ys
strive to use it as an instrument of advancing their own private
interests. They act on the beautiful maxim, "Let government take care
of the rich, and the rich will take care of the poor," instead of the
far safer maxim, "Let government take care of the weak, the strong can
take care of themselves." Universal suffrage is better than restricted
suffrage, but even universal suffrage is too weak to prevent private
property from having an undue political influence.

The evils attributed to universal suffrage are not inseparable from it,
and, after all, it is doubtful if it elevates men of an inferior class
to those elevated by restricted suffrage. The Congress of 1860, or of
1862. was a fair average of the wisdom, the talent, and the virtue of
the country, and not inferior to that of 1776, or that of 1789; and the
Executive during the rebellion was at least as able and as efficient as
it was during the war of 1812, far superior to that of Great Britain,
and not inferior to that of France during the Crimean war. The Crimean
war developed and placed in high command, either with the English or
the French, no generals equal to Halleck, Grant, and Sherman, to say
nothing of others. The more aristocratic South proved itself, in both
statesmanship and generalship, in no respect superior to the
territorial democracy of the North and West.

The great evil the country experiences is not from universal suffrage,
but from what may be called rotation in office. The number of
political aspirants is so great that, in the Northern and Western
States especially, the representatives in Congress are changed every
two or four years, and a member, as soon as he has acquired the
experience necessary to qualify him for his position, is dropped, not
through the fickleness of his constituency, but to give place to
another whose aid had been necessary to his first or second election.
Employes are "rotated," not because they are incapable or unfaithful,
but because there are others who want their places. This is all bad,
but it springs not from universal suffrage, but from a wrong public
opinion, which might be corrected by the press, but which is mainly
formed by it. There is, no doubt, a due share of official corruption,
but not more than elsewhere, and that would be much diminished by
increasing the salaries of the public servants, especially in the
higher offices of the government, both General and State. The pay to
the lower office