forced upon them by the threat of political ruin, may be obviated.1

The plan of delegating power to appointed experts has very recently been winning approval in municipal government, where it is commonly called the "City Manager" plan. A small body of commissioners are elected and held responsible for the city government; these men may remain in their private vocations, and draw a comparatively small salary from the city. Their duty is to select an expert city manager who will receive a high salary, and conduct personally and through his appointees the whole business of the city. The commissioners may dismiss him if his work is not satisfactory and engage another to take his place. Responsibility is concentrated; mismanagement can be stopped at once, more readily even than by the recall; unity and continuity of policy become possible; in short, the same successful methods that have made American business the admiration of the world can be applied to politics. If this plan becomes widely adopted, as it bids fair to be, politics can become a trained profession, and we can be governed by experts instead of by politicians.2

(3) The recall. Many of the newer plans for government include a method by which an inefficient or dishonest official can be removed from office by the people, without the cumbersome process of an impeachment. It would not be wise to apply the recall to local representatives, who would then be still more at the mercy of local wishes; but with a short ballot and the concentration of responsibility upon execu

1 Cf. the new (1914) Public Health Council of six members, in New York State, to whom has been delegated all power to make and enforce laws bearing upon the public health throughout the State (except in New York City). See World's Work, vol. 27, p. 495.

2 See The City Manager Plan of Municipal Government (printed by the National Short Ballot Organization). National Municipal Review, vol. 1, pp. 33, 549; vol. 2, pp. 76, 639; vol. 3, p. 44. Outlook, vol. 104, p. 887.

tives or small commissions who represent the community as a whole, it is highly desirable to have a method available for quickly remedying mistakes. The danger of being recalled from office is a salutary influence upon a weak or a selfwilled man. And the possibility of it allows the election of officials for longer terms, which are desirable from several points of view: they bring a more stable government, freed from too frequent breaks or reversals of policy; they permit the acquiring of a longer political experience, and stimulate abler men to run for office; they save the public the bother and expense of too frequent elections.1

(4) The referendum. A less drastic instrument of popular control over legislation is the referendum, which refers individual measures back to the people for approval or rejection. An official may be efficient and free from corruption, yet opposed to the general wish on some particular matter. In this, then, he may be overruled by the referendum without being humiliated or required to resign his office. Thus not only the improper influence of the machine or the interests may be guarded against by the public, but the unconscious prejudices of generally efficient officials. Of course there is, in the case of both recall and referendum, the possibility that the official may be right and the people wrong. But that danger is inherent in democratic government. The best that can be done is to make government responsive to the sober judgment of the majority; if that is mistaken, nothing but time and education can correct it.2

The air is full of suggestions, and experiments are being

1 See National Municipal Review, vol. 1, p. 204. Forum, vol. 47, North American Review, vol. 198, p. 145.

p. 157.

2 See W. B. Munro, The Initiative, Referendum and Recall; The Government of American Cities, p. 321 ff. Political Science Quarterly, vol. 26, p. 415; vol. 28, p. 207. National Municipal Review, vol. 1, p. 586. Nation, vol. 95, p. 324.

tried in every direction. There is every hope that America may yet learn by her failures and evolve a system of government that shall be her pride rather than her shame. Our National Government has worked far better than our state and local government, but even that can be further freed from the pull of improper motives, made much more efficient and responsive to the general will. We are in a peculiar degree on trial to show what popular government can accomplish. The Old World looks to us with distrust, but with hope. And though the solution of our political problem involves many technical matters, it has deep underlying moral bearings, and affects profoundly the success of every great moral campaign.

R. C. Brooks, Corruption in American Politics and Life. L. Steffens, The Shame of the Cities. J. Bryce, The Hindrances to Good Government. W. E. Weyl, The New Democracy, chaps. vIII, IX. Jane Addams, Democracy and Social Ethics, chap. vII. A. T. Hadley, Standards of Public Morality, chaps. IV, v. T. Roosevelt, American Ideals. C. R. Henderson, The Social Spirit in America, chap. XI. Edmond Kelly, Evolution and Effort, chap. IX. W. H. Taft, Four Aspects of Civic Duty. E. Root, The Citizen's Part in Government. D. F. Wilcox, Government by All the People. L. S. Rowe, Problems of City Government. H. E. Deming, The Government of American Cities. Publications of the National Municipal League (703 North American Building, Philadelphia). Political Science Quarterly, vol. 18, p. 188; vol. 19, p. 673; vol. 24, p. 1. G. Wallas, Human Nature in Politics. W. Lippmann, Preface to Politics. A. M. Kales, Unpopular Government in the United States. C. C. P. Clark, The Machine Abolished. J. E. Hedges, Common Sense in Politics. G. D. H. Cole, Social Theory.

CHAPTER XXV

SOCIAL ALLEVIATION

WHEN the security of peace and an efficient government are attained, the way lies open for the amelioration of social evils. Freedom from war and from political corruption are but the pre-conditions of social advance, which must consist in three things: the healing of existing ills, the reorganization of society to prevent the recurrence of similar ills, and the bringing of new opportunities and joys to the people. Our first step, then, is to consider social therapeutics — the palliation of present suffering, the redressing of existing wrongs; however we may seek, by radical readjustments, to strike at the roots of these evils, we must not fail to mitigate, as best we can, the lot of those who are the unfortunate victims of our still crude social organization. The detailed study of social ills and their remedies has come to be a science by itself, and a science that calls for close attention; for there is more good will than insight afield, and nothing demands more wisdom and experience than the permanent curing of social sores. But it falls to ethics to note the general duties and opportunities, to point out the responsibility of the individual citizen for wrongs which he is not helping to right, and to direct him to the great moral causes in one or more of which an increasing number of our educated men and women are enrolling themselves. A questionnaire recently sent out by the author of this book discloses the fact that over half the college graduates of this country have given time and money to one or more of the campaigns which

are being waged for social betterment. These evils which it is the duty of the State to try to remedy we shall now consider.

What is the duty of the State in regard to:

I. Sickness and preventable death? Physical ills are the unavoidable lot of the human race; but by no means to the extent to which they now prevail. A very large percentage of existing sickness and infirmity could have been prevented by a timely application of such knowledge as the intelligent already possess. It is the poverty, the crowded and unsanitary living conditions, the ignorance and helplessness of the masses, that perpetuate all this unnecessary suffering, this economic waste, this drag on human efficiency and happiness. Not only from humanitarian motives, but also from regard for national prosperity and virility, it behooves the State to wage war against preventable illness and safeguard the general health.

How shocking conditions are, in view of the sanitary and medical knowledge we now possess, we are not apt to realize. It is estimated that of the three million or so who are seriously ill in this country on any average day, more than half might have been kept well by the enforcement of proper precautions; that of the 1,500,000 deaths that occur annually in the United States, nearly half could have been postponed. Tuberculosis, for example, is not a highly contagious or rapid disease; it is absolutely preventable by measures now understood, and almost always curable in its earliest stages. Yet half a million people in our country are suffering from it, and about 130,000 die of it annually. Typhoid, which could readily be as nearly eradicated as smallpox has been, claims some 30,000 victims annually. It has been

1 Some of the results of this questionnaire were published in the Independent for August 5, 1913, vol. 75, p. 348.