“Congressmen require considerable omniscience to fulfil their responsibilities, but they possess very little of that qualification, and too often no honesty, public spirit, or devotion to the real interests of the country. Too poor to disregard the salary attached to the office, they must consider their personal interest to secure a re-election, which puts them at the mercy of any unscrupulous man or men who may hold the balance of power in their districts; and consequently the man who will follow the ‘boss’ or ‘work’ the proper portion of his constituents can get the place and salary while the intelligent and conscientious man who thinks less of the remuneration than of his duty to the public must remain at home. The time servers, demagogues, and men with an elastic conscience are the successful bidders for the offices and salaries. They know how to use good sentiments and patriotism for votes, the voters all the while running trustfully after the devil, who is sure to draw them into the bottomless pit.” (_Democracy_, p. 172.) This deterioration is observable in our public men generally. “Sincere men no longer deny that the offices of trust and profit are now filled, in the United States, with much more inferior men than as compared with former periods; indeed, it is admitted that if we want to find political conditions like unto ours, anywhere, we have to search in the records of the worst phases of public administration which history affords.” (Reemelin, _American Politics_, p. 307.) As late as the present year, 1919, Brooks Adams, in one of his writings, refers to the undoubtable deterioration of the standard of our public men as compared with the time of his grandfather, John Quincy Adams. Ostrogorski writes that: “The unreasoning discipline of party and the innumerable concessions and humiliations through which it drags every aspirant to a public post have enfeebled the will of men in politics, have destroyed their courage and independence of mind, and almost obliterated their dignity as human beings.” (_Democracy_, p. 389.) Professor Reinsch alludes to this moral degradation in striking language. Referring to the bosses, he says: