democratic distribution of effective political power. The
highest and most profitable individual political distinction is that
which is won from a large field and from a whole people. Political, even
more than other kinds of distinction, should not be the fruit of a
limited area of selection. It must be open to everybody, and it must be
acceptable to the community as a whole. In fact, the concession of
substantially equal political rights is an absolute condition of any
fundamental political bond. Grave as are the dangers which a democratic
political system incurs, still graver ones are incurred by a rigidly
limited electoral organization. A community, so organized, betrays a
fundamental lack of confidence in the mutual loyalty and good faith of
its members, and such a community can remain well united only at the
cost of a mixture of patronage and servility.

The limitation of the suffrage to those who are individually capable of
making the best use of it has the appearance of being reasonable; and it
has made a strong appeal to those statesmen and thinkers who believed in
the political leadership of intelligent and educated men. Neither can it
be denied that a rigidly restricted suffrage might well make in the
beginning for administrative efficiency and good government. But it must
never be forgotten that a limited suffrage confines ultimate political
responsibility, not only to a number of peculiarly competent
individuals, but to a larger or smaller class; and in the long run a
class is never to be trusted to govern in the interest of the whole
community. A democracy should encourage the political leadership of
experienced, educated, and well-trained men, but only on the express
condition that their power is delegated and is to be used, under severe
penalties, for the benefit of the people as a whole. A limited suffrage
secures governmental efficiency, if at all, at the expense of the
political education and training of the disfranchised class, and at the
expense, also, of a permanent and radical popular political grievance. A
substantially universal suffrage merely places the ultimate political
responsibility in the hands of those for whose benefit governments are
created; and its denial can be justified only on the ground that the
whole community is incapable of exercising the responsibility. Such
cases unquestionably exist. They exist wherever the individuals
constituting a community, as at present in the South, are