Unforeseen tendencies of democracy

by Edwin Lawrence Godkin

General Books publication date: 2009 Original publication date: 1898 Original Publisher: Houghton, Mifflin and Company Subjects: Democracy United States Australia Literary Criticism / General History / General Literary Criticism / General Political Science / General Political Science / Political Ideologies / Democracy Notes: This is a black and white OCR reprint of the original. It has no illustrations and there may be typos or missing text. When you buy the General Books edition of this book you get free trial access to Million-Books.com where you can select from more than a million books for free. Excerpt: THE NOMINATING SYSTEM It would hardly be possible to write a better description of the actual machinery of our nominating system than Mr. James Bryce's in his "American Commonwealth." In what I am about to say of it, therefore, I shall take for granted that the reader is familiar with it, or has abundant means of making himself acquainted with its working. Every American has either practical or theoretical knowledge of the process by which we select men for office. There are probably few Americans who have not either participated in it, or been exhorted to do so by writers on political morality. In fact, presence at the primary meetings, under the general name of " attending to his political duties," has been much preached as the chief political duty of the busy man who does not otherwise take an active part in politics. It used to be held more strongly than it is now that if a man had taken part in a primary, he might always, with a good conscience, vote for the candidate whom the primary and its resulting conventions presented to him. The primary has gradually assumed in our system the air of a scheme or device on which therepublic rests. Of course it has differed in its character and composition in different parts of the country; but under whatever name, for at least half a century, it has been treated by most political philosophers, as well ...

Hardcover

First published August 12, 2015

About the author

Founder and editor of the American current events magazine The Nation and editor 1865-81; editor, New York Evening Post 1883-1900.