The logic of its
position makes it the aggressor, just as the logic of its opponents'
position ties them to a negative and protesting or merely insubordinate
part. If the latter should prevail, their victory would become
tantamount to national dissolution, either by putrefaction, by
revolution, or by both.
Under the influence of certain practical demands, an increase has
already taken place in the activity of the Federal government. The
increase has not gone as far as governmental efficiency demands, but it
has gone far enough to provoke outbursts of protest and anguish from the
"old-fashioned Democrats." They profess to see the approaching
extinction of the American democracy in what they call the drift towards
centralization. Such calamitous predictions are natural, but they are
none the less absurd. The drift of American politics--its instinctive
and unguided movement--is almost wholly along the habitual road; and any
effective increase of Federal centralization can be imposed only by most
strenuous efforts, by one of the biggest sticks which has ever been
flourished in American politics.
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