CHAPTER 4 REPRESENTATIVE GOVERNMENT 76 PART ONE THE CONSTITUTIONAL FRAMEWORK The Progressives gained the support of two strong presidents,Theodore concept of separation of powers,for example,was a time-honored governing Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson,who shared the Progressives'opposition to princple that had previously been incorporated in state constitutions.Never- business monopolies but also recognized the power.inherent in a popular theless,the Framers clearly did not have a high opinion of popular government. presidency.Roosevelt described the office as a"bully pulpit."Wilson,writing Their system of representation was premised on a mistrust of popular majori about the president's potential for national leadership,said:"His is the only ties,and they did not establish voting as a basic right of citizens.The national voice in public affairs.Let him once win the admiration and confidence Constitution required only that a state impose no stricter suffrage qualifications of the country,and no other single voice will easily overpower him."Roosevelt in elections for the U.S.House of Representatives than it applied to elections for and Wilson's conception of the president as national leader,legitimized through the larger house of its own legislature.The states allowed only propertied white election by a majority of voters,helped to change the president's image.In the males to vote,and it would seem likely that a majority of the Framers belieyed view of the public,the president was replacing Congress as the chief instrument that suffrage should be limited to this class.But it would be inaccurate to conclude that the Framers were blatantly anfidemocratic by the standards of of democracy (see Chapter 19) Ironically,as the American system was being opened to greater popular their lime Property ownership was relatively widespread in America in the late participation early in this century,the power of government was increasing. eighteenth century,and in some states half or more of adult white males were This parallel development was no coincidence.Although open elections are a eligible to vote.3 means to popular influence,they are also a means by which government accumulates power.Official actions gain legitimacy when they are pursued in RECENT DEVELOPMENTS:POLLS,TELEVISION, the name of a public that has freely chosen a leadership to act on its behalf. AND PRESIDENTIAL NOMINATIONS Although George Bernard Shaw was overgeneralizing.he was not completely off the mark when he concluded,"The more democratic a government is the The Progressive movement declined in the 1920s,after most of its institutional more authoritativeit is. reforms had been achieved.If it had not subsided then,it would surely have done so in the 1930s,when the Western world's trust in majority government Beard's Economic Theory of the Constitution was shaken by developments in Europe,particularly in Germany.In 1933 the German people in a national election freely turned power over to Adolf Hitler. In the Progressives'view,the Framers had erred in giving the majority too little Germany's Weimar Republic had been founded on popular institutions;it was power.Not surprisingly,the Progressive movement spawned attacks on the about as close as any modern nation had come to establishing a pure Framers.A notable work in this vein is the historian Charles S.Beard's Economric democracy.When the Weimar Republic degenerated first into chaos and then Interpretation of the Constittion Arguing that the Constitution grew out of into Hitler's Third Reich,its demise seemed only to confirm Madison's wealthy Americans'fear of debtor rebellions,Beard claimed that its elaborate assertion.quoted earlier in this chapter,that direct democracies are "spectacles systems of power and representation were devices for keeping power in the of turbulence and contention as short in their lives as they have been hands of the rich.As evidence,Beard cited the Constitution's protections of violent in their deaths" property(see Chapter 6)and referred to James Madison's secret notes on the Nevertheless,the idea of popular government regained strength in the United Philadelphia convention,which showed that property interests were high on States after World War II,when changes in communications,technology,and the delegates'list of priorities. political organization brought the American people and their representatives Beard further noted that not one of the delegates was a workingman or small into an increasingly close relationship.The new mass medium of television farmer.Most of the Framers had large landholdings,controlled substantial began to enable political leaders to reach the public more easily.And as interests,or were major bank creditholders.A few had large debts,but their televised politics became routine,more Americans came to believe that leaders debts merely reflected the scope of their ambitions.This dominance of the should deal with the public directly rather than through political parties." Philadelphia convention by wealthy men reflected the fact that the delegates This perspective was evident during the late 1960s,when reform Democrats had been chosen by the state legislatures,which were controlled by the sought a change in the presidential nominating system.In 1968 the leaders of asoeaeikoatihaoeawad the Democratic party nominated Hubert H.Humphrey,who,as Lyndon Johnson's vice-president,was associated with the unpopular Vietnam war. Beard's thesis was challenged by other historians,and he later acknowledged Philadelphia. Antiwar Democrats challenged the legitimacy of Humphrey's nomination because he had not participated in a single primary election.When Humphrey that he had not taken the Framers'full array of motives into account.Their then lost the general election to Richard Nixon,reform-minded Democrats demanded a change from a nominating system dominated by party leaders to he(wYok:Colb niey one controlled by the party's rank-and-file voters through primaries and open 67 caucuses.Their position easily prevailed (see Chapter 19) ard Shaw to editor of Ne Republic,1936,repeinted in ibid.,August B and 15,1988, ences of Cousent,ch- rio ofCom:New York:Macmilla 10 1941)