pays great attention to public opinion. Every district or ward leader carefully watches the state of public feeling and keeps the boss informed about it. Sometimes a semi-official canvass is taken to ascertain what reception would be given to this or that candidature prepared by the Machine. It is said of certain bosses that they endeavour, like Haroun-al-Raschid, to get at the opinion of people in the streets, in places of public resort, by talking to car conductors, to passers-by, about candidatures or other questions of the day. In cases where it is possible to satisfy public opinion without any great sacrifice on the part of the Machine, the latter does so with alacrity. But this is not often within its power, for if it always consulted the interests of the public, it would ruin its own prospects. If it appointed honest people only to public office, they would not consent to serve it; if it gave up selling 'franchises," laws, and "protection" to corporations, where would it get the money which it wants for its up-keep and for the enormous general expenditure which the Machine of a large city or of a State has to meet? The bosses therefore are driven by the force of things to disregard the opinion of honest and enlightened people. The generally apathetic and inert state of public opinion enables them to defy it with impunity, in nine cases out of ten: the difficulty for them is to get over the tenth case; and it is for this purpose that they sound public opinion, to ascertain the approach of the fatal point. As long as they do not think themselves near it, they indulge unreservedly in their practices, and sometimes even take a fierce delight in openly defying public opinion; the more or less imminent danger which they run makes them look on their audacity almost as heroism. They yield only when they cannot help it. When the political situation is narrowed down to one question, submitted distinctly to public opinion, and producing a movement of the public mind in a particular direction, the Machine lies low. When it can descry nothing but the alternative of defeat or submission to the behests of public opinion, the Machine gives way. But often it tries its hand, in spite of this, and it is only after having been beaten that it mends its ways. Then it brings forward excellent candidates at the elections, adopts a humble, cringing attitude, practises virtue, until such time as public opinion goes to

sleep again. On the whole, the authority of public opinion in general is only a feeble and yielding obstacle to the designs of the Machine; it imposes only partial restrictions on the latter's power.

There is a special category of respectable members of the party which exercise a certain control over the Machine: these are the wealthy persons who, out of party loyalty, give the Machine large subscriptions to the election campaign funds; they have the ear of the bosses when important candidatures are involved. Far more effective is the check imposed on the Machine by the Machine of the opposite party: whenever the two parties are evenly matched, a small number of good citizens can turn the scale in favour of one or the other party; the two rival Machines are in that case obliged to vie with each other in cultivating the good graces of these independent electors, by making up their tickets with names of men as respectable as the business of the Machine will allow. This intervention of the independent electors as masters of the situation supplies a corrective to the Machine, which is daily growing more important and more efficacious. On the other hand, it is true that the existence of two rival Machines, of more or less equal strength, helps each to hold its own and ensures it the absolute adhesion of the members of the party, who vote for it, in spite of its corruption, in order not to endanger the prospects of the party. Whereas, in places where the feebleness of the Opposition makes the dominant party safe, the Machine is not followed, so blindly, and even falls to pieces pretty quickly. There are, however, very remarkable exceptions: in Pennsylvania, for instance, the egregious weakness of the Democratic Opposition does not prevent the Republicans from upholding, in the teeth of all resistance, the most corrupt State Machine that has ever existed in the United States.

The most extensive limitations to which the power of the Machine and of the politicians is subject are to be found in the social and economic character of the particular community. In places where the population is more homogeneous, and forms smaller sets, in which opinion has consequently more consistency and asserts itself with more force, the Machine cannot take the liberties which it does in large cities where public

spirit is smothered under the huge agglomerations of heterogeneous elements brought together promiscuously. Its proceedings do not escape the attention of the public so easily, and the Machine is from necessity more circumspect and more moderate in its desires. In places where there are no large public works to be tendered for, or important contracts to be awarded, where there are no powerful corporations with extensive interests depending on administration or legislation, in a word, where the material for plunder is not considerable, the Machine is necessarily frugal and cannot provide a sufficient livelihood for those who have no other means of subsistence. Hence the parts of the Union least contaminated by the Machine and the politicians are the country districts. There everybody knows each other. Opinion, which is more slow in forming among the rural population and that of small cities, is more solid, more durable, less spasmodic than in the large centres. The electors have both more leisure and more sense of their own value, a narrow and exacting sense, which procures them more consideration, at least in appearance. The Machine, however, does exist among these populations, but it is more respectable, more attentive to the general opinion. It does not assume the repulsive aspect of bossism, it simply appears as a trade-union of all those who live on the party or expect something from it, office-holders, aspirants to places with their relations and their friends. Comparatively speaking, this trade-union is as powerful as the Machine. of the large city, and, it may be added, just as corrupt. With their eyes always fixed on the local loaves and fishes and the modest diet provided thereby, the politicians of the small rural Machine make politics subservient to these interests. It is not uncommon in the country districts and the small cities for members of the same family to be distributed in the rival Machines. The South, which is still largely agricultural and where, according to the census of 1890, there were only two cities with a population exceeding 100,000, and only five cities with more than 50,000 inhabitants, does not present a very favourable field for the development of the Machine. Apart from these two large cities, New Orleans and Louisville, the odious type of the boss is hardly met with in the South. Continuing, as it were, the old tradition of the South before the

Civil War, the Southern boss, if the chief election wire-pullers may be thus designated, is fonder of the sentimental gratifications procured by power than of gain. This is less true of the Republican party, which occupies, as against the "Solid South," an inferior political and social position. In the West the Machine prospers more, while exhibiting infinite variations in the extent of its power and its misdeeds. The great hotbed of the Machine and of the bosses is still the Eastern States, which are rich and populous, and where social differentiation has made the most progress.

If on the map of the United States all the parts of the country where the Machine has developed were coloured red, the eye would at once be attracted to the right by a large blotch formed by the States of New York and Pennsylvania with a strip of the State of New Jersey on the east, with the State of Maryland on the south, and the State of Ohio on the west. This spot casts a faint shadow to the north-east over New England, while on the other side, to the west, the red will appear in more or less deep tints on the State of Illinois and will stain the neighbouring States, marking with scarlet points most of the large cities, such as St. Louis in Missouri and others of less importance, like Louisville in Kentucky or Minneapolis in Minnesota, and other still smaller ones among the large ones; then, after making a brief pause in the States of the Far West and leaving some patches there, it will flow toward the Pacific slope and deposit a thick layer of carmine on San Francisco; and, finally, jumping right over to the Gulf of Mexico, it will cover New Orleans with a similar layer. A very considerable space will be left hardly coloured at all or will even exhibit the shot colour to be seen in certain fabrics: these are regions or cities where the Machine has no stable and regular existence; rings of mercenary politicians form in them, disappear after a short time, and re-form under favourable circumstances. A good many points again on the map will appear almost white, presenting the touching spectacle of "good Machines." But this in truth is an abuse of language, an honest Machine is not in the course of nature; it would be more correct to say that there are many local party Organizations which have not degenerated, which have not fallen into the category of Machines. Every Machine represents a party

Organization, but every party Organization is not necessarily a Machine. However fair this distinction may be, it must nevertheless be admitted that, in the conditions which govern the life of American political parties, every Organization carries within it the germ of a Machine which is capable of a singularly rapid growth. A population may, so to speak, go to bed with an Organization and wake up with a Machine. Hence, the "Mushroom Machines" which are a tolerably common phenomenon. In any event, it must not be forgotten that the part of the map coloured red, while only a portion of the whole country, contains almost a third of the population of the United States and represents at least three-fifths of its economic interests. This domain of the Machine is daily growing larger. The Machine is gaining ground, especially in the West, where it is invading districts which appeared to be free from it. It is the steady development of economic interests which paves the way for it; that development produces the wherewithal for exploitation by the Machine, and, on the other hand, it more and more absorbs individual energies and diverts the attention of the citizens from political preoccupations, while leaving still greater liberty of action to the professionals of politics. The new chances thus offered to the Machine are improved in some cases by its somewhat more prudent conduct; in proportion as it consolidates its power, it takes more care not to provoke the opposition of the good citizens. The explosion is bound to come, but it is slower in coming; thanks to the precautions of moral hygiene which a good many Machines adopt, their average life has become longer, they are "smashed" at less frequent intervals.

III

But why should this periodical necessity of "smashing" the Machines exist at all? Why is the power of the Machine, even when mitigated by the limitations and the restrictions which we have just been considering, tolerated in the full blaze of democracy? The varied materials for an answer to this question have already been disclosed to us in the course of our investigation, It now remains for us to recapitulate them in a more methodical way. The first and general condi