The Americans

by Hugo Münsterberg

The problems of population, especially those concerning the immigration and the negro, have taken considerable of our attention. We shall be able to survey problems of internal politics more quickly, since we have already met most of them in considering the American form of government. The insane programme of those who desire no government at all, that is, anarchy, is one of the American’s political problems only when the deed of some foreign assassin gives him a sudden fright. Then all sorts of propositions are on foot to weed out anarchism stem and root; but after a little time they subside. One sees how difficult it is to draw the lines, and the idea of suppressing free political speech is too much against the fundamental principles of the American democracy. But the fundamental principles of anarchism, or rather its fundamental confusions, have so little hope of influencing the conservative ideas of the Americans, that there need be no fear of anarchism creeping into the national mind. In so far as there is any such problem in America, it is connected solely with the question of immigration. Up to the present time, the government has been content to forbid acknowledged anarchists to land; but this involves such an un-American intermeddling with private convictions that the regulation will hardly be tolerated much longer. The true American, in any case, believes in state ordinances and loves his governmental machinery.

This apparatus itself of government has many details which offer problems, indeed, and are much discussed. Some of its elements have been added recently by President Roosevelt; the most important of them is the newly created Department of Commerce and Labour. This new division of the government, with over ten thousand officials, embraces also the Bureau of Corporations, which is designed to collect statistics regarding trusts and the overcoming of their influence; but the struggle promises to be a two-sided one. To the present administration belongs also the creation of a general staff for the Army, and on this head there seems to be a unanimous opinion that the Army is distinctly benefited by the measure. In some other directions, moreover, the make-up of the Army has become more similar to European models; new schools of war have been founded and the plan of holding great manœuvres introduced. The weakness of the military system is that preferments go according to seniority. It is clear to all that a merely mechanical advancement of officers is not advantageous to the military service; and yet everybody is afraid, if the uniform principle is given up and personal preferment is introduced, that all sorts of regrettable political and social influences will be brought to bear in the matter. Many persons see a difficult problem here; the young officer has almost no incentive to-day to special exertions.

The government has more and various plans with regard to the Navy. There, too, it seems as if a general staff similar to that of the Army is indispensable. The steady growth of the Navy itself is assured, since everyone recognizes that America could not carry out its present policy without a strong fleet. The fleet, which dates virtually from 1882, won the hearts of the imperialistic public by its victories at Manila and Santiago; and its growth is nowhere seriously opposed. Likewise, the Navy is introducing more large manœuvres. The real difficulty lies in lack of men; it becomes more and more difficult to get officers and sailors; and even in the question of manning a ship, the inevitable negro question plays a part.

There are many open questions also in regard to the diplomatic and consular service. The United States maintains an uncommonly large number of consuls, whose enterprise is nowhere contested, but whose preparation, tact, and personal integrity often leave a good deal to be desired. Their remuneration through fees contributes a good deal toward creating unwholesome conditions. The personnel of the diplomatic service is perhaps still more unequal than that of the consular. Since early times the United States has had the discernment to send some of its most distinguished men to fill important ambassadorial positions. At a time when the international relations of the country were still insignificant, such a position was often given to distinguished authors and poets, who represented their country at a foreign court in an intellectual and cultivated way, and contributed much to its esteem. This can happen no longer, and yet America has had again and again the good fortune to send to diplomatic positions men of uncommon caliber; scholars like Andrew D. White, statesmen like John Hay, and brilliant jurists like Choate. The danger still subsists, however, that men who are merely rich, and who have done small services to Senators, expect in return a diplomatic appointment, for the sake of the social glory. There is a growing desire to make the diplomatic service a regular career, in which a man progresses step by step.

As to the postal service, the foremost problem is now that of free delivery in rural districts. The tremendous extent of the country and the thinness of its population had at first made it a matter of course that the farmer should fetch his own mail from the nearest village. The rural letter-carrier was unknown, as he is still unknown in small towns; every man in the village goes to the post-office to get his newspapers and letters. But like every country at the present time, the United States is trying to check the continual afflux of population into the cities. It is obvious that specially with the intellectual make-up of the American, every effort must be made to make rural life less monotonous and tiresome, and that it is necessary most of all to establish ready communication between the remote farm-houses and the rest of the world. The more frequently and easily the farming people receive their letters and magazines, so much the less do they feel tempted to leave the soil. For this reason the very expensive rural delivery has spread rapidly. In the last year nine thousand new appointments were made in this service. Another important problem connected with the Post-Office is the fact that it does not pay for itself, because it carries printed matter at unprofitably low rates, and in this way has stimulated to an extraordinary degree the sending of catalogues and advertising matter. One can see how far this goes from the fact that a short time ago a factory for medicine sent out so many copies of a booklet advertising its specific through the so-called “testimonials,” that a railway train with eight large freight cars was necessary to carry them to the nearest post-office. Part of the difficulty comes from the private ownership of the railroads, whose contracts with the government for carrying the mails involve certainly no loss to the stockholders.

In similar wise, all of the great departments of government have their problems, large or small, and the most important of these must be dealt with when we come to speak of the economic situation. But there is one problem that is common to all branches of the government; it is the most important one which concerns internal affairs, and although it is discussed somewhat less actively to-day than in former years, it continues none the less in some new form or other to worry the parties, the government, and more especially public opinion. It is the question of civil-service reform.

We have touched on this question before when we spoke of the struggles between parties, and of the motives which bring the individual into the party service. Some things remain to be said by way of completely elucidating one of the most important problems of American public life. To commence with, if we abstract from the civil service in city and state—although the question is much the same there—that is, if we take into account only the federal service—we find over a hundred thousand official appointments: and the question is—Shall these appointments, with their assured salaries, be distributed to adherents of the party in power, chiefly with reference to their services to the party, or shall these positions be removed from all touch with the parties and given to the best and ablest applicants? It is clear that the problem could easily be so exhibited that the appointment of the best and most capable applicant, without reference to his party, should seem to be absolutely and unequivocally necessary, and as if any other opinion could proceed only from the desire to work corruption. The situation is not quite so simple, however.

In the first place, every one is aware that the highest administrative positions are invariably places of confidence, where it is very necessary that the incumbent shall be one in thought and purpose with the Executive; and this is more than ever necessary in a democracy composed of two parties. If the majority of the people elects a certain President in order to carry out the convictions of one party in opposition to the other, the will of the people would be frustrated if the upper members of the governmental staffs were not to be imbued with the same party ideas. A Republican President could not work together with a Democratic Secretary of State without sacrificing the efficiency of his administration, and struggling along on such compromises as would ultimately make meaningless the existence of two organized parties. A Republican Secretary of State must have, however, if he is to be spared a good deal of friction, an assistant secretary of state with whom he is politically in harmony; and so it goes on down.

But if we begin at the bottom and work up, the situation looks different. The book-keeper to the ministry, the small postal clerk, or the messenger boy in the treasury, has no opportunity to realize his personal convictions. He has merely his regular task to perform, and is not immediately concerned whether the policy of state is Republican or Democratic, imperialistic or anti-imperialistic. We have then to ask—Where lie the boundaries between those higher positions in which the private convictions of the incumbents ought properly to be with the administration, and those lower positions where party questions are in no way involved?

Opinions vary very widely as to where this boundary lies. Some put it rather low, and insist that the American by his whole political training is so thoroughly a creature of the party, that true harmony in state offices can be had only if the whole service from top to bottom is peopled with adherents of the ruling party; and this opinion, although it may be refuted on good grounds, is neither absurd nor dishonest. The population of Germany is divided to-day into a civil and a social-democratic party, and it appears to the dominant civil party by no means unnatural to exclude the social-democrats so far as possible from participation in the public service.