Chapter V: Part 5

And now for the company. This drama differs from most dramatic productions in that it makes demands upon a large number of actors. To produce it properly on the theatrical stage would bankrupt any manager unless he were subsidized heavily from the revenues of the twenty leading villains. The cast includes besides twenty leading villains, twelve low comedians, no hero, no heroine (except, incidentally, Josephine); eight newspaper editors; ten thousand easy-going second-class villains; ten thousand patriotic, conscientious, and enlightened citizens, including a sprinkling of ardent reformers; twenty-five thousand zealous, hide-bound partisans; fifty thousand respectable, well-intentioned, tolerably ignorant citizens who vote but are too busy with their own affairs to pay attention to politics, and as a consequence generally vote the party ticket, or vote to please a "friend"; ten thousand superior, self-centred souls who neglect to vote and despise politics anyway, among them poets, artists, scientists, some men of leisure, and travellers; ten thousand enemies of social order such as gamblers, thieves, keepers of dives, drunkards, and toughs; and your philosopher.

A very large stock company. I will leave the precise arithmetic to you. I wish merely to indicate the variegated composition of the average political constituency, and to let you perceive that the piece which is being performed is no parlor comedy. It is written in dead earnest, and it seems to me that the twenty leading villains, though smooth and in some instances aristocratic appearing individuals, are among the most dangerous characters in the history of this or any other stage. But before I refer to them more particularly I will make you acquainted with our twelve low comedians--the Board of Aldermen.

It is probably a surprise to you and to Josephine that the Aldermen are not the villains. Everything is comparative in this world, and, though I might have made them villains without injustice to such virtues as they possess, I should have been at a loss how to stigmatize the real promoters of the villainy. And after all there is an element of grotesque comedy about the character of Aldermen in a large American city. The indecency of the situation is so unblushing, and the public is so helpless, that the performers remind one in their good-natured antics of the thieves in Fra Diavolo; they get bolder and bolder and now barely take the trouble to wear the mask of respectability.

Have I written "thieves?" Patriotic Americans look askance at such full-blooded expressions. They prefer ambiguity, and a less harsh phraseology--"slight irregularities," "business misfortunes," "commercial usages," "professional services," "campaign expenses," "lack of fine sensibilities," "unauthenticated rumors." There are fifty ways of letting one's fellow-citizens down easily in the public prints and in private conversation. This is a charitable age, and the word thief has become unfamiliar except as applied to rogues who enter houses as a trade. The community and the newspapers are chary of applying it to folk who steal covertly but steadily and largely as an increment of municipal office. It is inconvenient to hurt the feelings of public servants, especially when one may have voted for them from carelessness or ignorance.

Here is a list of the twelve low comedians for your inspection:

Peter Lynch, no occupation.
James Griffin, stevedore.
William H. Bird, real-estate.
John S. Maloney, saloon-keeper.
David H. Barker, carpenter.
Jeremiah Dolan, no occupation.
Patrick K. Higgins, junk dealer.
Joseph Heffernan, liquors.
William T. Moore, apothecary.
James O. Frost, paints and oils.
Michael O'Rourke, tailor.
John P. Driscoll, lawyer.

You will be surprised by my first statement regarding them, I dare say. Four of them, Peter Lynch, James Griffin, Jeremiah Dolan, and Michael O'Rourke neither drink nor smoke. Jeremiah Dolan chews, but the three others do not use tobacco in any form. They are patterns of Sunday-school virtue in these respects. This was a very surprising discovery to one of the minor characters in our drama--to two of them in fact--Mr. Arthur Langdon Waterhouse and his father, James Langdon Waterhouse, Esq. The young man, who had just returned from Europe with the idea of becoming United States Senator and who expressed a willingness to serve as a Reform Alderman while waiting, announced the discovery to his parent shortly before election with a mystified air.

"Do you know," said he to the old gentleman, who, by the way, though he has denounced every person and every measure in connection with our politics for forty years, was secretly pleased at his son's senatorial aspirations, "do you know that some one told me to-day that four of the very worst of those fellows have never drunk a drop of liquor, nor smoked a pipe of tobacco in their lives. Isn't it a curious circumstance? I supposed they were intoxicated most of the time."

You will notice also that Peter Lynch and Jeremiah Dolan have no occupation. Each of them has been connected in some capacity with the City Government for nearly twenty years, and they are persons of great experience. They have more than once near election time been amiably referred to in the press as "valuable public servants," and it must be admitted that they are efficient in their way. Certainly, they know the red tape of City Hall from A to Z, and understand how to block or forward any measure. The salary of Alderman is not large--certainly not large enough to satisfy indefinitely such capable men as they, and yet they continue to appear year after year at the same old stand. Moreover, they resist vigorously every effort to dislodge them, whether proceeding from political opponents or envious rivals of their own party. A philosopher like myself, who is, politically speaking, a worm, is expected to believe that valuable public servants retain office for the honor of the thing; but even a philosopher becomes suspicious of a patriot who has no occupation.

Next in importance are Hon. William H. Bird and Hon. John P. Driscoll. It is a well-known axiom of popular government that citizens are called from the plough or counting-room to public office by the urgent request of their friends and neighbors. As a fact, this takes place two or three times in a century. Most aspirants for office go through the form of having a letter from their friends and neighbors published in the newspapers, but only the very guileless portion of the public do not understand that the candidates in these cases suggest themselves. It is sometimes done delicately, as, for instance, in the case of young Arthur Langdon Waterhouse of whom I was writing just now. He let a close friend intimate to the ward committee that he would like to run for Alderman, and that in consideration thereof his father would be willing to subscribe two thousand dollars to the party campaign fund. It seems to a philosopher that a patriotic people should either re-edit its political axioms or live up to them.

Now Hon. William H. Bird and Hon. John P. Driscoll never go through the ceremony of being called from the plough--in their case the ward bar-room. They announce six months in advance that they wish something, and they state clearly what. They are perpetual candidates for, or incumbents of, office, and to be elected or defeated annually costs each of them from two to four thousand dollars according to circumstances. One of them has been in the Assembly, the Governor's Council, and in both branches of the City Government; the other a member of the Assembly, a State Senator, and an Alderman, and both of them are now glad to be Alderman once more after a desperate Kilkenny contest for the nomination. They are called Honorable by the reporters; and philosophers and other students of newspapers are constantly informed that Hon. William H. Bird has done this, and Hon. John P. Driscoll said that.

These four are the big men of the Board. The others are smaller fry; ambitious and imitative, but less experienced and smooth and audacious. Yet the four have their virtues, too. It is safe to state that no one of them would take anything beyond his reach. Moreover, if you, a patriot, or I, a philosopher, were to find himself alone in a room with one of them and had five thousand dollars in bills in a pocket-book and the fact were known to him, he would make no effort to possess himself of the money. We should be absolutely safe from assault or sleight of hand. Whoever would maintain the opposite does not appreciate the honesty of the American people. If, on the other hand, under similar circumstances, the right man were to place an envelope containing one thousand dollars in bills on the table and saunter to the window to admire the view, the packet would disappear before he returned to his seat and neither party would be able to remember that it ever was there. I do not intend to intimate that this is the precise method of procedure; I am merely explaining that our comedians have not the harsh habits of old-fashioned highwaymen.

Then again, there are people so fatuous as to believe that Aldermen are accustomed to help themselves out of the city treasury. That is a foolish fiction, for no Alderman could. The City Hall is too bulky to remove, and all appropriations of the public money are made by draft and have to be accounted for. If any member of the Board were to make a descent on the funds in the safe, he would be arrested as a lunatic and sent to an insane asylum.

As for the other eight low comedians, it happens in this particular drama that I would be unwilling to make an affidavit as to the absolute integrity of any one of them. But there are apt to be two or even three completely honest members of these august bodies, and two or three more who are pretty honest. A pretty honest Alderman is like a pretty good egg. A pretty honest Alderman would be incapable of touching an envelope containing one thousand dollars, or charging one hundred in return for his support to a petition for a bay-window; but if he were in the paint and oil business or the lumber trade, or interested in hay and oats, it would be safe to assume that any department of the City Government which did not give his firm directly or indirectly a part of its trade would receive no aldermanic favors at his hands. Then again, a pretty honest Alderman would allow a friend to sell a spavined horse to the city.

To _A Political Optimist_. II.

Having hinted gently at the leading characteristics of the twelve low comedians, I am ready now to make you acquainted with the twenty leading villains. There is something grimly humorous in the spectacle of a dozen genial, able-bodied, non-alcoholic ruffians levying tribute on a community too self-absorbed or too easy-going or too indifferent to rid itself of them. I find, on the other hand, something somewhat pathetic in the spectacle of twenty otherwise reputable citizens and capitalists driven to villainy by the force of circumstances. To be a villain against one's will is an unnatural and pitiable situation.

_That one may smile, and smile, and be a villain!_

Here is the list:

Thomas Barnstable, President of the People's Heat and Power
Company.
William B. Wilcox, General Manager of the North Circuit Traction
Company.
David J. Prendergast, Treasurer of the Underground Steam Company.
Porter King, President of the South Valley Railroad Company.
James Plugh, Treasurer of the Star Brewing Concern.
Ex-State Treasurer George Delaney Johnson, Manager of the United
Gas Company.
Willis O. Golightly, Treasurer of the Consolidated Electric Works.
Hon. Samuel Phipps, President of the Sparkling Reservoir Company.
P. Ashton Hall, President of the Rapid Despatch Company.

Ex-Congressman Henry B. Pullen, Manager of the Maguinnis Engine Works. And so on. I will not weary you with a complete category. It would contain the names of twelve other gentlemen no less prominent in connection with quasi-public and large private business corporations. With them should be associated one thousand easy-going, second-class villains, whose names are not requisite to my argument, but who from one year to another are obliged by the exigencies of business or enterprise to ask for licenses from the non-alcoholic, genial comedians, for permission to build a stable, to erect a bay-window, to peddle goods in the streets, to maintain a coal-hole, to drain into a sewer, to lay wires underground; in short, to do one or another of the many every-day things which can be done only by permission of the City Government. And the pity of it is that they all would rather not be villains.

[_Note._--At the suggestion of Josephine I here enter a caveat for my and her protection. While I was enumerating the list of low comedians she interrupted me to ask if I did not fear lest one of them might sand-bag me some dark night on account of wounded sensibilities. She laughed, but I saw she was a little nervous.

"I have mentioned no real names," said I.

"That is true," she said, "but somehow I feel that the real ones might be suspicious that they were meant."

I told her that this was their lookout, and that, besides, they were much too secure in the successful performance of their comedy to go out of their way to assassinate a philosopher. "They would say, Josephine, that a philosopher cuts no ice, which is true, and is moreover a serious stigma to fasten on any patriotic man or woman." But now again she has brought me to book on the score of the feelings of the leading villains. She appreciates that we are on terms of considerable friendliness with some Presidents of corporations, and that though my list contains no real names, I may give offence. Perhaps she fears a sort of social boycott. Let me satisfy her scruples and do justice at the same time by admitting that not every President of a quasi-public corporation is a leading villain. Nor every Alderman a low comedian. That will let out all my friends. But, on the other hand, I ask the attention even of my friends to the predicament of Thomas Barnstable, President of the People's Heat and Power Company.]

Thomas Barnstable, the leading villain whose case I select for detailed presentation, has none of the coarser proclivities of David J. Prendergast, Treasurer of the Underground Steam Company. As regards David J. Prendergast, I could almost retract my allegation of pity and assert that he is a villain by premeditation and without compunction. That is, his method of dealing with the twelve low comedians is, I am told, conducted on a cold utilitarian basis without struggle of conscience or effort at self-justification. He says to the modern highwaymen, "Fix your price and let my bill pass. My time is valuable and so is yours, and the quicker we come to terms, the better for us both." What he says behind their backs is not fit for publication; but he recognizes the existence of the tax just as he recognizes the existence of the tariff, and he has no time to waste in considering the effect of either on the higher destinies of the nation.

Thomas Barnstable belongs to another school. He is a successful business man. In the ordinary meaning of the phrase, he is also a gentleman and a scholar. His word in private and in business life is as good as his bond; he respects the rights of the fatherless and the widow, and he is known favorably in philanthropic and religious circles. Having recognized the value of certain patents, he has become a large owner of the stock of the People's Heat and Power Company, and is the President of the corporation. Hitherto he has had plain sailing, municipally speaking. That is, the original franchise of the company was obtained from the city before he became President, and only this year for the first time has the necessity of asking for further privileges arisen. Moreover, he finds his corporation confronted by a rival, the Underground Steam Company.

Now here is a portion of the dialogue which took place five weeks before election between this highly respectable gentleman and his right-hand man, Mr. John Dowling, the efficient practical manager of the People's Company.

"Peter Lynch was here to-day," said Mr. Dowling.

"And who may Peter Lynch be?" was the dignified but unconcerned answer.

"Peter Lynch is Peter Lynch. Don't you know Peter? He's the Alderman from the fifth district. He has been Alderman for ten years, and so far as I can see, he is likely to continue to be Alderman for ten more."

"Ah."

"Peter was in good humor. He was smiling all over."

Mr. Dowling paused, so his superior said, "Oh!" Then realizing that the manager was still silent, as though expecting a question, he said, "Why did he come?"

"He wishes us to help him mend his fences. Some of them need repairing. The wear and tear of political life is severe."

"I see--I see," responded Mr. Barnstable, reflectively, putting his finger-tips together. "What sort of a man is Peter?"

Mr. Dowling hesitated a moment, merely because he was uncertain how to deal with such innocence. Having concluded that frankness was the most business-like course, he answered, bluffly, "He's an infernal thief. He's out for the stuff."

"The stuff? I see--I see. Very bad, very bad. It's an outrage that under our free form of government such men should get a foothold in our cities. I hope, Dowling, you gave him the cold shoulder, and let him understand that under no consideration whatever would we contribute one dollar to his support."

"On the contrary, I gave him a cigar and pumped him."

"Pumped him?"

"I wanted to find out what he knows."

"Dear me. And--er--what does he know?"

"He knows all about our bill, and he says he'd like to support it."

This was a shock, for the bill was supposed to be a secret.

"How did he find out about it?"

"Dreamt it in his sleep, I guess."

"I don't care for his support, I won't have it," said Mr. Barnstable, bringing his hand down forcibly on his desk to show his earnestness and indignation. "I wish very much, Mr. Dowling, that you had told him to leave the office and never show his impudent face here again."

There was a brief silence, during which Mr. Dowling fingered his watch-chain; then he said in a quiet tone, "He says that the Underground Steam Company is going to move heaven and earth to elect men who will vote to give them a location."

"I trust you let him know that the Underground Steam Company is a stock jobbing, disreputable concern with no financial status."

"It wasn't necessary for me to tell him that. He knows it. He said he would prefer to side with us and keep them out of the streets, which meant of course that he knew we were able to pay the most if we chose. It seems Prendergast has been at him already."

"Disgusting! They both ought to be in jail."

"Amen. He says he gave Prendergast an evasive answer, and is to see him again next Tuesday. There's the situation, Mr. Barnstable. I tell you frankly that Lynch is an important man to keep friendly to our interests. He is very smart and well posted, and if we allow him to oppose us, we shall have no end of trouble. He is ready to take the ground that the streets ought not be dug up, and that a respectable corporation like ours should not be interfered with. Only he expects to be looked after in return. I deplore the condition of affairs as much as you do, but I tell you frankly that he is certain to go over to the other side and oppose us tooth and nail unless we show ourselves what he calls friendly to his 'interests.'"

"Then we'll prevent his election. I would subscribe money toward that myself."

The Manager coughed, by way perhaps of concealing a smile. "That would not be easy," he said. "And if it could be done, how should we be better off? Peter Lynch is only one of fifteen or twenty, many of whom are worse than he. By worse I mean equally unscrupulous and less efficient. Here, Mr. Barnstable, is a list of the candidates for Aldermen on both sides. I have been carefully over it and checked off the names of those most likely to be chosen, and I find that it comprises twelve out-and-out thieves, five sneak-thieves, as I call them, because they pilfer only in a small way and pass as pretty honest; four easy-going, broken-winded incapables, and three perfectly honest men, one of them thoroughly stupid. Now, if we have to deal with thieves, it is desirable to deal with those most likely to be of real service. There are four men on this list who can, if they choose, help us or hurt us materially. If we get them, they will be able to swing enough votes to control the situation; if they're against us, our bill will be side-tracked or defeated, and the Underground Steam Company will get its franchise. That means, as you know, serious injury to our stockholders. There's the case in a nut-shell."

"What are their names?" asked Mr. Barnstable, faintly.

"Peter Lynch, Jeremiah Dolan, William H. Bird, and John P. Driscoll, popularly known in the inner circles of City Hall politics as 'the big four.' And they are--four of the biggest thieves in the community."

"Dear me," said Mr. Barnstable. "And what is it you advise doing?"

"Like the coon in the tree, I should say, 'Don't shoot and I'll come down.' It's best to have a clear understanding from the start."

"What I meant to ask was--er--what is it that this Peter Lynch wishes?"

"He uttered nothing but glittering generalities; that he desired to know who his friends were, and whether in case he were elected he could be of any service to our corporation. The English of that is, he expects in the first place a liberal subscription for campaign expenses--and after that retaining fees from time to time as our attorney or agent, which will vary in size according to the value of the services rendered."

A faint gleam of cunning hope appeared in Mr. Barnstable's eyes.

"Then anything we--er--contributed could properly be charged to attorney's fees?" he said by way of thinking aloud.

"Certainly--attorney's fees, services as agent, profit and loss, extraordinary expenses, machinery account, bad debts--there are a dozen ways of explaining the outlay. And no outlay may be necessary. A tip on the stock will do just as well."

"Dear, dear," reiterated Mr. Barnstable. "It's a deplorable situation; deplorable and very awkward."

"And the awkward part is, that we're a dead cock in the pit if we incline to virtue's side."

Mr. Barnstable sighed deeply and drummed on his desk. Then he began to walk up and down. After a few moments he stopped short and said:

"I shall have to lay it before my directors, Dowling."

"Certainly, sir. But in general terms, I hope. A single--er--impractical man might block the situation until it was too late. Then the expense of remedying the blunder might be much greater."

Mr. Barnstable inclined his head gravely. "I shall consult some of the wisest heads on the Board, and if in their opinion it is advisable to conciliate these blackmailers, a formal expression of approval will scarcely be necessary."

A few days later the President sent for the Manager and waved him to a chair. His expression was grave--almost sad, yet resolute. His manner was dignified and cold.

"We have considered," said he, "the matter of which we were speaking recently, and under the peculiar circumstances in which we are placed, and in view of the fact that the success of our bill and the defeat of the Underground Steam Company is necessary for the protection of the best interests of the public and the facilitation of honest corporate business enterprise, I am empowered to authorize you to take such steps, Mr. Dowling, as seem to you desirable and requisite for the proper protection of our interests."

"Very good, sir. That is all that is necessary."

There was a brief silence, during which Mr. Barnstable joined his finger-tips together and looked at the fire. Then he rose augustly, and putting out his hand with a repellant gesture said, "There is one thing I insist on, which is that I shall know nothing of the details of this disagreeable business. I leave the matter wholly in your hands, Dowling."

"Oh, certainly, sir. And you may rely on my giving the cold shoulder to the rascals wherever it is possible for me to do so."

That is a pitiful story, isn't it? Virtue assaulted almost in its very temple, and given a black eye by sheer force of cruel, overwhelming circumstances. Yet a true story, and the prototype in its general features of a host of similar episodes occurring in the different cities of this land of the free and the home of the brave. Each case, of course, has its peculiar atmosphere. Not every leading villain has the sensitive and combative conscience of Thomas Barnstable; nor every general manager the bold, frank style of Mr. Dowling. There is every phase of soul-struggle and method from unblushing, business-like bargain and sale to sphinx-like and purposely unenlightened and ostrich-like submission. In the piteous language of a defender of Thomas Barnstable (not Josephine), what can one do but submit? If one meets a highwayman on the road, is one to be turned back if a purse will secure a passage? Surely not if the journey be of moment. Then is a corporate body (a corporation has no soul) to be starved to death by delay and hostile legislation if peace and plenty are to be had for an attorney's fee? If so, only the rascals would thrive and honest corporations would bite the dust. And so it happened that Mr. Dowling before election cast his moral influence in favor of the big four, and a little bird flew from headquarters with a secret message, couched in sufficiently vague language, to the effect that the management would be pleased if the employees of the People's Heat and Power Company were to mark crosses on their Australian ballots against the names of Peter Lynch, Jeremiah Dolan, Hon. William H. Bird, and the Hon. John P. Driscoll.

Let us allow the curtain to descend to slow music, and after a brief pause rise on some of our other characters. Behold now the fifty thousand respectable, well-intentioned, tolerably ignorant citizens who vote but are too busy with their own affairs to pay attention to politics, and as a consequence generally vote the party ticket or vote to please a friend. As a sample take Mr. John Baker, amiable and well-meaning physician, a practical philanthropist and an intelligent student of science by virtue of his active daily professional labors. For a week before election he is apt to have a distressing, soul-haunting consciousness that a City Government is shortly to be chosen and that he must, as a free-born and virtue-loving citizen, vote for somebody. He remembers that during the year there has been more or less agitation in the newspapers concerning this or that individual connected with the aldermanic office, but he has forgotten names and is all at sea as to who is who or what is what. Two days before election he receives and puts aside a circular containing a list of the most desirable candidates, as indicated by the Reform Society, intending to peruse it, but he is called from home on one evening by professional demands, and on the other by tickets for the theatre, so election morning arrives without his having looked at it. He forgets that it is election day, and is reminded of the fact while on his way to visit his patients by noticing that many of his acquaintances seem to be walking in the wrong direction. He turns also at the spur of memory, and mournfully realizes that he has left the list at home. To return would spoil his professional day, so he proceeds to the polls, and, in the hope of wise enlightenment, joins the first sagacious friend he encounters. It happens, perhaps, to be Dowling.

"Ah," says Dr. Baker, genially, "you're just the man to tell me whom to vote for. One vote doesn't count for much, but I like to do my duty as an American citizen."

"It's a pretty poor list," says Dowling, pathetically, drawing a paper from his pocket. "I believe, however, in accomplishing the best possible results under existing circumstances. If I thought the Reform candidates could be elected, I would vote for them and for them only; but it's equally important that the very worst men should be kept out. I am going to vote for the Reform candidates and for Lynch, Dolan, Bird, and Driscoll. They're capable and they have had experience. If they steal, they'll steal judiciously and that is something. Some of those other fellows would steal the lamp-posts and hydrants if they got the chance."

"All right," says Dr. Baker. "I'll take your word for it. Let me write those names down. I suppose that some day or other we shall get a decent City Government. I admit that I don't give as much consideration to such matters as I ought, but the days are only twenty-four hours long."

Then from the same company there is Mr. David Jones, hay and grain dealer, honest and a diligent, reputable business man. He harbors the amiable delusion that the free-born American citizen in the exercise of the suffrage has intuitive knowledge as to whom to vote for, and that in the long run the choice of the sovereign people is wise and satisfactory. He is ready to admit that political considerations should not control selection for municipal office, but he has a latent distrust of reformers as aristocratic self-seekers or enemies of popular government. For instance, the idea that he or any other American citizen of ordinary education and good moral character is not fit to serve on the school committee offends his patriotism.

"What's the matter with Lynch, anyway?" he asks on his way to the polls. "I see some of his political enemies are attacking him in the press. If he were crooked, some one would have found it out in ten years. I met him once and he talked well. He has no frills round his neck."

"Nor wheels in his head," answers a fellow-patriot, who wishes to get a street developed and has put his case in Lynch's hands.

"He shall have my vote," says the hay and grain dealer.

As for the twenty-five thousand hide-bound partisans, I will state to begin with, my optimistic correspondent, that if this drama were concerned with any election but a city election, their number would be larger. But these make up in unswerving fixity of purpose for any diminution of their forces due to municipal considerations. They are content to have their thinking done for them in advance by a packed caucus, and they go to the polls snorting like war-horses and eager to vindicate by their ballots the party choice of candidates, or meekly and reverently prepared to make a criss-cross after every R or D, according to their faith, with the fatuous fealty of sheep. Bigotry and suspicions, ignorance and easy-going willingness to be led, keep their phalanx steady and a constant old guard for the protection of comedians and villains.

In another corner of the stage stand the ten thousand superior, self-centred souls who neglect to vote and despise politics--the mixed corps of pessimists, impractical dreamers, careless idlers, and hyper-cultured world-disdainers, who hold aloof, from one motive or another, from contact with common life and a share in its responsibilities--some on the plea that universal suffrage is a folly or a failure, some that earth is but a vale of travail which concerns little the wise or righteous thinker, some from sheer butterfly or stupid idleness. Were they to vote they would help to offset that no less large body of suffragists--the active enemies of order, the hoodlum, tobacco-spitting, woman-insulting, rum-drinking ruffian brigade. There are only left the ten thousand conscientious citizens, real patriots--a corporal's guard, amid the general optimistic sweep toward the polls. These mark their crosses with care against the names of the honest men and perhaps some of the pretty honest, only to read in the newspapers next morning that the big four have been returned to power and that the confidence of the plain and sovereign people in the disinterested conduct of their public servants has again been demonstrated.

"Ho, ho, ho," laugh the low comedians. "Mum's the word." The faces of the big four are wreathed in self-congratulatory smiles. At the homes of Peter Lynch and Jeremiah Dolan, those experienced individuals without occupation, there are cakes and ale. It is a mistake to assume that because a citizen is an Alderman he is not human and amiably domestic in his tastes. Jeremiah loves the little Dolans and is no less fond of riding his children on his leg than Thomas Barnstable, or any of the leading villains. When their father looks happy in the late autumn, the children know that their Christmas stockings will be full. Jeremiah is at peace with all the world and is ready to sit with slicked hair for his photograph, from which a steel (or is it steal?) engraving will shortly be prepared for the new City Government yearbook, superscribed: "Jeremiah Dolan, Chairman of the Board of Aldermen." A framed enlargement of this will hang on one side of the fire-place, and an embroidered motto, "God Bless Our Home," on the other, and all will be well with the Dolans for another twelve months. In his own home Jeremiah is a man of few words on public matters. Not unnaturally his children believe him to be of the salt of the earth, and he lets it go at that, attending strictly to business without seeking to defend himself in the bosom of his family from the diatribes of reformers. Still, it is reasonable to assume that, under the fillip of the large majority rolled up in his favor, he would be liable to give vent to his sense of humor so far as to refer in the presence of his wife and children to the young man who was willing to become an Alderman while waiting to be Senator, as a T. Willy.

If you have read "The Hon. Peter Stirling," you will remember that the hero rose to political stature largely by means of attending to the needs of the district, befriending the poor and the helpless and having a friendly, encouraging word for his constituents, high or low. The American public welcomed the book because it was glad to see the boss vindicated by these human qualities, and to think that there was a saving grace of unselfish service in the composition of the average successful politician. It would be unjust to the big four were I not to acknowledge that they have been shrewd or human enough to pursue in some measure this affable policy, and that the neighborhood and the district in which they live recognize them as hustlers to obtain office, privileges, and jobs for the humble citizen wishing to be employed by or to sell something to the City Government. To this constituency the comparatively small tax levied seems all in the day's work, a natural incident of the principle that when a man does something, he ought to be paid for it. To them the distinction that public service is a trust which has no right to pecuniary profit beyond the salary attached, and a reasonable amount of stationery, seems to savor of the millennium and to suggest a lack of practical intelligence on the part of its advocates. They pay the lawyer and the doctor; why not the Alderman?

To _A Political Optimist_. III.

I am reminded by Josephine that I seem to be getting into the dumps, which does not befit one who claims to be an optimistic philosopher. The drama just set before you is not, I admit, encouraging as a national exhibit, and I can imagine that you are already impatient to retort that the municipal stage is no fair criterion of public life in this country. I can hear you assert, with that confident air of national righteousness peculiar to the class of blind patriots to which you belong, that the leading politicians of the nation disdain to soil their hands by contact with city politics. Yet there I take issue with you squarely, not as to the fact but as to the truth of the lofty postulate seething in your mind that the higher planes of political activity are free from the venal and debasing characteristics of municipal public service--from the influence of the money power operating on a low public standard of honesty.

Most of us--even philosophers like myself--try to cling to the fine theory that the legislators of the country represent the best morals and brains of the community, and that the men elected to public office in the councils of the land have been put forward as being peculiarly fitted to interpret and provide for our needs, by force of their predominant individual virtues and abilities. Most of us appreciate in our secret souls that this theory is not lived up to, and is available only for Fourth of July or other rhetorical purposes. Yet we dislike to dismiss the ideal as unattainable, even though we know that actual practice is remote from it; and patriots still, we go on asserting that this is our method of choice, vaguely hoping, like the well-intentioned but careless voter, that some day we shall get a decent government, municipal, state, national--that is decent from the standpoint of our democratic ideal. And there is another theory, part and parcel of the other, which we try to cling to at the same time, that our public representatives, though the obviously ornamental and fine specimens of their several constituencies, are after all only every-day Americans with whom a host of citizens could change places without disparagement to either. In other words, that our theory of government is government by the average, and that the average is remarkably high. This comfortable view induces many like yourself to wrap themselves round with the American flag and smile at destiny, sure that everything will result well with us sooner or later, and impatient of criticism or doubts. As a people we delight in patting ourselves on the back and dismissing our worries as mere flea-bites. The hard cider of our patriotism gets readily into the brain and causes us to deny fiercely or serenely, according to our dispositions, that anything serious is the matter.

Yet whatever Fourth of July orators may say to the contrary, the fact remains that the sorry taint of bargain and sale, of holding up on the political highway and pacification by bribery in one form or another, permeates to-day the whole of our political system from the lowest stratum of municipal public life to the councils which make Presidents and United States Senators. To be sure, the Alderman in his capacity of low comedian dictating terms to corporations seeking civic privileges is the most unblushing, and hence the most obviously flagrant case; but it is well recognized by all who are brought in contact with legislative bodies of any sort in the country that either directly or indirectly the machinery of public life is controlled by aggregations of capital working on the hungry, easy-going, or readily flattered susceptibilities of a considerable percentage of the members. Certainly our national and state assemblies contain many high-minded, honest, intellectually capable men, but they contain as many more who are either dishonest or are so ignorant and easily cajoled that they permit themselves to be the tools of leading villains. Those cognizant of what goes on behind the scenes on the political stage would perhaps deny that such men as our friend Thomas Barnstable or his agent, Dowling, attempt to dictate nominations to either branch of the legislature on the tacit understanding that a member thus supported is to advocate or vote for their measures, and by their denial they might deceive a real simon-pure philosopher. But this philosopher knows better, and so do you, my optimistic friend. It is the fashion, I am aware, among conservative people, lawyers looking for employment, bankers and solid men of affairs, to put the finger on the lips when this evil is broached and whisper, "Hush!" They admit confidentially the truth of it, but they say "Hush! What's the use of stirring things up? It can't do any good and it makes the public discontented. It excites the populists." So there is perpetual mystery and the game goes on. Men who wish things good or bad come reluctantly or willingly to the conclusion that the only way to get them is by paying for them. Not all pay cash. Some obtain that which they desire by working on the weaknesses of legislators; following them into banks where they borrow money, getting people who hold them in their employ or give them business to interfere, asking influential friends to press them. Every railroad corporation in the country has agents to look after its affairs before the legislature of the State through which it operates, and what some of those agents have said and done in order to avert molestation would, if published, be among the most interesting memoirs ever written. Who doubts that elections to the United States Senate and House of Representatives are constantly secured by the use of money among those who have the power to bestow nominations and influence votes? It is notorious, yet to prove it would be no less difficult than to prove that Peter Lynch, Alderman for ten years without occupation, has received bribes from his fellow-citizens. How are the vast sums of money levied on rich men to secure the success of a political party in a Presidential campaign expended? For stationery, postage stamps, and campaign documents? For torch-light processions, rallies, and buttons? Some of it, certainly. The unwritten inside history of the political progress of many of the favorite sons of the nation during the last forty years would make the scale of public honor kick the beam though it were weighted with the cherry-tree and hatchet of George Washington. In one of our cities where a deputation of city officials attended the funeral of a hero of the late war with Spain, there is a record of four hundred dollars spent for ice-cream. Presumably this was a transcript of petty thievery inartistically audited. But there are no auditings of the real use of the thousands of dollars contributed to keep a party in power or to secure the triumph of a politically ambitious millionaire.

[_Note._--Josephine, who had been sitting lost in thought since the conclusion of the drama, and who is fond of problem plays, inquired at this point whether I consider the low comedians or the leading villains the most to blame for the existing state of things.

"It is a pertinent question, Josephine, and one not easily answered. What is your view of the matter?"

"I suppose," she answered, "as you have termed the bribers the leading villains, they are the worst. And I do think that the temptation must be very great among the class of men who are without fine sensibilities to let themselves become the tools of rich and powerful people, who, as you have indicated, can help them immensely in return for a vote. It is astonishing that those in the community who are educated, well-to-do citizens, should commit such sins against decency and patriotism."

"Yes, it seems astonishing, but their plea is pathetic, as I have already stated, and somewhat plausible. Suppose for a minute that I am Thomas Barnstable defending himself and see how eloquent I can be. 'What would you have me do, Madam? I am an honest man and my directors are honest men; the bills we ask for are always just and reasonable. I have never in my life approached a legislator with an improper offer, nor have I used direct or indirect bribery so long as it was absolutely possible to avoid doing so. But when a gang of cheap and cunning tricksters block the passage of my corporation's measures, and will not let them become law until we have been bled, I yield as a last resort. We are at their mercy. It is a detestable thing to do, I admit, but it is necessary if we are to remain in business. There is no alternative. The responsibility is on the dishonest and incapable men whom the American public elects to office, and who under the specious plea of protecting the rights of the plain people levy blackmail on corporate interests. Corporations do not wish to bribe, but they are forced to do so in self-defence.' There! Is not that a tear-compelling statement?"

"I can see your side," said Josephine.

"Pardon me," I interrupted. "It is Mr. Barnstable's side, not mine. I am not a capitalist, only a philosopher."

"Well, his side then; and I feel sorry for him in spite of the weakness of his case. Only his argument does not explain the others. I should not suppose that men like Mr. Prendergast could truthfully declare that all the legislation they ask for is just and reasonable."

"Precisely. Yet they buy their desires in the open market from the free-born representatives of the people. If any one states so at the time he is hushed up, if possible; if not, there is an investigation, nothing is proved, and the integrity of the legislative body is vindicated. I can shed a tear on behalf of men like Mr. Barnstable, a crocodile tear, yet still a tear. But there is the larger army of hard-headed, dollar-hunting, practical capitalists, who are not forming corporations for their health, so to speak, to be reckoned with. My eloquence is palsied by them. They would tell you that they were obliged to bribe, but they do not waste much time in resistance or remorse. They seem to regard the evil as a national custom, unfortunate and expensive, but not altogether inconvenient. Confidentially over a cigar they will assure you that the French, the Spanish, the Turks, and the Chinese are infinitely worse and that this is merely a passing phase of democracy, whatever that may mean."

"Dreadful," said Josephine. "And then there are the people with money who aid and abet their own nominations for Congress. I think I could mention some of them."

"Well, you mustn't. It might hurt their feelings, for they may not know exactly what was done except in a general way. After all is over they ask 'how much?' draw a check and make few inquiries. That is the genteel way. But in some states it is not necessary or politic to be genteel. The principle is the same, but the process is less subtle and aristocratic. But haven't you a word of extenuation to offer on behalf of the low comedians? Think of Jeremiah Dolan and the little Dolans."

"I suppose he also would say it wasn't true," said Josephine.

"Oh, yes. 'Lady, there isn't a word of truth in the whole story. Some one's been stuffing you.'"

"They must be dreadfully tempted, poor wretches."

"'Lady, it's all make-believe. But it's one thing to talk and another to sit still and have a fellow whisper in your ear that you have only to vote his way to get five thousand in clean bills and no questions asked. When a man has a mortgage on his house to pay, five thousand would come in handy. I'm only supposing, Lady, and no one can prove I took a cent.'"

"Fred," said Josephine, after a solemn pause, "the dreadful thought has just occurred to me that the American people may not be--are not strictly honest."

"Sh!" I shouted eagerly and seizing a tea table-cloth I threw it over her head and stayed her speech.

"My dear, do you realize what you are saying?"

"Do you realize that you are tumbling my hair?"

I paid no heed to this unimportant interjection, but said, "If any true patriot were to hear you make such an accusation you would subject yourself and me to some dreadful punishment, such as happened to Dreyfus, or 'The Man Without a Country.' Not honest? By the shades of George Washington, what are you thinking of? Why, one of the chief reasons of our superiority to all the other nations of the world is because of our honesty--our immunity from the low moral standards of effete, frivolous despotisms and unenlightened masses who are without the blessings of freedom. Not strictly honest? Josephine, your lack of tact, if nothing else, is positively audacious. Do you expect me to break this cruel piece of news to the optimistic patriot to whom this letter is addressed?"

"I think you are silly," said my wife, freeing herself from the tea table-cloth and trying to compose her slightly disordered tresses. "I only thought aloud, and I said merely what you would have said sooner or later in more philosophical terms. I saw that you were tempted by the fear of not seeming a patriot to dillydally with the situation and avoid expressing yourself in perspicuous language. T-h-i-e-f spells thief; b-r-i-b-e-r-y spells bribery. I don't know much about politics, and I'm not a philosopher, but I understand the meaning of every-day English, and I should say that we were not even pretty honest. There! Those are my opinions, and I think you will save time if you send them in your letter instead of beating about the bush for extenuating circumstances. If you don't, I shall--for really, Fred, it's too simple a proposition. And as for the blame, it's six of one and half a dozen of the other."

"Josephine, Josephine," I murmured, "there goes my last chance of being sent to the Philippines, in my capacity as a philosopher, to study whether the people of those islands are fit for representative government."]

You have read what Josephine says, my optimistic friend. She has stated that she would write to you her summing up of the whole matter if I did not, so I have inserted her deduction in all its crudity. She declares the trouble to be that the American people are dishonest. Of course, I cannot expect you to agree with any such conclusion, and I must admit that the boldness of the accusation is a shock to my own sensibilities as a patriot. Of course, Josephine is a woman and does not understand much about politics and ways and means, and it is notorious that women jump at conclusions instead of approaching them logically and in a dignified manner. But it is also said that their sudden conclusions are apt to be right. Dishonest? Dear me, what a dreadful suggestion. I really think that she went a little too far. And yet I am forced to agree that appearances are very much against us, and that if we hope to lead the world in righteousness and progress we must, to recur to political phraseology, mend our moral fences. I do not indulge in meteoric flights, like Josephine. Let us argue the matter out soberly.

You and I, as men of the world, will agree that if the American people prefer or find it more serviceable to cherish bribery as a federal institution, no one will interfere. The fact that it is ethically wrong is interesting to real philosophers and to the clergy, but bribery will continue to flourish like a bay-tree if it is the sort of thing which the American people like. Now, to all outward appearances they find it, if not grateful and comforting, at least endurable and convenient. Certainly, except among the class of people whom you would be apt to stigmatize as "holier than thous," there is comparatively little interest taken in the question. The mass of the community seek refuge behind the agreeable fiction that the abuse doesn't exist or exists only in such degree as to be unimportant. Many of these people know that this is false, but they will not admit that they think so in order not to make such doings familiar, just as their custom is to speak of legs as lower limbs in order not to bring a blush to the cheek of the young person. For thorough-going hypocrisy--often unconscious, but still hypocrisy--no one can equal a certain kind of American. It is so much easier in this world, where patting on the back is the touch-stone of preferment and popularity, to think that everything is as serene as the surface indicates, though you are secretly sure that it is not. How much more convenient to be able to say truthfully, "I have no knowledge of the facts, so don't bother me," than to be constantly wagging the head and entertaining doubts concerning the purity of one's fellow-citizens, and so making enemies.