more
and better to do, or else they must arrange so that these bodies will
have a chance to perform an inferior but definite service more capably.

The legislatures have been corrupt and incapable, chiefly because they
have not been permitted any sufficient responsibility, but this
irresponsibility itself has had more than one cause. It cannot be traced
exclusively to the diminished confidence and power reposed in
representative bodies by the state constitutions. Early in the
nineteenth century, the legislatures were granted almost full
legislative powers; and if they did not use those powers well, they used
them much better than at a later period. Their corruption began with the
domination of the political machine; and it is during the last two
generations that their powers and responsibilities have been more and
more restricted. They have undoubtedly been more corrupt and incompetent
in proportion as they have been increasingly deprived of power; but the
restrictions imposed upon them have been as much an effect as a cause of
their corruption. There is a deeper reason for their deficiencies; and
this reason is connected with mal-adaptation of the whole system of
American state government to its place in a Federal system. The Federal
organization took away from the states a number of the most important
governmental functions, and in certain respects absolutely subordinated
the state to the nation. In this way the actual responsibilities and the
powers of the state governments were very much diminished, while at the
same time no sufficient allowance for such a diminution was made in
framing their organization. Their governments were organized along the
same lines as that of an independent state--in spite of the fact that
they had abandoned so many of the responsibilities and prerogatives of
independence.

The effect of this mal-adaptation of the state political institutions to
their place in a Federal system has been much more important than is
usually supposed. The former were planned to fulfill a much completer
responsibility than the one which they actually possessed. The public
business of a wholly or technically independent state naturally arouses
in its citizens a much graver sense of responsibility than does the
public business of a state in the American Union. The latter retained
many important duties; but it surrendered, if not the most essential of
its functions, at least the most critical and momentous, whi