548 TEE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY 



system and the growing number of experts employed in the conduct of 

 governmental affairs indicate that democracy is not necessarily incon- 

 sistent with efficiency in the public service. In any event, an influential 

 portion of the property-owning class is no less responsible than the 

 working class for the manifest failures in our municipal, county, state 

 and federal governments. The mistake of supposing that some new 

 kind of political machinery, such as commission government, will work 

 desirable results without the watchful eye of an intelligent electorate is 

 not confined to any one class. 



It does not follow that the services of a man who is not elevated to 

 an elective office are lost to the country. The case of Mr. Bryan, whom 

 an error of judgment on the silver question and the "cross of gold'"' 

 speech brought into prominence, ia a good illustration. He has never 

 reached the presidency, but as the critic of his own as well as of other 

 parties he has rendered the country more distinguished service than 

 some who have reached the highest office in the gift of the people. Many 

 of the positions of greatest influence are outside of public office. There 

 is no occasion to despair of the influence of the educated man who can 

 think and express himself clearly. 



We may rail at "mere talk" as much as we please, but the probability is 

 that the affairs of nations and of men will be more and more regulated by talk. 

 . . . there can be no doubt that it is talk — somebody's, anybody's, everybody's 

 talk ... by which each generation comes to feel and think differently from its 

 predecessor. No one ever talks freely about anything without contributing some- 

 thing, let it be ever so little, to the unseen forces which carry the race on to its 

 final destiny. Even if he does not make a positive impression, he counteracts or 

 modifies some other impression, or sets in some train of ideas in some one else, 

 which helps to change the face of the world. 1 * 



The late Edwin L. Godkin justly complained of the influence of the 

 boss in our nominating system, of the decline of our state legislatures, 

 of the prevalence of the spoils system, of the lack of public spirit, and of 

 our failures in municipal government. 15 These evils are still with us, 

 but the changes that have taken place, while leaving much to be de- 

 sired, have been, for the most part, in the right direction. In no re- 

 spect has there been greater improvement than in the weakening of 

 party ties and the growing influence of the independent voter. An ex- 

 cessive loyalty to party was one of the unfortunate results of the Civil 

 War. In the South, voting the democratic ticket became almost a sine 

 qua non for admission to polite society. In many northern communi- 

 ties, the republican party 



was merely a synonym for patriotism, another name for the nation. One became, 

 in Urbana and in Ohio for many years, a Republican just as the Eskimo dons 



i* Edwin L. Godkin, "Problems in Modern Democracy," pp. 221, 223 and 

 224. 



is See ' ' Unforeseen Tendencies of Democracy, ' ' passim. 



