then, asks Professor Wendell, should fathers and mothers who themselves practise every conjugal virtue delight in novels and dramas that dissect all the prurient phases of divorce, adultery, and sexual laxity? Simply because such topics take them out of themselves by presenting situations quite foreign to their experience and hence strikingly interesting. In some degree the same answer applies to American public interest in corrupt practices. The great mass of business and professional men, and of politicians as well, who sincerely attempt to live up to the best standards of their vocations nevertheless read and hear with avidity spicy accounts of the malpractices of their disreputable colleagues. Nor can this interest on their part be denounced as morbid so long as it leads not to palliation and imitation but to reprobation and efforts for the wiping out of abuses. Would the situation be really improved if instead of the daily grists presented to us by the newspapers we should read nothing but accounts of the straightforward methods which are employed in the great bulk of political, business, and professional transactions? The habit might be exemplary but it would certainly be supremely dull. While it is not true that all sin is news there would seem to be nothing to regret in the fact that neither are all virtues. Of the two the former undoubtedly has the greater news value. But the reason for this is that relative to the sum total of everyday transactions the

more heinous offences against morals and law are to a high degree unusual. Virtue and ability, on the other hand, are so commonplace that it requires a most exceptional display of either to secure public notice. Considerable vogue has been enjoyed recently by the term "smokeless sin," as applied to certain forms of social evil-doing which although large and dangerous are also so subtle and complicated that responsibility for them can easily be avoided.1 Students of sin would do well to remember, however, that now as always virtue as a whole possesses the quality of smokelessness to a much more eminent degree than vice.

Admitting that political corruption exists among us to a disquieting extent the point is frequently made that the vigour with which it has recently been exposed and attacked is in itself evidence of moral health and harbinger of ultimate victory over the evil. Such exposure and attacks, it is said, signify the development of higher ideals measured by which practices formerly tolerated are now condemned by public opinion and will later be condemned by law. As to the emergence of higher ideals there can be no doubt, and so far we have just ground for encouragement. Reform sentiment as a whole, however, can scarcely be accepted

1As, e.g., fraudulent promotion, adulteration, the building of unsanitary tenements, failure to provide proper safety devices in theatres and factories or on railroads and steamships.

at its full face value. A considerable part of the denunciation which accompanies it is as much exaggerated as the corresponding campaign "literature" and "oratory" of the practical politician. Thus the volume of clamour is augmented and the difficulty of correctly estimating honesty in public life increased. There are always those who deliberately attach themselves to reform movements solely because they foresee victory at the polls with office and emoluments and other less legitimate opportunities for themselves. In other words while ostensibly fighting corruption the motives of such persons are at bottom corrupt from the start. Bandit Mendoza of the Sierras, that eminent socialist of Shaw's creation, was not entirely wrong in maintaining that "a movement which is confined to philosophers and honest men can never exercise any real political influence: there are too few of them. Until a movement shows itself capable of spreading among brigands, it can never hope for a political majority." In some American cities charges have even been made that corporate interests which did not enjoy the favour of the gang or boss have contributed largely to

anti-graft" campaigns, their real purpose being to place themselves in a "position to claim the favour of the "honest " administration elected by their efforts. Knowledge of corrupt transactions, discretely hinted at in the press, has been used in other instances as a sort of political blackmail to

club the gang or boss into the granting of privileges to applicants who had hitherto been denied. The mere volume of clamour developed by reform movements against corrupt practices is, therefore, no certain index of higher moral standards. There is even danger that we may too complacently accept mere denunciation for real achievement. Nor can the work be deemed finished when popular uproar has secured new legislation, for laws, notoriously, do not execute themselves. Discouragement then too easily overtakes the rank and file of the anti-corrupt element; hence, in part, the spasmodic character of many reform movements. When every necessary deduction has been made, however, the fundamental strength and continued progress of the cause of honesty in politics is beyond question. Even the selfish interests that attach themselves to it prove this contention. It is true they bring no enthusiasm for higher standards as such, and also that the results of alliances of this character are often disheartening. Nevertheless the mere fact that such alliances are entered into by practical politicians is pretty strong testimony, coming as it does from men who are very little affected by considerations of sentiment, to the power of the sincere reform element which is pursuing no ulterior ends. In all cases of this sort the selfish politician is seeking to strike with the strength of others, and this strength must be reckoned with as a real factor, no matter what uses

designing men endeavour to make of it. Here as elsewhere the counterfeit bears witness to the value of the genuine.

Whatever may be the extent of corruption in the United States it is under fire all along the line. Moreover we regard and attack as abuses practices which in other countries are considered free from reproach or even as pillars of the state. Comparisons to our disadvantage on the score of corruption are most frequently made with England and Germany. In England, however, the privileges of peerage, gentry, clergy, and the landholding class generally are enormous.1 Land is assessed at a fraction of its real value, local rates are thrown upon the tenant, railroads seeking charters and cities seeking legislation to wipe out diseasebreeding slums or to take over badly managed docks find themselves mulcted by special acts exacting excessive prices for the property taken, and the interests responsible for all these conditions sit enthroned in an omnipotent parliament. Landlordism has progressed to a considerable degree in the United States, to be sure, and we possess a more than plentiful supply of slum landlords. Property rights in realty are abundantly protected among us, but our landowners are very far from enjoying the class privileges or the social standing accorded them in England. Moreover when abuses arise in

1Cf. Mr. Frederic C. Howe's admirable article on Graft in England," American Magazine, vol. lxiii (1907), p. 398.