icket, and nothing but the ticket." The leaders
and their lieutenants, as the machine stands, have it in their power to
spot and expose anyone venturing to break over the line and obey his own
will.

This is the power, well recognized, which makes the nominating caucus
the government. The right to vote carries with it to each voter a right
to a candidate of his own selection. As the matter stands, in fact, he
comes to the polls and has presented to him generally two tickets. It is
claimed that he can vote one or the other, or, as it is called, vote in
the air. The fact is he has no such choice. The despotic power of party
discipline holds him firmly to the ticket his party has put in
nomination. Our ballot, that is claimed to be secret, is open as the
day. Every vote is counted and every voter known, and to make assurance
doubly sure the polls are guarded by both parties, and the noble citizen
runs the gauntlet through double lines of detestable township or ward
politicians, potent for mischief in their sneers and jeers, and, if need
be, ready with dirty fists or clubs, sometimes revolvers, to back the
edict of the party.

Through this process a majority is supposed to govern. The practical
fact is that a small minority, and that made up of the worst element,
holds sway. The nominating caucus is composed of men who work for pay,
and put in nomination the political aspirants corrupt enough to purchase
their positions. The more decent class of our citizens avoid the
primaries. They well know that to control them means a corrupt use of
money, or a fight wherein victory is as fatal as defeat. In the rural
districts the farmer is called to leave his plough and ride from one to
three miles, and lose a day's work, for the privilege of being
controlled by a small political bunco-steerer to the support of some
aspirant to office who has the fellow in his pay. If the farmer differs
from Mary's little lamb in not being white as snow, he resembles that
poetic pet in his amiable docility. The caucus is composed of a mere
corporal's guard from the army of voters. In the towns and cities the
element is so brutal, impudent, and active that decency shrinks from a
mere contact, let alone a contest in which decency will have its hat
mashed over its eyes, its nose bloodied, and its body bruised. In ward
and township these able manipulators are not the majority, as we have
said, and yet they rule with a despotic brutality that makes the ki