The Owosso times. (Owosso, Mich.) 1897-1926, 1911-10-06

not with the machinery, but with
those who are operating it. The rem
edy is not for the people en- masse to
attempt to manipulate the complicated
and delicately adjusted mechanism
which must inevitably lead to confu
sion and disaster, but to exercise more
care In the selection of their specially
chosen operating agents.
Everybody will agree that the av.
erage man Is not as intelligent. as
able, or as honest as the ablest, or
the most intelligent, or the most hon.
est. The individual fallibility of the
average man will at once be con.
coded, but there are some people who
seem to imagine that there is some
mysterious virtue in mere numbers !;
that ten men are necessarily more
moral and more honest than one man |;
that by adding together thousand in
d1viduals, none Of whom has ever gone
beyond the multiplication table, some
strange and weird transmutation re-
suits by which the combined mass is
enabled to work out the most difficult
| problem in Euclid with the utmost
accuracy. Thus, following out this
highly intelligent theory, whenever
one Is anxious to have message car
ried with the greatest haste from one
part OF the city to another, obviously
the thing to do is to employ not the
fieetest messenger boy in the service,
but arrange with ten or a dozen aver
| age boys to unionize the job.
The distinguished senator from Ore
gon (Mr. Bourne) is perhaps the great
est living exponent Of this doctrine.
! His recipe roughly stated, | under
stand to be this: Take the voices of
10 foolish men, 20 ordinary men, s
rascals, 16 good citizens, and 8 wise
men (if any such can be induced to
join); mix them all up together, with
the result, vox populi, vox Del. 1t
was in some such flash of inspired
! wisdom that the learned senator, in
the course of a speech delivered in
senting to us his now well-known and
, Justly celebrated Composite citizen"
said:
The people can be trusted. The COM
posite citizen knows more and is from
higher motives than any single Individual.
however great. experienced, or well de-
veloped. While selfshness Is usually
dominant in the individual. 1T is mini
mixed in the composite citizen.
With growing confidence in this
child of his creative genius, he next
evidently as the result of
mature reflection, because the decla-
ration constitutes one of the capital
lied headings with which in his edi-
torial capacity he has thoughtfully
adorned his speech-that the
COMPOSITE CITIZEN IS UNSET
FISH"
The senator Immediately proceeds
under this caption to tell us how the
gratifying transformation from dis
.tributive selfishness to collective al
truism Is brought about by process
as interesting as 1t is ingenious.
quote again:
The composite citizen is made up Of
millions of individuals, each dominated
in most cases by selfish interest. But
because of the difference in the personal
equations of the individual units making
up the composite citizen there is a cor
responding difference in the interests
dominating said units.
Mr.. President, let me pause long
enough here to say that this is not a
quotation from Herbert Spencer,
though quite as lucid and convincing
as anything that learned philosopher
ever wrote. But listen further:
And while composite action Is taking
place, friction Is developed. attrition re-
suits. selfishness Is worn away. and gem
eral welfare is substituted before action
Is accomplished.
am unable to accept the frivolous
suggestion advanced by some that this
beautiful conception has been evolved
from an overworked and hysterical in
ner consciousness; that friction and
a ri h<.
exercise an intelligent choice: and
that what little general welfare there
is in the combination to begin with is
quite as likely to be worn away as
selfishness. Solomon has told us that
fool may be brayed in a mortar with
a pestle and his foolishness will not
depart from him, but It evidently
never occurred to that wisest of men
that the result might have been far
different IL he had submitted q large
number of fools to the process at that
critical period while composite action
was taking place.
All the operations OF government
lawmaking, law constructing, law exc
cuting-will be merged In the one SUI
preme, all-embracing function of bal
loting. We may confidently look for.
ward to that halcyon era when there
will be primary elections to nominate
candidates for Office, preprimary cleo
lions to designate persons to become
candidates for nomination, and ante
prepriamaries to frame an eligible
list from which to select preprimary
candidates to run the gauntlet of the
primary itself, to the end that only
the good and virtuous may compete
for the fnal SURFACES Of the people
Having selected our candidates by
this sitting and RESTING and rere-
sitting series Of primary elections, we
will have election elections to de-
termine who Of these irreproachable
persons shall become our officials. and
then recall elections to get rid OF them
IL we think on reflection that some un-
desirable material has slipped through