aspire to senatorial honors. The debauch of the state legislatures
which was revealed in the closing year of the nineteenth century and
the opening days of the twentieth so revolted the people that the
seventeenth constitutional amendment was adopted (1913) providing for
the election of senators by direct vote.

The House of Representatives was designed to be the "popular house."
Its election from small districts, by direct vote, every two years is
a guarantee of its popular character. From this characteristic it has
never departed. It is the People's House. It originates all revenue
measures. On its floor, in the rough and tumble of debate, partizan
motives are rarely absent.

Upon this national tripod, the Presidency, the Senate, and the House, is
builded the vast national party machine. Every citizen is familiar
with the outer aspect of these great national parties as they strive in
placid times to create a real issue of the tariff, or imperialism, or
what not, so as to establish at least an ostensible difference between
them; or as they, in critical times, make the party name synonymous with
national security. The high-sounding platforms, the frenzied orators,
the parades, mass meetings, special trains, pamphlets, books,
editorials, lithographs, posters--all these paraphernalia are
conjured up in the voter's mind when he reads the words Democratic and
Republican.

But, from the standpoint of the professional politician, all this that
the voter sees is a mask, the patriotic veneer to hide the machine,
that complex hierarchy of committees ranging from Washington to every
cross-roads in the Republic. The committee system, described in a former
chapter, was perfected by the Republican party during the days of the
Civil War, under the stress of national necessity. The great party
leaders were then in Congress. When the assassination of Lincoln placed
Andrew Johnson in power, the bitter quarrel between Congress and the
President firmly united the Republicans; and in order to carry the
mid-election in 1866, they organized a Congressional Campaign Committee
to conduct the canvass. This practice has been continued by both
parties, and in "off" years it plays a very prominent part in the party
campaign. Congress alone, however, was only half the conquest. It was
only through control of the Administration that access was gained to the
succulent herbage of federal pasturage and that vast political prestige
with the voter w