might continue to know him as a good fellow but it has been a rare constituency that has followed him up in his official duties to know how “good” he was to the unfortunates under his care and to the public in general. It has been a rare good fellow who has combined in his single person the ability to shake every right hand and kiss every baby in the county, with a really modern, scientific knowledge of the treatment of poverty. The county clerk upon assuming office shuts himself away in a forest of filing cases and meets the public officially only as they come to him for a marriage license or to file a deed or mortgage. And as for the coroner, mostly people have been glad to leave him severely alone, trusting that no untoward mishap will bring them into his clutches. For all ordinary purposes they have regarded him as a grim joke, not knowing that in many cases a misstep on his part might result in the escape of a criminal or spoil the case of a litigant entitled to damages or of a policyholder to his insurance. A possible exception to this inconspicuousness is the district attorney. American communities appear to have reserved high political honors to the most efficient and best advertised “man-hunter.” A white light of public interest has always beat upon the public prosecutor. Many a reputation for skill and courage and all-around general administrative ability has been built up around a record of convictions of notorious criminals. The district attorney with a sense of the dramatic has usually been in line for the governorship of his state. It seems also to be regarded as conducive to efficiency that this officer should be controlled directly through the ballot. And so, the system of popular election has given no assurance that, though the people may know them ever so well as individuals, they would know their candidates in the sense that fixes their electoral responsibility. What has had to be done, but what the people of the county have been unwilling or unable to do for themselves, has given to a public-minded fraction of the community the opportunity of their lives. They have generously taken over the people’s government and run it for them.