created and preserved. A legislature may theoretically allow self-
government, but by its constitution may operate against national
character and its expression in a civilization. We have accepted the
principle of representative government, and that, I readily concede, is
the ideal principle, but the method by which a representative character
is to be given to State institutions we have not thought out at all. We
have committed the error our neighbors have committed of assuming that
the representative assembly which can legislate for general interests
can deal equally with particular interests; that the body of men who
will act unitedly so as to secure the liberty of person or liberty of
thought, which all desire for themselves, will also act wisely where
class problems and the development of particular industries are
concerned. The whole history of representative assemblies shows that
the machinery adequate for the furtherance and protection of general
interests operates unjustly or stupidly in practice against particular
interests. The long neglect of agriculture and the actual condition of
the sweated are instances. I agree that representative government is
the ideal, but how is it to operate in the legislature and still more in
administration? Are government departments to be controlled by
Parliament or by the representatives of the particular class to promote
whose interests special departments were created. I hold that the
continuous efficiency of State departments can only be maintained when
they are controlled in respect of policy, not by the casual politician
whom the fluctuations of popular emotion places at their head, but by
the class or industry the State institution was created to serve. A
department of State can conceivably be preserved from stagnation by a
minister of strong will, who has a more profound knowledge of the
problems connected with his department than even his permanent
officials. He might vitalize them from above. But does the party system
yield us such Ministers? In practice is not high position the reward of