toward higher standards of morality.

Before making any comparison between the morality of two different periods, we should first find out whether, in passing from the one period to the other, there has been any change in the accepted ideas of right and wrong. Now, if such is the case, it is manifestly an important factor in the problem—one that should not be ignored; and yet this is just what many writers are doing who imagine that they are proving by statistics a decline in morality. Their error consists in overlooking the one fact of paramount importance, viz., that the accepted standard of morality has itself been raised. We are not judging conduct to-day according to the ideas of civic duty in vogue a century, or even a generation ago. We are insisting upon higher standards of conduct both in politics and in business. Our ideas of right and wrong in their manifold applications to social life have been profoundly changed, and in many respects for the better. We are trying to realize a new conception of justice. Many things which a century ago were sanctioned by law, or at least not forbidden, are no longer tolerated. Moreover, enlightened public opinion now condemns many things which have not yet been brought under the ban of the law.

During any period, such as that in which we are now living, when society is rapidly assuming a higher ethical type, it is inevitable that much resistance should be made to the enforcement of the new standard of justice. Old methods of business and old political practices are not easily repressed, even when the public opinion of the community has come to regard them as socially injurious. Forms of conduct once permitted, but now regarded as anti-social, tend to persist in spite of the effort of law and public opinion to dislodge them. The more rapid the ethical progress of society, the more frequent and the more pronounced will be the failure of the morally backward individuals to meet the requirements of the new social standard. At such a time we always see an increase in crimes, misdemeanors and acts which enlightened public opinion condemns. This is due, however, not to any decline in public morality, but to the fact that the ethical progress of society as a whole has been more rapid than that of the offending class.

There is another source of error which we must guard against. Social immorality is not always detected even when it exists. Much that is socially immoral both in politics and in business escapes observation. Nevertheless, the agencies for ferreting out and holding up to public condemnation offences against society, are far more efficient and active to-day than they have ever been in the past. Both the corrupt public official and the unscrupulous business man dread the searchlight of public opinion, which is becoming more and more effective as a regulator of conduct with the growth of intelligence among the masses. Nor is it surprising that when the hitherto dark recesses of politics and business are exposed to view, an alarming amount of fraud and corruption should be revealed. We are too prone to forget, however, that publicity is something new—that in our day the seen may bear a much larger proportion to the unseen than it has in the past. What appears, then, to be an increase in business and political immorality may, after all, be largely accounted for as the result of more publicity. Here, again, we see that the facts usually taken to indicate a decline in public morality are susceptible of a very different interpretation.

Another feature of present-day society which deserves careful consideration by reason of its far-reaching effect upon public morality is the change now taking place in theological beliefs. Heretofore the church has been by far the most important agency for enforcing conformity to the accepted moral standard. The hope of reward or fear of punishment in the world to come has been the chief support upon which the church has in the past rested its system of social control. But this other-world sanction is now losing its compelling force in consequence of the growing disbelief in the old doctrine of rewards and punishments. The fear of the supernatural, which has its highest development in the savage, steadily declines with the progress of the race. When the general level of intelligence is low, the supernatural sanction is a far more potent means of regulating conduct than any purely temporal authority. But, just in proportion as society advances, the other-world sanction loses its potency and increasing reliance must, therefore, be placed upon purely human agencies.

The immediate effect of this change in our attitude toward the hereafter and the supernatural has been to remove or at least to weaken an important restraint upon anti-social tendencies. There is no reason, however, for apprehension as to the final outcome. Society always experiences some difficulty, it is true, in making the transition from the old to the new. In every period of social readjustment old institutions and beliefs lose their efficacy before the new social agencies have been perfected. But if the new is higher and better than the old, the good that will accrue to society will in the long run greatly outweigh any temporary evil.

But great as has been the change in our point of view with reference to the church, our attitude toward the state has been even more profoundly changed. We do not have to go very far back into the past to find government everywhere controlled by a king and privileged class. The ascendency of the few was everywhere established by the sword, but it could not be long maintained by force alone. The ignorance of the masses was in the past, as it is now, the main reliance of those who wished to perpetuate minority rule. Fraud and deception have always been an indispensable means of maintaining class ascendency in government. The primitive politician no less than his present-day successor saw the possibility of utilizing the credulity of the masses for the purpose of furthering his own selfish ends. This explains the long-continued survival of that interesting political superstition which for so many centuries protected class rule under the pretended sanction of a God-given right.

The growth of intelligence among the masses by discrediting the doctrine of divine right made it necessary to abandon the old defense of class rule. From that time down to the present the disintegration of the old political order has been rapid. Every effort has been made by the defenders of the old system to find some means of justifying and maintaining class rule—a task which is becoming more and more difficult with the growing belief in democracy. At the present time we are in a transition stage. The divine theory of the state, which was the foundation and support of the old system of class rule, is no longer accepted by intelligent people in any civilized country. But class rule still has its advocates, even in the countries that have advanced farthest in the direction of popular government. The opponents of democracy, however, comprise but a small part of the population numerically, yet, owing to their great wealth and effective organization, their influence as a class is everywhere very great. Over against these is arrayed the bulk of the population, who are struggling, though not very intelligently always, to overcome the opposition of the few and make the political organization and the policy of the state a complete and faithful expression of the popular will. No modern state has yet passed entirely through this transition stage. Everywhere the movement toward democracy has been and is now being energetically resisted by those who fear that thoroughgoing popular government would deprive them of economic or political privileges which they now enjoy. Let us not deceive ourselves by thinking that the old system of class rule has been entirely overthrown. No fundamental change in government or any other social institution ever comes about suddenly. Time, often much time, is required for those intellectual and moral readjustments without which no great change in social institutions can be made. And when we remember that only a century ago every government in the Western world was avowedly organized on the basis of minority rule, we can readily understand that society has not yet had sufficient time to outgrow the influence of the old political order.

No one can discuss intelligently the question of political morality if he ignores the effect of this struggle between the old system of minority domination and the new system of majority rule. And yet scarcely ever do our text-books or magazine articles dealing with present political evils even so much as allude to this most important fact—the one, indeed, on which hinges our whole system of business fraud and political corruption. We often hear the opinion expressed by people of more than ordinary intelligence that the public immorality so much in evidence in this country is the natural and inevitable result of popular government. This view is industriously encouraged by the conservative and even accepted by not a few of those whose sympathies are with democracy. Yet no conclusion could be more erroneous. It would be just as logical to attribute the religious persecutions of the Middle Ages to the growth of religious dissent. If there had been no dissenters, there would have been no persecution; neither would there have been any reformation or any progress toward a system of religious liberty. Persecution was the means employed to repress dissent and defeat the end which the dissenters had in view. Corruption sustains exactly the same relation to the democratic movement of modern times. It has been employed, not to promote, but to defeat the ends of popular government. No intelligent person should any longer be in doubt as to the real source of corruption. It is to be eradicated, not by placing additional restrictions on the power of the people, but by removing those political restraints upon the majority which now preclude any effective popular control of public officials. We forget that when our government was established the principle of majority rule was nowhere recognized—that until well along into the nineteenth century the majority of our forefathers did not even have the right to vote. The minority governed under the sanction of the Constitution and the law of the land. Then a great popular movement swept over the country, and in the political upheaval which followed, the masses secured the right of suffrage. But universal suffrage, though essential to, does not ensure popular government. The right to vote for some, or even all, public officials, does not necessarily involve any effective control over such officials by, or any real responsibility to, the majority of the voters. Nor is any constitutional system set up to achieve the purpose of minority rule likely to contain those provisions which are necessary for the enforcement of public opinion in the management of political affairs. It was thought by the masses, of course, when they acquired the suffrage that they acquired the substance of political power. Their expectation, however, was but partially realized. Indirect election, official independence, and the rigidity of the constitutional system as a whole, with its lack of responsiveness to popular demands, largely counteracted the results expected from universal suffrage. But the extension of the suffrage to the masses, though having much less direct and immediate influence upon the policy of the state than is generally supposed, was in one respect supremely important. In popular thought it worked a transformation in the form of the government. The old view which recognized the political supremacy of the minority was now largely superseded by the new view that the will of the majority ought to be the supreme law of the land.

The minority, however, still continue to exert a controlling influence in most matters of public policy directly affecting their interests as a class, although the extension of the suffrage made the exercise of that control a much more difficult matter and left little room for doubt that actual majority rule would ultimately prevail. A large measure of protection was afforded them through the checks which the Constitution imposed upon the power of the majority. There was no certainty, however, that these checks could be permanently maintained. A political party organized in the interest of majority rule, and supported by a strong public sentiment, might find some way of breaking through or evading the constitutional provisions designed to limit its power. Certain features of the Constitution, however, afforded excellent opportunities for offering effective resistance to the progress of democratic legislation. Entrenched behind these constitutional bulwarks, an active, intelligent and wealthy minority might hope to defeat many measures earnestly desired by the majority and even secure the adoption of some policies that would directly benefit themselves. Here we find the cause that has been mainly responsible for the growth of that distinctively American product, the party machine, with its political bosses, its army of paid workers and its funds for promoting or opposing legislation, supplied by various special interests which expect to profit thereby. With the practical operation of this system we are all familiar. We see the results of its work in every phase of our political life—in municipal, state and national affairs. We encounter its malign influence every time an effort is made to secure any adequate regulation of railways, to protect the people against the extortion of the trusts, or to make the great privileged industries of the country bear their just share of taxation. But the chief concern of those in whose interest the party machine is run is to defeat any popular attack on those features of the system which are the real source of the great power which the minority is able to exert. Try, for example, to secure a constitutional amendment providing for the direct election of United States senators, the adoption of the initiative and the referendum, a direct primary scheme, a measure depriving a city council of the power to enrich private corporations by giving away valuable franchises, or any provision intended to give the people an effective control over their so-called public servants, and we find that nothing less than an overwhelming public sentiment and sustained social effort is able to make any headway against the small but powerfully entrenched minority.

Many changes will be required before efficient democratic government can exist. The greatest and most pressing need at the present time, however, is for real publicity, which is the only means of making public opinion effective as an instrument of social control. The movement toward publicity has been in direct proportion to the growth of democracy. Formerly the masses were not regarded by the ruling class as having any capacity for political affairs, or right to criticise governmental policies and methods. With the acceptance of the idea of popular sovereignty, however, the right of the people to be kept informed concerning the management of governmental business received recognition; but practice has lagged far behind theory.

Much would be gained for good government by extending publicity to the relations existing between public officials and private business interests. This would discourage the corrupt alliance which now too often exists between unscrupulous politicians and corporate wealth. The public have a right and ought to know to what extent individuals and corporations have contributed money for the purpose of carrying elections. The time has come when the political party should be generally recognized and dealt with as a public agency—as an essential part or indispensable organ of the government itself. The amount of its revenue, the sources from which it is obtained, the purposes for which it is expended, vitally concern the people and should be exposed to a publicity as thorough and searching as that which extends to the financial transactions of the government itself. The enforcement of publicity in this direction would not be open to the objection that the government was invading the field of legitimate private activity, though it would bring to light the relations which now exist between the party machine and private business, and in so doing would expose the true source of much political corruption.

But this is not all that the people need to know concerning party management. They can not be expected to make an intelligent choice of public officials, unless they are supplied with all the facts which have a direct bearing upon the fitness of the various candidates. Popular elections will not be entirely successful until some plan is devised under which no man can become a candidate for office without expecting to have all the facts bearing upon his fitness, whether relating to his private life or official conduct, made public. Publicity of this sort would do much toward securing a better class of public officials.

Publicity concerning that which directly pertains to the management of the government is not all that will be required. The old idea that all business is private must give way to the new and sounder view that no business is entirely private. It is true that the business world is not yet ready for the application of this doctrine, since deception is a feature of present-day business methods. It is employed with reference to business rivals on the one hand and consumers on the other. This policy of deception often degenerates into down-right fraud, as in the case of secret rebates and other forms of discrimination through which one competitor obtains an undue and perhaps crushing advantage over others; or it may take the form of adulteration or other trade frauds by which the business man may rob the general public.

"Deception," says Lester F. Ward, "may almost be called the foundation of business. It is true that if all business men would altogether discard it, matters would probably be far better even for them than they are; but, taking the human character as it is, it is frankly avowed by business men themselves that no business could succeed for a single year if it were to attempt single-handed and alone to adopt such an innovation. The particular form of deception characteristic of business is called shrewdness, and it is universally considered proper and upright. There is a sort of code that fixes the limit beyond which this form of deception must not be carried, and those who exceed that limit are looked upon somewhat as a pugilist who 'hits below the belt,' But within these limits every one expects every other to suggest the false and suppress the true, while caveat emptor is lord of all, and 'the devil take the hind-most.'"[197]

Under this system the strong, the unscrupulous and the cunning may pursue business tactics which enable them to accumulate wealth at the expense of consumers or business rivals, but which, if generally known, would not be tolerated. The great profits which fraudulent manufacturers and merchants have made out of adulterated goods would have been impossible under a system which required that all goods should be properly labeled and sold for what they really were. Such abuses as now exist in the management of railroads and other corporations could not, or at least would not long be permitted to exist, if the general public saw the true source, character, extent and full effects of these evils.

The greatest obstacle to publicity at the present time is the control which corporate wealth is able to, and as a matter of fact does, exercise over those agencies upon which the people must largely depend for information and guidance regarding contemporary movements and events. The telegraph and the newspaper are indispensable in any present-day democratic society. The ownership and unregulated control of the former by the large corporate interests of the country, and the influence which they can bring to bear upon the press by this means, as well as the direct control which they have over a large part of the daily press by actual ownership, does much to hinder the progress of the democratic movement. This hold which organized wealth has upon the agencies through which public opinion is formed, is an important check on democracy. It does much to secure a real, though not generally recognized, class ascendency under the form and appearance of government by public opinion.

This great struggle now going on between the progressive and the reactionary forces, between the many and the few, has had a profound influence upon public morality. We have here a conflict between two political systems—between two sets of ethical standards. The supporters of minority rule no doubt often feel that the whole plan and purpose of the democratic movement is revolutionary—that its ultimate aim is the complete overthrow of all those checks designed for the protection of the minority. The only effective means which they could employ to retard the progress of the popular movement involved the use of money or its equivalent in ways that have had a corrupting influence upon our national life. Of course this need not, and as a rule does not, take the coarse, crude form of a direct purchase of public officials. The methods used may in the main conform to all our accepted criteria of business honesty, but their influence is none the less insidious and deadly. It is felt in many private institutions of learning; it is clearly seen in the attitude of a large part of our daily press, and even in the church itself. This subtle influence which a wealthy class is able to exert by owning or controlling the agencies for molding public opinion is doing far more to poison the sources of our national life than all the more direct and obvious forms of corruption combined. The general public may not see all this or understand its full significance, but the conviction is gaining ground that it is difficult to enact and still more difficult to enforce any legislation contemplating just and reasonable regulation of corporate wealth. The conservative classes themselves are not satisfied with the political system as it now is, believing that the majority, by breaking through restraints imposed by the Constitution, have acquired more power than they should be permitted to exercise under any well-regulated government. It is but a step, and a short one at that, from this belief that the organization of the government is wrong and its policy unjust, to the conclusion that one is justified in using every available means of defeating the enactment or preventing the enforcement of pernicious legislation. On the other hand, the supporters of majority rule believe that the government is too considerate of the few and not sufficiently responsive to the wishes of the many. As a result of this situation neither the advocates nor the opponents of majority rule have that entire faith in the reasonableness and justice of present political arrangements, which is necessary to ensure real respect for, or even ready compliance with the laws.

Here we find the real explanation of that widespread disregard of law which characterizes American society to-day. We are witnessing and taking part in the final struggle between the old and the new—a struggle which will not end until one or the other of these irreconcilable theories of government is completely overthrown, and a new and harmonious political structure evolved. Every age of epoch-making change is a time of social turmoil. To the superficial onlooker this temporary relaxation of social restraints may seem to indicate a period of decline, but as a matter of fact the loss of faith in and respect for the old social agencies is a necessary part of that process of growth through which society reaches a higher plane of existence.



CHAPTER XV

DEMOCRACY OF THE FUTURE

The growth of the democratic spirit is one of the most important facts in the political life of the nineteenth century. All countries under the influence of Western civilization show the same tendency. New political ideas irreconcilably opposed to the view of government generally accepted in the past are everywhere gaining recognition. Under the influence of this new conception of the state the monarchies and aristocracies of the past are being transformed into the democracies of the future. We of the present day, however, are still largely in the trammels of the old, though our goal is the freedom of the new. We have not yet reached, but are merely traveling toward democracy. The progress which we have made is largely a progress in thought and ideals. We have imbibed more of the spirit of popular government. In our way of thinking, our point of view, our accepted political philosophy, there has been a marked change. Everywhere, too, with the progress of scientific knowledge and the spread of popular education, the masses are coming to a consciousness of their strength. They are circumscribing the power of ruling classes and abolishing their exclusive privileges which control of the state has made it possible for them to defend in the past. From present indications we are at the threshold of a new social order under which the few will no longer rule the many.

Democracy may be regarded, according to the standpoint from which we view it, either as an intellectual or as a moral movement. It is intellectual in that it presupposes a more or less general diffusion of intelligence, and moral in that its aim is justice. It could not have appeared or become a social force until man became a thinker and critic of existing social arrangements. It was first necessary that he should acquire a point of view and a habit of thought that give him a measure of intellectual independence and enable him to regard social institutions and arrangements as human devices more or less imperfect and unjust. This thought can not be grasped without its correlative—the possibility of improvement. Hence democracy everywhere stands for political and social reform.

Democracy is modern, since it is only within recent times that the general diffusion of knowledge has been possible. The invention of printing, by making possible a cheap popular literature, contributed more than any other one fact to the intellectual and moral awakening which marks the beginning of modern times. The introduction of printing, however, did not find a democratic literature ready for general distribution, or the people ready for its appearance. A long period of slow preparation followed, during which the masses were being educated. Moreover, it is only within recent times that governments would have permitted the creation and diffusion of a democratic literature. For a long time after printing was invented the ruling classes carefully guarded against any use of the newly discovered art that might be calculated to undermine their authority. Books containing new and dangerous doctrines were rigorously proscribed and the people carefully protected from the disturbing influence of such views as might shake their faith in the wisdom and justice of the existing social order.[198]

It is perhaps fortunate for the world that the political and social results of printing were not comprehended at the time of its introduction. Had the ruling classes foreseen that it would lead to the gradual shifting of political power from themselves to the masses, it is not unlikely that they would have regarded it as a pernicious innovation.

But, as is the case with all great inventions, its full significance was not at first understood. Silently and almost imperceptibly it paved the way for a social and political revolution. The gradual diffusion of knowledge among the people prepared them for the contemplation of a new social order. They began to think, to question and to doubt, and thenceforth the power and prestige of the ruling classes began to decline. From that time on there has been an unceasing struggle between the privileged few and the unprivileged many. We see it in the peaceful process of legislation as well as in the more violent contest of war. After each success the masses have demanded still greater concessions, until now, with a broader outlook and a larger conception of human destiny, they demand the complete and untrammeled control of the state.

To the student of political science, then, the spirit and temper, the aims and ideals of the new social order now coming into existence, are a matter of supreme importance. That our industrial system will be profoundly modified may be conceded. Other consequences more difficult to foresee because less direct and immediate, but not necessarily less important, may be regarded as not unlikely. That our ideas of right and wrong, our conception of civic duty, and human character itself will be modified as a result of such far-reaching changes in social relations, may be expected. But while the more remote and indirect consequences of democracy may not be foreseen, some of its immediate results are reasonably certain.

The immediate aim of democracy is political. It seeks to overthrow every form of class rule and bring about such changes in existing governments as will make the will of the people supreme. But political reform is regarded not as an end in itself. It is simply a means. Government is a complex and supremely important piece of social machinery. Through it the manifold activities of society are organized, directed and controlled. In a very real sense it is the most important of all social institutions, since from its very nature it is the embodiment of social force, asserting and maintaining a recognized supremacy over all other social institutions and agencies whatever, modifying and adapting them to suit the purposes and achieve the ends of those who control the state.

The form or type of government is all-important, since it involves the question as to the proper end of government as well as the proper means of attaining it. Our notion of what constitutes the best political system depends on our general theory of society—our conception of justice, progress and social well-being. As government by the few inevitably results in the welfare of the few being regarded as the chief concern of the state, the widest possible diffusion of political power is the only guarantee that government will seek the welfare of the many.

The advocate of democracy does not think that it will be a perfect government, but he does believe that it will in the long run be the best, most equitable and most progressive which it is possible to establish. Government by the few and government by the many stand for widely divergent and irreconcilable theories of progress and social well-being. As the methods, aims, and social ideals of an aristocracy are not those of which a democratic society would approve, it necessarily follows that the purposes of democracy can be accomplished only through a government which the people control.

Modern science has given a decided impetus to the democratic movement by making a comfortable existence possible for the many. It has explored the depths of the earth and revealed hidden treasures of which previous ages did not even dream. Inventions and discoveries far-reaching in influence and revolutionary in character have followed each other in rapid succession. With the progress of the sciences and mechanical arts, man's power to control and utilize the forces and materials which nature has so bountifully provided has been enormously increased; and yet, much as has been accomplished in this field of human endeavor, there is reason to believe that the conquest of the material world has but just begun. The future may hold in store for us far greater achievements along this line than any the world has yet seen.

It is not surprising, then, that the masses should feel that they have received too little benefit from this marvelous material progress. For just in proportion as the old political system has survived, with its privileged classes, its checks on the people and its class ascendency in government, the benefits of material progress have been monopolized by the few. Against this intrusion of the old order into modern society the spirit of democracy revolts. It demands control of the state to the end that the product of industry may be equitably distributed. As the uncompromising enemy of monopoly in every form, it demands first of all equality of opportunity.

Democracy, however, is not a mere scheme for the redistribution of wealth. It is fundamentally a theory of social progress. In so far as it involves the distribution of wealth, it does so as a necessary condition or means of progress, and not as an end in itself.

Democracy would raise government to the rank and dignity of a science by making it appeal to the reason instead of the fear and superstition of the people. The governments of the past, basing their claims upon divine right, bear about the same relation to democracy that astrology and alchemy do to the modern sciences of astronomy and chemistry. The old political order everywhere represented itself as superimposed on man from above, and, thus clothed with a sort of divine sanction, it was exalted above the reach of criticism. The growth of intelligence has dispelled one by one the crude political superstitions upon which the old governmental arrangements rested. More and more man is coming to look upon government as a purely human agency which he may freely modify and adapt to his purposes. The blind unthinking reverence with which he regarded it in the past is giving way to a critical scientific spirit. Nor has this change in our point of view in any way degraded government. In stripping it of the pretence of divine authority, it has in reality been placed upon a more enduring basis. In so far as it can no longer claim respect to which it is not entitled we have a guarantee that it can not persistently disregard the welfare of the people.

Democracy owes much to modern scientific research. With the advance of knowledge we have gained a new view of the world. Physics, astronomy, and geology have shown us that the physical universe is undergoing a process of continual change. Biology, too, has revolutionized our notion of life. Nothing is fixed and immutable as was once supposed, but change is universal. The contraction of the earth's crust with its resultant changes in the distribution of land and water, and the continual modification of climate and physical conditions generally have throughout the past wrought changes in the form and character of all animal and vegetable life. Every individual organism and every species must change as the world around it changes, or death is the penalty. No form of life can long survive which does not possess in a considerable degree the power of adaptation. Innumerable species have disappeared because of their inability to adjust themselves to a constantly changing environment. It is from this point of view of continuous adjustment that modern science regards the whole problem of life individual and collective.

We must not, however, assume that what is true of the lower forms of life is equally true of the higher. In carrying the conceptions of biology over into the domain of social science we must be careful to observe that here the process of adapting life to its environment assumes a new and higher phase. In the lower animal world the life-sustaining activities are individual. Division of labor is either entirely absent or plays a part so unimportant that we may for purposes of comparison assume its absence. The individual animal has free access to surrounding nature, unrestrained by social institutions or private property in the environment. For the members of a given group there is what may be described as equality of opportunity. Hence it follows that the individuals which are best suited to the environment will thrive best and will tend to crowd out the others.

But when we come to human society this is not necessarily true. Here a social environment has been created—a complex fabric of laws, usages, and institutions which envelopes completely the life of the individual and intervenes everywhere between him and physical nature. To this all his industrial activities must conform. The material environment is no longer the common possession of the group. It has become private property and has passed under the control of individuals in whose interests the laws and customs of every community ancient and modern have been largely molded. This is a fact which all history attests. Wherever the few acquire a monopoly of political power it always tends to develop into a monopoly of the means and agents of production. Not content with making the physical environment their own exclusive property, the few have often gone farther and by reducing the many to slavery have established and legalized property in human beings themselves. But even when all men are nominally free and legalized coercion does not exist, the fact nevertheless remains that those who control the means of production in reality control the rest. As Mr. W.H. Mallock, the uncompromising opponent of democracy and staunch defender of aristocracy, puts it: "The larger part of the progressive activities of peace, and the arts and products of civilization, result from and imply the influence of kings and leaders in essentially the same sense as do the successes of primitive war, the only difference being that the kings are here more numerous, and though they do not wear any arms or uniforms, are incomparably more autocratic than the kings and czars who do."[199] "Slavery, feudalism, and capitalism," he tells us, "agree with one another in being systems under which the few"[200] control the actions of the many.

This feature of modern capitalism—the control of the many by the few—which constitutes its chief merit in the eyes of writers like Mr. Mallock is what all democratic thinkers consider its chief vice. Under such a system success or failure is no longer proof of natural fitness or unfitness. Where every advantage that wealth and influence afford is enjoyed by the few and denied to the many an essential condition of progress is lacking. Many of the ablest, best, and socially fittest are hopelessly handicapped by lack of opportunity, while their inferiors equipped with every artificial advantage easily defeat them in the competitive struggle.

This lack of a just distribution of opportunity under existing industrial arrangements, the defenders of the established social order persistently ignore. Taking no account of the unequal conditions under which the competitive struggle is carried on in human society, they would make success proof of fitness to survive and failure evidence of unfitness. This is treating the complex problem of social adjustment as if it were simply a question of mere animal struggle for existence. Writers of this class naturally accept the Malthusian doctrine of population, and ascribe misery and want to purely natural causes, viz., the pressure of population on the means of subsistence. Not only is this pressure with its attendant evils unavoidable, they tell us, but, regarded from the standpoint of the highest interests of the race it is desirable and beneficent in that it is the method of evolution—the means which nature makes use of to produce, through the continual elimination of the weak, a higher human type. To relieve this pressure through social arrangements would arrest by artificial contrivances the progress which the free play of natural forces tends to bring about. If progress is made only through the selection of the fit and the rejection of the unfit, it would follow that the keener the struggle for existence and the more rapid and relentless the elimination of the weak, the greater would be the progress made. This is exactly the contention of Kidd in his Social Evolution. He claims that if the pressure of population on the means of subsistence were arrested, and all individuals were allowed equally to propagate their kind, the human race would not only not progress, but actually retrograde.[201] If we accept this as true, it would follow that a high birth rate and a high death rate are necessary in order that the process of selection and rejection may go on. This is indeed a pleasant prospect for all except the fortunate few. But the question, of course, is not whether this is pleasant to contemplate or unpleasant, but whether it is true. Is the evolution of a higher human type the same kind of a process as that of a higher animal or vegetable type? Is progress achieved only through the preservation of the fit and the elimination of the unfit? If it could be shown that this is the case, then certainly the conditions under which this struggle to the death is carried on would be a matter of supreme importance. Are our social adjustments such as to facilitate, or at least not interfere with it? Do they make the question of success or failure, survival or elimination, depend upon individual fitness or unfitness? This, as we have seen, is not the case, though the partisans of the biological theory of human progress have constantly assumed it. Mr. Mallock takes even a more extreme position than most writers of this class, and actually says "that the social conditions of a time are the same for all, but that it is only exceptional men who can make exceptional use of them."[202] The unequal distribution of wealth he seeks to justify on the ground that "the ordinary man's talents as a producer ... have not appreciably increased in the course of two thousand years and have certainly not increased within the past three generations."[203]

"In the domain of modern industrial activity the many" ... he tells us, "produce only an insignificant portion of the total, ... and in the domain of intellectual and speculative progress the many produce or achieve nothing."[204] If we accept his premises, we must agree with his conclusion that democracy's indictment of our modern industrial system falls to the ground. This view of the matter is acceptable, of course, to those who are satisfied with present social arrangements. It furnishes a justification for the system under which they have prospered while others have failed. It relieves their conscience of any misgiving and soothes them with the assurance that only through the poverty and misery of the unfit can a higher civilization be evolved. This largely explains the popularity among the well-to-do classes of such books as Malthus' Principle of Population and Kidd's Social Evolution.

Such a treatment of the social problem, however, will not bear the test of analysis, since it assumes that the present distribution of opportunity is just. To ignore or treat as unimportant the influence of social arrangements upon the struggle for existence between individuals, as apologists for the existing social order are too much inclined to do, is like ignoring the modern battle-ship as a factor in the efficiency of the modern navy.

But while this biological theory of evolution has been made to serve the purpose of defending existing social arrangements, it is in reality no adequate explanation of human progress. Selection and rejection do not, as a matter of fact, play any important part in the progress of civilized communities. Here the struggle for existence has assumed the form of a struggle for domination. The vanquished are no longer eliminated as a result of the competitive struggle; for, as Mr. Spencer says, social institutions preserve the incapables.[205] Not only are the unsuccessful not eliminated but, as sociological students well know, they increase more rapidly than the successful few. If, then, we accept the biological theory of social evolution, we are forced to the conclusion that the human race, instead of advancing, is really retrograding. Seeing that this is not a satisfactory explanation of human progress, Mr. Mallock supplements it with a new factor which he describes as "the unintended results of the intentions of great men."[206] But, like all of these writers, he makes progress depend entirely on the biological struggle for existence or the industrial struggle for supremacy, not recognizing the all-important part which social ideals and conscious social choice play in human evolution.

There is, then, as we have seen, ample justification for the hostility to privilege which the democratic movement everywhere exhibits. In making equality of opportunity a feature of the new social order, the advocates of reform are proceeding in harmony with the teaching of modern science. Such changes must be brought about in the organization of industry, the laws of property, the scope and character of public and private activities, as will sweep away entirely the whole ancient system of special privileges, and by placing all individuals upon the same footing, make success the unfailing reward of merit. To accomplish this is to solve the monopoly problem. Some progress has been made in this direction, but it consists for the most part in discovering that such a problem exists. Just how posterity will deal with it, it is impossible to foresee; but of one thing we may be sure—this new conception of justice will exert a profound influence upon the legislation of the future.

The attention of the democratic movement has up to the present time been occupied almost exclusively with the question of a just distribution of opportunity; yet this is not the only problem which democracy will have to solve. Indeed, it is but the first step in a continuous process of conscious social readjustment. This fact many writers on social science have not fully grasped. There is still a tendency to regard society as a sort of divinely ordered mechanism, which, if properly started, will automatically work out the process of social evolution. * * * * From this point of view it is easy to conclude that "whatever is, is right." * * * * If we accept this belief in the beneficent and progressive character of all natural processes, the conclusion is irresistible that nature's methods should not be interfered with.

This is largely the point of view of the earlier English political economists, and it partly explains their belief in the policy of non-interference. The best and most comprehensive statement of this view of social progress is found in Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations. In this work he attempted to show that legislative interference with industry is unnecessary. Therefore he advocated the repeal of all laws which interfered with or in any way restricted the liberty of the individual. He believed that the natural principle of competition would of itself effectually regulate industrial life. The desire of each individual to pursue his own interests made state interference, in his opinion, unnecessary. In the absence of legal restraints industrial matters would spontaneously regulate themselves. The varied economic activities of individuals in society would be adequately controlled and harmonized with the general interests of society, if statute or human law did not interfere with natural or divine law. Reliance on competition would ensure order, harmony and continuous progress in society, just as in the realm of matter the influence of gravitation has transformed by a long-continued development the original chaos into an orderly universe. Each individual acting in obedience to this law would be "led by an invisible hand to promote"[207] the well-being of society, even though he was conscious only of a selfish desire to further his own ends.

Such was the industrial philosophy of Adam Smith. It was in harmony with and the natural outcome of the movement which had already revolutionized religious and philosophic thought. In every department of human activity emphasis was being put on the individual. Liberty was the watchword of society—the panacea for all social ills. The Western world was breaking through the old system of restraints under which the individual had been fettered in religion, politics and business. A new conception of the state, its duties and its functions, had been evolved. Mere human law was being discredited. Philosophers, distrusting the coercive arrangements of society, were looking into the nature of man and the character of the environment for the principles of social organization and order. Belief in the curative power of legislation was being supplanted by a growing faith in the sufficiency of natural law.

The underlying motives for advocating the laissez faire policy were, however, mainly political and economic.[208] The ready acceptance of this doctrine must be attributed largely to the fact that it offered a plausible ground for opposing the burdensome restraints of the old system of class rule.

This is the origin of our modern doctrine of laissez faire which has so profoundly influenced our political and economic life. But as movements of this character are likely to do, it carried society too far in the opposite direction. This is recognized by that most eminent expounder of the let-alone theory of government, Mr. Herbert Spencer, who, in the third volume of his Principles of Sociology, admits that "there has been a change from excess of restriction to deficiency of restriction."[209] This means that in our accepted political and economic philosophy we have overvalued the organizing power of unregulated natural law, and have consequently undervalued the state as an agency for controlling and organizing industrial forces.

All new ideas have to be harmonized with much that is old. As at first accepted they are only partially true. A new philosophy requires time before its benefits can be fully realized. It must pass through a process of adaptation by which it is gradually modified, broadened and brought into orderly relations with life in general.

The theory of industrial freedom has during the nineteenth century been passing through just such a stage of development. The contention of Adam Smith and his followers that the mere desire for gain would of itself ensure adequate regulation of industry is certainly not true under existing conditions. Natural law is not, as he assumed, always beneficent in its operation. It is just as liable to produce harm as benefit unless it is regulated, controlled and directed by appropriate human agencies. It needs no argument to convince one that this is true so far as the forces of the physical world are concerned. Gravitation, steam and electricity contributed nothing to human progress until man discovered the means whereby they could be harnessed and controlled. Material civilization means nothing else but the development of control over and the consequent utilization of the materials and forces of the physical world. The important part played by mere human agencies is the only feature that distinguishes civilization from barbarism. Everything which in any way contributes to material progress augments the power of man to control, modify and adapt his environment.

And though it may not be so obvious, this general principle is just as true in the moral and spiritual world as in the physical. All progress, material and moral, consists in the due subordination of natural to human agencies. Laws, institutions and systems of government are in a sense artificial creations, and must be judged in relation to the ends which they have in view. They are good or bad according as they are well or poorly adapted to social needs. Civilization in its highest sense means much more than the mere mastery of mind over inanimate nature; it implies a more or less effective social control over individual conduct. Certain impulses, instincts and tendencies must be repressed; others must be encouraged, strengthened, and developed.

It is a mistake to suppose that the unrestrained play of mere natural forces ensures progress. Occasional advance is the outcome, but so also is frequent retrogression. There is no scientific basis for the belief in a natural order that everywhere and always makes for progress. Competition or the struggle for existence ensures at most merely the survival of the fittest; but survival of the fittest does not always mean survival of the best. Competition is nature's means of adapting life to its environment. If the environment is such as to give the more highly organized individuals the advantage, progress is the result. But if it is such as to place them at a disadvantage, retrogression, not progress, is the outcome. The higher types of character, no less than the higher organic forms, presuppose external conditions favorable to their development. Competition is merely the means through which conformity to these external conditions is enforced. It eliminates alike that which is better than the environment and that which is worse. It is indifferent to good or bad, to high or low. It simply picks out, preserves and perpetuates those types best suited to environing conditions. Both progress and retrogression are a process of adaptation, and their cause must be sought, not in the principle of competition itself, but in the general external conditions to which it enforces conformity. Success, then, is a matter of adaptation to the environment, or the power to use it for individual ends—not the power to improve and enrich it. The power to take from, is nature's sole test of fitness to live; but the power to enrich is a higher test, and one which society must enforce through appropriate legislation.

Laws, institutions and methods of trade which make it possible for the individual to take from more than he adds to the general resources of society tend inevitably toward general social deterioration. Competition is wholesome only when all our social arrangements are such as to discourage and repress all individual activities not in harmony with the general interests of society. This is the point of view from which all social and industrial questions must be studied. The problem which democracy has to solve is the problem of so organizing the environment as to assure progress through the success and survival of the best.

[Footnote 1: Sebohm, English Village Community, Ch. III; Traill, Social England, Vol. I, p. 240; Ashley, English Economic History, Vol. I, p. 17.]

[Footnote 2: Lowell, Governments and Parties in Continental Europe, Vol. I, Ch. I; Lecky, Democracy and Liberty, Vol. I, p. 265.]

[Footnote 3: Work and Wages, p. 398.]

[Footnote 4: Tyler, The Literary History of the American Revolution, Vol. I, p. 300.]

[Footnote 5: Tyler, The Literary History of the American Revolution, Vol. I, p. 301.]

[Footnote 6: Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Virginia.]

[Footnote 7: Delaware, Maryland and North Carolina.]

[Footnote 8: Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania and Maryland.]

[Footnote 9: Delaware, New York, New Jersey, North Carolina, South Carolina and Virginia.]

[Footnote 10: Connecticut, Rhode Island, New Jersey, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, New York and Delaware.]

[Footnote 11: Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Maryland, Delaware, South Carolina and Pennsylvania.]

[Footnote 12: Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New York, Delaware, Maryland, North Carolina, South Carolina and Virginia.]

[Footnote 13: Macdonald's Select Charters, Vol. I, pp. 94-101.]

[Footnote 14: Schouler's Constitutional Studies, pp. 70-78, Macdonald's Select Charters, Vol. I.]

[Footnote 15: "Who would have thought, ten years ago, that the very men who risked their lives and fortunes in support of republican principles, would now treat them as the fictions of fancy?" M. Smith in the New York Convention held to ratify the Constitution, Elliot's Debates, Second Edition, Vol. II, p. 250.]

[Footnote 16: Simeon E. Baldwin, Modern Political Institutions, pp. 83 and 84.]

[Footnote 17: Critical Period of American History, p. 226.]

[Footnote 18: S.F. Miller, Lectures on the Constitution of the United States, pp. 84-85.]

[Footnote 19: McMaster, With the Fathers, pp. 112-113.]

[Footnote 20: "They [the framers of the Constitution] represented the conservative intelligence of the country very exactly; from this class there is hardly a name, except that of Jay, which could be suggested to complete the list." Article by Alexander Johnston on the Convention of 1787 in Lalor's Cyclopaedia of Pol. Science, Pol. Econ. and U.S. Hist.]

[Footnote 21: Elliot's Debates, Vol. V, p. 557.]

[Footnote 22: Ibid., p. 138.]

[Footnote 23: "By another [rule] the doors were to be shut, and the whole proceedings were to be kept secret; and so far did this rule extend, that we were thereby prevented from corresponding with gentlemen in the different states upon the subjects under our discussion.... So extremely solicitous were they that their proceedings should not transpire, that the members were prohibited even from taking copies of resolutions, on which the Convention were deliberating, or extracts of any kind from the Journals without formally moving for and obtaining permission, by a vote of the Convention for that purpose." Luther Martin's Address to the Maryland House of Delegates. Ibid., Vol. I, p. 345.

"The doors were locked, and an injunction of strict secrecy was put upon everyone. The results of their work were known in the following September, when the draft of the Federal Constitution was published. But just what was said and done in this secret conclave was not revealed until fifty years had passed, and the aged James Madison, the last survivor of those who sat there, had been gathered to his fathers." Fiske, The Critical Period of American History, p. 229. McMaster, With the Fathers, p. 112.]

[Footnote 24: Elliot's Debates, Vol. I, pp. 119-127.]

[Footnote 25: Elliot's Debates, Vol. II, p. 470.]

[Footnote 26: Elliot's Debates, Vol. I, p. 422.]

[Footnote 27: Ibid., p. 450.]

[Footnote 28: Book 5, Ch. I, Part II.]

[Footnote 29: Elliot's Debates, Vol. V, p. 160.]

[Footnote 30: Ibid., p. 137.]

[Footnote 31: Elliot's Debates, Vol. I, p. 450.]

[Footnote 32: Ibid., pp. 421-422.]

[Footnote 33: Ibid., p. 475.]

[Footnote 34: No. 10.]

[Footnote 35: In Massachusetts and New Hampshire the constitutions framed during the Revolutionary period were submitted to popular vote. The Virginia Constitution of 1776 contained the declaration "that, when any government shall have been found inadequate or contrary to these purposes [the purposes enumerated in the Bill of Rights], a majority of the community hath an indubitable, inalienable, and indefeasible right to reform, alter, or abolish it, in such manner as shall be judged most conducive to the public weal." The Revolutionary constitution of Pennsylvania contained a similar declaration. Poore, Charters and Constitutions.]

[Footnote 36: Elliot's Debates, Vol. III, pp. 48-50.]

[Footnote 37: Ames, Proposed Amendments to the Constitution of the United States. This book gives a list of the amendments proposed during the first one hundred years of our history under the Constitution. During the fifteen years from 1889 to 1904, four hundred and thirty-five amendments were proposed. These figures are taken from a thesis submitted for the LL.B. degree at the University of Washington by Donald McDonald, A.B.