It is indeed no easy matter to find under what conditions the will of a people can most directly express itself in the official machinery of politics. Many Germans, for instance, entertain the notion that no government is truly democratic except the cabinet be in all matters dependent on a majority in parliament; and they are astonished to learn that in democratic America Congress has no influence on the election of the highest officials; that the President, in fact, may surround himself with a cabinet quite antagonistic to the political complexion of Congress. But no American believes that politics would represent public opinion any better if this independence of the Executive and his cabinet were to be modified, say in conformity with the English or French idea. The reasons for a discrepancy between public opinion and official politics lie anyhow not in the special forms prescribed by the Constitution, but in the means by which the forms prescribed by the Constitution are practically filled by the nation. In the English Constitution, for instance, there is nothing about a cabinet; and yet the cabinet is the actual centre of English politics. American politics might keep to the letter of the Constitution, and still be the truest reflection of public opinion. That they are not such a reflection is due to the strong position of the parties. The rivalry of these encourages keen competition, in which the success of the party has now become an end in itself quite aside from the principles involved. Personal advantages to be derived from the party have become prominent in the minds of its supporters; and even where the motives are unselfish, the tactics of the party are more important than its ideals. But tactics are impossible without discipline, and a party which hopes to be victorious in defending its own interests or in opposing others’ will be no mere debating club, but a relentlessly strict and practical organization. Wherewith the control must fall to a very few party leaders, who owe their positions to professional politicians—that is, to men who for the most part stand considerably below the level of the best Americans.
The immense number of votes cast in the Presidential elections is apt to hide the facts. Millions vote for one candidate and millions for the other, without knowing perhaps that a few months before the national convention some ten or twelve party leaders, sitting at a quiet little luncheon, may have had the power to fix on the presidential candidate. And these wise foreordainings are even less conspicuous in the case of governors, senators, or representatives. Everywhere the masses believe that they alone decide, and so they do between the nominees of one party and of the other, or sometimes between several candidates within the party; but they are not aware that a more important choice is made behind the scenes before these candidates make their appearance.