The political problem

Front matter

BY

ALBERT STICKNEY

AUTHOR OF "DEMOCRATIC GOVERNMENT " ETC.

Chap. III. The Changes Needed 67 Some General Considerations. .,.,„., 177

THE POLITICAL PROBLEM.

INTRODUCTORY.

Careful observers of the drift of public affairs must have seen of late a deep and increasing discontent, in Europe and in this country, with the practical working of existing forms of democratic government. Even among the friends of democracy it is easy to see indications of doubt as to the success of democratic institutions, considered as the mere machinery for the transaction of public business. While they are still firm in their belief that democratic institutions, of some form, are essential for the security of the liberties of the citizen and the people, yet they are also often ready to concede that democratic institutions may yet not furnish the most successful working political machinery, considered from a standpoint purely administrative.

But we may go even further.

The essential idea of democracy is that the sul preme power in the State is in the hands of the people.

That is the theory.

But how is it with us, at the present day, in practice ? In this country will any one say that public men and public methods are under the supreme control of the people? Do the people really select their own public servants ? Do the people control those servants after the servants are selected?

In short, does this American people, at this day, under its present political system, have anything more, in practice, than a right of revolution ? It is, no doubt, the fact that when any particular body of professional politicians too far outrages the public sense of decency, the people can revolt, and for a time remove certain individuals from certain public places. But, when that has been done, how often do we succeed in getting any substantial or lasting improvement in public men or public methods ?

Our present political system is one of legalized revolution. Once in four years, in our national government, we have a revolution — a great struggle, conducted, it may be, under the strictest compliance with the requirements of the law, for the possession of the highest public places and the

INTRODUCTORY.

public treasury — between the men who are in office and the men who are out of office. In form, this struggle is one between two or more great political " parties," as they are termed. In fact, the struggle is quite as often between different factions of one party. Almost always the contest is one, between persons, for places.

In these great contests all reasonable men agree that incidentally great harm is done to the highest public interests. The highest efforts of our highest public servants, that should be given to the service of the people, are in fact given to the service of persons. The highest public places, which should be filled with men carefully selected with a view only to their fitness for those places, are often virtually bought and sold — for money. The public service lacks efficiency and stability. Public servants lack ability and experience.

It is no doubt possible that these defects are necessary, are unavoidable. It may be that it is not practicable to secure any large degree of political liberty and political activity for the citizen, and at the same time secure vigor and efficiency of administration.

However that may be, there is no doubt that there is at present deep discontent with the actual working of our political institutions. Thinking men are considering whether there is not some remedy, at least partial, for existing political evils. Many of them are beginning to despair as to the practical success of democratic institutions.

But are we not somewhat hasty if we conclude that democratic institutions have yet reached their full development ? Is it altogether reasonable to suppose that our ancestors, one hundred years ago, when they made the very first experiment in the world's history in democratic government on any large scale, created and organized a great political system that was perfect, in which there was no possibility of improvement ? Considering their work then in hand, they were a mere group of political theorists. The members of the Constitutional Convention of 1787 were merely laying down on paper the lines of a political experiment. No one of them professed to feel any degree of certainty as to what would be the results of that experiment. Each one of them, as far as I am aware, as to those results had the deepest doubt and distrust. Is it possible, then, that their work was perfect — was finished for all time %

Such a supposition would be most absurd. It is certain that time must have shown defects in

INTRODUCTORY. 5

our political machinery, and that those defects can be discovered, from a careful study of its actual working results.

Is it not, too, at least possible, that the same careful study will not merely discover the defects, but will also give us some light as to possible improvements that are now practicable ?

If, too, it is now possible, in the light of our past experience, to discover some possible improvements in our political machinery, can there be any matter more interesting or more important for the public thought ?

I propose, therefore, to here submit the ideas of a single individual, on these public questions, for public consideration. They are only the ideas of one person. If they have value they will receive due consideration. They may need great modification — or, indeed, they may be entirely unsound. As to that, time will show.

In this examination of the political problem, in the solution of which the American people is now engaged, I shall consider, first, the theory of our present political system ; then, its actual working results ; and thereafter, the changes that would seem to be necessary in our political machinery, in the light of our past political experience.

Chapter I. The Theory Of Our Political System

The main idea on which our political system has thus far been developed has been that of securing the rights and liberties of the individual citizen.

We have not, thus far, attempted to work out, in practical shape, the idea of a large people, organized as a single corporate body, having its different organs and members, its own brain and will, for the administration of its own public affairs. A government, too, has generally been considered rather as a body of rulers who were to be largely feared and distrusted, who might possibly become tyrants, than as an organized body of public servants.

The idea, therefore, has been, on the one hand, to avoid the concentration of power in the hands of single public officials, or single bodies of public officials, and to keep the supreme power in the State, the selection and the control of the

THE THEORY OF OUR POLITICAL SYSTEM. 7

highest public officers, as far as possible in the hands of the individual citizens. These individual citizens, too, under the letter and the theory of the law, were merely to be counted, not weighed. One man's voice was to count for as much as that of another. Public questions were to be decided by the vote of a mere majority — by count — of the votes of individuals. The political action thus taken, though often called the action of the people, has really been, and has been considered, the action only of numbers of individual citizens. Popular government has been, in theory, a government of masses and majorities.

Xo theory of democratic government is practicable under which the public work of any large people is to be actually done, indiscriminately, or by turns, by the individual citizens themselves. The utmost that has been attempted, in the way of giving the individual citizen a direct personal part in the management of public affairs, has been to give him a direct vote in the selection and control of some of the highest public officials, who are actually to do the work. That work cannot be actually done by all the citizens, in their own persons, with their own hands. Nor can they all take turns at it — except in the case of small peoples of small numbers. Wherever the numbers of a people are large, the real work of government must be done by men specially selected. In the affairs of a small town or village it is, no doubt, a possibility to avoid specialization in public work to some extent. The work is small ; in a small country town it is possible to have every man make and repair the roads in front of his own land; to have the teacher of the district school live by turns in different families ; even the teaching of the school can be virtually taken by turns; it can be put in the hands of the daughter of one citizen for one period, and then in the hands of another daughter for another period. In the same way the few other public offices can be held by turns. And it may be, in very small peoples, that all the public work can be done on the rotatory system. No doubt the work will be clone badly. Teaching the district school, the nursery of statesmen and of the fathers and mothers of statesmen, is one of the most important works in the State ; it demands a rare combination, of temperament, knowledge, and experience, if the work is to be done well — if the sons and daughters of poor men are to have a good common-school education. But public work can be done, and

THE THEORY OF OUR POLITICAL SYSTEM. 9

endured, in a very small town or village, on the system of turn and turn about. When, however, we come to the public affairs of large peoples, of large cities, large states, and large nations, then thinking men must agree that public servants must be men who are in some w x ay specially selected, for their fitness, to do the actual public work. It can no longer be done by every one, or it will be done by no one. With peoples of large numbers, therefore, the utmost that is possible, in the way of giving power to the individual citizen, is to give him his one voice in the selection and control of those men by whom the public work is actually to be done.

The mere point of selection of those public servants seems, at first sight, comparatively simple and easy. It seems, at first thought, a simple and easy matter to select a mayor, or a governor, or even a president, by a mere majority vote of the citizens, even if the numbers of the people be verv large.

But, though there seems to be no difficulty in the matter of selection, when we come to the point of control, and consider the question of how the individual citizens are to control, not merely one or two officials, but the entire government, the solution is not so easy. In practice, it has been attempted to secure this point of control by the use of the same process — this process of popular election, so-called — using it for a large number of officers, at short and fixed intervals of time, that is, for short and fixed terms of office. The theory is, by having terms of office short and elections frequent, to keep the official under the control of the citizen all the time — or as nearly so as is possible. The result is a use of this process of so-called popular election to a large extent and for diverse purposes, not merely for the selection of the highest public officials, but also for the purpose of controlling them. The intention has been, not that the official shall hold his office for only one short term of years, for that would make it impossible for public servants to gain experience, but that the official is to continue to hold his office, for one term after another, so long as a majority of the citizens shall see fit to re-elect him? In other words, the highest public officials are to hold their offices on the tenure by election. In this way it has been assumed that not merely the selection of the highest officials, but the substantial control of their official action, would be in the hands of the individual citizens.

A necessary result of this attempt to keep

THE THEORY OF OUR POLITICAL SYSTEM. 11

power in the hands of the individual citizen, to have him take a direct part, in his own person, in the selection and control of a large number of the highest public officials, is the general disuse of the public meeting ; that is, the disuse of the public meeting as the organ for the political action of the citizens themselves. It is retained in the cases of legislatures and boards and commissions. But, as the organ for the action of the citizens themselves, it necessarily falls into disuse wherever the numbers of the citizens are large, if each citizen is to act in his own person. A public meeting of ten million voters, or of any large number of voters, for the purpose of common deliberation, is not a practicable thing. Experience shows that the largest number of men that can meet in one body, and conduct rational, calm deliberation, as a single body, cannot much exceed five hundred. With numbers much larger than that, common deliberation becomes impossible. It is no doubt possible to have mass meetings, of large numbers of men, where great orators can excite great enthusiasm by appeals to the feelings. But for the purpose of common conference and common thought, where men of different ways of thinking can quietly hear one another's views, yield to the influence of rational argument, and come to an agreement as to a common course of action, any meeting of much more than five hundred men is unmanageable. The attempt, therefore, in any people of large numbers, to have all the individual citizens take a direct personal part in political action must necessarily involve the use of the individual paper ballot, and the disuse of the public meeting.

In practice still another result has ensued: The theory has been that freedom of political action meant that the action of the individual citizen should be free from the influence of other men. This theory, in practice, has taken the form of having the action of the citizen secret, of having the citizen declare his will, on public questions of men and measures, by a paper ballot that is secret.

The general idea of our present political system, then, is that the supreme control of all public affairs, of the entire nation, of the states, cities, towns, and villages, is to be in the hands of the mass of individual citizens, who are to use the individual secret ballot, without the public meeting, for the selection of the highest public officials, and that these highest officials are not only to be selected by this process, but that the same process is to fix their official tenure. The

THE THEORY OF OUR POLITICAL SYSTEM. 13

theory is, that thus the supreme control of all public affairs will be in the hands of the individual citizens, and that they will also thus secure complete freedom of individual political action.

That is the theory.

Careful thought will, however, suggest that the system, as carried out in practice, involves a very large use of this process of so-called popular election.

It might be surmised that, in practice, this system of tenure by election, used for so many offices, at such short intervals of time, and over such large areas of territory, might cause public servants to give their time and thought to carrying elections instead of doing their official work — in other words, that government might be turned into an election machine.

But we have the theory.

Let us now turn our attention to the practical results.

Chapter II. The Practical Results

The theory has a good sound.

This idea of having the individual citizen utter his individual judgment, once in each year or term of years, on the conduct of affairs by his public servants, who are selected by himself, by his exercise of the franchise vested in him as a citizen of a great republic, and as one of a great brotherhood of men, each one of whom is born free, and who is the peer of each one of his millions of fellow citizens, quite stirs one's blood. This theory of making the highest public servants of a great nation directly responsible to the individual citizen, through this process of frequent popular election, is quite impressive and quite plausible — as a theory — on paper.

Let us see how it works.

The hard, practical experience of one hundred years has now definitely established, as to the actual working of our present political system, certain fundamental political facts. Among them are the following :

1. The system creates a privileged class.

In one sense any form of government must be a government by a class ; that is, it must be a government by a body of men who are in some way specially selected for the public service.

But the theory of a democratic government is that at least the men at the head of the government are to be chosen for their worth, on their merits, by the people.

But this is not the practical result that our present system gives. "What I mean when I say that our present political system creates a privileged class is, that it brings into existence, naturally and necessarily, though not by any express provision of law, a class of men who are selected, not by the people, but by themselves, who virtually to a large extent control the selection and action of all our public officials.

Bear in mind that under our present political system the highest places in the government, national, state, and local, in other words, the prizes of public life, are to be won by carrying elections.

This work of carrying elections is very large, and recurs at regular and very short intervals. To state it more correctly, the work never ends. Here is a very large number of public offices. The terms of office are very short. Every year there is a large number of vacancies to be filled by this process of election ; and it is known precisely what those vacancies are to be. This large amount of election work must be done by some one. The doing of it has the possibility of great rewards. Naturally and certainly it finds men ready to do it, and usually their readiness to do the work is caused by the prospect of the rewards that the work promises. These men who do election w^ork make it their regular profession, their business. In that profession they gain great skill. They organize. In time it comes to be virtually impossible for any man to be elected to a public office except by their permission and with their active support. These organizations of professional electioneering agents virtually control the selection, and therefore largely control the official action, of nearly all our highest public officials in the entire country, national, state, and local. It is no doubt the fact that our public officials, in the large majority of cases, intend to perform their official duties to the best of their ability. As a class, even under the great disadvantages under which they now labor, they do their work as well as they can. But they are not free. Most of them depend on the professional politicians for their next nomination, and there-

THE PRACTICAL RESULTS. 1 V

fore for their next election, to their public positions ; in other words, they depend on the professional politicians for their official lives and fortunes. It is certain, therefore, that they will be largely controlled by those politicians. The professionals too, no doubt, are, to some degree, influenced by public opinion. But this influence has its limits. No doubt, too, the professionals, in a large majority of cases, so far as is allowed by their personal interests, endeavor to select fairly good men for office. But for every office there are many seekers. Election work must be done, and it must be paid for. So long as the highest officials are dependent for the continuance of their official existence on that work, it is and will be paid for with the people's offices. Whatever may be the general wishes and purposes of the leaders of these great organizations, however much they may wish, as many of them do, to follow public opinion and serve public interests, they are compelled, by the necessities of their official existence, to pay their followers with the people's offices ; in other words, to use the people's offices for their own personal ends. These large organizations become virtually standing armies, engaged in a constant struggle for the spoils of public office and the control of the 2 public treasury. Their leaders become a very peculiar specimen of a privileged class. They are not selected by the people. They are not recognized by the letter of the law. They come into existence outside the law, as a certain and necessary fruit of a political system in which a large number of the highest public places are regularly and frequently put up as the prizes to be won in a great contest where large moneyed interests are at stake and where there are large constituencies. Such a system, may serve fairly well for the administration of communities that are small and poor. It will certainly be a failure with peoples that are large and rich. With such peoples it will necessarily and surely result in the creation of a privileged class of professional election workers who to a large extent control the selection of public servants and the administration of public affairs.

2. The system bars the best citizens from the public service.

The best citizens neglect this work of carrying elections.

They neglect it, because they are compelled to do so. They cannot take the time that it requires. The best class of citizens are the men who work, who are driven with work, because their services are in demand, for the reason that they have been found to be honest and industrious. Their time has value. Their private work must be done ; and it is their habit to do it well. The time needed to do this present vast mass of election work is greater than they can possibly afford to give. They cannot give it, and they will not.

It is not that our citizens do not take a sufficient interest in public affairs, that they are not patriotic, or that they are unwilling to make sacrifices to serve public interests. This American people has very many and very recent proofs of the readiness of its individual citizens to make personal sacrifices in the cause of the people. But this work of carrying elections is too great, too continuous, and too engrossing. Those men in the community who have their own way to make, their own living to earn, by their own labor, cannot take the time that is necessary to do the mass of election work that now comes on the community.

The result is that, in this work of arranging nominations and carrying elections, the busy men, the working men in the community, find themselves at a hopeless disadvantage. Many of them at times make a sincere and earnest effort to do what they deem their duty to the State, and to use their just influence in the selection of fit public servants. But the men who regularly betake themselves to this work of carrying elections do so to make money. In that work they have a direct personal pecuniary interest. At that work they get great skill. With them, in their own field, the ordinary lay citizen can never cope. It is the old story of the amateur against the professional, and the professional wins. It is the law of nature. It is needless to say that the amateur sooner or later withdraws from a contest so unequal, attended with defeat so uniform, and the professionals have the field to themselves.

I assume, what I believe to be the fact, that the large majority of citizens really wish to select the best men for their public servants. That is for their interest. It saves their money, lessens their taxes, makes life easier and more comfortable — and that they know.

I assume, also, what I believe to be the fact, that the professional politicians who are in office, the large majority of them, honestly try to give us as honest and efficient administration of public affairs as they can — under existing circumstances.

But the professional politicians naturally, as do all men, look out for their own personal interests. They are compelled to do so. They nominate and elect men on whom they can depend to serve those personal interests. The politicians need men who are pliable, and they get them. But the men who will best guard the interests of the public are not pliable. They are made of firm stuff. As a rule they are not men who are what is termed " popular." They are the men who will do what they think is demanded by a full regard to public interests, with little or no regard to interests that are purely personal.

The result is that the politicians, w T ho have the power, who substantially select all our highest public officials, sooner or later throw aside the men w T ho will not serve personal ends. At times the professional election workers are compelled, under the stress of peculiar circumstances, to nominate and elect very valuable men. But in time — however well single public officers may serve the people, however often professional politicians may make concessions to public opinion in occasional nominations of popular men — these politicians will in the end succeed in quietly eliminating from public life men who are independent and serve only the interests of the public. The best men, whether they wish it or not > are gradually retired, or are put in places where they have no real power.

It is, no doubt, the fact that many individuals, who are fairly efficient public servants, in one way and another, under circumstances more or less exceptional, do succeed in keeping their places in the public service — for a time. But in general the tendency is (and the tendency works itself out with great success) to keep and drive the best citizens out of the public service. They find it hard to get in — and, as a rule, impossible to stay in for any long time.

I am here considering ordinary times, times of peace, times when no unusual call is made on the citizen for the sacrifice of his private interests. When war comes, when it is a question of life and death to the nation, then this American people has thus far found many men willing to risk their lives and fortunes in the service of the people. So too, in times of great popular political excitement, in times that may properly be termed revolutionary, many of the best citizens make large sacrifices of time and money, to effect, if possible, the election of competent and honest men to high public office.

But in ordinary times men do not feel called

THE PRACTICAL RESULTS. V*

on to make sacrifices so large. Then most men prefer their own ease and comfort, and wish to look after themselves and their families. In those ordinary times the men whose labor is valuable, who command good wages and steady employment, are not willing to take the risks and discomforts of depending for their livelihood on the contingencies of popular elections, as those elections must necessarily be carried on under our present political system. They cannot afford it, unless they are men of independent fortune, or are willing to steal. They must, can, and will have security for steady employment, at reasonable rates of compensation. A man who is making a fair income, in a reputable calling, may be willing, for a single year, to neglect his private affairs. He may do so even for two years. But to undertake the duties of any ordinary public office for a term of four, or five, or ten years is ordinarily beyond his power. To do so for a still longer term, if he is to perform his official duties with thoroughness, is too much to ask. - At the end of so long a time his place in private affairs will be probably filled, and he will be compelled, in a measure, to begin life anew, under great disadvantages, when he is well on in years. Such risks will not be taken by prudent men.

Such men rightly require greater security of regular employment than they can now have under our political system. Eich men and needy adventurers are, as a rule, now the only classes of men who can afford to go into " politics." But men without fortunes, who are compelled to earn their own incomes, cannot afford the effort to enter public life. It is no doubt the fact that many young men, and many estimable men, from very praiseworthy motives, give much time to the practical work of carrying elections. But men of prudence, who have their fortunes still to make, cannot at present afford to touch politics.

There is a further consideration.

The getting of public office, under our present system, by our present processes of nomination and popular election, generally requires either the doing of a large amount of dirty work, or the payment of large amounts of money for the doing of it by other men. All this work, of conventions and nominations, brass bands, parades, and election literature, with the support of the professional politicians, without whose support no man can now obtain any public office, must be paid for, either in money or in kind. Candidates for office must, as a rule, hold themselves more or less at the beck and call of verv dis-