ble that any delegate should
completely represent the desires of ten or twenty thousand electors. No
two human beings are agreed about everything; and, in every election,
electors, in order to express approval of one cherished principle, are
driven to adopt half-a-dozen others which they bitterly
disapprove."[598] "The way to true democracy will never be found through
delegacy. The only safe way is through direct legislation--through the
referendum and initiative. The referendum and initiative does not mean
more laws, but fewer, shorter, simpler, and more understandable
ones."[599] "What is wanted is neither aristocracy, plutocracy, nor
demagoguecracy, but democracy--the one governing system which never has
been tried. The people must learn that the game of politics is not an
unfathomable science, but a struggle of rival interests in which no
delegate can so well represent their needs as themselves."[600] "The
referendum quite changes the character of the Federal Assembly. It
ceases to be a Parliament, and becomes merely a drafting committee. In
other countries the initiative comes from above; the Parliament and the
King are together the legal sovereign. In Switzerland it comes from
below, for the legal sovereign is the electorate."[601]

Other Socialists are strongly opposed to the referendum: "Democracy,
as understood by the Fabian Society, means simply the control of the
Administration by freely elected representatives of the people. The
Fabian Society energetically repudiates all conceptions of democracy
as a system by which the technical work of Government administration,
and the appointment of public officials, shall be carried on by
referendum or any other form of direct popular decision. Such
arrangements may be practical in a village community, but not in the
complicated industrial civilisations which are ripening for
Social-Democracy."[602] "The people can only judge political measures
by their effect when they have come into operation; they cannot plan
measures themselves, or foresee what their effect will be, or give
precise instructions to their representatives; nor can any honest
representative tell, until he has heard a measure thoroughly discussed
by representatives of all other sections of the working class, what
form the measure should take so as to keep the interests of his
constituents in due subordination to those of the community. It is to
be considered, further, that intelligent reformers, especia