been devised which would prevent them from using their personal followers in the primary elections of both parties; and no such method can be devised without enforcing some comparatively fixed distinction between a Republican and a Democrat, and thus increasing the difficulties of independent voting.  In case the number of elective officials were decreased, as has been proposed above, there would be fewer objections to the direct primary.  Under the suggested method of organization each election would become of such importance that public opinion would be awakened and would be likely to obtain effective expression; and the balloting for the party candidates would arouse as much interest, particularly in the case of the dominant party, as the final election itself.  In fact, the danger would be under such circumstances that the primaries would arouse too much interest, and that the parties would become divided into embittered and unscrupulous factions.  Genuinely patriotic and national parties may exist; but a genuinely patriotic faction within a party would be a plant of much rarer growth.  From every point of view, consequently, the direct primary has its doubtful aspects.  The device is becoming so popular that it will probably prevail; and as it prevails, it may have the indirect beneficial result of diminishing the number of regular elections; but at bottom it is a clumsy and mechanical device for the selection of party candidates.  It is merely one of the many means generated by American political practice for cheapening the ballot.  The way to make votes important and effective is not to increase but to diminish their number.

A democracy has no interest in making good government complicated, difficult, and costly.  It has, on the contrary, every interest in so simplifying its machinery that only decisive decisions and choices are submitted to the voter.  Every attempt should be made to arouse his interest and to turn his public spirit to account; and for that reason it should not be fatigued by excessive demands and confused by complicated decisions.  The cost of government in time, ability, training, and energy should fall not upon the followers but upon the leaders; and the latter should have every opportunity to make the expenditure pay.  Such is the object of the foregoing suggestions towards reconstruction which, radical as they may seem, have been suggested chiefly by an examination of the practical conditions of contemporary reform.  Only by the adoption of some such plan can the reformers become something better than perpetual moral protestants who are fighting a battle in which a victory may be less fruitful than defeat.  As it is, they are usually flourishing in the eyes of the American people a flask of virtue which, when it is uncorked, proves to be filled with oaths of office.  The reformers must put strong wine into their bottle.  They must make office-holding worth while by giving to the officeholders the power of effecting substantial public benefits.