1914] on Some Aspects of the American Democracy 219 



The conviction of the necessity to train every human creature has 

 become so strong and so general that a very large part of the popu- 

 lation gives something (in addition to school taxes) to equip schools 

 of some sort. Large contributions from rich men we hear much 

 about, but a far larger amount is every year given by poorer people 

 in small sums. All this is spent in the equipment and the endowment 

 of schools of every grade and kind. There has been an educational 

 ferment in American life. The colossal proportions of this energy 

 and effort may be seen from such facts as these : There are (in round 

 numbers) 20 million enrolled pupils in the common schools of the 

 United States, taught by 535,000 teachers, maintained at an expense 

 to the tax-payers of 456 million dollars (90 million pounds). There 

 are 12,000 high schools conducted at the public expense, with 

 1,110,000 pupils, and 2,000 privately-owned high schools with 

 141,000 pupils. This vast educational activity, differing of course 

 greatly in earnestness and in effectiveness in different parts of the 

 land, I regard as the most important and typical manifestation of 

 the earnestness and wisdom of our democracy. It is its crowning 

 act of self-preservation. 



These great benefactions remind me that I often encounter the 

 opinion that the American democracy is in danger from its rich men. 

 It has sometimes been feared by those who become easily alarmed 

 that, in a mobile society, the rich would become a plutocracy, and 

 would find ways to rule— socially and politically — that they would 

 acquire undue power of an enduring kind. We have all heard 

 plausible arguments to prove that this is to be the inevitable fate of 

 the American democracy : and most of us have read novels which 

 give pictures of the complete social and even political surrender to 

 the organized rich. So far from the trutli is this, that the democracy 

 has lately at least surely shown something less than favours to the rich. 

 I think that this is the judgment of most thoughtful men. The rich 

 are too easily subjected to suspicion among us. When, for examj^le, 

 one branch of the National Legislature was suspected of being too 

 friendly to the great corporations, public criticism did not cease till 

 most of the suspected friends of wealth were retired from it — some 

 by failure to secure re-election, some by their own motion under the 

 pressure of public disapproval. And surely it is no distinction merely 

 to be a rich man in the Ignited States. The fact that a man is rich 

 gives him no help towards public advancement. There is, in fact, 

 among our very richest men, hardly one who could be elected to the 

 humblest public office. Nor do they gain influence in the social 

 organization — except of their own " set " — merely because they are 

 rich. The justice of these public jud^rments ])assed on the rich is a 

 matter of private opinion, and (I may add) in many cases of justified 

 doubt. But this fact surely proves that the danger of plutocracy is 

 wholly imaginary. 



Li fact, the pressure on the rich to justify their possession of 



