ever busy over the successive unstable central administrations at
Paris, which exercise a bureaucratic direction of every commune in the
land. In all these countries, men rather than measures are the objects
of discussion, an immediate important campaign question inevitably being
whether, when once in office, candidates may make good their
ante-election promises. Thus, on all sides, over the border from
Switzerland, political turmoil, with its rancor, personalities, false
reports, hatreds, and corruptions, is endless. But in Switzerland,
debate uniformly bears not on men but on measures. The reasons are
plain. Where the veto is possessed by the people, in vain may rogues go
to the legislature. With few or no party spoils, attention to public
business, and not to patronage or private privilege, is profitable to
office holders as well as to the political press.

In the number of newspapers proportionate to population, Switzerland
stands with the United States at the head of the statistical list for
the world. In their general character, Swiss political journals are
higher than American. They are little tempted to knife reputations, to
start false campaign issues, to inflame partisan feeling; for every
prospective cantonal measure undergoes sober popular discussion the year
round, with the certain vote of the citizenship in view in the cantons
having the Landsgemeinde or the obligatory Referendum, and a possible
vote in most of the other cantons, while federal measures also may be
met with the federal optional Referendum.

The purity and peacefulness of Swiss press and politics are due to the
national development of today as expressed in appropriate institutions.
Of these institutions the most effective, the fundamental, is direct
legislation, accompanied as it is with general education. In education
the Swiss are preëminent among nations. Illiteracy is at a lower