WHY SHOULD WE CHANGE OUR FORM OF GOVERNMENT STUDIES IN PRACTICAL POLITICS BY NICHOLAS MURRAY BUTLER PRESIDENT OF COLTJMBIA UNIVERSITY MEMBER OF TEE AMERICAN ACADEMY OF ARTS AND LETTERS NEW YORK CHARLES SCRIBNERS SONS 1912 TO THE MEMORY OF MY FATHER AND MOTHER GENTLEFOLK OF THE OLD SCHOOL WHO TAUGHT THEIR SONS TO CARE FOR PUBLIC AFFAIRS AND TO FOLLOW HIGH STANDARDS IN DOING SO PREFACE WHY is it that in the United States the words politics and politician have associations that are chiefly of evil omen Why is it that in the ...
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WHY SHOULD WE CHANGE OUR FORM OF GOVERNMENT STUDIES IN PRACTICAL POLITICS BY NICHOLAS MURRAY BUTLER PRESIDENT OF COLTJMBIA UNIVERSITY MEMBER OF TEE AMERICAN ACADEMY OF ARTS AND LETTERS NEW YORK CHARLES SCRIBNERS SONS 1912 TO THE MEMORY OF MY FATHER AND MOTHER GENTLEFOLK OF THE OLD SCHOOL WHO TAUGHT THEIR SONS TO CARE FOR PUBLIC AFFAIRS AND TO FOLLOW HIGH STANDARDS IN DOING SO PREFACE WHY is it that in the United States the words politics and politician have associations that are chiefly of evil omen Why is it that in the United States the phrase, to play politics, means to cajole the mob or to descend to practices of doubtful honor In the true and broad sense of the word, politics is one of mans highest concerns, and nowhere should the word have loftier and nobler associations than in a twentieth century democracy. The fact that this is not the case indicates the measure of our failure, as yet, to place our public life and our governmental administration upon the plane where they ought to be. There is a singular and discouraging discrep ancy between the political expositions and dis cussions of a century ago and those of today. In the Federalist and in Calhouns Disquisi tion on Government, we have perhaps the two most profound and original contributions to vii viii PREFACE political science that have been made since Aristotle. Even when the controversy over slavery was at its height and mens passions were fiercely roused, there was a distinction in the public debates and discussions, both in the Senate and on the platform, that is now sadly lacking. The people of the whole country hung with breathless interest upon the great debate between Lincoln and Douglas, and its published recordremains to-day, after the controversy which caused it has been closed forever, a politi cal classic of first-rate importance. We have no such debates on the pending proposals to overturn our form of government and on the principles of that political philosophy which calls itself socialism. Surely these questions are of vital interest and of fundamental im portance. The reason may be that we are just now without either a Lincoln or a Douglas, but the question remains why do not the condi tions under which we are now living produce political leaders and guides of philosophic mind, of broad scholarship, and of unselfish patriot ism Why are we condemned to the mediocre and the second-rate, and to waste our time in reading the outgivings of those whose only PREFACE ix claim to eminence is the magnitude of their thirst for office It would be well for the American people to find answers to questions like these. One may be forgiven for suspecting the fact to be that our politics has become sadly com mercialized. There is no real support for a policy of governmental frugality and economy, because a large proportion of the population is trying to get the government to spend some part of its money taken in taxes upon them, upon their own localities, or upon their special interests. When enough of these local, particu lar, and special interests combine their forces, they easily outweigh the influence of those who would act for the public interest alone. It is this fact, more than anything else, that has given strength and support to the movement, now wide-spread in the United States, in favor of socialism or of what may perhaps be called semi-socialism. Everywhere individuals and communities areleaning upon government, and the sense of manly independence is being sup planted by a desire to be taken care of. Many of the philanthropic schemes so eagerly urged upon the governments of the nation and of the x PREFACE states are unsound both in logic and in ethics, but they are urged with all the force and enthu siasm which unreflecting sentimentality brings to the advocacy of any cause in which it is for the moment interested...
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