Vanishing landmarks; the trend toward bolshevism

Front matter

Class _rLlXia4_ Rook ■ & S52*

CqpigiitN __i_i__CL

CDESRIGHT DEPOSIT.

Contents

I Republic Versus Democracy. . 13

II The Constitutional Convention 19

III Statesmen Must First be Born

Chapter I Republic Versus Democracy

Representative government and direct government compared.

The Fathers created a republic and not a democracy. Before you dismiss the thought, examine your dictionaries again and settle once and forever that a republic is a government where the sovereignty resides in the citizens, and is exercised through representatives chosen by the citizens; while a democracy is a government where the sovereignty also resides in the citizens but is exercised directly, without the intervention of representatives.

Franklin Henry Giddings, Professor of Sociology of Columbia University, differentiates between democracy as a form of government, democracy as a form of the state, and democracy as a form of society. He says: "Democracy as a form of government is the actual decision of every question of legal and executive detail, no less than of every question of right and policy, by a direct popular vote." He also says: "Democracy as a form of the state is popular sovereignty. The state is democratic when all its people, without distinction of birth, class or rank, participate in the making of legal authority. Society is democratic only when all people, without distinction of rank or class, participate in the making of public opinion and of moral authority."

The distinction, briefly and concisely stated, is this : \ One is direct government, the other representative government. Under a democratic form of government, the people rule, while in a republic they choose their rulers. In democracies, the people legislate; in republics, they choose legislators. In democracies, the people administer the laws; in republics, they select executives. In democracies, judicial questions are decided by popular vote; in republics, judges are selected, and they, and they only, interpret and construe laws and render judgments and decrees. I might add that in republics the people do not instruct their judges, by referendum or otherwise, how to decide cases. Unless the citizens respect both the forms of law and likewise judicial decisions, there is nothing in a republic worth mentioning.

When we speak of individuals and communities as being democratic, we correctly use the term. My father's family, for instance^ like all

Republic versus Democracy 15

New England homes of that period, was very democratic. It was so democratic that the school teacher, the hired man and the hired girl ate with the family. We sat at a common fireside and joined in conversation and discussed all questions that arose. It was a very democratic family ; but it was not a democracy. My father managed that household.

In very recent years we have been using the word "democracy" when we have meant "republic." This flippant and unscientific manner of speaking tends to lax thinking, and is fraught with danger. A good illustration of careless diction is found in the old story that Noah Webster was once overtaken by his wife while kissing the maid. She exclaimed: "I am surprised!" Whereupon the great lexicographer rebuked her thus: "My dear Mrs. Webster, when will you learn to use the English language correctly? You are astonished. I'm surprised."

It is a well known fact that the meaning of words change with usage. Some recent editions of even the best dictionaries give democracy substantially the same definition as republic. They define a republic as a "representative democracy" and a democracy as a government in which the people rule through elected representatives. This gradual change in the meaning of the word would be perfectly harmless if our theory of government did not also change. Probably our change of conception of representative government is largely responsible for the evolution in the popular use of the word democracy.

A far more important reason why the term "democracy" should not be used improperly lies in the fact that every bolshevist in Russia and America, every member of the I. W. W., in the United States, as well as socialists everywhere, clamor for democracy. All of these people, many of them good-intentioned but misguided, understand exactly what they mean by the term. They seek no less a democratic form of government as Professor Giddings defines it, than a democratic society as he defines that, and likewise financial and industrial democracy. They want not only equality before the law, but equality of environment and equality of rewards. Only socialists, near-socialists, anarchists and bolsheviki clamor for "democracy." Every true American is satisfled with representative government, and that is exactly what the term republic means.

EQUALITY

The expression, "All men are created equal',' does not signify equality of eyesight, or equality of physical strength or of personal comeliness.

. Republic versus Democracy 17

Neither does it imply equal aptitude for music, art or mechanics, equal business foresight or executive sagacity or statesmanship. Equality before the law is the only practicable or possible equality.

Why educate, if equality in results is to be the goal? Why practice thrift, or study efficiency, if rewards are to be shared independent of merit? Those who clamor most loudly for equality of opportunity, have in mind equality of results, which can be attained only by denying equality of opportunity. Equal opportunity in a foot race is secured when the start is even, the track kept clear and no one is permitted to foul his neighbor. But equality of results is impossible between contestants of unequal aptitude when all are given equality of opportunity.

The kind of "democracy" which the socialist and the anarchist demand, confessedly hobbles the fleet, hamstrings the athletic and removes all incentive to efficiency. The keystone of representative government is rewards according to merit, and the buttresses that support the arch are freedom of action on the one side, and justice according to law on the other.

f* Republics keep a one-price store. Whoever pays the price, gets the goods. Democracy, on the contrary, expects voluntary toil, popular sacrifices and then proposes to distribute the resultant good either pro rata or indiscriminately. No one can read socialistic literature without recognizing that political, social, industrial and financial democracy is the goal of its endeavor. When the supreme conflict comes between organized government, organized liberty, organized justice and bolshevism under whatsoever garb it may choose to masquerade, I do not intend anyone shall "shake his gory head" at me and say that I helped popularize their universal slogan and international shibboleth. Unless we speedily give heed we shall be fighting to make America unsafe for democracy. Then we may have difficulty in explaining that we have meant all these years a very different thing than our language has expressed.

Chapter II The Constitutional Convention

The republican character of the constitutional convention, the qualifications of the delegates, and the extent to which they trusted to the wisdom of the people.

The Constitutional Convention was a republican body, and not a mass meeting. George Washington presided. He was a delegate from Virginia. James Madison was another representative from the same state, and he wrote the greater part of the Constitution. Thomas Jefferson was in France, and had nothing whatever to do with drafting the great document, or in securing its adoption. Benjamin Franklin was a delegate from Pennsylvania. Roger Sherman was a representative of Connecticut. New York sent no delegate, but Alexander Hamilton, who with George Washington had early recognized that the League of Nations, or League of Sovereign States, which means the same, and which the old Articles of Confederation created, was proving an utter failure in practice, and had, therefore, urged from the beginning "a more perfect union,' ' attended and he was seated as a delegate from New York. His matchless vision led him to seek the incorporation of additional safeguards against bolshevism, as it is now called, and though his advice was not heeded it was Hamilton, more than any other man, with John Jay and James Madison his able supporters, who secured the ratification of the Constitution as drafted.

These, and the other delegates, representing the people of the several states, after much deliberation formulated the historic document beginning, "We the people." It provides among other things that its ratification by delegated conventions in nine of the thirteen states shall make it binding upon the states so ratifying the same. It also provides that it can be amended in a similar delegated convention called at the request of chosen representatives in the legislatures of two-thirds of all the states, or by joint resolutions passed by two-thirds of the representatives of the people, in Congress assembled, when ratified by representatives of the people in three-fourths of the states, in their respective legislatures assembled.

Those who talk about "taking the government back to the people" would do well to remember that the American people have never voted upon

The Constitutional Convention 21

any provision of the National Constitution, and there is no way provided by which they can, in any direct way, express their approval or disapproval. I repeat, the Fathers created a republic, and not a democracy. Washington speaks of "the delegated will of the nation" — never of the popular wish of the people.

THE FATHERS CONSULTED HISTORY

The members of the Constitutional Convention were worthy of their seats. They were men of both learning and experience. They had read history. They knew that many attempts at representative government had been made and that all had failed. They also knew the path all these republics had taken on their way to oblivion. They were fully alive to the fact that the first step had always been from representative government to direct government; from direct government to chaos, from chaos to the man on horseback — the dictator ; thence to monarchy. The discussion in the convention makes it abundantly clear that the Fathers sought to save America from the monarch, and to protect her from the mass. They chose the middle ground between two extremes, both fraught with danger.

They even went so far as to guarantee that no state should be cursed with a democratic form of government, or a monarchial form of government or any other kindred system. The provision is in this language: "The United States shall guarantee to every state in this Union a republican form of government." That excludes every other form.

CONFIDENCE IN THE PEOPLE JUSTIFIED

The members of the Constitutional Convention, having been selected because of their aptitude for public matters, their knowledge of public questions and their experience in public affairs, very naturally had confidence that men of like caliber and character would always be selected for important representative positions. They believed the people would choose legislators, executives and judges of aptitude, at least, and would retain them in office until they attained efficiency through experience.

Presumably these delegates anticipated that men would be born with no aptitude for public positions, but they confidently believed even these would be able to select men of aptitude. They may have realized that some men would be unfit for Congress, who, nevertheless, would be competent to select able congressmen. For these, as well as for other reasons, they provided no way by which those whom no one would think of send-

The Constitutional Convention 23

ing to Congress, and who naturally give no attention to public affairs, could instruct their congressmen, who alone must bear the responsibility of legislation. Had such a thing as legislating by referendum been thought of at that time, the Fathers certainly would have expressly prohibited it. Legislation by representatives was considered and express and detailed provision therefor was made.

The preceding differentiation between republic and democracy has no reference, of course, to political parties. Long before the republican party, as now constituted, had an existence, democratic orators grew eloquent over "republican institutions," meaning thereby representative institutions.

Every protestant church in America is a republic. Its affairs are managed by representatives — by boards. Otherwise there would be no churches. Every bank and every corporation is a republic, managed by boards and officers selected by stockholders. The United States Steel Corporation, for instance, is analogous to a republic, the stockholders being the electors, but if the stockholders were to take charge of that corporation, and direct its management by initiative or referendum, it would be in the hands of a receiver within ninety days.

The United States of America is a great Corporation, in which the Stockholder is the Elector. Stockholders of financial and industrial corporations desire dividends, which are paid in cash. Not desiring office, the stockholders are satisfied to have the corporation managed by representatives of aptitude and experience. The dividends paid by political corporations like the United States and the several states are "liberty and the pursuit of happiness," "equality before the law," an army and navy for national defense, and courts of justice for the enforcement of rights and the redress of wrongs. But stockholders in political corporations are not always satisfied with these returns. Some prefer office to dividends payable only in blessings.

In banks and other business corporations, stockholders are apt to insist that representatives and officers who show aptitude and efficiency shall be continued in office so long as dividends are satisfactory. In political corporations the people have recently been pursuing a very different course. They have been changing their representatives so frequently that efficiency, which results only from experience, is impossible.

While stockholders of a corporation would certainly wreck the institution if they attempted to manage its affairs directly or by referendum,

The Constitutional Convention 25

it is very appropriate for stockholders, acting on the recommendation of their representatives — the board of directors — to determine an important measure like an issue of bonds, or whether the scope and purpose of the concern shall be enlarged or its capital increased. Analogous to this is the determination of governmental policies at regular elections where the people choose between the programs of different political parties as set forth in their platforms. Thus the people sometimes ratify the policy of protection, and sometimes the policy of free trade, demonstrating that they do not always act wisely by frequently reversing themselves.

Political parties usually omit from their platforms the details of legislation. The only exception that occurs to me was when every detail of a financial policy was incorporated in the platform submitted for ratification. The coinage was to be "free," it was to be "unlimited," and at the "ratio of 16 to 1." If the people had approved this at the polls their representatives would have had no discretion. There would have been no room for compromise. While the people are presumably competent to choose between policies recommended in the platforms of political parties, it is a far stretch of the imagination to suppose that the average citizen is better prepared to determine the details of a policy than the man he selects to represent him in the halls of Congress. The congressman who concedes that his average constituent is better prepared to pass upon a proposition than he is necessarily admits in the same breath that his district committed a serious blunder in sending him. It ought to have selected a man at least of average intelligence.

The fact that neither stockholders en masse, nor employees en masse are able to manage a business enterprise does not imply that the principle of a republic may not be advantageously applied to industrial concerns. This question is again referred to in Chapter xxx, and the possible safe, middle course between the industrial autocracy demanded by capital, and the industrial democracy demanded by labor, is suggested and briefly discussed.

Chapter III Statesmen Must First Be Born And Then Made

Some fundamental qualifications for statesmanship. Integrity and wisdom compared.

How are lawyers obtained? Admission to the bar does not always produce even an attorney. And there is a very marked difference between an attorney and a lawyer. But when a young man is admitted to the bar who has aptitude for the law, without which no man can be a lawyer, industry in the law, without which no man ever was a lawyer, then with some years of appropriate environment — the court room and the law library — a lawyer will be produced into whose hands you may safely commit your case.

How are law makers obtained? Many seem to think it only necessary to deliver a certificate of election, and, behold, a constructive statesman, of either gender. I would like to ask whether, in your judgment, it requires any less aptitude, any less industry, or a less period of appropriate environment to produce a constructive law maker, than to develop a safe law practitioner.

I will carry the illustration one step further. Do you realize that it would be far safer to place the man of ordinary intelligence upon the bench, with authority to interpret and enforce the laws as he finds them written in the book, than to give him pen and ink and let him draft new laws ? We all recognize that it requires a man of legal aptitude and experience to interpret laws, but some seem to assume neither aptitude nor experience is necessary in a law-maker. If legislators in state and nation are to be abjectly obedient to the wish of their constituents, what use can they make of knowledge and judgment? They will prove embarrassments, will they not?

To interpret the laws requires aptitude improved by experience ; it demands special knowledge, both of the general law and of the particular case under discussion. It takes a specialist.

I would rather have the ordinary man stand over my dentist and tell him how to crown my tooth than to have him stand over my congressman and tell him how to vote. He knows, in a general way, how a tooth should be crowned, and further than that I refuse to carry the illustration. Then, I can stand a bad tooth better than I can a bad law. No man ever lost his job because of a bad tooth. But millions have stood in the bread line, and other millions will suffer in like manner

Statesmen Must First Be Born 29

because of unfortunate and ill-considered legislation.

INTEGRITY VERSUS WISDOM

We all demand integrity in office, but integrity is the most common attribute of man. I can go on the street and buy integrity for a dollar a da}^ ? if it does not require any work ; but aptitude, experience and wisdom are high-priced. If I had to choose between men of probity but wanting in aptitude and experience, and men of aptitude and experience known to be dishonest, I should unhesitatingly choose the crook rather than the fool ; either for bank president or congressman. Banks seldom fail because of dishonesty. Banks fail because of bad management. The thief may steal a little of the cream but the careless and the inexperienced spill the milk.

Thus far in our history no man has ever walked the street in vain for work, no man has gone home to find his wife in rags and his children crying for bread, because of dishonesty in public office. The United States can stand extravagance, it can stand graft, it has stood and is standing the most reckless abandon in all its financial expenditures. The worst this nation has yet encountered — and may the good Lord save us from anything more dreadful — is incompetency in the halls of legislation. Extravagance and graft stalk forth at noonday when incompetency occupies the seats intended for statesmen.

None but bolsheviki would consider subjecting an army to democratic command. The personnel of an army may possess equal patriotism without possessing equal aptitude for war. Recent experiences have only emphasized what was said more than a thousand years ago: "An army of asses commanded by a lion will overthrow an army of lions commanded by an ass."

Strange, is it not, that every one should recognize this principle when applied to an army and to business, and an overwhelming majority overlook it when applied to governmental matters?

Chapter IV Expectations Realized

The capacity of the people to select representatives wiser than their constituents illustrated by historic facts.

America has passed through several crises, and each time has been saved because the people's representatives were wiser than the people. In this respect, the expectation of the Fathers has been realized. I will mention but three instances.

During the Civil War the government resorted to the issuance of paper currency, commonly called greenbacks. While conservative people assumed that these greenbacks would be redeemed whenever the government was able, nevertheless, there being no express provision for their redemption, they went to depreciation, and passed from hand to hand far below par. All this resulted in inflation which inevitably led to a period of depression.

In this connection it is well to remember that whenever we have had a period of depression, and whenever we shall have such a period, there always has been and ever will be a group of people with a panacea for our ills. During the period referred to, a political party, calling itself the "Greenback Party," came into existence and advocated the issuance of an indefinite volume of irredeemable paper currency which, in their ignorance, they called "money/' The specious argument was to the effect that when "money" can be made on a printing press, it is silly to have less than enough. They expressly advocated issuing all the currency the people could use without making any provision for its retirement. Whenever the people wanted more, they proposed to print more.

Fully seventy-five percent of the American people, without regard to political affiliation, favored some phase or degree of "greenbackism." While much of this sentiment failed of crystallization, quite a number of congressmen were elected on that issue. If the direct primary law, with which most of the states are now cursed, had been in force at that time, it is probable that no man could have been nominated for Congress, by any party, who was not avowedly in favor of inflation by some method. But the people were saved from themselves exactly as the Fathers had anticipated. The representatives of the people, being wiser than the people, refused the people

Expectations Realized 33

what most of them desired and gave them what they needed, resumption of specie payment.

Again, in the '90's we had a period of depression, and the panacea then recommended was the free and unlimited coinage of silver, at the ratio of 16 to 1 with gold. The difference between "greenbackism" and "free silverism" was simply one of degree. The greenbacker desired the government to print the dollar mark on a piece of paper, thus producing currency one hundred percent flat, while the free silverite asked that the government stamp the dollar mark upon a piece of silver, thus producing currency fifty percent flat.

Fully nine-tenths of the American people desired the free and unlimited coinage of silver. William McKinley, willing as he was to run for president on a gold standard platform in 1896, when in Congress had voted for a clean-cut free silver measure. The lower house of Congress actually passed a free silver bill. But, exactly as the Fathers expected, the people's representatives in the Senate, wiser than the people who had placed them there, refused the people what ninety percent of them wanted and gave them what one hundred percent needed — sound money.

Outside of Russia, there is scarcely a man in all the world who would now recommend the issuance of irredeemable paper currency, what three-fourths of the American people wanted in the '70's; and there is not more than one man in all the world who would now recommend the free coinage of silver, what four-fifths of the American people wanted in the '90's.

The direct primary in 1896 would have nominated a free silver republican, and a free silver democrat in each and every congressional district of the United States, and we would have had a solid free silver House. If the United States senators had been then elected by the people, preceded by a direct primary, the Senate of the United States would have been solidly for free silver ; and we would have passed, as everyone now recognizes, to financial ruin. We were saved, because the United States of America was a republic and not a democracy — because, if you please, we had representative and not direct government.

More recently, Germany and the Central Powers made war upon the United States. This they continued for more than two years. Finally, the President, in his message of April 2, 1917, advised Congress to "declare the course of the Imperial German Government to be, in fact, nothing less than war against the country and the people of the United States." A resolution to that effect was thereupon passed on April 6, 1917.

Expectations Realized 35

If the proposition of going to war with Germany had been submitted to a direct vote of the American people, under a referendum, they would have voted against it, two to one, and in many localities and cities, four to one. Again we were saved, because we had a republican and not a democratic form of government. We were saved because our representatives proved wiser than their constituents.

Chapter V Independence Of The Representative

The effect of popular instructions to representatives discussed and illustrated.

The Fathers never intended that the people should legislate, interpret the laws or administer justice. They did provide, however, that the people should choose their legislators, their judges and their executives. They sought also to render impossible any interference with the independence of these representatives. Judges are not expected to inquire of bystanders how questions of law shall be decided, or what decrees shall be rendered, or what punishments imposed.

The Fathers did not anticipate that executives would hold their ears so close to the ground as to become nests for crickets. I do not mean to be understood, however, as intimating that the buzzing of insects has never been mistaken for the voice of the people. Members of the House and the Senate were not supposed to conform to Dooley's definition of a statesman: "One who watches

Independence of the Representative 37

the procession until he discovers in which direction it is moving and then steals the stick from the drum major." The Fathers expected officials to be as independent of the voters who select them as officers of a corporation are independent of stockholders.

In proof that Washington did not consider the delegates to the Constitutional Convention bound to follow the wishes of the people they represented I cite what Gouverneur Morris quotes him as saying: "It is too probable that no plan we propose will be adopted. Perhaps another dreadful conflict is to be sustained. If to please the people we offer what we ourselves disapprove, how can we afterward defend our work? Let us raise a standard to which the wise and the honest can repair; the event is in the hand of God."

Suppose the state should engage in banking. A doorkeeper, a bookkeeper and a president would be necessary. But if the president sought instruction from the street, the bank would be short-lived. If a body of stockholders were to enter a bank, as now operated, and demand a loan without security, either for themselves or for some needy fellow creature, the president would probably say, "You can have another president any day you please, but while I am president, you will furnish collateral." Otherwise, there would be no bank.

L. Q. C. Lamar used to say to his constituents: "If you desire me to represent you in Congress, I will do so." Then, with becoming dignity and in absolute harmony with the principles of the republic, as established by the Fathers, he would add, "But do not, for a moment, suppose you can stand between the plow handles during the day and tell me how to vote." Evidently Mr. Lamar expected to study public questions and to be better informed than his average constituent.

Later, the legislature, recognizing his ability, sent him to the United States Senate. Here he opposed greenback legislation which was favorably considered by the people of Mississippi. Thereupon the legislature passed a resolution demanding either that he vote in harmony with the sentiment of his state, or resign. He refused to do either, but continued to speak, and to vote his convictions based on knowledge. Before his term expired, the wisdom of his course was recognized and he was re-elected to the Senate by the very men who had sought to direct his action in a matter wherein they had no jurisdiction and he had supreme responsibility, and concerning which they knew nothing, while he knew much.

Following the Civil War impeachment pro-

Independence of the Representative 39

ceedings were instituted against Andrew Johnson. Because of the known prejudices of the people of Iowa, Senator Grimes of that state was expected to vote "guilty." He voted "not guilty," and his colleague asked him, "Do you think you are expressing the sentiment of the people of Iowa?" The grand old Roman replied: "I have not inquired concerning the sentiment of the people of Iowa. I vote my convictions." That would be political suicide today.

A few years ago proceedings to expel a certain senator were pending and several of his associates, after hearing the evidence submitted to them in their judicial capacity, expressed the conviction that the accused was innocent, but, because of the prejudices of their states, they would have to vote for expulsion. Senator Depew told me of a member who actually cried as he contemplated voting to expel a man whom he believed to be innocent.

I would like to ask how long you think the United States of America can maintain her proud position among the nations of the world, if oathbound representatives of the people accept popular sentiment as the guide of their official conduct.

At the unveiling of the monument to Elijah Love joy, a letter was read from Wendel Phillips containing this sentence: "How cautiously most slip into oblivion and are forgotten, while here and there a man forgets himself into immortality." In these most trying times our greatest need is men in public life whose ears are always open to counsel but ever closed to clamor — who will approach pending problems that threaten our very existence, with no other care but their country's weal. The corner stone of freedom, as laid by the Fathers, is the absolute independence of the representative, coupled with the unimpeded right of the people to choose again at brief but appropriate intervals.