cuses, conventions, built up in every city, was linked to the
national organization. A citizen of New York, for instance, was not
asked to vote for the Broadway Franchise, which raised such a scandal
in the eighties, but to vote for aldermen running on a national tariff
ticket!

The electorate was somnolent and permitted the politician to have his
way. The multitudes of the city came principally from two sources, from
Europe and from the rural districts of our own country. Those who came
to the city from the country were prompted by industrial motives; they
sought wider opportunities; they soon became immersed in their tasks and
paid little attention to public questions. The foreign immigrants who
congested our cities were alien to American institutions. They formed
a heterogeneous population to whom a common ideal of government was
unknown and democracy a word without meaning. These foreigners were
easily influenced and easily led. Under the old naturalization laws,
they were herded into the courts just before election and admitted to
citizenship. In New York they were naturalized under the guidance of
wardheelers, not infrequently at the rate of one a minute! And, before
the days of registration laws, ballots were distributed to them and they
were led to the polls, as charity children are given excursion tickets
and are led to their annual summer's day picnic.

The slipshod methods of naturalization have been revealed since the new
law (1906) has been in force. Tens of thousands of voters who thought
they were citizens found that their papers were only declarations of
intentions, or "first papers." Other tens of thousands had lost even
these papers and could not designate the courts that had issued them;
and other thousands found that the courts that had naturalized them were
without jurisdiction in the matter.

It was not merely among these newcomers that the boss found his
opportunities for carrying elections. The dense city blocks were
convenient lodging places for "floaters." Just before elections,
the population of the downtown wards in the larger cities increased
surprisingly. The boss fully availed himself of the psychological and
social reactions of the city upon the individual, knowing instinctively
how much more easily men are corrupted when they are merged in the crowd
and have lost their sense of personal responsibility.

It was in the city, then, that industrial politics found their natural
habitat. W