The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1911-05-25

to. and they have made terms with them. They have agreed to supply them with money for campaign eXpen- ses and to stand by them in all other cases where money was necessary if in return they might resort to them for protection or for resistance in mat ters of legislation. There have been times when it was a matter of no surprise to us to learn that legisla- lures looked to a certain man who was not even a member of their body for the instructions as to what they were
 to do with particular laws, and we have become cynically accustomed to the presumption that the instructions they received were received after the majority had conferred with those who were backing him and assisting him in the business world.
 It is not altogether just to indulge in indiscriminate blame for this state of affairs; our legislatures being at loose ends, nobody in particular being responsible, it was natural not to say inevitable, that some sort of control should spring up. The machine. which was the center of party organ ization, was the natural instrument of control, and men who had business in- terests to promote naturally resorted to the body which exercised the con- trol There need have been nothing sinister about this. If the whole mat ter had been open and candid and hon. est public. criticism would not have centered upon it. But the use of money always results in demoraliza- tion and goes beyond demoralization to actual corruption. There are two kinds of corruption-the crude and ob<- vious sort, which consists in direct bribery, and the much subtler, more dangerous sort, which consists in a corruption of the will. Business men who have tried to set up a control in politics through the machine have have allowed themselves to think that the whole matter was a necessary means of Self-defense, have said that 1t was a necessary outcome of our political system. Having treasured themselves in this way, they have drifted from one thing to another un- til the questions of morals involved have become hopelessly obscured and submerged.
 The methods used are well enough known. Money has not only been SUD- piled to those men in public life who would be serviceable to big business interests by way of promoting the legislation they desired and prevent, ing the legislation they feared, but it has also been denied to those who would not be serviceable. It is this latter use of the money power which has attracted very little attention, but which is after all the most insidious and contemptible part of the whole ugly system. Most of our legislators are men engaged in one kind of bus mess or another or engaged in one sort of employment or another. They. therefore have their own individual business interests and connections, and again and again it has happened that individual legislators who wished to conscientious aIo6 jn6anPnHPnt public service found themselves sud- denly embarrassed when they refused to serve particular business interests which were seeking legislative favors. They have found that they could not renew their notes at the bank They stacles put in their way in the conduct of their business. The whole thing can be easily managed without att tracting public attention and in such subtle ways that even the man in jured cannot always prove that there is anything intentional or deliberate in the injury done him; but the grip of the money market tightens on him none the less and strangles him if he exercises too great independence and does not lend himself to the pur- pose which the machine has consent ed to promote at the bidding of the business men with whom they are al- lied
 Unhappily money is necessary at every turn of the political game. It is necessary in connection with every part of our electoral process because our electoral processes have to be pub lie, men have to be commended to the electorate by methods of one sort Or another, like public speeches, lit erature printed and distributed through the mails,-by all the methods of publicity, which are necessarily costly. A man cannot get into office without the expenditure of a good deal of money, even if he confines the eX- penditure to perfectly legitimate ob- jects. The sources of money are therefore the sources of political Op- portunity and of power, and those who supply the money can generally con- trol the nominations, that is to say the selection of those who are to eX- ercise the powers of government and of law-making. And opportunity does not stop at election. The men elected to office generally hope to have some political future, and they find that fu- ture in turn controlled at the source: so that those who supply the sin ews of war; are too often able to eX- ercise a kind of command which de- prives representatives of the people of their own real independence. It requires a great deal of courage and an unusual amount of individual ini- tiative to serve in one of our legisla lures without being touched and re- strained and coerced in some degree by influences of this kind.
 One of the best instances that could be cited is the whole disappointing bus to import duties. The tariff has been the most DrO1jfc SOlIrca tha cor !