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POPULAR MISGOVERNMENT IN THE
UNITED STATES
POPULAR MISGOVERNMENT
IN THE UNITED STATES
BY
ALFRED B. CRUIKSHANK
[Illustration]
1920
MOFFAT, YARD & COMPANY
NEW YORK
COPYRIGHT, 1920, BY
MOFFAT, YARD & COMPANY
CONTENTS
PAGE
CHAPTER I
PAST FAILURE AND FUTURE DANGERS OF UNLIMITED SUFFRAGE 1
CHAPTER II
THE OLDEST AND THE BEST AMERICAN TRADITIONS FAVOR A RESTRICTED
SUFFRAGE 28
CHAPTER III
THE SUFFRAGE IS NOT A NATURAL RIGHT BUT A FUNCTION OF GOVERNMENT
AND MAY THEREFORE PROPERLY BE RESTRICTED TO THOSE COMPETENT TO
EXERCISE IT 40
CHAPTER IV
THE STATE AS THE DEPUTY OF SOCIETY POSSESSES THE JUST POWER OF
ORDAINING FRANCHISE QUALIFICATIONS 50
CHAPTER V
THE CAPACITY TO CREATE AND PRESERVE PRIVATE PROPERTY IS THE PROPER
TEST AND PROOF OF QUALIFICATION FOR ACTIVE CITIZENSHIP IN AN
ADVANCED DEMOCRACY 59
CHAPTER VI
ORIGIN AND FIRST APPEARANCE OF MANHOOD SUFFRAGE AS PART OF THE
FRENCH TERRORIST MACHINERY 78
CHAPTER VII
IMPORTANT INFLUENCE OF FRENCH RED RADICALISM IN PROPAGATING THE
MANHOOD SUFFRAGE DOCTRINE IN THE UNITED STATES 83
CHAPTER VIII
THE SAFEGUARD OF A PROPERTY QUALIFICATION FOR VOTERS WAS DISCARDED
BY A GENERATION OF AMERICANS WHO DID NOT REALIZE ITS VALUE OR
THE DANGERS ATTENDANT UPON UNIVERSAL SUFFRAGE 88
CHAPTER IX
FIRST EFFECTS AND SUBSEQUENT RESULTS OF MANHOOD SUFFRAGE; SPOILS
SYSTEM; TRAFFIC IN VOTES; ORGANIZED CORRUPTION; THE BOSS; THE
MACHINE; RULE OF POLITICAL OLIGARCHY 109
CHAPTER X
SHORT SKETCHES OF MANHOOD SUFFRAGE PROGENY; THE POLITICIAN AND
THE BOSS; THEIR CREATIONS, THE RING AND THE MACHINE; AND
THEIR BY-PRODUCT, THE LOBBY 135
CHAPTER XI
THE EFFECT OF MANHOOD SUFFRAGE IS TO FASTEN ON THE COUNTRY AND
MAKE PERMANENT THE RULE OF THE POLITICIANS 158
CHAPTER XII
INJURIOUS EFFECT OF MANHOOD SUFFRAGE UPON AMERICAN LEGISLATIVE
BODIES 174
CHAPTER XIII
MANHOOD SUFFRAGE AS APPLIED TO THE GOVERNMENT OF AMERICAN CITIES
HAS NOT ONLY BEEN A FAILURE BUT A DISASTER AND A SCANDAL 190
CHAPTER XIV
BRIEF REFERENCE TO MANY NOTED DISCLOSURES OF GOVERNMENTAL CORRUPTION
MOSTLY IN STATE AND FEDERAL AFFAIRS SINCE THE INSTITUTION
OF MANHOOD SUFFRAGE EN THE UNITED STATES 218
CHAPTER XV
THE FOUR YEARS CIVIL WAR IN THE UNITED STATES IS DIRECTLY CHARGEABLE
TO MANHOOD SUFFRAGE 244
CHAPTER XVI
FAILURE AND CONDEMNATION OF MANHOOD SUFFRAGE AFTER A TEN YEARS’
EXPERIMENT IN THE SOUTHERN STATES 253
CHAPTER XVII
THE EFFECT OF MANHOOD SUFFRAGE IS TO ENSURE INEFFICIENCY IN DOMESTIC
LEGISLATION AND ADMINISTRATION 267
CHAPTER XVIII
WEAKNESS AND INEFFICIENCY OF OUR MANHOOD SUFFRAGE GOVERNMENT
IN ITS FOREIGN RELATIONS 293
CHAPTER XIX
ROTATION IN OFFICE; A MISCHIEVOUS BY-PRODUCT OF THE MANHOOD SUFFRAGE
DOCTRINE AND ANOTHER FACTOR IN POPULAR MISGOVERNMENT
AND HEREIN OF CIRCUMLOCUTION OFFICE REFORM 305
CHAPTER XX
THE EFFECT OF THE OPERATION OF MANHOOD SUFFRAGE HAS BEEN TO GIVE
A LOWER TONE TO AMERICAN PUBLIC LIFE 315
CHAPTER XXI
GENERAL PRIVATE AND PUBLIC CONDEMNATION BY THE INTELLIGENT CLASSES
OF MANHOOD SUFFRAGE POLITICS AND GOVERNMENT IN THE UNITED
STATES; AND HEREIN OF WATCH DOGS AND YELLOW DOGS 320
CHAPTER XXII
THE ELECTORATE FUNCTIONS NOT BY ITS INDIVIDUALS BUT BY GROUPS
WHEREBY THE ENFRANCHISEMENT OF THE SHIFTLESS AND IGNORANT
GROUP NECESSARILY TENDS TO CREATE A VICIOUS POWER IN POLITICS 334
CHAPTER XXIII
ANSWER TO THE PLEA THAT THE BALLOT SHOULD BE GRANTED TO THE UNPROPERTIED
CLASSES AS A PROTECTIVE WEAPON 341
CHAPTER XXIV
ANSWER TO THE PLEA THAT THE PRIVILEGE OF SUFFRAGE BE GRANTED TO
ALL AS A MEANS OF POLITICAL EDUCATION; AND HEREIN OF SILK
PURSES MADE FROM SOW’S EARS AND OF AMATEUR HARPING 347
CHAPTER XXV
ANSWER TO SUGGESTION THAT UNLIMITED SUFFRAGE IS A PART OF AMERICAN
LIBERTY 354
CHAPTER XXVI
AN UNQUALIFIED NUMERICAL MAJORITY RULE IS NOT IN ACCORD WITH
GOOD STATESMANSHIP 367
CHAPTER XXVII
OF EDUCATIONAL AND AGE SUFFRAGE QUALIFICATIONS FOR VOTERS 373
CHAPTER XXVIII
WOMAN SUFFRAGE IN THEORY 378
CHAPTER XXIX
WOMAN SUFFRAGE IN PRACTICE 408
CHAPTER XXX
A PROPERLY QUALIFIED ELECTORATE WILL REMOVE THE CAUSES OF THE
PRESENT POPULAR DISSATISFACTION AND SERVE AS A DEFENSE AGAINST
THE PRESENT MENACE OF BOLSHEVISM 421
CHAPTER XXXI
THE CASE IS URGENT; THERE SHOULD BE NO DELAY WHATEVER IN ESTABLISHING
THIS GOVERNMENT UPON A PROPERTY BASIS 434
CHAPTER XXXII
CONCLUSION 439
BRIEF SKETCH OF WRITERS REFERRED TO 449
POPULAR MISGOVERNMENT IN THE UNITED STATES
CHAPTER I
PAST FAILURE AND FUTURE DANGERS OF UNLIMITED SUFFRAGE
_Let us raise a standard to which the wise and the honest can
repair; the event is in the hand of God._--WASHINGTON
Great numbers of discerning Americans must by this time have been
brought to realize that something practical must shortly be done in this
country by the believers in private property and private property rights
to safeguard the nation from its threatened invasion by Bolshevism,
Socialism and other various forms of anti-individualism, or else we are
in for a hard and possibly a bloody struggle to maintain the very
fundamentals of our social and political systems. From time to time in
this country as in every other there occur periods of extraordinary
danger to the political structure. In the past we have had several such
episodes, the most noted being that of the secession movement
culminating in 1860 and 1861. The seriousness of the present menace of
communism in its various forms is due not so much to the strength of the
communist faction, considerable though it be, as to the weakness of our
civic structure consequent upon the long continued and increasing
general distrust and suspicion of our actual political agencies and the
confirmed popular dissatisfaction with their operations. Meantime,
nothing adequately effective either in the way of strengthening our
institutions or of disarming opposition thereto is being done or has
even been proposed. A lot of vigorous denunciation has been directed
against native and foreign Bolshevism, all thoroughly deserved and not
without effect on the public mind, but falling far short of positive
acts of defense or protection. Bolshevism is in the field not merely as
an abstract doctrine, to be answered with words, but as an active and
aggressive force which must be met by measures of active resistance.
Such measures to be effective must take the shape of the creation of
practical means and methods of offense and defense. The case is not one
which admits of trifling; the attack is fundamental, the danger is
vital, and cannot be effectually met by superficial expedients.
Now there is happily one available measure of protection and defense
against Bolshevism and all its assaults, one which is manifestly
appropriate and will be absolutely efficacious. It is one which has long
been highly desirable for other reasons hereinafter set forth, but which
in view of the menace of radicalism is now imperatively demanded. It
consists in such a reform of the electorate itself as will make it
impassible and impervious to every influence subversive of our basic
institutions. An electorate of male private property owners of
twenty-five years of age and upwards would constitute an absolute
barrier against all attacks on private property from any quarter; its
establishment would summarily and forever terminate all hopes of
Bolshevistic revolution in this country and ensure the American people
freedom to enjoy the noble future which Providence has made possible to
them.
The cause of private property rights is in the truest sense the American
cause and that to which all other national causes political and social
are subordinate. Those rights involve almost everything which is dear to
the American heart. Even our governmental institutions are of secondary
importance, they are the instruments merely; the means whereby we seek
to obtain among other aids and aims the protection of private property,
the absolute assurance to each American of the use and enjoyment of the
fruits of his toil, of his self denial and of his foresight. This view
is not novel in our politics. It was thoroughly familiar to our
Eighteenth Century statesmen, it was part of the political faith of
some of the most prominent among them, including a majority of the
political leaders of the Revolutionary epoch. They endeavored to secure
these ends and to ensure the future of the new nation by requiring
wherever possible a property qualification for voters. Had this practise
and its underlying principle been adhered to and (with proper
modifications for changed conditions as they might occur) had the
government been continued on the basis on which the wise and prudent men
of that time endeavored to establish it, it would at this moment
represent a satisfactory approximation of a true and scientific
democracy able to hold in safe derision its critics and enemies. But the
principle of a properly qualified electorate, so vitally essential to an
efficient democracy has been repudiated and abandoned; the practise of
unlimited white suffrage has been general amongst us for about ninety
years, and today there can be no doubt that there is a prospect of
danger to our country, not because of lack of courage and loyalty in her
sons, but because of the unhealthy organism of our body politic, whose
modern basic principle, unlimited suffrage, ignores property rights, and
looks to control by the representatives of the inefficient and the
proletariat whenever they can secure a numerical majority at the polls,
thus incidentally accomplishing what Bolshevism directly aims at.
And now that private property rights heretofore considered as
unquestionable are openly attacked, we must prepare for their defense,
for the defense of the family, of the American social system and the
free individual life, all three of which depend on private property for
their existence. The time has come when the institution of private
property must be formally recognized and defended as fundamental to our
existence as a nation, and such recognition requires and involves the
allotment to that institution of a place and influence in our electoral
system. Private property cannot safely rely for its defense upon
officials who are dependent upon the votes of the non-property holding
populace. There is no way of final avoidance of the issue, or even of
long postponing it. This nation must either declare itself definitely as
adhering to the principle of private property rights or it must expect
disaster. And first, the cause of private property rights needs
organization and self consciousness. Property holders cannot properly
defend a cause which has never declared itself and which has neither
standard nor leaders, while its enemies have both, and are not only
proclaiming their convictions with courage, but have enacted them into
living statutes wherever they have power. If the institution of private
property is to endure in this country it must be formally recognized as
representing a sacred cause, to be carefully committed into the hands of
its friends; the electorate must be made over into a property qualified
body, and all temptation to Bolshevism must be removed from the American
politician. Let this be done, let the constitution of every State be
amended so that our voting mass shall be virile and substantial, and
freed from the element of effeminacy and inefficiency now so
controlling; give the conservative good sense of the nation a rallying
point, an official standard, an authoritative creed, and it will
speedily make short work of the enemies of social order and of sound
political institutions.
But there is a great deal more to be said in favor of a property
qualification for voters than that it will be a wall against Bolshevism.
It will act on our political internal system as a tonic and a purifier.
It sometimes occurs in politics and statesmanship that two mischiefs are
so bound together that they can be destroyed at one blow. Such was the
case in 1861-1865, when the causes of the perpetuation of the Federal
Union and the emancipation of the black race became by the logic of
events so involved as to be practically united, and when by the triumph
of the northern armies the mischiefs of chattel slavery and disunion
politics were made to perish together. And in like manner we now find
not only that unqualified or manhood suffrage is the chief source of our
weakness in dealing with Bolshevism, but that it has been in the past
and still is the principal cause of our political corruption and
governmental inefficiency. And therefore it has come about that the
cause of private property and property rights is so bound up with the
cause of administrative purity and efficiency in our government that by
the one measure of the establishment of a property qualification for
voters the perils of the menace of Bolshevism and the mischiefs of
political corruption and inefficiency may be dispatched together.
It is in fact principally to the corruption and inefficiency of manhood
suffrage government that we owe the popular dissatisfaction out of which
the hopes of American Bolshevism are bred and nourished. The failure of
democratic institutions in this country must be admitted and it is
almost entirely due to the operation of manhood suffrage. We have aimed
at theoretical perfection, the natural conditions have been most
favorable; we have loudly called the world to witness the experiment,
and the world has condemned it as a political failure. This statement
will hardly be challenged, but it is well supported by available proof,
and need not rest merely on the assertion or opinion of the writer. And
right here the reader may as well be informed that it is the author’s
intention to support his material assertions with such evidence as the
nature of the subject permits. Such readers as are tolerably familiar
with American political history will recognize the truth of most of the
statements of fact contained in these pages; but the reasonable doubts
of the politically uninstructed will be removed as far as conveniently
possible by reference to records and to the testimony of reliable
witnesses. Here therefore we quote on this branch of the subject from an
address of _Henry Jones Ford_, President of The American Political
Science Association, delivered at the Annual Meeting at Cleveland,
December 29, 1919.
“There was at one period an enthusiastic belief that in the
Constitution of the United States reflection and choice had at last
superseded accident and force, and that a model of free government
was now provided by which all countries and peoples might benefit.
The effect upon governmental arrangements was once very marked, but
complete examination of the documents shows that this influence
soon spent itself, and a decided change of disposition took place.
If, for instance, one shall attentively consider the constitutional
documents of all the Americas, one will observe, that although in
their early forms the Constitution of the United States was the
model, this is no longer the case. The Constitution of the French
republic now excels it in influence. The United States has lost its
lead, despite the fact that never has our country bulked larger in
the world than now. The present situation is indeed a striking
confirmation of Hamilton’s opinion that error in our republic
becomes the general misfortune of mankind, for it is a fact well
known to every student of politics that a belief that our system of
government is a failure on the essential point of justice is now a
potent influence on the side of social revolution throughout the
world....
Students of political science will generally agree that the three
greatest works of this class, all displaying wide knowledge and
deep thought, are De Tocqueville’s _Democracy in America_, first
published in 1885; Bryce’s _American Commonwealth_, 1888; and
Ostrogorski’s _Democracy and the Organization of Political
Parties_, 1902. These works form a crescendo of censure upon
American government, each re-examination of the subject confirming
previous disapproval and adding to it.”
Needless to say that the writers referred to by Ford and others
hereinafter referred to fully sustain his statements above quoted. Our
government has not only been a failure on the essential point of justice
as President Ford points out, but a still greater failure on the equally
essential points of purity and efficiency. The democratic system in
actual operation among us has been productive of corruption and
mismanagement to such an extent as to cause and justify the almost
universal verdict that popular misgovernment rather than popular
government has been the outcome. Hence general dissatisfaction and
unrest; hence the danger of revolutionary movements, with which we are
openly threatened.
It is often said that governments reflect the character of the people.
If that were so in this country, as our people are conceded to be one
of the most intelligent in the world, we would have one of its best
working governments; instead of which we have one of the most wasteful,
corrupt and inefficient. Our inferiority in this respect has been
universally recognized both in this country and abroad for the last
fifty years or more; it is a common-place of conversation; and has
caused numberless Americans to feel rage and indignation at home and to
suffer shame and humiliation abroad. It has been the subject of
innumerable books, pamphlets, sermons and lectures; it has inspired
denunciation, satire and invective in pulpit, and on platform; the press
has reeked with the disgusting details of the corruption, ignorance and
incompetence of our office holders. Everywhere in the United States is
to be found great popular dissatisfaction with the operations of our
government, profound distrust of its methods and spirit, and conviction
that there has been a failure to reach the standards and to realize the
hopes of the Fathers of the Republic. This dissatisfaction and distrust,
this conviction of failure is not confined to any class; it pervades all
classes; it is widespread; it is to be heard freely expressed day by day
and hour by hour alike in the business office and in the bar-room, in
the private dwelling and on the street; by the mechanic, banker,
tradesman, laborer and lawyer. In short it is a matter of common
knowledge that for about eighty years past the United States and each of
them has been in many important respects badly, corruptly and
inefficiently governed. Read for instance this statement recently
published by an able American student and writer, and say whether it
does not indicate a state of things fruitful with danger to the
Republic, in two principal ways; one, that of its decay by corruption,
the other by furnishing material for scandal and propaganda to its
enemies.
“The present situation has been described over and over again.
Briefly, it is constant encroachments by the legislature upon the
executive; legislation under irresponsible ‘bosses’ for personal
ends, blackmailing of corporations by politicians, and of society
by corporations to recoup the plunder of the politician, or to
accumulate ill-gotten gain, both of them very good imitations of
the Spanish policy in the colonies which is terminating in the ruin
of an empire; favours shown to special forms of business and
industry; unjust taxation; the irresponsible conduct of our
legislatures whose deliberations are the signal for alarm and
confusion in the commercial world; and mass-meetings every week to
frighten politicians into submission, libel, bribery, and lying in
campaign work, government by perjurers, pugilists and pimps, and
political leadership by men who know no arts but those of
Alcibiades and Catiline--all these and a hundred other facts like
them create a profound and justifiable suspicion of institutions
that confer the supreme power upon those who are equally unfit to
govern themselves and others.” _Democracy_, Hyslop, p. 294.
Now, let us more carefully examine and consider the essential character
of the political system which has produced these unsatisfactory results.
Its basis is unlimited or unqualified suffrage, until recently appearing
and manifested as “manhood suffrage,” but now, since the so-called
“enfranchisement” of women more nearly fitting the name “universal
suffrage.” In any case in theory at least it is government by numbers,
in contradistinction to government by intelligence, birth, wealth,
experience, talent or by any combination of these or other qualities or
achievements. This doctrine of unlimited or unqualified suffrage is now
and has long been recognized as an established principle of government
in this country by most of us; indeed we may say by all Americans with
the exception of the natives or inhabitants of the Southern or former
slave States. By these latter pure manhood suffrage has been tried and
condemned and has been replaced by white manhood suffrage by means of
certain well known and successful political devices amounting
practically to a strict race qualification; though the important and
suggestive fact that thereby the basic principle of manhood suffrage was
expressly repudiated by the entire South has been carefully blinked by
Americans generally.
In a general way we may say then that manhood suffrage is everywhere in
the United States the legally recognized method of choosing all our
lawmakers and many of our administrative officials; that white manhood
suffrage actually obtains in the Southern States; and that in the other
States constituting about three fourths of the whole, every resident
male citizen, native or naturalized, and in some of them residents not
naturalized, may vote. In sixteen of the forty-eight States the suffrage
has within recent years been extended to women. So that at present the
basis of government in the United States is manhood or male suffrage in
all the States with the addition in some of them of female suffrage; or
in other words, ignoring the negro situation, we have manhood suffrage
in thirty-two and universal suffrage in sixteen States. In all of these
States elections are frequent, in most annual, in others biennial, in a
few quadrennial.
The controlling political importance of these elections is evident when
we consider that thereby are chosen all the members of both houses of
the various State Legislatures, of both houses of Congress, the
governors of the states and the President and Vice-President of the
United States, that is to say the entire body of lawmakers of the
country. Also in many of the States are thus selected the Judges of the
Courts higher and lower, and numerous administrative state officials,
such as State Attorneys, Auditors, State Engineers, Financial Officers,
etc. Besides these there are elections of almost equal practical
importance of minor or local officers, such as Sheriffs, County
Attorneys and Supervisors, Mayors and Aldermen of Cities, and
miscellaneous officials. Beyond all this, the electorate is required
from time to time, and in some States at nearly every election, to pass
upon constitutions, or amendments or provisions of constitutions, state
and federal, referenda and propositions of various kinds involving
sometimes vast expenditures. For none of these elections is any voting
qualification practically required of the resident citizen, except that
of color, and that only in the South.
It is interesting and curious to note how under our system of popular
elections, government as legally constituted is merely a product of a
process of aggregation of numbers. In practise, this numerical system is
modified by the low despotism of Boss rule, but in theory it rests on an
arithmetical count of heads, many of them cracked, others of various
degrees of emptiness, without taking note of merit, capacity or fitness.
And right here in order to fully realize the force and sweep of the
numerical system of government we should remember that the effect of the
vote of the electorate is not confined to the directly elective offices;
it extends to the appointive offices as well; for the appointing power,
whether President, Governor, Senate or Legislature being chosen by
election, is under the necessity of selecting his or its appointees from
those of its supporters who control the most votes. It is not therefore
surprising that the politician whom the votes of the populace have made
President or Governor sometimes appoints a knave or demagogue to public
office. Such appointment, however offensive to some of us, may have been
in strict accordance with our political system. Under that system the
ultimate appeal is never to experience, ability, capacity or character,
but always to numbers; and therefore the official indebted to the power
of numbers for his own high office may possibly be quite justified in
continuing the process, and in bestowing his appointments on the
representative or controller of numbers, no matter what his quality or
theirs. To use the language of practical politics “the man with a
following is entitled to recognition” be he demagogue, rogue or humbug;
and the President, Governor or Boss who fails to give it to him is false
to the modern American principle of “numbers win”; in a word he is
un-American; and is likely to suffer politically in consequence. In fact
we may say generally that government in this country is authorized by
numbers, rests on numbers, and is backed and sanctified by numbers and
naught else; while our governing class count numbers, live by numbers
and need respect nothing but numbers if of numbers they can obtain
sufficient support. The President is selected and appointed as the
result of a numerical reckoning; and so with all other officials and
the men who choose the officials; the laws are made either by men chosen
by the addition of figures, or more directly by a similar count of
voters; nearly all of whom are absolutely ignorant of the merits and
scope of the projected legislation and each of them lacking other
qualification than that he exists and can be counted. The candidate with
the largest total gets the office; the project approved by the greatest
number becomes law.
Our government is not one of talent, nor cunning, nor of money, nor
birth, nor military force, but of numeral computation; our rulers are
not hereditary nor called to rule for their merits nor by the grace of
God; they are counted in; it is a government by calculation, an
arithmetical government. Our ruling classes are not aristocrats, nor
militarists, nor statesmen, nor capitalists, nor landowners; they are
handshakers, mixers, they have “followings,” and their political weight
in council does not depend on their wisdom, but on the numbers of the
mob running at their heels. We are taught politically to think in
numbers, to believe in numbers; in fact, politically we believe in
nothing else.
Now it is clear that the effect of this régime is to disregard much that
statesmanship should take into account in framing a nation’s polity.
There are many other considerations besides mere numbers which affect
men politically; other forces which far more than mere numbers operate
towards the development of mankind, the shaping of human destiny, the
establishment and fall of political institutions; all of which forces
are by our political system completely ignored. In a free play of
political life we would expect for instance to reckon with intellect,
capacity, energy, industry, wisdom, knowledge, judgment, prudence,
physical strength, wealth, experience, training, efficiency, and perhaps
other qualities, but in our political scheme none of them is considered;
everything is ascertained and decided upon and all doubts resolved by an
arithmetical process; you take a count and the thing is done. Be the
question, for instance, who is the properest man to fill an
administrative office of trust and importance; on the one hand is A who
has a good physique, is of a fine family, habits good, long training and
experience, excellent education, bright past record for efficiency and
honor; and on the other B who has none of these valuable qualities, is a
little shady in fact; but a glib platform speaker. The number of votes
is counted and B has the more and is thus positively ascertained to be
the man for the place. Is not this wonderful? Tried by any other test he
would have been declared unfit for the position; but the numeral system
conclusively demonstrated his fitness. And indeed the writer is
compelled to admit that the number system is deservedly popular with
those able to profit by it, and has given promotion to thousands of
nonentities who would otherwise have remained in obscurity. So of a
project of law involving difficult questions of justice and expediency;
students of civics and even great statesmen may be in doubt as to
whether it ought not to be amended or modified; but with our system in
operation there is no need for study or hesitation; you just invite
every one to say “Yes” or “No.” Possibly the majority will not
understand the project at all or will misunderstand it, but that makes
no difference: understanding is not necessary to voting; it is numbers
that count, not understanding. Possibly a conscientious or indolent
third of the voters will decline to vote; that makes no difference
either; possibly every one of the few who realty understand the
proposition is opposed to it, but that is of little practical
consequence as the knowledge or ignorance of the voters is immaterial
and is never made the subject of inquiry; possibly the scheme is
imperfect and to the knowledge of the well informed plainly needs
amendment; it matters not, there is no provision for amendment of
details in the numerical system; possibly the project has never been
properly presented to the electorate and most of the votes pro or con
are the result of ignorance, whim or prejudice; but this fact will not
be considered in the result, for an ignorant or prejudiced vote is just
as valid as a just and wise one. The system is unfailing; it will solve
every difficulty; the doubts of able statesmen are answered in a moment
by the vote of the female mill hands of Factoryville. You are sure to
get some decision, and any decision will serve; for no matter how
foolish or unreasonable it may be, no one is responsible; there is no
appeal and practically no redress.
This electoral scheme would seem to imply a general belief in the
capacity of the electorate. It would at first blush appear to be founded
upon a theory of the superior wisdom and almost superhuman knowledge and
virtue of the masses, whereby every voter is presumed to know who are
best fitted to fill the offices of Mayor, Alderman, Sheriff, County and
State Attorney, Judge of Courts small or large, State Assemblyman, State
Senator, Congressman, State Engineer and Surveyor, Governor of the
State, and President of the United States; and it would seem, besides,
that every voter, male or female, is presumed to cast his or her vote
with the good of the community and nation at heart. The verdict so taken
would thus have something of the effect of an infallible decree; and
indeed we note that people and newspapers often speak of the results of
an election with a species of awe; and that in the somewhat too common
event of a doubtful character or even of a noted scamp being elected to
a public office the result is often spoken of as his “vindication.”
These “vindications” in fact are frequently needed and demanded by
political gentlemen under a cloud, and have been accorded by the
electorate in a surprisingly large number of cases. Nor does the mere
capacity to select the best officials measure the full quota of the
wisdom and accuracy apparently required by the populace under our
political system. They, every man jack, and in the “advanced” States,
every woman jenny of them all is from time to time required to vote upon
questions which presuppose them to be perfectly familiar with the
Constitution of the United States and of his and her own State; to
understand all its provisions and to be able to determine the meaning
and effect of any and all amendments thereto, which are or may possibly
be proposed.
Now, all this is of course absurd; no such belief in the wisdom of the
electorate is entertained by the masses or by anybody, for no one in the
world is such a fool as not to be aware that at every election large
numbers of the voters are absolutely incapable of passing upon the
merits of candidates far above them in education, station in life, and
capacity to fill offices whose high duties they could not be made to
understand by any amount of explanation. Few even of the most ignorant
are unaware that only trained minds are capable of construing and
understanding constitutional provisions and forecasting their probable
effects. There must therefore exist within the manhood suffrage scheme,
some principle or theory more sane than a belief in the omniscience of
the rabble of ignorance, stupidity and indifference which it proudly
marshals to the polls; and though this principle or theory has never
been precisely or authoritatively defined, yet on examining the numerous
written or spoken expressions in support of universal suffrage found in
books, speeches and newspaper articles, we discover that the postulate
at the bottom of the manhood suffrage proposition is this: not that the
mass of voters are competent judges of conditions or policies, but that
they are the natural, necessary and proper arbiters thereof; not that
ignorance, stupidity and vice do not go to the polls, but that in the
nature of the case they are there and have a right to be there; that it
is intended and expected that they shall be actually represented and
expressed in the vote; that in politics all have equal right to be
heard; that government and law should be an expression of the will of
all the people or at least of all of the men of this country; not merely
of those having patriotism, experience, virtue, judgment, and wisdom, or
any one of these qualities; but of the whole populace; including the
ignorant, stupid, worthless and depraved; and that each of these latter
should have an equal voice with the wise and worthy. Such is and must be
the underlying theory of manhood suffrage; and as women are notoriously
still more ignorant of political affairs than men, the adoption of
woman suffrage is evidently a mere extension of this same theory of
equality of political value to the female sex; so that under a system of
universal suffrage the law and the government include the expression of
the ignorance, stupidity and depravity of both sexes of the community,
state or nation as well as of its education, wisdom and goodness. And
this principle is in effect generally carried out at our elections; so
that practically the only disfranchised classes are those of the
publicly supported paupers and the negroes in the South, and the whole
immense national mass of ignorance, incapacity and hostility to social
wellbeing is included in our voting lists and finds expression at the
polls.
From an electorate so constituted, from a system of government founded
on such a perverse theory no good results are or ever were to be
expected. Accordingly, we are not surprised to note that the first plain
signs of a general political deterioration in American politics were
about coincident with the establishment of manhood suffrage in the early
part of the nineteenth century. For the first forty years of the
republic politics were comparatively pure; the United States was a model
among nations; then we note a fatal declension, a swift lowering of
standards; we observe the close connection between the establishment of
manhood suffrage and the entrance into high places of low politicians;
how upon the widening of the franchise the management and control of
politics in the United States began gradually to pass from the hands of
the principal men of the country, the ablest, the most wealthy, the best
educated, the most influential, the members of the oldest and best
families, and to fall under the control of the professional politicians.
This latter class originating at about that period developed into well
organized bands who under the leadership of chiefs, since known as
bosses, have seized, occupied and still hold and occupy the offices, the
machinery of public elections, appointments, and almost the entire
control of public affairs. Their management and control have been
selfish, corrupt and inefficient. Their legislation has been excessive
and poor in quality; their administration of governmental affairs
ignorant, weak, capricious, oppressive, wasteful, careless and
dishonest. During all this time the system of manhood suffrage has
remained unassailed and unquestioned, and the people have listened more
or less complacently to fulsome praises of their government system by a
venal and superficial press and by ignorant and insincere political
platform orators. These, in their speeches and platforms have been
easily able to escape imputation of the mischiefs of manhood suffrage
and of their own class by charging them upon the opposite party, or upon
such of their political opponents as happened for the time being to hold
public office. And so elections have come and gone, parties have risen
and fallen, officials have been selected as popular one year and thrown
aside as unsatisfactory the next, but through it all corruption and
inefficiency remain constant and acknowledged features of American
political life.
The time has come when a remedy for this state of things can no longer
be safely postponed; the situation is serious; the democratic system is
being attacked, and will continue to be attacked here and elsewhere by
great numbers of the very class who have heretofore been supposed to
constitute its defenders and champions. Be they Bolsheviki, Anarchists,
Socialists or what you will, these assailants of our institutions are
nearly all of the common people, of the very working class whom it has
been and ought to be the pride and mission of America to shelter and
satisfy. Many of them were brought to this attitude of revolt by evil
conditions in Europe and are continuing here their hostile attitude to
organized society and spreading the spirit of mischief among us because
they are justly disappointed by our political conditions; finding here
in a country supposed to be democratic, the rule of a corrupt oligarchy
of politicians thoroughly established and apparently acquiesced in by
the people at large. The seeds of discontent which they are assiduously
sowing are likely to take root in the breasts of our own people,
disgruntled as they are with the past and present corruption of our
politics and the inefficiency of our government.
This corruption, this inefficiency, long a scandal among us, is the real
cause of that popular “unrest,” that dissatisfaction the subject of so
much comment, which for more than a generation just prior to the German
war had been steadily increasing in this country. It was started by the
degradation of politics which ensued immediately upon the establishment
of manhood suffrage and the inauguration of Jackson and the Spoils
Policy in 1829. It was already well under way in 1840; but was
subsequently held in check by the Anti-Slavery agitation, by the Civil
War and the Southern Reconstruction troubles, which ended in 1876 with
the inauguration of Hayes. From that time this popular protest against
our political unrighteousness has been steadily on the increase, gaining
in power and bitterness with the added instances of official unfitness
and maladministration of public affairs. With the disappearance of the
older generations reared in a religious belief in our republican
institutions and filled with memories of the honest days before Jackson,
appeared the spirit of contemptuous disbelief in official capacity and
honesty which has taken possession of their descendants. The vision of a
government administered by statesmen and patriots of the type of
Washington and the Adamses has given place in the mind of America to a
picture of a sordid gang of corrupt and incapable politicians in power,
and it is therefore to the credit of our people that there has been
protest, dissatisfaction and “unrest.” The popular demand that this
state of things be remedied is at the bottom of the so-called “unrest,”
and it is not an unreasonable demand. Never in the world’s history was
there a people so religious, so patriotic, so disinterested, so
idealistic, so appreciative, so tolerant of mere mistakes, so easy to
govern justly as the American people; but the best of them are
determined that their republican government shall be the ultimate
success their fathers promised to make it. They care much less about
“world democracy”; they are far from being such consummate fools as to
believe that our political system is fit for other and inferior races or
to want to meddle with the affairs of other nations; but they want
Americanism to continue _here_; they want honest and efficient
government established in this country; and they fear the breakdown of
those republican institutions to which they feel a passionate devotion.
There have indeed been no lack of efforts at reform. All sorts of
expedients have been proposed and every remedy possible has been adopted
and tried except the only one which could possibly be efficacious,
namely, the limitation and elevation of the electorate. This and the
other new idea or so-called political reform has been tried and
discarded, or proved of little value; hundreds of penal statutes have
been enacted, hundreds of boards, commissions and officials of various
sorts have been created; there have been innumerable grand jury inquests
and committees of investigations; there have been created new ballot
systems, new primary laws; initiatives and referendums, besides
thousands of tax-payers’ suits, injunctions, newspaper campaigns, new
reform parties and fusions of old parties, not with the slightest hope
of reaching perfection, but in desperate efforts on behalf of common
decency. All have failed. Countless political movements have been
started and political campaigns fought in the effort to cure the
delinquency, to cleanse the corruption of our local and general
governments, with varying temporary success, but without permanent
benefit. Men have spent their lives and fortunes in the effort; each new
generation hopefully undertaking the task of cleaning the stable only to
abandon it in its turn; and nothing permanent or even enduring has been
accomplished. Here and there, an individual or a group of political
malefactors has been punished; here and there schemes for public plunder
have been exposed and defeated; the particular system or legislation
which permitted these specific instances has been changed or reformed;
this or that particular abuse suppressed, and in the aggregate a great
deal of mischief has thus been done away with or prevented. But no one
pretends that the root of the evil has been removed or that the grasp
of the professional politician class upon the throat of the nation has
been loosened. The elections from which so much was expected, the men
and movements from which so much was hoped, have come and gone without
substantial results. The same class of politicians, the same methods,
the same political games, the same corruption, the same boss rule, the
same old rings, the same fraud, cheating, waste and general inefficiency
remain the most striking features of our American public life. The same
men, though not always holding the same places, remain in office year
after year, and the rule of the oligarchy of professional politicians
established eighty years ago goes on forever. When one of its members is
turned out of one political job by a spurt of indignation of a gullible
and innocent public, he quickly appears in another one just as
comfortable and lucrative, and sometimes with a capacity for mischief
and blundering rather increased than diminished by the change.
Seeing this, the reformers naturally ask each other in wonder and
disgust what is the matter with the people? What is the cause of their
failure to rid themselves of these political gangs? What is the remedy
and where is it to be found? To ascertain the cause, to correctly
diagnose the disease is of course the first and the main problem.
Afterwards the remedy. The fact that it persists and has so long
persisted in operation affords evidence that it is not superficial but
represents an organic defect in our governmental system. Many political
students have puzzled over it, many have given the inquiry up as
hopeless. In an article in the _Atlantic Monthly_ for July, 1896, the
writer, referring to our legislative bodies, notes
“a decline in the quality of the members in general respect, in
education, in social position, in morality, in public spirit, in
care and deliberation, and, I think, I must add in integrity also.”
He finds them subservient to the Boss rather than to public opinion
and adds, “To account for this or to say how it is to be mended,
is, I admit, very difficult. Few subjects have done more to baffle
reformers and investigators. It is the great puzzle of the
heartiest friends of Democracy.”
Among people generally there is a failure to agree upon any specific
cause for the sad inferiority of our political condition. Some attribute
it to human frailty; some to American carelessness or good nature; some
to the spirit of the age, some to the inherent weakness of democracy. In
a very able and scholarly little book published as late as 1918 by Max
Farrand of Yale University entitled _The Development of the United
States_, the writer, after referring to persistent and ineffectual
attempts of reformers for the past generation to cleanse politics in
this country, makes this significant statement (p. 293): “It is
surprising that the people still retain faith in any remedies, but hope
springs eternal and every new plan was able to rally ardent supporters.
To the thoughtful observer, however, it was evident that the root of the
trouble had not been found and that something more radical or something
entirely different was necessary.” I find no hint in Farrand’s book as
to what this “something” might be. One may suspect that the worthy
professor had tracked the bear to his den but did not care to start him;
that he preferred to avoid making his book the subject of controversy by
giving his opinion as to what is in fact “the root of the trouble.”
However, he states the problem in a nutshell. All efforts to reform and
cleanse our politics have failed, something new and different is needed,
some remedy that will reach the very source of the political corruption
of our time and country. But after all, there need be very little
difficulty in finding the “root of the trouble”; it lies exposed, plain
enough for all men to see and to stumble over as they pass to and fro.
Many no doubt have identified it who prefer to be silent on the subject,
though a few prominent men have spoken out. President Woolsey of Yale,
for example, frankly says that “universal suffrage does not secure the
government of the wisest nor even secures the liberties of a country
placed in such a democratic situation, much less secures its order and
stability.” (_Pol. Science._ Vol. I, Sec. 101). In Reemelin’s _American
Politics_ (1881) the author says in his chapter on the ballot box that
“thickly strewn around us lie the evidences, that governing by the
ballot box, based on universal suffrage and universal qualification for
office is a failure; but why this is so, and what remedy we should apply
is not so intelligible.” (P. 168.) In 1871 the _Westminster Review_, a
British radical magazine, published an article on _The American
Republic, its Strength and Weakness_ in which the dangers of manhood
suffrage were plainly pointed out, and its institution attributed to the
efforts of demagogues, and to a mistaken conception of suffrage as a
right instead of as a privilege to be conferred upon those capable of
exercising it. The writer sums up the topic by saying that:
“The elevation of the government, laws and institutions of a
republic must necessarily depend upon the average intelligence and
virtue of its voting population. Hence it is a most dangerous
experiment for America to reduce the qualifications of its voters
to the level of the lowest, instead of raising the latter to a
certain definite standard at which the right of suffrage might with
comparative safety be placed in their hands.”
Another writer thus expresses himself:
“It is perfectly idle to attempt to give political power to persons
who have no political capacity, who are not intellectual enough to
form opinions or who are not high minded enough to act on those
opinions.... Lastly the events of the earlier part of the last
century show us--demonstrate we may say, to us,--the necessity of
retaining a very great share of power in the hands of the wealthier
and more instructed classes, of the real rulers of public opinion.”
(Bagehot, _Parliamentary Reform_, p. 316.)
And Lecky predicts that the day will come when the adoption of the
theory that the best way to improve the world and secure national
progress is to place the government under the control of the least
enlightened classes will be regarded as one of the strangest facts in
the history of human folly.
Indeed, but little political discernment is required to enable one to
realize the fatal mischiefs attendant upon the plan of according a place
in the electorate to females generally and to the ignorant, idle,
unthrifty, purchasable, vicious and anti-social males. It is not
difficult to see that such a scheme is erroneous in principle,
antagonistic to civilization, and to society as the agent of
civilization. History informs us that manhood suffrage is contrary to
our best traditions; that it has been mischievous and unclean in
practise; that it has filled the body politic with the foulest
corruption; that it is largely responsible for the Civil War and other
serious blunders and mischiefs; that it has cost thousands of millions
to the American people in money stolen and squandered. Reason plainly
teaches us that the suffrage is not a natural right, but a function in
the social system belonging only to those who by the process of natural
selection are qualified as men of education and property to take a part
in government; that unlimited universal or manhood suffrage is dangerous
for the future and if not overthrown may ultimately cause our national
destruction. There is not therefore after all any real difficulty in
determining that universal suffrage is the political disease under which
America is suffering. Its specific cause is the virus of the rabble
vote; men without character and destitute of achievement should be
excluded from the suffrage; they are by nature political nonentities,
and were they content to mark zero on their ballots thus indicating the
real extent of their political value and sagacity they would be
harmless; but they are too often the willing tools of scamps and
demagogues, and though individually zeros they attach themselves to real
figures to give them a fictitious and in this case a maleficent
influence. Nor is the remedy far to seek, though so many political
writers have been rather shy in hinting it. It is possible by very
simple means, by a mere return to the original American principle and
American practice of a property qualification for voters to so reform
our entire governmental system from the foundation upwards that it will
become efficient and enduring and capable of defying all the political
madness of the times. The democratic theory would thus be retained, but
it would be purified and strengthened by a return to the principles of
the fathers of the republic. We have failed because we have attempted in
defiance of those principles to create a democracy founded on numbers
and on nothing but numbers. The resulting product has not been a true
democracy; it has not properly represented and does not properly
represent the American nation, which consists not merely of population
but of American intelligence and industry. The manhood suffrage
democracy of numbers merely is too narrow; it does not afford a broad
enough foundation for the national superstructure; and that foundation
should he widened to include the American character and American
achievement.
The real difficulty in the case lies then not in ascertaining the source
of American political ills, nor in prescribing the remedy; the
difficulty lies in obtaining leadership or even advocacy of a movement
which to most men appears to promise little in the way of personal
advancement and much in the way of hostile criticism. As to the masses
in private life, most are indifferent and the remainder voiceless. All
the organs of public opinion are muzzled, controlled or terrified into
silence by the politicians; and but few in public life whether newspaper
men, clergymen, judges, politicians, teachers or public servants or
officials; but few of those merely dependent upon or connected with
politics or government, whether bankers, lawyers, physicians in
hospitals, officers of public utilities or the like, have heretofore
dared more than whisper to their closest friends their real hatred of
the political despotism under which we are living today in the United
States. Now, however, the present menace of the political madness known
as Bolshevism affords a new and compelling motive to every true American
to arouse himself, and there is a hope that in the presence of a new
peril, good citizens may be moved to realize the inherent weakness and
danger of our present political system, and to undertake the
establishment of a suffrage based upon such qualifications as will
insure the creation and continuance of a government in this country so
strong, determined, intelligent and devoted to the interests of
civilization that under it our whole political life may be purified and
made efficient; one which may be relied upon not merely to crush
Bolshevism in the United States but to extirpate it from this country
forever.
The proposal to establish a property qualification for voters throughout
the United States may seem novel and even startling to many Americans,
but there is no other way out of the political mess in which we find
ourselves. As will be shown in detail in subsequent pages the corrupt
rule of the low professional politicians of this country is made secure
by the vote of the thriftless and controllable class; until that vote is
expurgated there can be no purification of the body politic; without
purification there can be no efficiency; and unless the administration
of our public affairs is purified and made efficient we cannot either
answer the charges of the enemies of our institutions or repel their
attacks. We cannot depend upon the electorate as at present made up; it
has already shown its capacity to breed and encourage bad government;
the thriftless classes are all ready to accept Bolshevism or any other
economical and political absurdity; they are no more able to understand
the scheme of civilization and the value and importance of accumulations
of earnings and creation of property in furtherance of that scheme than
they are able to understand a musical symphony or a problem in the
higher mathematics. And after all there is nothing sacred about the
doctrine of unlimited suffrage; it is only a political experiment like
another; and the well known record of its complete and dismal failure is
summarized in these pages where it is shown that it has not been an
instrument of progress nor a means of freedom, but that its tendency has
been and is towards reaction and despotism; that it is anti-social and
hostile to civilization. The proposal to make property accumulations the
basis of government, though it is sanctioned by ancient practise, is
not reactionary; it is progressive, as every return to old and sound
principles is progressive. Nor will it create or tend to create a narrow
or exclusive electorate; it will on the contrary have a broadening
effect and will tend to furnish a truly popular government, one resting
directly on the consent and the votes of most of the population, and
utilizing qualities of virtue and manhood now denied their proper effect
in politics. It will represent directly or indirectly every element of
value in the nation; everything on which a democratic government depends
for its best support; namely, the industry, thrift, wealth,
intelligence, character and honest independence of its people. The
change will appear in the overthrow of the rule of brute force and the
curbing of the present despotism of numbers. Do what we will, the
passions and prejudices of the unthinking and uninstructed will always
affect political action; but if our democracy is to survive their power
must be checked and modified by associating with the sway of numbers the
powers of intelligence, of character, and of industry which working
together constitute efficiency.
Every generation has its problems which it must solve at its peril. Ours
is before us and must shortly be met if the signs tell true. Like Edipus
we must answer correctly or perish. And the question is, how to abolish
the weak and corrupt rule of the politicians and re-establish a pure,
firm, intelligent and truly republican government in the United States.
The true answer must be by the reform and elevation of the electorate.
Purify the source and the stream will be pure and sweet.
This object is of such consequence that every American ought to be
willing to devote strong efforts to its accomplishment. And first, the
intelligent and patriotic people of the country need to be aroused to a
sense of its importance and instructed in the merits of the case. They
must be made not merely to know but to realize vividly the main features
of the argument for a property qualification, which may be summarized
in ten points, namely: (1) That this government was not originally
founded on the principle of universal suffrage but on that of a
propertied electorate. (2) That the permanency of the corrupt and
inefficient rule of the political oligarchy in the United States is due
to the operation of universal suffrage. (3) That there is no natural
right to vote; but that voting is a function of government to be
exercised only for the benefit of society and never merely for that of
the individual. (4) That government in our day is a highly specialized
business institution requiring from its members expert knowledge rather
than oratorical gifts. (5) That good government in a democracy requires
a worthy and intelligent electorate. (6) That the franchise laws must
deal with classes, not with individuals. (7) That the franchise should
be confined to those who are socially qualified, as proven by lives of
successful social endeavor, resulting in the solid acquisition of
substantial property. (8) That book or school education is insufficient
to constitute by itself a franchise qualification. (9) That the body or
mass of men are better fitted than that of women to exercise all
political functions, voting included, and that therefore women should be
denied the suffrage. (10) That the elevation of the franchise is
absolutely necessary to purify our politics, strengthen our government
and protect property and civilization from threatened anarchy.
It is with the hope of assisting in this work that this book has been
written and published. It is not within its plan and scope to propose
and discuss in minute detail the exact qualifications of voters and
suffrage restrictions under the proposed new system. The basic
principles herein advocated once recognized, the detailed regulations
for their enforcement may properly be left to such state legislatures or
conventions as may undertake to deal with the matter. They would
obviously differ in different states and possibly in different
communities. They should be such as would tend to insure a contribution
by the voter of such a quota of intelligence, independence and good
judgment in casting his vote as will greatly decrease bribery in
elections; as will raise the standard of candidates for office, reduce
the influence of demagogues and “yellow” journals, elevate the tone of
public service, and incidentally encourage good citizenship by making
the voting power a badge of honor and manhood and a privilege to be
sought after and valued. There is no place in this scheme for an
educational qualification; such a requirement would be inconsistent with
the theory of this book which is that the school of business life is the
appropriate preparation for the voting booth. The class of men of good
education who are unable to acquire a modest competence in this country
are obviously so lacking in either interest in, or judgment of,
practical affairs as to be unfit to pass upon those business questions
which form the main part of the problems of government. The world of
books on the one hand is a totally different realm from the world of
business and of politics on the other hand. Further, an educational
qualification for voters is absolutely impracticable; it could not
possibly be enforced. But this subject will be discussed more at length
in the twenty-ninth chapter. Meanwhile let us briefly examine the
history and operations of the voting system in the United States.