Download or read book Some Fundamental Political Principles Applied to Municipal Government, And, Evans University Prize Orations (Classic Reprint) written by Samuel Peterson and published by Forgotten Books. This book was released on 2017-10-29 with total page 50 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Excerpt from Some Fundamental Political Principles Applied to Municipal Government, And, Evans University Prize Orations There is, however, in some cities a movement against both the prin ciple and the spirit of democracy - a movement the real character of which is not suspected because it makes no encroachment upon universal suffrage, with which democracy is popularly confused. I refer to the movement in favor of government by commission instead of by council. It is said that the proper thing to do is to select three or four men who know best what ought to be done, and how to do it, and just turn over the government to them. This, however, 18 nothing but the idea of oli garchical government, and if, instead of three or four men, one should be agreed on, it would be the old idea of a monarchy. Suppose we apply it to our State legislature or to the National Congress. Every other year something over a hundred and fifty men gather for two or three months at the State capital, wrangling and disputing, trying to agree on what ought to be done. They are all temporarily away from their ordinary occupations, and many have had little training in legislation. Why not select five or six men, more capable than the average of these, pay them salaries so they may devote all their time to State affairs, and just turn over the State government to them? About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.