PARTY ORGANIZATION AND MACHINERY CHAPTER I THE POLITICAL CYCLE AMERICAN party machinery has for its professed object the securing and maintaining of control over the executive and legislative departments of government. In its dual aspects it has grown up around the Presidency, and its most manifest, most spectacular, and, in the general public view, most important purpose is that connected with the choice of the Chief Magistrate. The election of a President is, however, but one of its many functions, though that may be regarded as the culmination of its activities and that upon which all others have an ultimate bearing. The national political life falls into a series of periods four years in length. A political cycle begins and ends with the election of a President, when the public excitement reaches its highest point and then, under the ordinary conditions, quickly subsides. Taking the presidential year-the year of the great conventions, the campaign, and the final election-as the end of the series and the period of transcendent interest, the year following may be reckoned the be ginning of the new cycle, when organization appears to the uninstructed observer to lie dormant and public interest is at its lowest ebb. The remarkable events of the preceding year, which have brought out into strong light before the people the gigantic agencies in use for ascertaining and registering the popular will, the intense efforts of the opposing party organs in the great struggle, the stupendous exhibition of skill, of earnestness, and of determination, all have tended to obscure and divert attention from many important facts respecting party organizations and their permanent and unceasing usefulness. The time of least pronounced activity may, therefore, be the most convenient for the beginning of a definite study of parties and party action. Each year of the quadrennial period has its own peculiar political significance. In each year elections occur in all of the States, and all have to the eye of the politician some bearing upon the final contest of the presidential year. The first year of the quadrennial cycle is an odd-numbered year, since the presidential election always occurs upon an even-numbered year. Reaction has followed the supreme political effort; many of the extraordinary party agencies are disbanded; the new administration has scarcely become established or manifested its distinctive character; no Federal officers are to be chosen ; no Federal policies or principles are involved. It would appear that only state and local interests need be at all considered. There is, however, one point, even on this first of the "off years," where state and Federal politics touch. Because one third of the members of the Senate of the United States are elected every two years, some of the States will this year elect members of the state legislature who will help to choose a senator of the United States For the nomination and election of the state and local officers the national party organizations are called into play in all the States and exercise complete control. Nominations are made through the use of party machinery; party lines are recognized in the selection of candidates; party committees look after the registration of voters and conduct the canvass. For this use of party agencies when no partizan policy is directly involved a variety of reasons may be given. In the first place, it is economical to make use of the already existing machinery to accomplish the necessary business rather than to do the work with unusual effort and pains by the creation of new forms and methods. Again, party managers sometimes take especial care to give impetus to the party organs in an "off year," because of the conviction that it strengthens the party to use its agencies whenever opportunity offers. It is considered a good party habit to marshal all the voters and bring them to the polls at every election. The moral effect also of a party victory at such a time is accounted important in its relations to the great contest of the presidential year. The year midway between two presidential elections, an even-numbered year, is of especial importance, because then an entire new House of Representatives is chosen by direct vote of the people, and the same year one third of the membership of the national Senate is renewed.by the action of state legislatures The elections of this second year of the quadrennial |