THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO PRESS 



government as one of centralized power which is able to main- 

 tain itself in the face of popular disapproval. He then points 

 out that the establishment in the United States of state and 

 municipal governments, according to the plan of splitting up the 

 power^ of government among many separate offices and requiring 

 the widest and most frequent use of the elective principle, has 

 cast so great a burden upon the electorate that an intelligent 

 citizen is reduced to a state of political ignorance inconsistent 

 with self-government. This situation has made it possible, he 

 thinks, for a well-organized hierarchy to acquire the real power 

 of government and to retain it, in the face of popular disapproval, 



for selfish ends. Such leaders the author characterizes as "polito- 

 crats." 



The first part of the volume deals with the rise of the polito- 

 crats ; the second discusses various expedients for restoring the 

 American ideal of democracy; while the third considers con- 

 structive proposals like the commission form of government for 

 smaller cities, and the application of the principles underlying 

 this form to larger cities and the state, and to the selection of 

 judges. 



Chicago Tribune. Albert M. Kales, Professor of Law in Northwestern 

 University, has written a book which ought to be read wherever 



citizens are perplexed by the intricacies and distressed by the failures 

 of government. 



Chicago and the Old Northwest, 1 673-1 835. By Milo Milton 



Quaife, Superintendent of the Wisconsin State Historical 

 Society. 



^ 488 pages, 8vo, cloth; $4.00, postage extra (weight 2 lbs. 14 oz.) 



This book recounts, in a manner at once scholarly and 

 dramatic, the early history of Chicago. Important as this 

 subject is, it is not treated solely for its own sake. The author's 

 larger purpose has been to trace the evolution of the frontier 

 trom savagery to civilization. From the point of view of Chicago 

 and the Northwest alone the work is local in character, although 

 the locality concerned embraces five great states of the Union ; 

 in the larger sense its interest is as broad as America, for every 

 foot of America has been at some time on the frontier of 

 civilization. It is believed that this book will take rank as the 

 standard history of Chicago in the early days. 



The Nation. In this monograph [on the history of Fort Dearbornl we 



have one of the most careful studies in Western history that has 

 ever been made. 



