Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 5.djvu/76

 62 THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF SOCIOLOGY

The results of this coincidence of times should be fully appre- ciated. Few citizens can do three things at once. In passing upon three sets of issues and three blocks of candidates together, the average voter invariably sacrifices one interest by making it support another. Of this fact the seekers of the three classes of offices make the most. It offers a paradise of Yankee bar- gaining. It extracts the quintessence of concession. The city boss is a contented nonentity in state or national affairs, if the rich municipal spoil be left to him. Politicians of the upper ranks give up local duty to win national power. A great editor belabors the corrupt chief of his party in his home state and flatters the corrupter chief in a state that is far away. Cabinet members or United States senators, whose constituents may dwell among the Rocky Mountains, leave their posts at Washington and hasten to New York city to side with bribe-taking city bosses against members of their own parties whose names are synonyms for probity and patriotism. Between the municipal and the national politician stands the Janus-faced state boss, the entrepreneur par excellence. He, if he is uncertain of his hold upon the state, buys for it city and national support, giving in return his promise to be merely a tool in city and national politics. If he has the state's committeemen, legislators, and congressmen all securely in hand, he names mayors, commissioners, senators, ministers, and presi- dents.

The coincidence of the elections for the three grades produces an advanced type of that union of "deals" called a slate. In its simplest form, a slate is a combination of the seekers of the elective ofifices in a single grade. The numerous offices of Cleveland, for instance, are distributed among its wards, and the numerous offices of Cuyahoga county among its towns. A south Ohioan whose eye is upon the governorship forms alliances with north Ohioans whose eyes are upon the minor state elective offices. Seven states with vice-presidential " possibilities " cultivate the state with a presidential aspirant. But, with a grand mixture of three elections, the advanced type of the slate appears. Four Ohioans join hands and will be mayor of Cincinnati, governor of Ohio, senator from Ohio, and president from Ohio. Behind these