Bates, — On Democracy. 107 



of the sovereignty of the people are — (1) The extension of the 

 parhamentary franchise so as to include all citizens except 

 children, criminals, and the insane ; (2) the ehgibility of citi- 

 zens of all ranks for nearly all offices of State ; (3) the su- 

 premacy of legislation. 



"What are some of the principles of the new democracy ? 

 Amongst these we must enumerate " equality of rights" — a 

 somewhat vague phrase, but which I take to mean that all 

 men are equal before the law or in respect to prohibition and 

 restriction, and that every man has a right to be heard in all 

 matters that affect him. Another principle is that majorities 

 must rule — or, in other words, that the majority for the time 

 being represents the will of the people. A third principle is 

 an increased and increasing use of the machinery of the 

 State in the interests of the masses of mankind. This is done 

 chiefly in the way of compulsory, permissive, or other kinds 

 of legislation. As regards the intervention or limits of the 

 State the greatest diversity of opinion prevails. There are 

 those who would limit the function of the State to the pro- 

 tection of life and property, and there are those who would 

 fly to Government on any and every occasion. Between 

 these two extremes there are many varieties of opinion. 

 The truth seems to be that no hard-and-fast rules can be 

 laid down on the subject. " As to the question in its general 

 bearing," says Sir Frederick Pollock, "I do not think it can be 

 fully dealt with except by going back to the older question, 

 What does the State exist for ? And, although I cannot justify 

 myself here at length, I will bear witness that for my own part 

 I think this is a point at which we may well say, ' Back to 

 Aristotle.' The minimisers tell us that the State exists only 

 for protection. Aristotle tells us that it was founded on the 

 need for protection, but exists for more than protection — 



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material security, but the perfection of human and social life, is 

 what we aim at in that organized co-operation of many men's 

 lives and works which is called the State. I fail to see good 

 warrant of either reason or experience for limiting the cor- 

 porate activity of a ntttion by hard-and-fast rules." It seems 

 to me that the doctrine of pure individualism is as much 

 opposed to what may be called municipal socialism as to 

 State interference. Be this, however, as it may, in this 

 country the State has established an insurance department, 

 and has undertaken the construction and management of 

 railways — and yet the world goes round. 



As regards the programmes of democratic legislation, we 

 find economical and social questions mixed up with those 

 which are purely political. Land-nationalisation, co-opera- 

 tion, profit-sharing, limitation of the hours of labour, loans of 



