Page:Speeches, correspondence and political papers of Carl Schurz, Volume 5.djvu/239

Rh whom the prospect of spoil always attracts, will muster a powerful host at the polls. Such a voting force, impelled by a mercenary interest, is easily organized and drilled. It will obediently follow the command of the chiefs from whom favors have been obtained and further favors are expected, and it will be always ready for united action. It may constitute only a minority of all the voters of the community, but its compact organization, its strict discipline, its constant readiness for united action, will usually give it a great advantage over the majority, which but seldom can be united against it without the impulse of an uncommon excitement. From time to time an outraged and indignant community will rise up and sweep the dishonest rulers from power; but if the same means for alluring, and the same facilities for organizing the mercenary element remain in existence, the same class of men will continue to regain the temporarily lost places when the watchfulness and energy of the public-spirited citizens become less effective or when the opposition to the dishonest permits itself to be distracted by party polities, and then the same kind of misrule will return. This is in a few words the history of most of the municipal governments in our large cities.

It is always wise to learn from the enemy. The politicians who look upon our municipal governments as mines to be worked for their benefit and who wish to entrench themselves in the municipal offices against the assaults of the so-called “better element,” naturally desire and endeavor to increase as much as possible the mass of patronage to be manipulated by them. And as the patronage mainly consists of places in the public employment drawing salaries or wages, and of contracts expected to yield profit, they will to the utmost of their opportunities seek to multiply official employments as well as public works, regardless of the public interest.