Trawick:The City Church and Its Social Mission, pages 14-22, 50-76, 95-99, 122-160.Strayer:Reconstruction of the Church, pages 161-249.Menzies:History of Religion, pages 19-78.Rauschenbusch:Christianizing the Social Order, pages 7-29, 96-102.McCulloch:The Open Church for the Unchurched, pages 33-164.Coe:Education in Religion and Morals, pages 373-388.
Trawick:The City Church and Its Social Mission, pages 14-22, 50-76, 95-99, 122-160.
Strayer:Reconstruction of the Church, pages 161-249.
Menzies:History of Religion, pages 19-78.
Rauschenbusch:Christianizing the Social Order, pages 7-29, 96-102.
McCulloch:The Open Church for the Unchurched, pages 33-164.
Coe:Education in Religion and Morals, pages 373-388.
308.Experimenting in the Mass.—The modern city is a gigantic social experiment. Never before have so many people crowded together, never has there been such a close interlocking of economic and social and religious associations, never has there been such ease of communication and transit. Modern invention has given its aid to the natural effort of human beings to get together. The various interests that produce action have combined to make settlement compact. The city is a severe test of human ability to live peaceably and co-operatively at close quarters. In the country an unfriendly man can live by himself much of the time; in the city he is continually feeling somebody's elbows in his ribs. It is not strange that there is as yet much crudeness about the city. Its growth has been dominated by the economic motive, and everything has been sacrificed to the desire to make money. Dirty slums, crowded tenements, uncouth business blocks, garish bill-boards and electric signs, dumped rubbish on vacant lots, constant repairs of streets and buildings—these all are marks of crudity and experimentation, evidences that the city is still in the making. Many of the weaknesses that appear in urban society can be traced to this situation as a cause. The craze for amusement is partly a reaction from the high speed of modern industry, but partly, also, a social delirium produced by the new experience of the social whirl. Naturally more serious efforts are neglected for a time, and institutions of long standing, like the family, threaten to go to pieces. A thought-provoking lecture or a sermon on human obligation does not fit in with the mood of the thousands who walk or ride along the streets, searchingfor a sensation. The student who looks at urban society on the surface easily becomes pessimistic.
309.Reasons for Optimism.—This new experience of society will run its course. Undoubtedly there will go with it much of social loss, but there is firm ground for believing that there will be more of social gain. It is quite necessary for human beings to learn to associate intimately, for population is steadily increasing and modern civilization makes all classes and all nations more and more dependent on one another. The pace of life will slow down after a time, there will be less of social intoxication, and men and women will take their pleasures more sanely. Eventually they will listen to a message that is adapted to them, however serious it may be. One of the most hopeful factors in the situation is the presence of individuals and organized groups who are able to diagnose present conditions, and who are working definitely for their improvement. Much of modern progress is conscious and purposeful, where formerly men lived blindly, subject, as they believed, to the caprice of the gods. We know much about natural law, and lately we have learned something about social law; with this knowledge we can plan intelligently for the future. There is less excuse for social failure than formerly. Cities are learning how to make constructive plans for beautifying avenues and residential sections, and making efficient a whole transportation system; they will learn how to get rid of overcrowding, misery, and disease. What is needed is the will to do, and that will come with experience.
310.Reasonable Expectations of Improvement.—Any soundly constructive plan waits on thorough investigation. Such an organization as the Russell Sage Foundation, which is gathering all sorts of data about social conditions, is supplying just the information needed on which to base intelligent and effective action. On this foundation will come the slow process of construction. There will be diffusion of information, an enlistment of those who are able to help, and an increased co-operation among the numerous agencies of philanthropy and reform. The mostobvious evils and those that seem capable of solution will be attacked first. Intelligent public opinion will not tolerate the continued existence of curable ills. Pure water, adequate sewerage, light, and air, and sanitary conveniences in every home will be required everywhere. Community physicians and nurses will be under municipal appointment to see that health conditions are maintained, and to instruct city families how to live properly. Vocational schools and courses in domestic science will prepare boys and girls for marriage and the home, and will tend to lessen poverty. Undoubtedly the time will come when it will be seen clearly that the interests of society demand the segregation of those who cannot take care of themselves and are an injury to others. Hospitals and places of detention for mental and moral defectives, and the victims of chronic vice and intemperance, as well as criminals of every sort, will seem natural and necessary. Larger questions of immigration, industrial management, and municipal administration will be studied and gradually solved by the united wisdom of city, state, and nation.
311.Agencies of Progress and Gains Achieved.—An examination of what has been achieved in this direction by almost any one of the larger cities in the United States shows encouraging progress. Smaller cities and even villages have made use of electricity for lighting, transportation, and telephone service. The water and sewerage systems of larger centres are far in advance of what they were a few years ago. Bathrooms with open plumbing and greater attention to the preservation of health have supplemented more thorough efforts to the spread of communicable diseases. Increasing agitation for more practical education has led to the creation of various kinds of vocational schools, including a large variety of correspondence schools for those who wish specific training. There are still thousands of boys and girls who enter industrial occupations in the most haphazard way, and yield to irrational impulse in choosing or giving up a particular job or a place to live in; similar impulse induces them to mate in the same haphazard way, and as lightly to separateif they tire of each other; but the very fact that enlightened public opinion does not countenance these practices, that there are social agencies contending against them, and that they are contrary to the laws of happiness, of efficiency, and even of survival, makes it unlikely that such irrational conduct can persist. As for the social ills that have seemed unavoidable, like sexual vice, current investigation and agitation, followed by increasing legislation and segregation of the unfit, promises to work a change, however gradual the process may be. Numerous organizations are at work in the fields of poverty, immigration, the industrial problem, reform of government, penology, business, education, and religion, and thousands of social workers are devoting their lives to the betterment of society.
312.Conference and Co-operation.—Improvement will be more rapid when the various agencies of reform have learned to pull together more efficiently. It is frequently charged that the friction between different temperance organizations has delayed progress in solving the problem of intemperance. It is often said that there would be less poverty if the various charitable agencies would everywhere organize and work in association. The independent temper of Americans makes it difficult to work together, but co-operation is a sound sociological principle, and experience proves that such principles must be obeyed. If the principle of combination that has been applied to business should be carried further and applied to the problems of society, there can be no question that results would speedily justify the action. Perhaps the greatest need in the city to-day is a union of resources. If an honest taxation would furnish funds, if the best people would plan intelligently and unselfishly for the city's future development, if boards and committees that are at odds would get together, there is every reason to think that astonishing changes for the better would soon be seen.
Suppose that in every city of our land representatives of the chamber of commerce, of the city government, of the associated charities, of the school-teachers, of theministers of the city, of the women's clubs, of the Young Men's Christian Association and the Young Women's Christian Association, of the labor-unions, and of the agencies that cater to amusement should sit together once in two weeks in conference upon the interests of all the people of the city, and should honestly and frankly discuss the practical questions that are always at the fore in public discussion, and then should report back for further conference in their own groups, there can be no doubt that the various groups would have a far better understanding and appreciation of one another, and in time would find ways and means to adopt such a programme as might come out of all the discussion.
313.The Crucial Test of Democracy.—World events have shown clearly since the outbreak of the European war that intelligent planning and persistent enforcement of a political programme can long contend successfully against great odds, when there is autocratic power behind it all. Democracy must show itself just as capable of planning and execution, if it is to hold its own against the control of a few, whether plutocrats, political bosses, or a centralized state, but its power to make good depends on the enlistment of all the abilities of city or nation in co-operative effort. There is no more crucial test of the ability of democracy to solve the social problems of this age than the present-day city. The social problem is not a question of politics, but of the social sciences. It is a question of living together peaceably and profitably. It involves economics, ethics, and sociological principles. It is yet to be proved that society is ready to be civilized or even to survive on a democratic basis. The time must come when it will, for associated activity under the self-control of the whole group is the logical and ethical outcome of sound sociological principle, but that time may not be near at hand. If democracy in the cities is to come promptly to its own, social education will soon change its emphasis from the material gain of the individual to co-operation for the social good, and under the inspiration of this idea the various agencies will unite for effective social service.
Howe:The Modern City and Its Problems, pages 367-376.Goodnow:City Government in the United States, pages 302-308.Eldridge:Problems of Community Life, pages 3-7.Ely:The Coming City.Boston Directory of Charities, 1914.
Howe:The Modern City and Its Problems, pages 367-376.
Goodnow:City Government in the United States, pages 302-308.
Eldridge:Problems of Community Life, pages 3-7.
Ely:The Coming City.
Boston Directory of Charities, 1914.
314.Questions of the Larger Group.—In any study of social life we have to find a place for larger groups than the family and the neighborhood or even the city. There are national units and even a certain amount of international unity in the world. How have they come to exist? What are the interests that hold them together? What are the forms of association that are practicable on such a large scale? Is there a tendency to stress the control of the group over its individual members, even its aristocracy 01 birth or wealth? These are questions that require some sort of an answer. Beyond them are other questions concerning the relations between these larger groups. Are there common interests or compelling forces that have merged hitherto sovereign states into federal or imperial union? Is it conceivable that such mutually jealous nations as the European powers may surrender willingly their individual interests of minor importance for the sake of the larger good of the whole? Can political independence ever become subordinate to social welfare? Are there any spiritual bonds that can hold more strongly than national ambitions and national pride? Such questions as these carry the student of society into a wider range of corporate life than the average man enters, but a range of life in which the welfare of every individual is involved.
315.The Significance of National Life.—The nation is a group of persons, families, and communities united for mutual protection and the promotion of the general welfare, and recognizing a sovereign power that controls them all. Some nations have been organized from above inobedience to the will of a successful warrior or peaceful group; others have been organized peacefully from below by the voluntary act of the people themselves. The nation in its capacity as a governing power is a state, but a nation exercises other functions than that of control; it exists to promote the common interests of mankind over a wider area than that of the local community. The historic tendency of nations has been to grow in size, as the transmission of ideas has become easy, and the extension of control has been made widely possible. The significance of national life is the social recognition at present given to community of interest by millions of individuals who believe that it is profitable for them to live under the same economic regulations, social legislation, and educational system, even though of mingled races and with various ideals.
316.How the Nation Developed.—The nation in embryo can be found in the primitive horde which was made up of families related by ties of kin, or by common language and customs. The control was held by the elderly men of experience, and exercised according to unwritten law. The horde was only loosely organized; it did not own land, but ranged over the hunting-grounds within its reach, and often small units separated permanently from the larger group. When hunting gave place to the domestication of animals, the horde became more definitely organized into the tribe, strong leadership developed in the defense of the tribe's property, and the military chieftain bent others in submission to his will. As long as land was of value for pasturage mainly, it was owned by the whole tribe in common. When agriculture was substituted for the pastoral stage of civilization, the tribe broke up by clans into villages, each under its chief and advisory council of heads of families. So far the mode of making a living had determined custom and organization.
Village communities may remain almost unchanged for centuries, as in China, or here and there one of them may become a centre of trade, as in mediæval Germany. In the latter case it draws to itself all classes of people,develops wealth and culture, and presently dominates its neighbors. Small city states grew up in ancient time along the Nile in Egypt, and by and by federated under a particularly able leader, or were conquered by the band of an ambitious chieftain, who took the title of king. In such fashion were organized the great kingdoms and empires of antiquity.
Social disintegration and foreign conquest broke up the great empires, and for centuries in the Middle Ages society existed in local groups; but common economic and racial interests, together with the political ambition of princes and nobles, drew together semi-independent principalities and communes, until they became welded into real nations. At first the state was monarchical, because a few kings and lords were able to dominate the mass, and because strength and authority were more needed than privileges of citizenship; then the economic interest became paramount, and merchants and manufacturers demanded a share in government for the protection of their interests. Education improved the general level of intelligence, and invention and growing commerce improved the condition of the people until eventually all classes claimed a right to champion their own interests. The most progressive nations racially, politically, and economically, outstripped the others in world rivalry until the great modern nations, each with its own peculiar qualities of efficiency, overtopped their predecessors of all time.
317.The Story of the United States.—The story of national life in the United States is especially noteworthy. Within a century and a half the people of this country have passed through the economic stages, from clearing the forests to building sky-scrapers; in government they have grown from a few jealous seaboard colonies along the Atlantic to a solidly welded federal nation that stretches from ocean to ocean; in education and skill they have developed from provincial hand-workers to expert managers of corporate enterprises that exploit the resources of the world; and in population they have grown from four million native Americans to a hundred million people,gathered and shaken together from the four corners of the earth. In that century and a half they have developed a new and powerful national consciousness. When the British colonies asserted their independence, they were held together by their common ambition and their common danger, but when they attempted to organize a government, the incipient States were unwilling to grant to the new nation the powers of sovereignty. The Confederation was a failure. The sense of common interest was not strong enough to compel a surrender of local rights. But presently it appeared that local jealousies and divisions were imperilling the interests of all, and that even the independence of the group was impossible without an effective national government. Then in national convention the States, through their representatives, sacrificed one after another their sovereign rights, until a respectable nation was erected to stand beside the powers of Europe. It was given power to make laws for the regulation of social conduct, and even of interstate commerce, to establish executive authority and administrative, judicial, and military systems, and to tax the property of the people for national revenue. To these basic functions others were added, as common interests demanded encouragement or protection.
318.Tests of National Efficiency.—Two tests came to the new nation in its first century. The first was the test of control. It was for a time a question whether the nation could extend its sovereignty over the interior. State claims were troublesome, and the selfish interests of individuals clashed with revenue officers, but the nation solved these difficulties. The second test was the test of unity, and was settled only after civil war. Out of the struggle the nation emerged stronger than it had ever been, because henceforth it was based on the principle of an indissoluble union. With its second century have come new tests—the test of absorbing millions of aliens in speech and habits, the test of wisely governing itself through an intelligent citizenship, the test of educating all of its people to their political and social responsibilities. Whetherthese tests will be met successfully is for the future to decide, but if the past is any criterion, the American republic will not fail. National structures have risen to a certain height and then fallen, because they were not built on the solid foundations of mutual confidence, co-operation, and loyalty. Building a self-governing nation that will stand the test of centuries is possible only for a people that is conscious of its community of interests, and is willing to sacrifice personal preferences and even personal profits for the common good.
Bryce:The American Commonwealth(Abridged Edition), pages 3-21.Dealey:Development of the State, pages 26-48.Bluntschli:Theory of the State, pages 82-102.Mulford:The Nation, pages 37-60.Bagehot:Physics and Politics, pages 81-155.Usher:Rise of the American People, pages 151-167, 182-195, 269-281.
Bryce:The American Commonwealth(Abridged Edition), pages 3-21.
Dealey:Development of the State, pages 26-48.
Bluntschli:Theory of the State, pages 82-102.
Mulford:The Nation, pages 37-60.
Bagehot:Physics and Politics, pages 81-155.
Usher:Rise of the American People, pages 151-167, 182-195, 269-281.
319.The Reality of the Nation.—Ordinarily the individual is not pressed upon heavily by his national relationships. He is conscious of them as he reads the newspaper or goes to the post-office, but except at congressional or presidential elections they are not brought home to him vividly. He thinks and acts in terms of the community. The nation is an artificial structure and most of its operations are centralized at a few points. The President lives and Congress meets at the national capital. The departments of government are located there, and the Supreme Court holds its sessions in the same city. Here and there at the busy ports are the custom-houses, with their revenue officers, and at convenient distances are district courts and United States officers for the maintenance of national order and justice. The post-office is the one national institution that is found everywhere, matched in ubiquity only by the flag, the symbol of national unity and strength. But though not noticeably exercised, the power of the nation is very real. There is no power to dispute its legislation and the decisions of its tribunals. No one dares refuse to contribute to its revenues, whether excise tax or import duties. No one is unaware that a very real nation exists.
320.The Social Nature of the Nation.—In thinking of the nation it is natural to consider its power as a state, but other functions belong to it as a social unit that are no less important. Its general function is not so much to govern as to promote the general welfare. The social nature of national organization is well expressed in the preamble to the national Constitution: "We the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union,establish justice, insure domestic tranquillity, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America." The general welfare is a somewhat vague term, but it includes all the interests of the people, and so indicates the scope of the national function.
321.The Economic Function.—The nation has an economic function. It is its business to encourage trade by means that seem most likely to help, whether by subsidies, tariffs, or expert advice; to protect all producers, distributers, and consumers by just laws and tribunals, so that unfair privileges shall not be enjoyed by the few at the expense of the many, and to provide in every legitimate way for the spread of information and for experimentation that agriculture, mining, and manufacturing may be improved. Evidences of the attempt of the United States to measure up to these responsibilities are the various tariffs that have been established for protection as well as revenue, the interstate and trade commissions that exist for the regulation of business, and the individuals and boards that are maintained for acquiring and disseminating information relating to all kinds of economic interests. The United States Patent Office encourages invention, and American inventors outnumber those of other nations. The United States Department of Agriculture employs many experimenters and expert agents and even distributes seeds of a good quality, in order that one of the most important industries of the American people may flourish. At times some of the national machinery has been prostituted to private gain, and there is always danger that the individual will try to prosper at the expense of society, but the people more than ever before are conscious that it is the function of the nation to promote thegeneralwelfare, and private interests, however powerful, must give heed to this.
322.Manufacturing in Corporations and Associations.—Back of all organization and legislation lies a realnational unity, through which the nation exercises indirectly an economic function. In spite of a popular jealousy of big business in the last decade, there is a pride in the ability of American business men to create a profitable world commerce, and middle-class people in well-to-do circumstances subscribe to the purchase of stocks and bonds in trusted corporations. Without this general interest and participation such a rapid extension of industrial enterprise could not have taken place. Without the lines of communication that radiate from great commercial and financial centres, without the banking connections that make it possible for the fiscal centres to support any particular institution that is in temporary distress, without the consciousness of national solidarity in the great departments of business life, economic achievement in America would have come on halting feet. This unity is fostered but not created by government, and no hostile government can destroy it altogether.
To further economic interests throughout the nation all sorts of associations exist and hold conventions, from American poultry fanciers to national banking societies. Occasionally these associations pool their interests and advertise their concerns through a national exposition. In this way they find it possible to make an impression upon thousands of people whom they are educating indirectly through the printing-press. It would be an interesting study and one that would throw light on the complexity and ubiquity of national relations, if it could be ascertained locally how many individuals are connected with such national organizations, and what particular associations are most popular. If this examination were extended from purely economic organizations to associations of every kind, we should be able to gauge more accurately the strength of national influence upon social life.
323.Health Interests.—If this national unity exists in the economic field it is natural to expect to find it in the less material interests of society. The sense of common interests is all-pervasive. National health conditions bring the physicians together to discuss the causes and thetherapeutics. How to keep well and to get strong, how to dress the baby and to bring up children are perennial topics for magazines with a national circulation. Insurance companies with a national constituency prescribe physical tests for all classes. Government takes cognizance of the physical interest of all its citizens, and passes through Congress pure-food and pure-drug acts. National societies of a voluntary nature also cater to health and happiness. Long-named organizations exist for moral prophylaxis and for the prevention of cruelty to children and animals. Vigilance associations of all sorts stand guard to keep children and their elders from contamination. Society protects itself over wide areas through such associated recognition of the mutual interests of all its members.
324.National Sport.—Recreation and sport also present national features. Every new phase of recreation from playgrounds to philately presently has its countrywide association. There is a conscious reaching out for wide fellowship with those who are interested in the same pursuits. The attraction of like-mindedness is a potent force in every department of life. Certain forms of relaxation or spirited rivalry have attained to the dignity of national sports. England has its football, Scotland its golf, Canada its lacrosse, the United States its baseball. The enthusiasm and excitement that hold whole cities in thrall as a national league season draws to its close, is a more striking phenomenon than Roman gladiatorial shows or Spanish bull-fights. Persons who seldom if ever attend a game, who do not know one player from another, wax eloquent over the merits of a team that represents their own city, while individuals who attain to the title of "fans" handle familiarly the details of the teams throughout the league circuit. Why should Olympic contests held in recent years between representatives of different nations, or international tennis championships, arouse universal interest? It is inexplicable except as evidence of collective consciousness and a national pride and loyalty.
The same spirit has entered into university athletics. The great universities have their "rooters" scattered allover the land, and the whole nation is interested in the Thames or Henley races and the Poughkeepsie regattas. There are intercollegiate tennis championships and chess tournaments, football contests between the leaders East and West, all-America teams, and even international rivalries.
325.The Function of Education.—Nation-wide ties and loyalties in sport do not call for the official action of the nation, though national officials as individuals are often devoted to certain sports, but the nation has other functions that may be classed as social. No duty is more pressing, not even that of efficient government, than the task of education. The National Bureau of Education supplemented by State boards, officially takes cognizance of society's educational interests. In education local independence plays a large part, but it is the function of government to make inquiry into the best theories and methods anywhere in vogue, to extend information to all who are interested, and to use its large influence toward the adoption of improvements. Government in certain States of the American Union even goes so far as to co-operate with local communities in maintaining joint school superintendents of towns or counties. It is appropriate that a democratic nation should give much attention to the education of the people because the success of democracy depends on popular intelligence.
The efforts of the government are seconded by voluntary organization. It is not unusual for college presidents or ordinary teachers to meet in conference and discuss their difficulties and aspirations, but a National Education Association is cumulative evidence that Americans think in terms of a continent, and that their interests are the same educationally in all parts of the land. It is no less true of other agencies of culture than the schools. Cultural associations of all kinds abound. Some of them are limited by State boundaries, not a few are national in their scope. There is a national Chautauqua; institutes with the same name hold their sessions all over the land. Music, art, and the drama, sometimes the same organized groupof artists, appeal to appreciative audiences in Boston, New Orleans, Chicago, and San Francisco. Popular songs from the opera, popular dances from the music-halls sweep the country with a wave of imitative enthusiasm. There are national whims and national tastes that chase each other from ocean to ocean, almost as fast as the sun moves from meridian to meridian.
326.National Philanthropy.—So much of national life is voluntary in direction and organization in America, as compared with Germany or Russia, that it is easy to overlook its national significance. As a national state the United States does not attempt philanthropy. The separate States have their asylums as they have penitentiaries and reformatories, but the nation performs no such function. Yet philanthropic organization girdles the continent. The National Conference of Charities and Corrections is one instance of a society that meets annually in the interest of the depressed classes, discusses their problems, and reports its findings to the public as a basis for organized activity. Such an organization not only represents the humanitarian principles and interest of individuals here and there, but it helps to bind together local groups all over the country that are working on an altruistic basis. Whole sections of territory join in discussing still wider human interests. The Southern Sociological Conference appeals to the whole South and calls upon the rest of the country for speakers of reputation and wisdom.
327.The Federal Council of Churches.—It is fundamental to the spirit and word of the American Constitution that church and state shall not be united, but this does not prevent religious interests from being cherished nationally, and ecclesiastical organizations from having national affiliations. Modern churches are grouped first of all in denominations, because of certain peculiarities, but most of the denominations have spread over the country and propagated their type as opportunity offered. National conferences and conventions, therefore, take place regularly, bringing together Episcopalians, Presbyterians, Baptists, or Methodists, as the case may be, to consider theinterests that are most vital to the denomination as a whole, or which the denomination as a whole, in place of the local churches, holds within its sphere of control. Politics and sectional interests have sometimes divided denominations, large bodies have sometimes split along conservative or radical lines, but the national ideal has never been lost sight of, and national organizations enjoy dignity and prestige. One of the most recent illustrations of a still broader interest and deeper consciousness is the federation of more than thirty evangelical Protestant denominations for better acquaintance and larger achievement. Temporary movements and even a definite Evangelical Alliance have been in evidence before, but now has come a permanent organization, to include all the religious interests that can be held in common, and especially to stress the more ambitious programme of social regeneration. The Federal Council of the Churches of Christ in America has yet to prove that it is not ahead of the times, but it is an earnest of a religious interest that oversteps the bounds of creed and denominational organization and calls upon the various divisions of the Protestant Church to unite for a national campaign.
328.The Scope of National Life.—Social life in the nation is not confined to any organization. It does not wait upon government to perform its various functions. It goes on because of the constant flow and counterflow of population through all the channels of acquaintance and correspondence, of travel and trade. People feel the need of one another, are in constant touch with one another, and inevitably are continually exchanging commodities and ideas. Barriers of race and language, of tariff walls and national conventions stand in the way of exchange between individuals of different nations, though a strenuous commercial age succeeds in making breaches in the barriers, but opportunity within the nation is free, and such natural barriers as language and race differences speedily give way before the mutual desires of the native and the hyphenated American.
Dealey:Development of the State, pages 63-115.Reports of the Commissioner of Education.American Year Book, 1914,passim.Ward:Year Book of the Church and Social Service, 1916, pages 24-29.
Dealey:Development of the State, pages 63-115.
Reports of the Commissioner of Education.
American Year Book, 1914,passim.
Ward:Year Book of the Church and Social Service, 1916, pages 24-29.
329.The State and Its Sovereignty.—The various economic and social functions that are exercised by the people as a nation can be performed in an orderly and effective way only when the people are organized politically, and the nation has full powers of sovereignty. When the nation functions politically it is a state. States may be large like Russia, or small like Montenegro; they may have full sovereignty like Great Britain, or limited sovereignty like New York; the fact that they exercise political authority makes them states. It is conceivable that this political authority may be exercised through the sheer force of public opinion, but the experience of the newly organized United States under the Articles of Confederation showed that national moral suasion was not effective. History seems to prove that society needs a machinery of government able to legislate and enforce its laws, and the tendency has been for a comparatively small number of states to extend their authority over more and more of the earth's surface. This has become possible through the maintenance of efficient military forces and wise local administration, aided by increasing ease of communication and transportation. Once it was a question whether the United States could enforce its law as far away as western Pennsylvania; now Great Britain bears unquestioned sway over the antipodes. Many persons look forward to the time when the people of all nations will unite in a universal state, with power to enforce its will without resort to war.
330.Why the State is Necessary.—There are some persons, commonly known as anarchists, who do not believe that government is necessary. They would havehuman relations reduced to their lowest terms, and then trust to human nature to behave itself properly. There are other persons known as Socialists, who would have the people in their collective capacity exercise a larger control than now over human action. Neither of these classes represents the bulk of society. Common sense and experience together seem to demand a government that will exercise a reasonable control, and by reasonable is meant a control that will preserve the best interests of all and make general progress possible. The political function of the nation is both coercive and directive. When we think of a state we naturally think of the power that it possesses to make peace or war with foreign powers, to keep order within the nation, to enforce its authority over any individual or group that breaks the laws that it has made; but while such power of control is essential and its exercise often spectacular, it is paralleled by the directive power. There are many social relations that need definition and much social conduct that needs direction. A man and a woman live together and bring up a family of children. Who is to determine their legal status, the terms of marriage, the rights of parenthood, the claims of childhood, the rights and obligations of the family as a part of the community? The family accumulates property in lands, houses, and movable possessions. Who will make the acquisition legal, insure property protection, and provide legally for inheritance? Every individual has his personal relation to the state, and privileges of citizenship are important. Who shall determine the right to vote and to hold office, or the duty to pay taxes or serve in the army or navy? In these various ways the state is no less functioning politically for the benefit of the people than when coercing recalcitrant citizens, warning or fighting other nations, or legislating in its congressional halls. Its opportunity to regulate the social interests of its citizens is almost illimitable, for while a written constitution may prescribe what a state may and may not do, those who made the constitution have the power to revise it or to override its provisions.
331.Theories of the State.—Archæological and historical evidence point to the family as the nursery of the state. There was a time when the contract theory was popular. It was believed that the state became possible when individuals agreed to give up some of their own individual rights for the sake of living in peace with their neighbors and enjoying mutual protection. There is no doubt that such a mutual arrangement was made in the troublous feudal period of mediæval European history, just as the original thirteen American colonies gave up some of their individual powers to make possible a real American state, but the social-contract theory is no longer accepted as a satisfactory explanation of the origin of government. There was noMayflowercompact with the bushmen when Englishmen decided to live with the natives in Australia.
There is another theory that eminently wise men, with or without divine assistance, formulated law and government for cities and tribes, and that their codes were definitely accepted by the people, but the work of these men, as far as it is historical at all, seems to have been a work of codifying laws which had grown out of custom rather than of making new laws. Still another theory that was once held strenuously by a few was that of the divine right of kings, as if God had given to one dynasty or one class the right to rule irresponsibly over their fellows. Individual political philosophers, like the Greek Aristotle and the German Bluntschli have published their theories, and have influenced schools of publicists, but the political science of the present day, basing its theories on observed facts, is content to trace the gradual changes that have taken place in the unconscious development of the past, and to point out the possibilities of intelligent progress in future evolution.
332.How the State Came to Be.—The true story of the development of the state seems to have been as follows. The roots of the state are in the family group. When the family expanded into the tribe, family discipline and family custom easily passed over to tribal disciplineand tribal custom, strengthened by religious superstition and the will of the priest. But not all chieftains and all tribes have the same ability or the same disposition, so that while political custom and religious sanctions tended in the main to remain unchanged, an occasional exception upset the social equilibrium. Race mixture and conflicting interests compelled organization on a civil rather than a tribal basis. Or an ambitious prince or a restless tribe interfered with the established relations, and presently a powerful military state was giving law to subjugated tribes. Egypt, Persia, Rome, Turkey have been such states. On a larger scale, something of the same sort has happened in the conquest of outlying parts of the world by the European Powers, until one man in Petrograd can give law to Kamchatka, a cabinet in London can determine a policy for the government of India, or the United States Congress can change the administration of affairs in the Philippines. Military power has been the weapon by which authority has been imposed from without, legislative action the instrument by which authority has been extended within.
333.The Government of Great Britain.—The government of Great Britain is one of the best concrete examples of the growth of a typical state. Its Teutonic founders learned the rudiments of government in the German forests, where the principles of democracy took root. Military and political exigencies gave the prince large power, but the people never forgot how to exert their influence through local assembly or national council. In the thirteenth century, when the King displeased the men of the nation, they demanded the privileges of Magna Carta, and when King and lords ruled inefficiently, the common people found a way to enlarge their own powers. Representatives of the townsmen and the country shires took their places in Parliament, and gradually, with growing wisdom and courage, assumed more and more prerogatives. Three times in the seventeenth century Parliament demanded successfully certain rights of citizenship, though once it had to fight and once more to depose a king. In the nineteenth century, by a succession of reform acts,King and Parliament admitted tradesmen, farmers, and working men to a full share in the workings of the state, and only recently the Commons have supplanted the Lords as the leading legislative body of the nation. The story of Great Britain is a tale of growing democracy and increasing efficiency.
The story of local government and the story of imperial government might be placed side by side with the story of national government, and each would reveal the political principles that have guided British progress. Social need, patient experiment, and growth in efficiency are significant phrases that help to explain the story. Every nation has worked out its government in its own way, interfered with occasionally by interested parties on the outside, but the general line of progress has been the same—local experimentation, federation or union more often imposed than agreed upon by popular consent, and a slow growth of popular rights over government by a privileged few. Present tendency is in the direction of safeguarding the interests of all by a fully representative government, in which the individual efficiency of prince or commoner alike shall have due weight, but no one sovereign or class shall rule the people as a whole.
334.The Organization of Government.—The political organization depends upon the functions that the state has to perform, as the structure of any group corresponds to its functions. The modern national machinery is a complicated system, and is becoming more so as constitutional conventions define more in detail the powers and forms of government, and as legislatures enter the field of social reform, but the simplest attempt at regulation involves several steps, and so naturally there are several departments of government. The first step is the election of those who are to make the laws. Practically all modern states recognize the principle that the people are at least to have a share in government; this is managed by the popular election of their representatives in the various departments of government. The second step is lawmaking by the representative legislature, congress, orparliament, usually after previous deliberation and recommendation by a committee; in some states the people have the right by referendum to ratify or reject the legislation, and even to initiate such legislation as they desire. The third step is the arrangement for carrying out the law that has been passed. This is managed by the executive department of the government. The fourth step is the actual administration of law and government by officials who are sometimes elected and sometimes appointed, and who constitute the administrative department of the political organization. A fifth step is the passing upon law and the relation of an individual or group to it by judicial officers attached to a system of courts. These departments of the state, with whatever auxiliary machinery has been organized to assist in their working, make up the political organization of the typical modern state.
335.The Electoral System.—There is great variety in the degree of self-government enjoyed by the people. In the most advanced nations the electoral privileges are widely distributed, in the backward nations it is only recently that the people have had any voice in national affairs. Usually suffrage is reserved for those who have reached adult manhood, but an increasing number of States of the American Union and several foreign nations have admitted women to equal privileges. Lack of property or education in many countries is a bar to electoral privilege. Pauperism and crime and sometimes religious heterodoxy disfranchise. The variety and number of officials to be elected varies greatly. The head of the nation in the states of the Old World generally holds his position by hereditary right, and he has large appointive power directly or indirectly. In some states the judiciary is appointed rather than elected on the ground that it should be above the influence of party politics. The chief power of the people is in choosing their representatives to make the laws. Most of these representatives are chosen for short terms and must answer to the people for their political conduct; by these means the people are actually self-governing, though the execution of the law may be inthe hands of officers whom they have not chosen. Democratic government is nevertheless subject to all the forces that affect large bodies exerted through party organizations, demagogues, and a party press, but even opponents of democracy are willing to admit that the people are learning political lessons by experience.
336.The Legislative System.—Legislation by representatives of all classes of the people is a new political phenomenon tried out most thoroughly among the large nations by Great Britain, France, and the United States. Even now there is much distrust of the ability of the ordinary man in politics, and considerably more of the ordinary woman. But there have been so many extraordinary individuals who have risen to political eminence from the common crowd, that the legislative privilege can no longer be confined to an aristocracy. The old aristocratic element is represented to-day by a senate, or upper house, composed of men who are prominent by reason of birth, wealth, or position, but the upper house is of minor importance. The real legislative power rests with the lower chamber, which directly represents the middle and lower classes, professional, business, and industrial. The action of lawmaking bodies is usually limited in scope by the provisions of a written constitution, and is modified by the public opinion of constituents. Important among the necessary legislation is the regulation of the economic and social relations of individuals and corporations, provision for an adequate revenue by means of a system of taxation, appropriation for the maintenance of departments of government and necessary public works, and the determination of an international policy. In the United States an elaborate system of checks and balances gives the executive a provisional veto on legislation, but gives large advisory powers to Congress. In Great Britain the executive is the chief of the dominant party in Parliament, and if he loses the confidence of the legislative body he loses his position as prime minister unless sustained in a national election.
In all legislative bodies there are inevitable differences of opinion and conflicts of interests resulting in partydivisions and such opposite groups as conservatives and radicals. The formulation and pursuance of a national policy is, therefore, not an easy task, and the conflict of interests often necessitates compromise, so that a history of legislation over a series of years shows that national progress is generally accomplished by liberalism wresting a modicum of power from conservatism, then giving way for a little to a period of reaction, and then pushing forward a step further as public opinion becomes more intelligent or more courageous.
337.The Executive Department.—Legislative bodies occasionally take vacations; the executive is always on duty in person or through his subordinates. Popularly considered, the executive department of government consists of the president, the king, or the prime minister; actually it includes an advisory council or cabinet, which is responsible to its chief, but shares with him the task of the management of national affairs. The executive department of the government stands in relation to the people of the nation as the business manager of a corporation stands in relation to the stockholders. He must see that the will of the people, as expressed by their representatives, is carried into effect; he must appoint the necessary administrative officials for efficient service; he must keep his finger upon the pulse of the nation, and use his influence to hold the legislature to its duty; he must approve or veto laws which are sent to him to sign; above all, he must represent his nation in all its foreign relations, appoint the personnel of the diplomatic force, negotiate treaties, and help to form the international law of the world. It is the business of the executive to maintain the honor and dignity of the nation before the world, and to carry out the law of his own nation if it requires the whole military force available.
338.Administrative Organization.—The executive department includes the advisers of the head, who constitute the cabinet. In Europe the cabinet is responsible to the sovereign or the parliament, and the members usually act unitedly. In the United States they are appointed by thePresident, and are individually responsible to him alone. In their capacity as a cabinet they help to formulate national policy, and their influence in legislation and in moulding public opinion is considerable, but their chief function is in administering the departments of which they have charge. It is the custom for the heads of the chief departments of government to constitute the cabinet, but their number differs in different states, and titles vary, also. In general, the department of state or foreign affairs ranks first in importance, and its secretary is in charge of all correspondence with the diplomatic representatives of the nation located in the world's capitals; the department of the treasury or the exchequer is usually next in importance; others are the departments of the army and navy, of colonial possessions, of manufacturing and commerce, mining, or agriculture, of public utilities, of education or religion, and for judicial business. Each of these has its subordinate bureaus and an army of civil-service officials, some of whom owe their appointment to personal influence, others to real ability. The civil officials with which the public is most familiar are postal employees, officers of the federal courts, and revenue officials. Such persons usually hold office while their party is in power or during good behavior. Long tenure of office tends to conservative measures and the spirit of bureaucracy, while a system by which civil office is regarded as party spoil tends to corruption and inefficiency. The business of administration is becoming increasingly important in the modern state.
339.The Judicial System.—There is always danger that law may be misinterpreted or prove unconstitutional. It is the function of the judicial department of government to make decisions, interpreting and applying the law of the nation in particular cases brought before the courts. The law of the nation is superior to all local or sectional law; so is the national judiciary supreme in its authority and national in its jurisdiction. The judicial system of the United States includes a series of courts from the lowest district courts, which are locatedthroughout the country, to the Supreme Court in Washington, which deals with the most momentous questions of national law. In the United States the judicial system is complicated by a system of lesser courts, State and local, independent of federal control, attached to which is a body of police, numerous judges, juries, and lawyers; the higher courts also have their justices and practising lawyers, but there is less haste and confusion and greater dignity and ability displayed. There has been much criticism in recent years of antiquated forms of procedure, cumbrous precedent, and unfair use of technicalities for the defeat of justice, but however imperfect judicial practice may be, the system is well intrenched and is not likely to be changed materially.
340.The Relation of National to District Governments.—In some nations there are survivals of older political divisions which once possessed sovereignty, but which have sacrificed most, if not all, of it for the larger good. This is the case in such federal states as the German Empire, Switzerland, and the United States. Each State in the American nation retains its own departments of government, and so has its governor and heads of departments, its two-chambered legislature, and its State judiciary. State law and State courts are more familiar to the people than most of the national legislation. In the German Empire each state has its own prince, and in many respects is self-governing, but has been more and more sinking its own individuality in the empire. In the British Empire there is still another relation. England, Wales, Scotland, and Ireland were once independent of each other, but military and dynastic events united them. For local legislation and administration they tend to separate, and already Ireland has obtained home rule. Beyond seas a colonial empire has arisen, and certain great dominions are united by little more than ties of blood and loyalty to the mother country. Canada, Australia, and South Africa have gained a larger measure of sovereignty. India is held as an imperial possession, but even there experiments of self-government are being tried. The wholetendency of government, both here and abroad, seems to be to leave matters of local concern largely to the local community and matters that belong to a section or subordinate state to that district, and to centralize all matters of national or interstate concern in the hands of a small body of men at the national capital. In every case national or imperial authority is the court of last resort.