_VANISHING LANDMARKS_
“_When the mariner has been tossed for many days in thick weather
and on an unknown sea he naturally avails himself of the first
pause in the storm, the earliest glance of the sun, to take his
latitude and ascertain how far the elements have driven him from
his true course._”
Webster
“_Have you lately observed any encroachment upon the just liberties
of the people?_”
Franklin
[Illustration]
VANISHING LANDMARKS
_The Trend Toward Bolshevism_
By
Leslie M. Shaw
Former Secretary of the Treasury
Ex-Governor of Iowa
[Illustration]
Laird & Lee, Inc.
Chicago
Copyright, 1919
By
Laird & Lee, Inc.
_Vanishing Landmarks_
IN JUSTIFICATION
There are several types of intellect, with innumerable variations and
combinations. Some see but do not observe. They note effects but look
upon them as facts and never seek a cause. Tides lift and rock their
boats but they ask not why. They stand at Niagara and view with some
outward evidence of delight a stream of water and an awful abyss, but
they lift neither their thoughts nor their eyes towards the invisible
current of equal volume passing from Nature’s great evaporator, over
Nature’s incomprehensible transportation system, back to the mountains,
that the rivers may continue to flow to the sea and yet the sea be not
full. That class will find little in this volume to commend, and much
to criticise.
A man is not a pessimist who, when he hears the roar and sees the
funnel-shaped cloud, directs his children to the pathway leading to the
cyclone cellar. He is not a pessimist who, after noting forty years of
boastful planning, realizes that war is inevitable, and urges
preparedness. But the man is worse than a pessimist—he is a fool—who
stands in front of a cyclone, rejoicing in the manifestation of the
forces of nature, or faces a world war, expatiating on the greatness of
his country and the patriotism and prowess of his countrymen.
It is commonly believed that Nero fiddled while Rome burned. Conceding
that he did, it was relatively innocent folly compared to the way many
Americans fiddled, and fiddled, and fiddled, and fiddled, until Germany
was well on the way to world domination. Coming in at fabulous cost and
incalculable waste, and saving the situation at the sixtieth minute of
the eleventh hour, we not only claim a full day’s pay but seem to
resent that those who toiled longer, with no more at stake, are asking
that honors be divided.
We are now facing a far worse danger than the armed hosts of the
Central Powers—a frenzied mob each day extending its influence, and
multiplying its adherents. Shall we again fiddle and fiddle, and fiddle
and fiddle, or shall we both think and act?
For six thousand years the human race has experimented in governments
and only China boasts of its antiquity. During this period almost every
possible form of government was tried but nothing stood the test of the
ages. The few surviving pages of the uncertain history of nations that
have existed and are no more, give ample proof that the task of
self-government is the severest that God in his wisdom has ever placed
upon His children.
When this government was launched the world said it would not endure.
It has both existed and prospered for more than a century and a
quarter, but there is no thinking man between the seas, and no thinking
man beyond the seas, who does not recognize that representative
government, in the great republic, is still in its experimental stage.
Even Washington declared he dared not hope that what had been
accomplished or anything he might say would prevent our Nation from
“running the course which has hitherto marked the destiny of nations.”
It is said that when Galusha Grow entered Congress he carried a letter
of introduction to Thomas Benton, then just concluding his thirty years
of distinguished service. Naturally, Senator Benton was pleased with
the brilliant Pennsylvanian, for he said to him: “Young man, you have
come too late. All the great problems have been solved.” Ah! they had
not been. Mr. Grow lived to help solve some; others have since been
solved; more confront us now than ever before in our history, and the
sky is lurid with their coming. If we are to continue a great
self-governing and self-governed nation, we must spend some time in the
study of statecraft, the most involved, the most complex, and, barring
human redemption, the most important subject that ever engaged the
attention of thinking men.
About the only subject which vitally affects all, and yet to which few
give serious thought, is the science of government. Our farms and our
factories, our mills and our mines, together with current news, much of
it frivolous, and little of it thought-inspiring, engage our attention,
but statecraft, as distinguished from partisan politics, is accorded
scant consideration. In the first place we are too busy, and, secondly,
we do not improve even our available time. A young New Englander was
asked how his people spent their long winter evenings. “Oh,” said he,
“sometimes we sit by the fire and think, and sometimes we sit by the
fire.” It is the hope of the author that the following pages will
invite attention to some problems that in his humble judgment must be
thought out at the fireside, and must be wisely solved, if we expect to
keep our country on the map, and our flag in the sky until the Heavens
shall be rolled together as a scroll.
Recent years have demonstrated the abiding patriotism of the American
people and their faith in the ever-increasing greatness of America. Few
there be who would not gladly die for their country. The only thing
they are not willing to do is to think, and then hold their conduct in
obedience to their judgment. The future of our blessed land rests with
those who can think, who will think, who can and will grasp a major
premise, a minor premise and drawing a conclusion therefrom, never
desert it.
It has become painfully commonplace to say that the American people can
be trusted. While their good intentions can be relied upon, no nation
will long exist on good intentions. The nations that have gone from the
map have perished in spite of good intentions. The future of America
rests not in the purity of motives, nor upon the intelligence, but in
the wisdom of its citizens. In the realm of statecraft some of the most
dangerous characters in history have been intelligent, pious souls, and
some of the safest and wisest have been unlearned.
Socrates taught by asking questions. So far as possible he who is
interested enough to read this volume will be expected to draw his own
conclusions. The facts stated are historically correct. What deductions
I may have drawn therefrom is relatively immaterial. The question of
primary importance to you will be, and is, what conclusions you draw.
And even your conclusions will be worthless to you and to your country
unless your conduct as a citizen is in some degree influenced and
controlled thereby.
From the monument that a grateful people had erected to a worthy son I
read this extract from a speech he had made in the United States
Senate: “He who saves his country, saves himself, saves all things, and
all things saved bless him; while he who lets his country perish, dies
himself, lets all things die, and all things dying curse him!”
LESLIE M. SHAW.
Washington, D.C., March, 1919.
CONTENTS
I Republic Versus Democracy 13
II The Constitutional Convention 19
III Statesmen Must First be Born and Then Made 27
IV Expectations Realized 31
V Independence of the Representative 36
VI Trend of the Times 43
VII Constitutional Liberty 48
VIII What is a Constitution 57
IX Preliminary 70
X No Competition Between the Sexes 74
XI Purposes and Policies of Government 79
XII The Result of this Policy 86
XIII All Dependent Upon the Payroll 93
XIV American Fortunes not Large, Considering 98
XV Popular Dissatisfaction 103
XVI Greed and its Punishment 110
XVII Obstructive Legislation 115
XVIII The Inevitable Result 121
XIX Unearned Increment 131
XX Business Philosophies 137
XXI The Government’s Handicap 145
XXII The Post Office 158
XXIII Civil Service 161
XXIV Civil Service Retirement 179
XXV Property by Common Consent 184
XXVI Equality of Income 193
XXVII An Historical Warning 196
XXVIII Capital and Labor 202
XXIX Can the Crisis be Averted 209
XXX Industrial Republics 217
_Conclusion_ 224
_Appendix_ 232
VANISHING LANDMARKS
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 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 satisfied 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. 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.
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.