It was, as I have said, a vigorous campaign on our side; and the Delectable One was re-elected by something more than his usual majority. On the night of the election it was reported—though this may have been mere rumour—that the bills which he laid on the counter of each saloon in the ward (and always forgot to take any change) were of the value of fifty dollars each. That was some years ago, but I understand that he is still in that same City Council, representing that same ward.
It was in the same city that one year I received notice of my personal property tax, the amount assessed against me being about ten times higher than it ought to have been. Experience had taught me that it was useless to make any protest against small impositions, but a multiplication of my obligations by tenfold was not to be submitted to without a struggle. I wrote therefore to the proper authority, making protest, and was told that the matter would be investigated. After a lapse of some days, I was invited to call at the City Hall. There I was informed by one of the subordinate officials that it was undoubtedly a case of malice—that the assessment had been made by either a personal or a political enemy. I was then taken to see the Chief. The Chief was a corpulent Irishman of the worst type. My guide leaned over him and in an undertone, but not so low that I did not hear, gave him a brief résumé of the story, stating that it was undoubtedly a case of intentional injustice, and concluding with an account of myself and my interests which showed that the speaker had taken no little trouble to post himself upon the subject. He emphasised the fact of my association with the press. At this point for the first time the Chief evinced some interest in the tale. His intelligence responded to the word "newspapers" as promptly as if an electrical current had suddenly been switched into his system. "H'm! newspapers!" he grunted. Then, heaving his bulk half round in his chair so as partially to face me——
"This is a mistake," he said. "We will say no more about it. Your assessment's cancelled."
"I beg your pardon," I said, "I have no objection to paying one-tenth of the amount. If an '0' is cut off the end——"
"That's all right," he said. "The whole thing is cut off."
I made another protest, but he waved me away and my guide led me from the room. Because it was opined that, through the press, I might be able to make myself objectionable if the imposition was persisted in, I paid no tax at all that year. Which was every whit as immoral as the original offence.
Stories of this class it would be easy to multiply indefinitely; but again I say that it is not my desire to insist on the corruptness which exists in American political life, but rather to explain to English readers what the nature of that corruptness is and in what spheres of the political life of the country it is able to find lodgment. What I have endeavoured to illustrate is, first, how the peculiar political system of the United States may, under some exceptional conditions, make it possible for even the nomination of a President to be treated as a matter of purchase, though the candidate himself and those who immediately surround him may be of incorruptible integrity; second, the unrivalled opportunities for bribery and other forms of political wrong-doing furnished by the existence of the State legislatures, with their eight thousand members, drawn necessarily from all ranks and elements of the population, and possessing exceptional power over the commercial affairs of the people of their respective States; and, third, the methods by which, in certain large cities, power is attained, used, and abused by the municipal "bosses" of all degrees, a condition of affairs which is in large measure only made possible by the identification of local and national politics and political parties. In each case the conditions which make the corruption possible do not exist in England, even though in the last named (the identification of local with national politics and parties) the tendency in Great Britain is distinctly in the direction of the American model. It is, perhaps, an inevitable result of the working of the Anglo-Saxon "particularistic" spirit, which ultimately rebels against any form of national government or of national politics in which the individual and the individual of each locality, is debarred from making his voice heard.
As for the corruptness which is supposed to exist in Congress itself, this I believe to be largely a matter of partisan gossip and newspaper talk. It may be that every Congress contains among its members a few whose integrity is not beyond the temptation of a direct monetary bribe; and it would perhaps be curious if it were not so. But it is the opinion of the best informed that the direct bribery of a member of either the Senate or the House is extremely rare. It happens, probably, all too frequently that members consent to acquire at a low figure shares in undertakings which are likely to be favourably affected by legislation for which they vote, in the expectation or hope of profit therefrom; but it is exceedingly difficult to say in any given case whether a member's vote has been influenced by his financial interest (whether, on public grounds, he would not have voted as he did under any circumstances), and at what point the mere employment of sound business judgment ends and the prostitution of legislative influence begins. The same may be said of the accusations so commonly made against members of making use of information which they acquire in the committee room for purposes of speculation.
Washington, during the sessions of Congress is full of "lobbyists"—i. e., men who have no other reason for their presence at the capital than to further the progress of legislation in which they are interested or who are sent there for the purpose by others who have such an interest; but it is my conviction (and I know it is that of others better informed than myself) that the instances wherein the labours of a lobbyist go beyond the use of legitimate argument in favour of entirely meritorious measures are immensely fewer than the reader of the sensational press might suppose. The American National Legislature is, indeed, a vastly purer body than demagogues, or the American press, would have an outsider believe.
