The New Nation

by Frederic L. Paxson

Exposures of the evil of boss government were frequent after 1870, and in most cities occasional revolts of outraged citizens overturned the machines, but in the long run the citizen was no match for the professional politician. In the unequal contest city government became steadily worse in America at a time when European city government was rapidly improving. States, too, were afflicted with machine politics, and before 1890 it appeared that the dominant national party derived its most valuable support from organized business that profited by the partnership.

A minority of Americans fought continually for better and cleaner government as the evils of boss rule became more visible. One of them, Bishop Potter, of New York, gained wide hearing through a sermon preached at the centennial of the Constitution, in 1887, in which he turned from the usual patriotic congratulation to discuss actual government. The keenest interest in the subject was aroused by the American Commonwealth of James Bryce.

Not since Alexis de Tocqueville published his Democracy in America, in 1835, had any foreign observer made an equally intimate study of American life, until James Bryce, a young English historian, began a series of visits to the United States in the early seventies. For nearly twenty years Bryce repeated his visits, living at home a full life in his Oxford professorate, in the House of Commons, and in the Ministry. In America he knew every one worth knowing, and he saw the remoter regions of the West as well as the older society of the East. In 1888 he brought out the result of his studies in two volumes that were filled with admiration for the United States and with disheartening observation upon its practices. One of its chapters cut so close that its victim brought suit for libel, but American opinion accepted the book as a friendly picture and regarded attacks upon it as further evidence of its inherent truth. Probably no book in a generation so profoundly influenced American thought and so specifically directed the course of American reform. It became a textbook at once, teaching the truth that corruption and misgovernment were non-partisan, and until the Populists took them up the movements for reform were non-partisan as well.

The power of the boss lay largely in the structure of American governmental machinery, and though some preached the need for a reform in spirit, others saw that only mechanical improvements could accomplish results. A corruptible electorate, such as had long confused British and American politics, was one defect most easily improved. The prevailing system for conducting elections made it easy for the purchaser of votes to see that he got value for his money. The State provided the polling-place, but the candidate or the party provided the printed ballot. Party agents distributed these at the polls, and the voters who received them could be watched until the votes were cast. Intimidation of employees or direct bribery were easy and common, while secret deals were not unknown. The loyal party voter deposited the ballots provided for him; the boss could have these arranged to suit his needs. It was commonly supposed that in 1888, through an agreement between the Democratic and Republican bosses of New York, Hill and Platt, many Republicans were made to vote for Hill as Governor, while Democrats voted for Harrison as President.

A secret ballot was so reasonable a reform that once it had been suggested it spread rapidly over the United States. In 1888 Massachusetts adopted a system based upon the Australian Ballot Law, while New York advertised its value in the same year when Governor Hill vetoed a bill to establish it. Before the next presidential election came in 1892, open bribery or intimidation of voters was rapidly becoming a thing of the past, for thirty-three States had adopted the Australian ballot, provided by public authority and voted in secrecy. "Quay and Platt and Clarkson may find in this fact a fresh explanation of President Harrison's willingness to divest himself of their services," wrote Godkin in a caustic paragraph in 1892.

The Australian ballot enabled the honest citizen to vote in secrecy and safety, but it failed to touch the fact that the nominations were still outside the law. "To find the honest men," Bryce wrote, "and having found them, to put them in office and keep them there, is the great problem of American politics." So long as a boss could direct the nomination he could tolerate an honest election. The movement to legalize the party primaries was just beginning when the ballot reform was accomplished. The most extreme of the primary reformers saw the need for a preliminary election conducted within each party, but under all the safeguards of law, to the end that the voters might themselves determine their candidates. Direct primaries were discussed by the younger men, who were often ambitious, but helpless because of the rigor with which the bosses selected their own candidates. In 1897 a young ex-Congressman, Robert M. LaFollette, worked out a complete system of local and national primaries, and found wide and sympathetic hearing for it. The movement had to face the bitter opposition of the machine politicians because it struck directly at their power, but it progressed slowly. In 1901 it won in Minnesota; a little later it won in Wisconsin; and in the next ten years it became a central feature in reform platforms.

The reforms of the primary and the ballot were designed to improve the quality of public officers, and were supplemented by a demand for direct legislation which would check up the result. In Switzerland a scheme had been devised by which the people, by petition, could initiate new laws or obtain a vote upon existing laws. The idea of submitting special measures to popular vote, or referendum, was old in the United States, for in this way state constitutions and constitutional amendments were habitually adopted, and matters of city charters, loans and franchises often determined. The initiative, however, was new, and appealed to the reformer who resented the refusal of the legislature to pass desired laws as well as the unwillingness to pass worthy ones. The Populists, in 1892, recommended that the system of direct legislation be investigated, and they favored its adoption in 1896. A journal for the promotion of the reform appeared in 1894. In 1898 the first State, South Dakota, adopted the principle of initiative and referendum in a constitutional amendment. To those who attacked the device as only mechanical it was answered: "Direct legislation is not a panacea for all national ills. In fact it is not a panacea at all. It is merely a spoon with which the panacea can be administered. Specific legislation is the panacea for political ills."

The West was more ready than the East to break from existing practice and take up the new reforms. It had always been the liberal section of the United States. Between 1800 and 1830 it had led in the enlargement of the franchise and in the removal of qualifications of wealth and religion. It now approached the one remaining qualification of sex. With the admission of Wyoming in 1890, full woman suffrage appeared among the States. Colorado adopted an amendment establishing it in 1893. Utah, in the words of the women, "completing the trinity of true Republics at the summit of the Rockies," became the third suffrage State in January, 1896, while Idaho adopted woman suffrage in the same year. It was fifteen years before a fifth State was added to the list, but the women's movement was advancing in all directions. A General Federation of Women's Clubs was organized in 1890 as a clearing-house for the activities of the women, and through organizations like the Consumers' League, the movement fell into line with the general course of reform. A clearer vision of the defects in governmental machinery and of the needs of society was spreading rapidly. Hull House, opened in 1889 by Jane Addams, had a host of imitators in the cities, and enabled social workers to study the results of industrial progress upon the laboring class.

The new reforms, mechanical and otherwise, established themselves about 1890, and were taken up by the Populist party between 1892 and 1896. Neither great party noticed the reforms before 1896, but in each party the younger workers saw their point. As non-partisan movements they gained adherents before the Populist party died out, and were pressed more and more seriously upon reluctant organizations. As a whole they were an attempt to make government more truly representative of the voters, and to take the control of affairs from the hands of men who might and often did use them for private aggrandizement. They were overshadowed in 1896 by the paramount issue of free silver, and were deferred in their fulfilment for a decade by accidents which drove them from the public mind. The Spanish War, reviving prosperity, and the renewal of tariff legislation, did not check the activities of the reformers, but did divert the attention of the public.

William McKinley was inaugurated on March 4, 1897. He had served in five Congresses and had been three times governor of Ohio. He "knew the legislative body thoroughly, its composition, its methods, its habits of thought," said John Hay. "He had the profoundest respect for its authority and an inflexible belief in the ultimate rectitude of its purposes." He was not likely to embarrass business through bluntness or inexperience. He had risen through a kindly disposition, a recognition of the political value of tact, and an unusual skill as a moderator of variant opinions. He believed that his function was to represent the popular will as rapidly as it expressed itself, differing fundamentally in this from Cleveland, who thought himself bound to act in the interest of the people as he saw it. His Cabinet reflected the interests that secured his election.