Senator Kenyon was a moderate nonconformist. Intellectually he was honest, but not strong, so that an outsider might have thought that his honesty and independence would be overlooked. But he was never accepted by the "booboisie." He was virtually cold shouldered out of the Senate, for it was with immense relief that he escaped from teapot ostracism to the securer social area of the Federal bench. I repeat a bit of gossip about the Iowa Senator without vouching for it. When he was retiring, it is said, a reporter asked, "What can be done with the Senate?" "Nothing," replied the Iowan, "The only thing to do is to destroy it." If he said this he really flattered the "booboisie." Destruction is reserved for wicked things like Sodom and Gomorrah. But the Senate is not wicked. It is good, honest in the sense of not stealing, well-meaning, timid, petty, tea-drinking, human, commonplace. You can't destroy it unless you have something to put in its place, and there is nothing. Much better turn it over to the blocs and see what they will do with it. CHAPTER XI A PEAK OF REALITY THRUSTS UP ON THE LEVEL PLAIN OF SHAMS As well fear blocs and minorities as fear the centrifugal force on the ground that it is seeking to pull us off the face of the earth. Minorities are the centrifugal force of politics. They maintain the balance of forces which makes political existence possible. Without them the State would become unbearable; it would destroy us or we should be compelled to destroy it. We have just passed through a period, the war, in which minorities were suppressed, in which the general will brooked no resistance, in which the bodies of men between certain ages and the minds of men and women of all ages were brought into compulsory service of the State. The mental draft dodger went to jail just as much as the physical draft dodger. A Chief of an Industrial Workers of the World Longshoremans' Union was sentenced for twenty years because he was an I. W. W., although under his direction his organization handled efficiently all the munitions of war shipped from Philadelphia. He "obstructed the war" by his thoughts as an I. W. W., even though his actions as a citizen contributed to success in the war. One may tolerate during a national emergency the oppression that results from the crushing of minorities, but in time of peace it is only in the balance of political forces that political existence may go on. All freedom is the work of minorities and so is all change. Respect for opinion is dearly bought by them. Majority views were all once minority views. Some political theorists even go so far as to say that all governments, no matter what apparent precautions are taken to represent majorities, are really conducted by minorities. Without the effective resistance of minorities the general will may become tyrannous or without the stimulus they afford it may become inert.