CHAPTER VIII

POLITICS

American democracy was ushered in on a theory of equality. And no word has been more strangely used and abused. There is the monarchical idea of equality, and Mr. Mallock begs the question when he gives the title "Aristocracy and Evolution" to a book on the necessary part played by great men. Doubtless, in Greek, aristocracy means "government by the best," but in history it means government by the privilege of birth and landed property. Democracy may be in philology "government by the mob," but in politics and industry it has been opportunity for great men without blood or property. Mr. Muensterberg, too, sees the breakdown of American democracy and the reaction towards aristocracy in the prominence of civil-service reform, the preeminence conceded to business ability, the deference to wealth, and the conquest of the Philippines.[103] But civil-service reform is only a device for opening the door to merit that has been shut by privilege. In England it was the means by which the mercantile classes broke into the offices preempted by the younger sons of aristocracy.[104] In America it is an awkward means of admitting ability wherever found to positions seized upon by political usurpers. It appealed to the American democracy only when its advocates learned to call it, not "civil-service reform," but "the merit system." As for the astonishing power of mere wealth in American affairs the testimony of another English observer is based on wider observation when he says, "Even the tyranny of trusts is not to be compared with the tyranny of landlordism; for the one is felt to be merely an unhappy and (it is hoped) temporary aberration of well-meant social machinery, while the other seems bred in the very bone of the national existence."[105]

A feeling of disappointment holds true of the conquest and treatment of the Philippines. That a war waged out of sympathy for an oppressed island nearby should have shaken down an unnoticed archipelago across the ocean was taken in childlike glee as the unexpected reward of virtue. But serious thinking has followed on seeing that these islands have added another race problem to the many that have thwarted democracy. Only a plutocracy sprung from race divisions at home could profit by race-subjection abroad, and the only alternative to race-subjection is equal representation in Congress. But to admit another race to partnership without the hope of assimilation is to reject experience. Independence or cession to Japan is the self-preservation of American democracy.

Another idea of equality is the socialist idea. Infatuated by an "economic interpretation of history," they overlook the racial interpretation. Permitting and encouraging plutocracy, they hope to see the dispossessed masses take possession when conditions become intolerable. But the "masses" would not be equal to the task. Privileged wealth knows too well how to buy up or promote their leaders, how to weaken them by internal dissensions, how to set race against race. Most of all, the inexperienced despotism of the masses is worse than the smooth despotism of wealth. The government of the South by the negro, the government of San Francisco by "labor," fell into the hands of the "carpet-bagger" and the "boss." Once in power, internal strife and jealousy, struggle for office, or racial antagonism disrupt the rulers, and a reaction throws them back more helpless than before. Men are not equal, neither are races or classes equal. True equality comes through equal opportunity. If individuals go forward, their race or class is elevated. They become spokesmen, defenders, examples. No race or class can rise without its own leaders. If they get admitted on equal terms with other leaders, whether it be in the councils of the church, the law-making bodies of the city, state, and nation, or the wage conferences of employers, they then can command the hearing which their abilities justify. They secure for their followers the equal opportunity to which they are entitled.

This is exactly the political problem that grows out of the presence of races and immigrants. With these admitted to the suffrage on the basis of mere manhood inspired by a generosity unknown to the people of any other land, the machinery of representative government inherited from England does not, for some reason, permit the free choice of leaders. The difficulties may be seen in cities where the system first broke down. A variety of races and nationalities living in the same ward are asked to elect aldermen and other officers by majority vote. No one nationality has a majority, but each sets up its list of candidates. The nationality with a mere plurality elects all of its candidates, and the other nationalities--a majority of the voters--are unrepresented. This is an extreme case, and has not often been allowed to happen. But the only means of preventing it is the "ward boss." The boss emerges from the situation as inevitably as the survival of the fittest. And the fittest is the Irishman. The Irishman has above all races the mixture of ingenuity, firmness, human sympathy, comradeship, and daring that makes him the amalgamator of races. He conciliates them all by nominating a ticket on which the offices are shrewdly distributed; and out of the Babel his "slate" gets the majority.

The boss's problem is not an easy one. His ward may contain business men on the hill and negroes along the canal. To nominate a business man would lose the negro vote--to nominate a negro would lose the business vote. He selects a nondescript somewhere between, and discards him for another at the next election. The representative becomes a tool in the hands of the boss. The boss sells his power to corporations, franchise speculators, and law-evaders. Representative democracy becomes bossocracy in the service of plutocracy. The ward system worked well when the suffrage was limited. Then the business men elected their business man unimpeded. But a system devised for restricted suffrage breaks down under universal suffrage. Could the ward lines be abolished, could the business men come together regardless of residence and elect their choice without the need of a majority vote, could the negroes and other races and classes do the same, then each would be truly represented by their natural leaders. So it is, not only in cities, but in county, state, and nation. Universal suffrage, clannish races, social classes, diversified interests, seem to explain and justify the presence of the party "machine" and its boss. Otherwise races, classes, and interests are in helpless conflict and anarchy. But the true explanation is an obsolete ward and district system of plurality representation adopted when but one race, class, or interest had the suffrage. Forms of government are the essence of government, notwithstanding the poet. An aristocratic form with a democratic suffrage is a plutocratic government. Belgium and Switzerland have shown that a democratic form is possible and practicable. Proportional representation instead of district representation is the corollary of universal suffrage which those countries have worked out as a model for others.[106] The model is peculiarly adapted to a country of manifold nationalities, interests, and classes. Races and immigrants in America have not disproved democracy--they have proved the need of more democracy.

This is seen also in the distinction between men and measures. It often has been noted that in American elections the voters are more interested in voting for candidates than they are in voting on issues. The candidate arouses a personal and concrete interest--the issue is abstract and complicated. The candidate calls out a full vote--the issue is decided by a partial vote.

This difference is partly the result of organization. The candidate has a political party, campaign funds, and personal workers to bring out the vote. The issue has only its merits and demerits. Equally important under American conditions is the race or nationality of the candidate. This feature is often concealed by the ingenuity of political managers in nominating a ticket on which the several nationalities are "recognized." But with the recent progress of the movement to abolish party conventions and to nominate candidates directly at the primaries the racial prejudices of the voters show themselves. The nationalities line up for their own nationality, and the political and economic issues are thrown in the background. It is different when they vote on the issues directly. The vital questions of politics, industry, corporations, and monopoly which menace the country, unless rightly answered, cut across the lines of nationality. The German farmer, manufacturer, wage-earner, merchant, capitalist, and monopolist may all unite to elect a popular German to office, but they do not unite to give a corporation a monopoly. The same is true of other nationalities. Wherever the referendum has been fairly tested, in Chicago, Detroit, Oregon, and elsewhere, the sound judgment of all races has prevailed over bias, prejudice, or racial jealousy. There none can claim preeminence, for all have shown their share of patriotism, intelligence, and regard for equal rights. By an automatic self-disfranchisement the ignorant, the corrupt, and the indifferent of all races eliminate themselves by failing to vote. Instead of being dismissed on the ground that voters care mainly for men and less for measures, the referendum should be adopted on the ground that it permits those interested in measures to decide the question. Those who are not interested enough to vote do thereby proclaim that they are satisfied whichever side wins. The initiative and referendum are, above all other forms of government, the specific remedy for the ills of universal suffrage and conflicting nationalities. Race antagonism springs from personalities, race coalescence from community of interest. A vote for candidates intensifies antagonism--a vote on measures promotes community.

There are, indeed, some kinds of measures which stir up race antagonism. But the keenest of these have happily been eliminated. More intense than any other source of discord is religious belief. Religious differences in America are not so much theological as racial in character. The Judaism of the Jew, the Protestantism of the British and colonial American, the Lutheranism of the German, the Roman Catholicism of the Irish, Italian, and Slav, the Greek Catholicism of other Slavs, all testify to the history and psychology of races. Far-sighted indeed were our fathers who separated Church and State. Were the people taxed to support religion, every election would be a contest of races. All other questions would be subordinate, and democracy impossible. But with religion relegated to private judgment, each race is free to cultivate at will that one of its own peculiarities most fanatically adhered to, but most repellent to other races, while uniting with the others on what is most essential to democracy. Religious freedom is more than a private right--it is an American necessity.

Another class of measures running partly along race lines are sumptuary laws, especially those regulating saloons and Sunday observance. In the Southern states saloon prohibition is largely a race discrimination and a race protection. In the North it often is American puritanism of the country against European liberalism of the cities. Here the referendum shows itself as the conciliator of nationalities. Upon no other issue has the popular vote been so generally resorted to. This issue comes close to the habits and passions of the masses. It takes precedence of all others except religion, but cannot be evaded like religion. If legislative bodies and executive officials decide the question, then the German or the Irishman adds to his zeal for the election of a conationalist his thirst for the election of a candidate with habits like his own. But when left to a popular vote, the saloon question is separated from the choice of candidates, and other issues come forward. A majority vote, too, pacifies the minority of all races, where the act of a legislative body leaves the suspicion of unfair advantage taken by unrepresentative politicians. By the exigencies of the situation the referendum has been invoked to take both the saloon problem and its share of the race problem "out of politics." The lesson is applicable wherever race or nationality conflicts with democracy. With questions of religious belief eliminated by the constitution, and questions of personal habits eliminated by the referendum, other questions of race antagonism will be eliminated by the initiative and the referendum.[107]

=Suffrage.=--The climax of liberality in donating the suffrage to all races and conditions was reached with the fifteenth amendment in 1869. At that time not only had the negro been enfranchised; but nearly a score of Western and Southern states and territories had enfranchised the alien. So liberal were these states in welcoming the immigrant that they allowed him to vote as soon as he declared his intention to take out naturalization papers. This declaration, under the federal law, is made at least two years before the papers are granted, and it may be made as soon as the immigrant has landed. Thus in some of those states he could vote as soon as he acquired a legal residence, that is, four or four and one-half years before he acquired citizenship. Several of these states have recently changed these laws, but there remain nine that continue to accept the alien as a voter.

In the Eastern states such generosity was not granted by law but was practised by fraud. Naturalization papers are issued by federal courts and by state courts of record. The law gives the judge much discretion, for he is required to refuse the certificate if he is not satisfied that the alien is of good moral character, attached to the Constitution, and well disposed. But so careless or crowded are the judges that seldom have they examined the applicants. Indeed the political managers have had the option of judges and could take their immigrants to the court that would shut its eyes. Many thousands of fraudulent papers have been secured in this way, beginning at the very time when the naturalization law was enacted in 1802, but increasing enormously during the past forty years.[108]

Finally, in 1906, Congress enacted a law giving to the Bureau of Immigration control over naturalization. The object is to bring all of the courts under a uniform practice, to provide complete records and means of identification, to establish publicity, to enable the government to appear in court and resist fraudulent naturalization, and to impose severe penalties.[109] The law also adds something to the qualifications required of the alien. He must not be an anarchist or a polygamist, nor a believer of such doctrines; he must be able to speak the English language, and must intend to reside permanently in the United States.[110] The language restriction affects but few, since in 1900 only 3.3 per cent of the naturalized foreign-born males of voting age could not speak English.[111] The intention of permanent residence, as well as the entire measure, is designed to remove the abuse of foreigners' acquiring citizenship in order to return to their native land and defy their rightful government. On the administrative side this law is of great significance. It marks a serious beginning on the part of the federal government of protecting the citizenship that a generation before it had so liberally bestowed.

There are certain races which by law are prohibited from naturalization. For nearly seventy years the law on the subject enacted in 1802 admitted to citizenship only free white persons. This was amended in 1870 to admit "aliens of African nationality and persons of African descent." But other colored races were not admitted, so that the Chinese, Japanese, or Malay immigrant has never been eligible to citizenship. His children, however, born in this country are citizens, and cannot be excluded from voting on account of race or color. Indians living in tribes are foreigners, but if they recognize allegiance by paying taxes or dividing up their land in severalty they are citizens and voters.

Of the immigrant races eligible to citizenship their importance as possible voters is greater than their importance in the population. This is because men and boys come in greater numbers than women and children. Ten million foreign-born population furnishes 5,000,000 males of voting age, but 66,000,000 native population furnishes only 16,000,000 males of voting age. In other words, one-half of the foreign-born, and only one-fourth of the native-born, are potential voters. But not all of the potential voters are actual voters. With a grand total in the year 1900 of 21,000,000 of the proper sex and age, only 15,000,000 went to the polls. The ratio is five out of seven. Two million negroes were excluded, and 1,400,000 foreign-born had not yet naturalized. This leaves 2,600,000 natives and foreign-born who might have voted but did not. The foreigner who takes out his citizenship papers does it mainly to vote. Two-thirds of them had done so or declared their intention in 1900.[112] Probably the proportion of native whites who did not vote was 15 per cent of their total number, and the proportion of foreign-born who did not, or could not, was over 40 per cent.

But this proportion differs greatly among the several races. It is not so much a difference in willingness as a difference in opportunity. Five years are required for naturalization, and while 40 per cent of those who have been here six to nine years have not declared their intention nor taken out their papers, only 7 per cent of those who have been here twenty years retain their allegiance to foreign governments.[113] This increases relatively the political weight of the Teutonic and Celtic races which are oldest in point of immigration, and reduces relatively the weight of the Italian, Slav, and Jewish races. The figures below make this quite plain. The table shows the proportion of foreign-born who remain aliens, in the sense that they have neither taken out citizenship papers nor declared their intention of doing so. Only 7 to 13 per cent of the foreigners from Northwestern Europe are aliens, compared with 35 to 60 per cent of those from Eastern and Southern Europe. In course of time these differences will diminish, and the Italian and Slav will approach the Irishman and German in their share of American suffrage:--

PER CENT OF ALIENS AMONG FOREIGN-BORN MALES OF VOTING AGE[114]

Wales 7.1 Germany 8.3 Norway 9.7 Ireland 10.1 Denmark 10.3 Holland 11.6 Sweden 11.9 Scotland 12.5 Bohemia 12.6 England 12.9 Canada, English 21.1 Russia (mainly Jews) 35.2 Canada, French 38.5 Finland 38.6 Austria (largely Slavs) 44.6 Portugal 51.6 Italy 53.0 Hungary (mainly Slavs) 53.1 Greece 57.8 Austria, Poland 61.6

The right to vote is not "inalienable," neither is the right to life or liberty. Governments give them, refuse them, and take them away. In America this means the state governments. The federal government only declares that the states must follow the "due process of law," and not discriminate on account of race, religion, or servitude. In allowing the right to vote they may and do discriminate on other grounds, such as morals, illiteracy, intelligence, property, and sex. This may result in race or immigrant discrimination, and does so in the case of illiteracy and intelligence. After the Irish immigration of the forties, Connecticut in 1855 and Massachusetts in 1857 refused thenceforth to enfranchise those who could not read the Constitution. Since 1889 six other Northern and Western states--Wyoming, Maine, California, Washington, Delaware, and New Hampshire, in the order named--have erected barriers against those who cannot read or write the English language or the Constitution.[115] Six Southern states have done the same, but one of them, Mississippi, has added another permanent barrier,--intelligence. This is supposed to be measured by ability to "understand" the Constitution as read by a white man. Southern states have also added vagrancy, poll tax, and property clauses even more exclusive than reading and writing.[116] The federal courts have refused to interfere because these restrictions in their legal form bear alike on white and black. If in practice they bear unequally, that is a matter for the state courts.[117]

To take away the suffrage from many of those who enjoy it is peacefully impossible under our system. But voters who hold fast to the privilege for themselves may be induced to deny it to the next generation. It was in this way usually that the foregoing restrictions were introduced. Massachusetts set the example by retaining all who could vote when the test was adopted, and making the exclusion apply only to those who came after. The Southern states did the same by "grandfather" and "understanding" clauses. By either method, in course of time, the favored voters disappear by death or removal, and the restrictions apply in full to the succeeding generation.[118]

The effect of the educational test on the suffrage of the foreign-born is not as great as might be supposed. Naturalization itself is almost an educational test. Only 6.3 per cent of the naturalized foreigners are illiterate, but 28 per cent of those who remain aliens are unable to read. In Boston only 2 per cent are excluded from voting through inability to read English, although the corresponding aliens are 22 per cent. Probably the educational qualification in Massachusetts affects these proportions by lessening the inducement to naturalize, but in Chicago and New York, where that qualification is not required, scarcely more than 5 per cent of those who get naturalized would be unable to vote under such a law, compared with less than 1 per cent of the native voters.[119] In the country at large the disproportion is not so great. Five and eight-tenths per cent of the sons of native parents would be excluded by an educational test against 6.3 per cent of the naturalized foreigners, and only 2 per cent of the native sons of foreigners. In the several Southern states the test, if equally applied, will exclude 6 to 20 per cent of the white voters and 35 to 60 per cent of the colored voters.[120] In a Southern city like Memphis it would exclude 1 per cent of the white and 38 per cent of the colored.

Tested by the standards of democracy, the ability to read and write the English language is a proper qualification. It is perhaps the maximum that can be required, for to test the ability to understand what is read and written is to open the door to partisanship and race discrimination. Yet it is intelligence that makes the suffrage an instrument of protection, and it is not a denial of rights to refuse such an instrument to one who injures himself with it. The literacy qualification is one that can be acquired by effort. Other tests, especially the property qualification, are an assertion of inequality. Yet it is not strange that with the corrupt and inefficient governments that have accompanied universal suffrage there should have occurred a reaction. This has not always expressed itself in the policy of restricting the suffrage, for that can with difficulty be accomplished. It has shown itself rather in withdrawing government as far as possible from the control of the voters. The so-called "business theory" which has so generally been applied to the reform of city governments has converted the city as far as possible to the model of a private corporation, with its general manager, the mayor. The city has been denied its proper functions, and these have been turned over to private parties. But this reaction seems to have reached its limit. It is now understood to have been simply the legal recognition of an incipient plutocracy establishing itself under the forms of democracy. The return movement has begun, and the rescue of democracy is sought, as stated above, in forms and functions of government still more democratic.

The way plutocracy looks when it has passed the incipient stage may be seen in Hawaii.[121] It is as though we had annexed those islands in order to watch in our own back yard the fruit of excessive immigration. A population of 154,000 furnishes 65,000 Hawaiians, Portuguese, and other Caucasians. The Chinese, Japanese, and Koreans have 87,000 population and no votes. The American contingent is some 17,000 souls and 3000 votes. The latter represent four classes or interests: the capitalist planters owning two-thirds of the property; superintendents, engineers, and foremen managing the plantation labor; skilled mechanics; small employers, merchants, and farmers. In order to get plantation labor and to keep the supply too large and diversified for concerted wage demands the planters imported contract Chinese in place of Hawaiians, then Japanese, then Koreans. As each race rises in standards and independence it leaves the plantations to enter trades, manufactures, and merchandising. It drives out the wage-earners from the less skilled occupations, then from the more skilled, then the small manufacturers, contractors, and merchants. The American middle classes disappear, partly by emigration to California, partly by abandoning business and relying on the values of real estate which rise through the competition of low standards of wages and profits, and partly by attaching themselves to the best-paid positions offered by the planters. In proportion as they move up in the scale through the entrance of immigrants in the lower positions, they transfer their allegiance from democracy to plutocracy. The planters themselves are caught in a circle. The rising values of their land absorb the high tariff on sugar and prevent rising wages if the values are to be kept up. The Japanese, with contract labor abolished, have shown a disposition to strike for higher wages. This has led to advances at the expense of profits, and the resulting "scarcity of labor" compels the planters again to ask for contract Chinese coolies. Immigration is thus only a makeshift remedy for the exactions of unions and the undevelopment of resources. More immigration requires perpetually more and still more, till the resulting plutocracy seeks to save itself by servile labor. A moderate amount of immigrant labor, assimilated and absorbed into the body politic, stimulates industry and progress, but an excessive and indigestible amount leads to the search for coercive remedies and ends in the stagnation of industry. The protective tariff was supposed to build up free American labor, but in Hawaii, with unrestricted immigration, it has handed us American plutocracy.