A Danger of Democracy: The Presidential Nominating Process

Quail hunte rs appreciate a bird dog that doesn't give up, th at ch ases the last bird after a covey rises, that is joyouslyunwilling to let even one get away . Old Pal was such a pointer, an d on one day he leaped for a last fluttering single, missed, of course, but, sad to say, leaped also over a sixty-foot cliffinto the icy Flint River. The moral is that he was going afterthe right bird b ut he wasn 't looking where he was going.The political party, with new rules calculated to open thepresidential nominating process, to involve more people, to reach the ultimate in democracy, may find itself in thesame plight as th e conscientious pointer. It is possible to goover the cliff in reaching for too much democracy . Somethink the parties have already fallen into the river .