Mexico weekly ledger., 1913-09-04

rnerel and trusting motly 10 ofioe1c hN
people in ever State, city and county VIII md the necessary means 70 5. y
principle enacted into law. The great and busy rublie is usually introduced
to the movement with The simple declaration that
THE short Ranot principle Isl
-F4rst-ThAt only those Onces should be elective which are I'M
pOrant enough to attract land deserved public examination
~secons-Thatv very few Offices should be fled BY election at one
time. hs o permit adequate and uneOnfnsed public examination Of
the candidates and 81 a to facilitate the Tree and intelligent making
Of original tickets By any voter for himself unaided By political
Specialists"
No complicated checks and balances no clever mechanisma Just .
very few. but absolutely direct points OF contact between the voter ana hs
public servants. without any patent Attachment-that declared Woodrow
Wilson. 10 a speech in Philadelphia. in support Of the movement. lis the key to
the whole question of the restoration Of government by the people" EhbOr
atng somewhat he said:-"The salient principles Of the Short Ballot system
are FIRST a governing body as small as is consistent with efficiency; second
a full administrative responsibility lodged IN that body; third. the election
Of that body by yotersw who are s1Vsz only 0sa or at most two. persons to
select for candidates <ndpO vote for a officers" In January Ise' he pub
Hhed a compete exposition Of the whole theme n 4 magazine article which
he called Hide and Seek Politics. in the course of which he declared
1.-THE short Ballot is the open way By which we can return to representa-
tive government 1t has turned out that the methods of organization which
lead to efficiency in government are also the methods which give the people
control The busy owner is more enectuany in control II he appoints a
capable superintendent and holds him responsible for the conduct Of the busF
ness than he would be If he undertook himself to choose all the subordinate
agents and workmen and superutend both them and the superintendent; and
the business is also better conducted-ineomparaby better conducted. What
the voters of the country are now attempting is not only impossible. but also
undesirable II we desire good government Such a charter as that of the
city of New York, for example, is a mere system of obscurity and of in
efficiency. 1t dspeses responsibility. mulhpres elective Offices beyond all
reason of necessity, and makes both of the government itself and of its con
troll by the voters a game of hdeandseek in a labyrinth Nothing could have
been devised better suited to the uses of the professional politician. nothing
susceptible Of being more perfectly articulated with the nominating machine
AS a means of popular government it is not worth the bother and expense of
an election"
Swiftly. the truth of these doctrines has been impresdng itself Upon the
people of the country. All but a mere handful Of the editors of the
larger city newspapers have come out readily for the principle; some Of them
revert to it again and again. Colleges and universities and high schools. over
sixty in number. have made it a special subject OF instruction in their class
rooms.
Two years slipped by from the launching of this idea. In the spring Of
1912 the Short Ballot was head over heels in politics This was partly due
to Colonel Roosevelt, who put his influence behind It in his address before
the Ohio constitutional convention. In the fall NJ last oar n was andorand
in fourteen State platforms-in Ohio and Illinois by all three leading parties
In 1919 eleven Governors urged its adoption in their States
CThe next two articles will show how Mr.. Wilson used and extended
the Short Ballot in New Jersey