contemporary movements and events. The telegraph and the newspaper are indispensable in any present-day democratic society. The ownership and unregulated control of the former by the large corporate interests of the country, and the influence which they can bring to bear upon the press by this means, as well as the direct control which they have over a large part of the daily press by actual ownership, does much to hinder the progress of the democratic movement. This hold which organized wealth has upon the agencies through which public opinion is formed, is an important check on democracy. It does much to secure a real, though not generally recognized, class ascendency under the form and appearance of government by public opinion.

This great struggle now going on between the progressive and the reactionary forces, between the many and the few, has had a profound influence upon public morality. We have here a conflict between two political systems-between two sets of ethical standards. The supporters of minority rule no doubt often feel that the whole plan and purpose of the democratic movement is revolutionary that its ultimate aim is the complete overthrow of all those checks designed for the protection of the minority. The only effective means which they could employ to retard the progress of the popular movement involved the use of money or its equivalent in ways that have

had a corrupting influence upon our national life. Of course this need not, and as a rule does not, take the coarse, crude form of a direct purchase of public officials. The methods used may in the main conform to all our accepted criteria of business honesty, but their influence is none the less insidious and deadly. It is felt in many private institutions of learning; it is clearly seen in the attitude of a large part of our daily press, and even in the church itself. This subtle influence which a wealthy class is able to exert by owning or controlling the agencies for molding public opinion is doing far more to poison the sources of our national life than all the more direct and obvious forms of corruption combined. The general public may not see all this or understand its full significance, but the conviction is gaining ground that it is difficult to enact and still more difficult to enforce any legislation contemplating just and reasonable regulation of corporate wealth. The conservative classes themselves are not satisfied with the political system as it now is, believing that the majority, by breaking through restraints imposed by the Constitution, have acquired more power than they should be permitted to exercise under any well-regulated government. It is but a step, and a short one at that, from this belief that the organization of the government is wrong and its policy unjust, to the conclusion that one is justified in using every available

means of defeating the enactment or preventing the enforcement of pernicious legislation. On the other hand, the supporters of majority rule believe that the government is too considerate of the few and not sufficiently responsive to the wishes of the many. As a result of this situation neither the advocates nor the opponents of majority rule have that entire faith in the reasonableness and justice of present political arrangements, which is necessary to ensure real respect for, or even ready compliance with the laws.

Here we find the real explanation of that widespread disregard of law which characterizes American society to-day. We are witnessing and taking part in the final struggle between the old and the new-a struggle which will not end until one or the other of these irreconcilable theories of government is completely overthrown, and a new and harmonious political structure evolved. Every age of epoch-making change is a time of social turmoil. To the superficial onlooker this temporary relaxation of social restraints may seem to indicate a period of decline, but as a matter of fact the loss of faith in and respect for the old social agencies is a necessary part of that process of growth through which society reaches a higher plane of existence.

CHAPTER XV

DEMOCRACY OF THE FUTURE

The growth of the democratic spirit is one of the most important facts in the political life of the nineteenth century. All countries under the influence of Western civilization show the same tendency. New political ideas irreconcilably opposed to the view of government generally accepted in the past are everywhere gaining recognition. Under the influence of this new conception of the state the monarchies and aristocracies of the past are being transformed into the democracies of the future. We of the present day, however, are still largely in the trammels of the old, though our goal is the freedom of the new. We have not yet reached, but are merely traveling toward democracy. The progress which we have made is largely a progress in thought and ideals. We have imbibed more of the spirit of popular government. In our way of thinking, our point of view, our accepted political philosophy, there has been a marked change. Everywhere, too, with the progress of scientific knowledge and the spread of popular education, the masses are coming to a consciousness of their strength. They

are circumscribing the power of ruling classes and abolishing their exclusive privileges which control of the state has made it possible for them to defend in the past. From present indications we are at the threshold of a new social order under which the few will no longer rule the many.

Democracy may be regarded, according to the standpoint from which we view it, either as an intellectual or as a moral movement. It is intellectual in that it presupposes a more or less general diffusion of intelligence, and moral in that its aim is justice. It could not have appeared or become a social force until man became a thinker and critic of existing social arrangements. It was first necessary that he should acquire a point of view and a habit of thought that give him a measure of intellectual independence and enable him to regard social institutions and arrangements as human devices more or less imperfect and unjust. This thought can not be grasped without its correlative-the possibility of improvement. Hence democracy everywhere stands for political and social reform.

Democracy is modern, since it is only within recent times that the general diffusion of knowledge has been possible. The invention of printing, by making possible a cheap popular literature, contributed more than any other one fact to the intellectual and moral awakening which marks the beginning of modern times. The introduc