The good nature with which we accept the second-rate man in municipal office is one of the most bewildering of all our political phenomena. “Well, things have always been this way, and I guess they always will be,” expresses the average citizen’s feeling about the matter. As he cannot, without much personal discomfort, change the existing order, he finds solace in the reflection that he couldn’t do anything about it if he tried. The more intolerant he is of second-rate employees in his own business, the more supinely he views the transfer of public business from one set of incompetents to another. To lift municipal government out of politics in States where the party organizations never shut up shop but are ceaselessly plotting and planning to perfect their lines, is manifestly no easy task, but it may be accomplished by effective leadership where the people are sincerely interested. And it is significant that the present movement for an abandonment of the old pernicious, costly system took rise from the dire calamities that befell two cities--Galveston and Dayton--which were suddenly confronted with problems that it would have been madness to intrust to incompetents. This illustrates a point overlooked by that large body of Americans who refuse to bring to their politics the test of fitness that they enforce in private business. The second-rate man may successfully hide his errors in normal conditions, but his faults and weaknesses become glaringly apparent when any severe demands are made upon him. I can suggest no permanent solution of the problem of municipal government that does not embrace the training of men for its particular duties. A development of the city-manager plan, of nation-wide scope, fortified by special courses of training in schools able to give the dignity of a stable profession to municipal administration may ultimately be the remedy. IV The debauchery of young men by the bosses is a familiar phase of our politics and is most potent in the game of checking the advance of the fit and assuring domination by the unfit. Several thousand young men leave college every year with some hope of entering upon a political career. By the time a young man is graduated he has elected to follow the banner of some party. If he lives in a city and shows a disposition to be of practical service, he is warmly welcomed into the fold of one of the organizations. He quickly becomes aware that only by the display of a servile obedience can he expect to become _persona grata_ to the party powers. By the time he has passed through one campaign as a trusted member of a machine, his political illusions are well-nigh destroyed. His childish belief that only the fit should be elevated to positions of responsibility, that public office is a public trust, is pretty well dissipated. “Good” men, he finds, are good only by the tests of partisanship as applied by the bosses. To strike at a boss is _lésé majesté_, and invites drastic punishment.