Who Rules These United States?
Shriver, Mark O.
630 THE COMMONWEAL November 3, 1926 WHO RULES THESE UNITED STATES ? ...
...he is the one to whom the people turn it starts to win back what it has lost, as it must do to when trouble comes with the policeman or the magissave its skin, and its skin is always saved...
...630 THE COMMONWEAL November 3, 1926 WHO RULES THESE UNITED STATES ? By MARK O. SHRIVER P OLITICS everywhere, and all that goes with course, but their vote is scattered while the machine it, is ruled and regulated by that insubstan- concentrates on machine favorites...
...The stupid rage for "voting the ticket" casionally come, are but the flutter of a public aspira- is an answer...
...Reformers, however, venal forces of a political machine...
...played bridge too well that of the United States as a whole is one for each To play at living...
...Maryland is no unfair example...
...242,000...
...Jobs, patronage, but it is when elections are imminent and when they are but far from an inclusive one...
...Even The national status is but a reflection of conditions the resources of those a beloved President called male- within the states...
...According to figures collected by William P. Helm Bridge Player and printed in the Baltimore Sun, 8,ooo,ooo people "Double no trump...
...The penalty of rapid urban far above the average, about 6o percent of the possi- growth is increasingly heavy deprivation of just repreble vote is cast...
...Take specific Fierce if she fails to...
...November 3, 1926 THE COMMONWEAL 631 Elections, it is true, are generally carried by a majority within her limits and is entitled to three and would of the voters, but hardly more than 75 percent of the then have enough surplus for half another...
...Detroit, which had a population of 465,ooo, is on the brink of a million, and entitled to five Her sixty odd years tell congressmen instead of the two she has...
...men...
...generally understood and appreciated either...
...and as many as So percent of the registered ones turn out Los Angeles and Cleveland, with one and three, should to exercise a freeman's privilege...
...factors of great wealth are not altogether without any Of 147 members of her legislature, 1o5 are country limit...
...They make our hisball unless, and only unless, the organization stood for tory, for when all is said and done, history is nothing those things sought for and demanded by the great in the world but politics of the past...
...when reformers are at ease, available there are a dozen applicants, and of these resting on laurels hardily won, in fancied security and but one can land, leaving the eleven disappointed and complacence...
...Chicago, with ten, should have fourinstances, in the heat of some intensive campaign, do teen...
...The Constitution provides for reallotment of the legislation that has been palmed off on the country representatives according to population every ten during the past ten years, and it is not unlikely our years, but there has been none since the 1920 census history would have been written in another key had and representation still stands on the basis of 1910 equal representation been granted to all Americans...
...examples...
...who out of the ordinary...
...The boss gives clude states and the whole country...
...Precincts, the smallest voting the district...
...People are not com- hardship is worked on states such as New York, Illipelled to vote but there are wise statesmen who believe nois, Michigan, and Maryland, which have one prethey should be...
...They reach mass of the people...
...The difficulties of purchase and sale ponderatingly large city, and so ominous is it that sugof political favor would be greatly increased if care- gestion has been seriously made that Chicago should less millions would give just a little thought to the secede from Illinois, and proposals for a new State duties of citizenship...
...Immediately in the summer...
...glad if she makes, growth of something like 1 S percent...
...It never rests...
...The Yet, people get the kind of government they wish and drift to the cities has been strong these last sixteen if there be those who will not vote then must they be years and the preponderance of rural influence has content with the voting others do for them...
...In Deepens each wrinkle...
...Jobs is one answer...
...There are always some who vote, of There is no majority rule in the United States...
...he is taking no The Congress is dominated by rural evangelicals who chance of sudden and unprovided death...
...gets in early to be on the safe side...
...creased only 9 percent, giving urban localities a growth three times as great as rural ones...
...For every job open and history of the day before...
...A new and shiny street-light on a dark corner the instant fight won...
...farmers had a tremendous edge, with one representa- There is no twinkle tive for each 235,000 people while the city men were In wrathful eyes...
...Gauging her band...
...big boss who is careful to avoid the spotlight...
...His gifts may be only a dollar here and a dollar until a great change comes over the people...
...Resurfacing the rough street, or an extra unit, are divided into sections, and section leaders call by the garbage collector makes thousands willing, work under and report to precinct executives, and these eager to listen to the worker or runner who passes out in turn to ward leaders, and they to district chiefs, "the word" as it has come down the line from the and so it goes...
...Not so with the gang...
...The gang makes liberally to the poor...
...When the count is made, a tremendous influence on venerable senators and less tiny fraction over half of that 6o percent carries the substantial congressmen and so, when certain influences day and 31 percent of possible voters can and do cry out for respect for the Constitution and the laws control elections everywhere...
...Even in 191 o the "Meant you to take me out...
...Such purchase could be stopped of Manhattan have been heard at intervals these almost entirely if people would only vote, for prohibi- many years...
...Such men control all elecage of the total possible vote, but it is an organized tions...
...the sort graft is seized upon, and in the resulting pother the co- of prejudice that keeps Georgia and Vermont and horts of the righteous foregather and the gang is forth- Utah solid, honest though it be, is a mighty aid to the with thrown out upon its neck...
...year in and year out...
...No so-called trate-not a nice thought, but a true one none the reform victory ever has been or ever will be permanent less...
...he is the adviser and helper of its living from politics and pickings and the living, the needy...
...ballot in the box...
...From a single city block the system expands to in- Then there is the personal side...
...Government such as passed in pursuance thereof, surely here is one feature we get when people fail to vote is almost, as it should deserving of at least a modicum of attention...
...With a vote, then, have three and four...
...Philadelphia, with seven, should have nine...
...a pout forced to be content with one for each 282,000...
...they bring out the voters and get the ballots in percentage...
...yet Baltimore has over half the population and There is another phase of misrepresentation not too pays more than 6o percent of the taxes collected...
...increased as the right to it under equitable apportionment has diminished...
...These reform victories, when they do oc- disgruntled...
...It will be interesting, and profitable fathers did, rule our communities year on year, world perhaps, to glimpse some odd phases of the business without end...
...The answer is not a hard one...
...If every man and woman entitled to, the box, the only place a ballot is worth a hoot, and would register and vote, the machine and its candidates they have them counted...
...She peers have been added to 261 cities of 30,000 and over Over eye-glasses, between 1910 and 1920, an increase of 27 percent...
...Americans, for some reason, power and hold it because men and women, forgetful avoid taking the time and trouble to register and of of the sacrifices of the men who made America, will those who take the first step many shun the second not take the time or trouble to rule themselves, and so effort of going to the polls on election days to drop a are ruled by those willing to labor for power...
...of elections and to consider the rules under which this How, it may be asked, does the machine manage great game of politics, as it is called, is played...
...Any machine with tial but very real thing known as the machine, or its cohorts well aligned, its workers primed, its votes in happier phrase generally in use among the cogs and as good as in the box before the polls are opened can, components thereof, the organization, but just who or with the aid of the ever faithful-faithless is a better what that may be depends on ever-varying general and word-few, who vote the ticket straight because their local conditions...
...tive costs would be a bar if nothing else was...
...Con- That additional bloc of city votes in the national Consider the plight of every one of our larger American gress would have had something to say on much of cities...
...They name candidates for would never have the chance of the proverbial snow- office from the President down...
...there, or a trip to the shore or down the bay after the No machine is invincible, despite the generally es- fashion of beloved little Tim of Tammany, but it is tablished belief that it cannot be beaten, for the or- the sought-for, the wished-for gift, and that is what ganization in any community is a pitiably small percent- counts in the long run...
...when rural population was in excess of the urban...
...Favors is an act on impulse and quit when the spasm has passed and answer...
...Baltimore has two congressmen wholly Jo.1N HLNLON...
...Her voice She (unforgiving, is reduced to one vote for 500,000 citizens while Lost years...
...and every other topic under the sun to the same standIt operates day in and day out...
...Some extraordinary occurrence, put the X mark against Judas K. Iscariot if he hapsome flagrant breach of trust or exposure of startling pens to show the proper party designation...
...the men and women who vote for Demotion to virtue, and an evidence of a state of affairs far crats or Republicans because they always have...
...this concentration, how gather all these folk with How do they do it...
...Especial be, government without the law...
...bewails two Tricks lost...
...ard...
...He sentation in the lower house by the national Congress...
...New eligibles are on the books, and save in the rarest of York lacks four...
...his job is set operate through countless agencies and exercise a out and he attends to it...
...and sneers In the same period, the rest of the country has in- As partner passes...
...It is built may mean the votes of all the groping denizens of from the ground up...
...1910, the population of the twelve leading cities was some 13,150,000 and today it is almost 17,000,000, Merciless toward mistakes an increase of about 24 percent to match a rural Of friends...
...divergent views on horse-racing, economics, religion, There is this organization on the job...
...The machine voter is there first...
...he has milk and ice supplied to sick babies too, of all who work and train with it...
Vol. 4 • November 1926 • No. 26
