The Leavenworth echo. [volume] (Leavenworth, Wash.) 1904-current, 1905-09-08
Why Democracy Gets ON In America.

W ny DeihOCEdcJ oSAS Oh hh EAihCAAC1s
Nearly three-quarters of a century
ago a French gentleman. De Tocque-
vile. wrote notable treatise on de-
mocracy IN the United States, based
Oh observations taken on the spot.
The author had Il judicial mind, and,
while he found much to admire in the
then young nation, his work on the
whole was replete with warnings and
rorebodings The moral of it all was
everything is lovely. but look out for
squalls.
Republican institutions and demo
cratic society were new things in the
world and on trial when De Tocque-
vile wrote. Now the bumptious
youngster of the early nineteenth cen
fury is a middle aged gentleman rich
in experience and social philosophy
and ready with self made mans
pride in his achievement to show other
people how to do the trick.
De Tocqueville is long dead and can
not In person review his work in the
glare of cold facts. Another hand,
this time n German, Professor Hugo
Munsterberg of Harvard. has taken
up the task on his own hook and in an
independent way He has not been
d casual locker on, like De Tocqueville
or Bryce. He has long lived here and
knows America, at least for the pur-
pose, better than Americans them
selves know It, for he has studied it
infinitely, coldly and critically through
German eyes, and written "The Amer
leans" for an audience in the father
land
Briefly Professor Munsterberg sets
out to explain American intentions
and to give to his European readers
the philosophy of Americanism," as
if to say, Il show you Americans as
they are, not as you think they ought
to be to be true democrats"
The guiding principle of all our ma
tional and civic life he finds to be
self directing;" of economic life, the
spirit of self initiation" of the intel
lectuaI life, the spirit of "self perfec-
ton" and of social life, the spirit of
self assertion Other cities have
said that we are democratic, assertive,
unitarian, and so on, to which this
authority agrees, but we are, he in
sists, all these things. with a differ
cnce," and in that difference lies the
true American spirit
Professor Munsterberg gives the
thoughtful reader no cause to lament
he aristocratic tendencies in American
society, to which subject he deyotes
chapter. The way the people of di-
verse conditions work out the problem
Of democracy is illustrated as follows:
Let us suppose that a group of SINH
larly employed good friends were on an
excursion and that the young people for
the sake of diversion were agreed to rep
resent for awhile various sorts of human
occupations-one is to play millionaire,
another beggar still others judge teacher,
artisan laborer high official and valet.
u
| abandon; one commands and the other
obeys; one dictates and the other trem-
bes And yet behind it all there is
pleasant feeling that at bottom they are
all Just alike and that the whole game Is
worth while merely because they know
that one Is in fact as good as another.
If real beggar or servant were to come
! into the circle there would be no more
! FUN, and the game would be wholly mean
| !ngless. Strange as it may sound. this
feeling is at the bottom of social life In
| America.
For the philosopher who has become
anxious as TO the possible outcome of
the social experiment in America, as
De Tocqueville was anxious and even
apprehensive, Professor Munsterberg
chapter on aristocracy is one of the
most hopeful in the book. America
owes her initial greatness to the fact
that, because of an accident of posi-
! ton, far removed from old world mar
rowness she has been able to see GER
tain things with amazing clearness and
/ to emphasize with amazing advantage
certain forgotten and neglected truths
! lrllt has bNlitNti III Hiii bNNNiNifNN Wv
innate virtue of the people But had
the activities of the people been direct
cd solely to the work of elementary
propagandism the result must have
/ been Il nation of dreamers or Ill as
sorted cyclists. Happily we have ac-
uulred something of the ordinary per-
] nr a
coming wen balanced, complex and
therefore sane and strong, Our arts
tocracy Is not that OF the individual
running In the blood as result Of
chance, but is an element of character
to which all may aspire and amy may
attain.
Visitors aboard the battleshlps now.
4 L..