possessed of the elective franchise. These in our country are now about one person in five of the whole population. If women were admitted to vote on equal terms with men the proportion would presumably be about two persons in five.
This then is the first characteristic of a political democracy. The political people are relatively very numerous.
The second characteristic is eligibility to public office. With us this is nearly as unlimited as the elective franchise. The age limit is somewhat higher, and occasionally there is a residence limitation also. To be sure no one can be president of the United States who is less than thirty-five years old. But, inasmuch as there are several millions of men in the various states who are above that age, and as these include practically all who under almost any supposable circumstances would be considered possibilities, we can hardly call the limitation a drastic one. Certainly there is never any dearth of candidates.
Compare this with the French law just preceding the revolution of 1848, which required the payment of direct taxes amounting to $2,000 a year as a condition of eligibility to sit in the lower house of the national legislature. By this means frequently there were not more than fifty men in a department who were thus eligible. Suppose the case that only fifty men in Illinois were legally qualified for membership in the national house of representatives! In fact we have the privilege of choosing our members from at least a half million men.
In both these respects, then—eligibility for the suffrage and eligibility to office—we are very democratic. And not only that—for the whole of our history we have steadily been becoming more democratic. A hundred years ago, the property qualification was required for suffrage in nearly all the states. It has been swept away. And thus the proportional number of voters has been greatly increased.
At the time of our revolutionary war, the most of the states restricted eligibility to hold office by requirements of property or religious belief. I quote from McMaster (III. 148):
