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from any effective party control as in the case of the Supreme Court. The division of authority under our Constitution makes it possible for either house of Congress to give the appearance of support to a measure which public opinion demands and at the same time really accomplish its defeat by simply not providing the means essential to its enforcement. The opportunity thus afforded for the exercise of a covert but effective veto on important legislation is a fruitful source of corruption. The extreme diffusion of power and responsibility is such as to make any effective party control and responsibility impossible. This would be the case even if the party were truly representative of public opinion. But when we consider that the party is organized on a plan which in some measure at least defeats both the popular choice of candidates and the expression of public opinion in party platforms, it is readily seen that the slight degree of party control permitted under our system is in no true sense a popular control. CHAPTER IX CHANGES IN THE STATE CONSTITUTIONS AFTER 1787 The effects of the conservative reaction were not confined to the general government. The movement to limit the power of the popular majority was felt in the domain of state as well as national politics. Even before the Constitutional Convention assembled the political reaction was modifying some of the state constitutions. This is seen especially in the tendency to enlarge the powers of the judiciary which was the only branch of the state government in which life tenure survived. This tendency received powerful encouragement and support in the adoption of the Federal Constitution which secured to the judiciary of the general government an absolute veto on both federal and state legislation. For as the state courts were not slow in following the precedent set by the Federal courts, what had been before the adoption of the Constitution a mere tendency soon became the practice in all the states. This in reality accomplished a revolution in the actual working of the state governments without any corresponding change in their outward form. It effected a redistribution of political powers which greatly diminished the influence of the popularly elected and more responsible branches of the state government and gave a controlling influence to that branch over which the people had least control. Not only was the state judiciary allowed to assume the
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