A Scotch-American on America.*

New Zealand Mail, Issue 874, 30 November 1888, Page 10

A Scotch-American on America.*

No one who, undazzled by the glamour of big figures, surveys tho present condition and considers the recent history of the United. States wftb a calm and scientific gaze, can fail to recognise the importance of the problems which are slowly maturing for solution on tho further shores of the Atlantic. The unparalleled prosperity, unparalleled alike in rapidity and volume, of the North American Union blinds tho majority of Old World spectators to the great and, serious perils which threaten its future, and menace the continued existence of a system whioh its founders endeavoured to assure by elaborate devices that become less and less efficient with the changing course of history. We hear of an ever increasing excess of revenue, of an ever widening area of cultivation, of a population growing at the rate of over a million every year, of enormous wealth, of a publio debt rapidly approaching extinction, of the development of individual liberty to tho verge of lioonce, of the perfect triumph of democracy, untrammelled by monarchy, aristocracy, or priestcraft. But if this splendid veil be a little lifted, if these attractive scenes be a little shifted, a confusion becomes visible, over the mass of which loom portentous dangers, shadowy perhaps in outline, yet real and substantial, each decade defining themselves into harder forms, that the statesmanship of the latter-day Republicanism in vain attempts to cope with. It is true that her geographical remoteness keeps America tree from the web of political intrigue in which history has enmeshed the old world. But foreign complications are of small moment compared with the difficulties which beset the course of every nation’s inner development. France, though shorn of two provinces, is still the geographical France in all essentials of 1789 ; while a hundred years of domestic struggle has brought her through a dozen Constitutions to one of the least satisfactory forms of national existence, a despotic Republic tempered by party faction. In America, the oourse of events has been very different; but in the able and striking introduction to hia admirable Handbook of Federal and State Republicanism, Mr Bannatyne shows only too clearly that beyond the Atlantic, as on this side of it, Democracy has not yet learned the secret of right government. Had the picture been limned by an Englishman, the darkness of it 3 shadows might have been attributed to some admixture of jealousy with any desire he could be credited with of presontiug the truth. But Mr Bannatyne is an American of Scotch extraction, and a New York solicitor to boot, who can hardly be suspected of exaggeration or misrepresentation. Moreover, if he supports his case partly by the results of his personal experience', it is mainly by reference to official publications, to which no possible exception can be taken, that he proves it. And his case, as we'read it, is, put briefly, that socially and politically the American state is rotten, not to the core, whioh is still sound, but to a point within mensurable distance of the core. It is so, not because the state is democratic, but because the democracy has not learned, and under tho form which it has assumed is not likely to learn, how to protect itself and assure its liberties. Mr Bannatyne gives a full account of the political and administrative systems of the State’ of New York, together with the text of its Constitution ; and ;sinoe, as he justly says,' ‘ no State of 'the Unibn is more 1 widely or deservedly known, or has exercised greater fnflue'noo upon other States,’ he is well warranted iu his choice of New York as the One best suited to illustrate—we may add, in the most favourable manner—State government in America. In New York, as in all the thirty-eight‘States of the Union, Save Kentucky, universal manhood suffrage exists. Let net seb what this meahs' under tf)e QouStifcution. In 1880, t{ie population of the Stgtq waq tv little over 5,000,000, the voting population was 1,358,0Q0, and of these electors, 536,000 —we are quotine numbei'3, omitting the b*—• *- ” „ found sidorably more tb»- -..ureds—or conl)oSU. J*- * -~ a one-third, wore foreigu- - * ‘ .aving the native voters in a majority of less than 200,000. Of a large proportion of the native-born electors, again, the parents were immigrants, A year’s residence in the State is the sole qualification for citizenship. Under conditions such as these a very large proportion of the electorate, considerable masses of which are constantly mov-ng westwards, can possess little more than a scintilla of political knowledge, or take more than a passing or faint interest in the fortunes of the State. They become thus the easy prey of demagogues and ‘ politicians.’ In the next place, elections are so frequent—elec, tions of governors, lieutenant-governors, senators, members of assembly’, executive officers, judges (State and local), and district, city, town, and village officials of all kinds—that on-all ordinary occasibns they excite no interest whatever, and fall entirely underthe control '■ of professional wirepullers, of 1 {jha workers of ‘ macbine-politios.’, 'lp March last,’Mr Ivins,'the City Chamberlain of New York,’ declared publicly that men were notpte&t&cl'fefi office solely beoausethey were Sick; ana able and willing to buy office, —no doubt for business ends. ‘lmportant offloes of honour, &c., are either put up at auction or raffled away, , . , , . In 1883, John Kelly was assessed 50,000d015. for the nomination of Register. Judicial npijiina-. tions were bought for as high so SO.Qp.Sdols/, —although the judicial office is far from,a remunerative Cud— ’* the nomination for Disttipt 'Attorney' commanded lo,OOOdols. to ' 15,000d01s, 1 And so forth. In 1886 the election expenses in New York City were 700,000d015. ; at the Presidential election in 1884, 1,000, OQOdols. would not have covered them. At least twenty out of every hundred voters are said by Mr Ivins tqbu'uhdfer pay oh election days, whijb the pride of a seat in the Senate' is 'about' 50,000d015., nearly' £IO,OOO. _ In the same month of ■ iVT arolj last, Mr Bishop showed' that in New ‘York city a ' sum of over ' 200,000d015. is nhnually paid by candidates for assessments, which, in addition to what the city offioially spends, is distributed among soma 45,000 men, moro than tliree-fourths of whom are;

in fact, thus publicly bribed, constituting a fifth of tho voting population. In other words, every’ sixth vote is at loast publicly bought and sold. The excessive frequency of elections is well 1 illustrated in the case of New Jersey, of which the population in ISBO was but a little ever eleveil hundred thousand, not equal to that of a quarter of London, But it 3 Legislature consisted of 21 senators, and 60 assemblymen, and its administration of 21 sheriffs, 63 coroners, 21 county clerks, as many surrogates, collectors, and prosecutors, 63 judges, and about 1,000 justices,—say, total, 1,312 officials. • add to these,’ says Mr Bannatyne, ‘ the number of State, town, village, city’, and United States officers, and their subordinates, and the total number of office-holders forms a large percentage of the whole population of adult age, one-half of which is presumed to be female.’ There are not only general elections in each November, but local elections at other times as well. ‘ No wonder,’ as Mr Bannatyne goes on to say, * that electioneering and politics form a kind of second nature in _the citizen,’ who, * imbued from infancy with the excitement and wiles of polities,’ beoomes ‘prematurely sharpened with knowledge of the baseness of man.’ The Governor and Lieutenant-Governor of New York State are elected every three years, tho principal executive officers every two years. It is significant that the post of superintendent of prisons is not left to popular election, but is made by the Governor with-the consent of the Senate, The Governor has no advisors of his own, and is iu effect, and within certain very wide limits, an executive dictator. He and bis Executive may bo, and often are, in violent opposition. The people, meanwhile, praotic. allv abdicate their sovereignty in favour, in different degrees, of the Governor, the Executive, and the Legislature. They possess no continuous control over their own destinies K 3 the English people do, and only a very modified ancl moderate control over them at any time, save at the moment of election of a Governor. And at that moment ‘machine politicians ’ intervene as at other elections and wrest to their own uses almost the entirety of popular sovereignty. Under such conditions it is not surprising that liberty, in the sense of freedom from interference by’ others, is hardly known in America. Machine politics and the system of government ' they imply’ hecessifcaite a widely-extended and d hep - reaching system of • espionage. A detective service of unparalleled efficiency has accordingly come into existence, of which the politicians make full use. In private life, even, the citizen is never safe from the newspaper reporters, social detectives, of whom ‘ there are swarms upon swarms. ...;.. both male and female over on tho alert for something sensational/ or, we, mav add, capable, by any’ kind of literary or other treatment, of bcipg made so. Of tho lengths to which these detectives will go, a singular instance is given by Mr Bannaryne,

extracted from the Daily Register (an official law journal pf New York) of July 17th, ISS6. Asa protection against the injustice and inefficiency pf the political and legal systems of the various States,' innumerable agencies and associations have been founded. Many of these give confidential information upon the character and position of firms, corporations, and private individuals, professional or;'other. One of tlie most impoitant of these publishes a sort of cipher ciireotqry of a very signifioant character, containing ‘ ratings for legal ability, Worth’, reliability, <fec., of over 60,000 lawyers.’, 1 r A similar directory seems almost as much wanted for State Courts and 1 judges as'for lawyers. Mr Bannatyne shows that the law! abiding classes are at a serious disadvantage. Suitors who from any cause, obnoxious to the prevailing ppliti'cai party have'far* top often' a hard fight tp procure jqstipe. fn nearly all gases the aggress** favoured at the expense of ' -- Others, the raultitn' 1 - ' victim. In tioaa OP*”" " -.-e of States and jurisdicinnumerable avenues of escape „u the wrongdoer, while the extreme complexity of the various interpenetrating systems of law under whioh the American oiti. sen lives makes him a slave to the lawyers. Mr Bannatyne can write 1 of the country whioh has had fewer,difficulties to deal with and great advantages to profit by than any other country in the world, —* The law is for the rich, and permits the rieh to exhaust the poor man and to swindle him, because he is poor or without friends, or has no political influence.’ What follows this sentenoe.is hardly credible. A stranger is robbed. The culprit is arrested, released on bail, and the prosecutor has to give saourity tfyat he will appear to proneoute. Be cannot do this, and is looked up! Months, years, pass by ; in time the culprit dies'; then, and not till then,’ the unlucky prosecutor gets p„ut, ‘ Such was the fate/ declares, Mr Ranuatyno, * off an immigrant not lo.ng ago.’ Reform is. less easy off 'aysomp&shment in the United States tjllW in any country in the world. Eye a 'in Russia emancipation was effected ' almost without post; in America, slavery oiuld be exercised—and that imperfectly—only by the sacrifice of half-a-million of men’s lives. On the ponderous, inefficiency of American Legislatures, My jjbidloy Field’s remarks quoted o„q II should be studied. They deal with tho legislation of Row Nqrk, but the figures of New Jersey legislation are even more instructive. Si'uoe‘lß4s this little State, of w;hioh tie population did not then probably exceed, the present population of Manchester, and is now only a little over, a million, has been | provided with nearly 13,000. laws. 3Thp,l»st (49th) Congress of the United States, in • sessions extending over b&m’e fifteen months, made some 7,000. reports on a mass of over. 114,000 Bilk),'whioh ended in the passing of ' 1,43.1 laws of which 264 only, became actual law bund of these, only a very few are of any iinportanoe. The enormous number of IS2 Bills were vetoed by the President, I twenty in excess of the whole number vetoed • during the preceding forty-eight Congresses. ;We have no spaoe for comment upon these facts, perhaps tliey need ficna. ! To conclude, a lev? significant items may •be given, extracted from the copious 1 statistics furnished by Mr Bannatyne. In 1860 no loss than 1,500 homioides (not by misadventure) were reported, mostly a 3 the result of quarrels, only 126 being attributed to drink. There wore 84 legal executions, k 4O of tho conviota being negroes; and 133

lynehings, 71 of the viotims being coloured men. Of course, each lynching would mean several (legal) murderers. In all, then; 1,640 persons met with a violent death; not through misadventure, in 1886 -an enormous butcher’s bill, only to be paralleled in Italian criminal Statistics. The total population in 18S0 of the United States was a little over fifty millions. Of these, over eleven millions possessed the franchise, eight millions being natives, and three millions being foreignborn. The negro voters numbered one and a half million, and with the immigrants constituted a voting-power equal to half that of the native American element, which does not increase at equal rate with the other elements. The number of prisoners undergoing sentence was 1 over 58,000, of whom 12,800 were immigrants. These statistics, however, appear to be inexact. President Charles Adams has recently stated that crime is twelve times more rife among the the foreign than among the native population. The total coloured population was six and a half millions, and the ‘ natural black increase ’ is to the ‘natural white increase ’ as three and a half to two. What will be the result of this rapid increase of the negro ? ‘ The whites/ says Mr Bannatyne, * will be forced to keep the tide of emigration, from coming north ; and what,’ he pertinently asks, * will then become of Republican institutions ? ’