Under a democratic political system there is, of course, no way of absolutely guaranteeing that any method of administrative organization, however excellent in itself, will accomplish the desired and the desirable result. Administrative authority must at some point always originate in an election. The election can delegate power only for a limited period. At the end of the limited period another executive will be chosen—possibly a man representing a wholly different political policy. Such a man will want his immediate advisers to share his political point of view; and it is always possible that in electing him the voters will make a mistake and choose an incompetent and irresponsible person. An incompetent or disloyal executive could undoubtedly under such a system do much to disorganize the public service; but what will you have? There can be no efficiency without responsibility. There can be no responsibility without authority. The authority and responsibility residing ultimately in the people must be delegated; and it must not be emasculated in the process of delegation. If it is abused, the people should at all events be able to fix the offense and to punish the offender. At present our administration is organized chiefly upon the principle that the executive shall not be permitted to do much good for fear that he will do harm. It ought to be organized on the principle that he shall have full power to do either well or ill, but that if he does do ill, he will have no defense against punishment. The principle is the same as it is in the case of legislative responsibility. If under those conditions the voters should persist in electing incompetent or corrupt executives, they would deserve the sort of government they would get and would probably in the end be deprived of their vote.
A system of local government, designed for concentrating power and responsibility, might, consequently, be shaped along the following general lines. Its core would be a chief executive, elected for a comparatively long term, and subject to recall under certain defined conditions. He would be surrounded by an executive council, similar to the President's Cabinet, appointed by himself and consisting of a Controller, Attorney General, Secretary of State, Commissioner of Public Works, and the like. So far his position would not differ radically from that of the President of the United States, except that he would be subject to recall. But he would have the additional power of introducing legislation into a legislative council and, in case his proposed legislation were rejected or amended in an inacceptable manner, of appealing to the electorate. The legislative council would be elected from large districts and, if possible, by some cumulative system of voting. They, also, might be subject to recall. They would have the power, dependent on the governor's veto, of authorizing the appropriation of public money and, also, of passing on certain minor classes of legislation—closely associated with administrative functions. But in relation to all legislation of substantial importance express popular approval would be necessary. The chief executive should possess the power of removing any administrative official in the employ of the state and of appointing a successor. He would be expected to choose an executive council who agreed with him in all essential matters of public policy, just as the President is expected to appoint his Cabinet. His several councilors would be executive officials, responsible for particular departments of the public service; but they would exercise their authority through permanent departmental chiefs—just as the Secretary of War delegates much of his authority to a chief of staff, or an English minister to a permanent under-secretary. The system could offer no guarantee that the subordinate departmental chiefs would be absolutely permanent; but at all events they would not be changed at fixed periods or for irrelevant reasons. They would be just as permanent or as transient as the good of the service demanded. In so far, that is, as the system was carried out in good faith they would be experts, absolutely the masters of the technical business of the offices and of the abilities and services of their subordinates. The weak point in such administrative organization is undoubtedly the relation between the members of the governor's council and their chiefs of staff; but there must be a weak link in any organization which seeks to convert the changing views of public policy, dependent upon an election, into responsible, efficient, and detailed administrative acts. If the system were not accepted in good faith, if in the long run it were not carried out by officials, who were disinterestedly and intelligently working in the public interest, it would be bound to fail; but so would any method of political organization. This particular plan simply embodies the principle that the way to get good public service out of men is to give them a sufficient chance.
Under the proposed system the only powers possessed by the state executive, not now bestowed upon the President of the United States, would consist in an express and an effective control over legislation. It would be his duty to introduce legislation whenever it was in his opinion desirable; and in case his bills were amended to death or rejected, it would be his right to appeal to the people. He would, in addition, appoint all state officials except the legislative council, and perhaps the judges of the highest court. On the other hand, he would be limited by the recall and he could not get any important legislative measure on the statute books except after severe technical criticism, and express popular consent. He could accomplish nothing without the support of public opinion; yet he could be held absolutely responsible for the good government of the state. A demagogue elected to a position of such power and responsibility might do a great deal of harm; but if a democratic political body cannot distinguish between the leadership of able and disinterested men and self-seeking charlatans, the loss and perhaps the suffering, resulting from their indiscriminate blindness, would constitute a desirable means of political education,—particularly when the demagogue, as in the case under consideration, could not really damage the foundations of the state. And the charlatan or the incompetent could be sent into retreat just as soon as exposed. The danger not only has a salutary aspect, but it seems a small price to pay for the chance, thereby afforded, for really efficient and responsible government. The chief executive, when supported by public opinion, would become a veritable "Boss"; and he would inevitably be the sworn enemy of unofficial "Bosses" who now dominate local politics. He would have the power to purify American local politics, and this power he would be obliged to use. The logic of his whole position would convert him into an enemy of the machine, in so far as the machine was using any governmental function for private, special, or partisan purposes. The real "Boss" would destroy the sham "Bosses"; and no other means, as yet suggested, will, I believe, be sufficient to accomplish such a result.
After the creation of such a system of local government the power of the professional politician would not last a year longer than the people wanted it to last. The governor would control the distribution of all those fruits of the administrative and legislative system upon which the machine has lived. There could be no trafficking in offices, in public contracts, or in legislation; and the man who wished to serve the state unofficially would have to do so from disinterested motives. Moreover, the professional politician could not only be destroyed, but he would not be needed. At present he is needed, because of the prodigious amount of business entailed by the multiplicity of elective officials. Somebody must take charge of this political detail; and it has, as we have already remarked, drifted into the hands of specialists. These specialists cannot be expected to serve for nothing. Their effort to convert their work into a means of support is the source of the greater part of the petty American political corruption; and such corruption will persist as long as any real need exists for the men who live upon it. The simplest way to dispense with the professional politician is to dispense with the service he performs. Reduce the number of elective officials. Under the proposed method of organization the number of elections and the number of men to be elected would be comparatively few. The voter would cast his ballot only for his local selectmen or commissioners, a governor, one or more legislative councilmen, the justices of the state court of appeals, and his Federal congressman and executive. The professional politician would be left without a profession. He would have to pass on his power to men who would be officially designated to rule the people for a limited period, and who could not escape full responsibility for their public performances.
I have said that no less drastic plan of institutional reorganization will be sufficient to accomplish the proposed result; and a brief justification must be afforded for this statement. It was expected, for instance, that the secret Australian ballot would do much to undermine the power of the professional politician. He would be prevented thereby from controlling his followers and, in case of electoral trades, from, "delivering the goods." Well! the Australian ballot has been adopted more or less completely in the majority of the states; and it has undoubtedly made open electoral corruption more difficult and less common than it once was. But it has not diminished the personal and partisan allegiance on which the power of the local "Boss" is based; and it has done the professional politician as little serious harm as have the civil service laws. Neither can it be considered an ideal method of balloting for the citizens of a free democracy. Independent voting and the splitting of tickets is essential to a wholesome expression of public opinion; but in so far as such independence has to be purchased by secrecy its ultimate value may be doubted. American politics will never be "purified" or its general standards improved by an independence which is afraid to come out into the open; and it is curious that with all the current talk about the wholesome effects of "publicity" the reformed ballot sends a voter sneaking into a closet in order to perform his primary political duty. If American voters are more independent than they used to be, it is not because they have been protected by the state against the penalties of independence, but because they have been aroused to more independent thought and action by the intrusion and the discussion of momentous issues. In the long run that vote which is really useful and significant is the vote cast in the open with a full sense of conviction and responsibility.
Another popular reforming device which belongs to the same class and which will fail to accomplish the expected result is the system of direct primaries. It may well be that this device will in the long run merely emphasize the evil which it is intended to abate. It will tend to perpetuate the power of the professional politician by making his services still more necessary. Under it the number of elections will be very much increased, and the amount of political business to be transacted will grow in the same proportion. In one way or another the professional politician will transact this business; and in one way or another he will make it pay. Under a system of direct primaries the machine could not prevent the nomination of the popular candidate whenever public opinion was aroused; so it is with the existing system. But whenever public interest flags,—and it is bound to flag under such an absurd multiplication of elections and under such a complication of electoral machinery,—the politicians can easily nominate their own candidates. Up to date no method has been devised which would prevent them from using their personal followers in the primary elections of both parties; and no such method can be devised without enforcing some comparatively fixed distinction between a Republican and a Democrat, and thus increasing the difficulties of independent voting. In case the number of elective officials were decreased, as has been proposed above, there would be fewer objections to the direct primary. Under the suggested method of organization each election would become of such importance that public opinion would be awakened and would be likely to obtain effective expression; and the balloting for the party candidates would arouse as much interest, particularly in the case of the dominant party, as the final election itself. In fact, the danger would be under such circumstances that the primaries would arouse too much interest, and that the parties would become divided into embittered and unscrupulous factions. Genuinely patriotic and national parties may exist; but a genuinely patriotic faction within a party would be a plant of much rarer growth. From every point of view, consequently, the direct primary has its doubtful aspects. The device is becoming so popular that it will probably prevail; and as it prevails, it may have the indirect beneficial result of diminishing the number of regular elections; but at bottom it is a clumsy and mechanical device for the selection of party candidates. It is merely one of the many means generated by American political practice for cheapening the ballot. The way to make votes important and effective is not to increase but to diminish their number.
A democracy has no interest in making good government complicated, difficult, and costly. It has, on the contrary, every interest in so simplifying its machinery that only decisive decisions and choices are submitted to the voter. Every attempt should be made to arouse his interest and to turn his public spirit to account; and for that reason it should not be fatigued by excessive demands and confused by complicated decisions. The cost of government in time, ability, training, and energy should fall not upon the followers but upon the leaders; and the latter should have every opportunity to make the expenditure pay. Such is the object of the foregoing suggestions towards reconstruction which, radical as they may seem, have been suggested chiefly by an examination of the practical conditions of contemporary reform. Only by the adoption of some such plan can the reformers become something better than perpetual moral protestants who are fighting a battle in which a victory may be less fruitful than defeat. As it is, they are usually flourishing in the eyes of the American people a flask of virtue which, when it is uncorked, proves to be filled with oaths of office. The reformers must put strong wine into their bottle. They must make office-holding worth while by giving to the officeholders the power of effecting substantial public benefits.
III
POSSIBILITIES OF EFFECTIVE STATE ACTION
The questions relating to the kind of reforms which these reorganized state governments might and should attempt to bring about need not be considered in any detail. In the case of the states institutional reconstruction is necessarily prior to social reconstruction; and the objects for which their improved powers can be best used need at present only be indicated. These objects include, in fact, practically all the primary benefits which a state ought to confer upon its citizens; and it is because the states have so largely failed to confer these primary benefits that the reconstruction necessarily assumes a radical complexion. It is absurd to discuss American local governments as agents of individual and social amelioration until they begin to meet their most essential and ordinary responsibilities in a more satisfactory manner.