Go to the Congressional Directory and investigate the origins and past performances of the present members of the lower house--our typical assemblage of typical politicians, the cornerstone of our whole representative system, the symbol of our democracy. You will find that well over half of them are obscure lawyers, school-teachers, and mortgage-sharks out of almost anonymous towns--men of common traditions, sordid aspirations, and no attainments at all. One and all, the members of this majority--and it is constant, no matter what party is in power--are plastered with the brass ornaments of the more brummagem fraternal orders. One and all, they are devoid of any contact with what passes for culture, even in their remote bailiwicks. One and all their careers are bare of civilizing influences.... Such is the American _Witenagemot_ in this 146th year of the Republic. Such are the men who make the laws that all of us must obey, and who carry on our dealings with the world. Go to their debates, and you will discover what equipment they bring to their high business. What they know of sound literature is what one may get out of McGuffey’s Fifth Reader. What they know of political science is the nonsense preached in the chautauquas and on the stump. What they know of history is the childish stuff taught in grammar-schools. What they know of the arts and sciences--of all the great body of knowledge that is the chief intellectual baggage of modern man--is absolutely nothing. H. L. MENCKEN JOURNALISM