A Reappraisal of American Political Institutions.

It is the purpose of this paper to discuss certain selected topics which illustrate how the tendency to approach the study of American institutions in terms of the British system has given rise to errors in judgment, to a mistaken emphasis, and to the distortion of facts. In the U.S. the investigating committee with its extensive hearings and its sifting of evidence has done much to correct shortcomings and failures in the administrative branch and has paved the way for the adoption of reform legislation. Although select committees were the most important instrumentality used in Great Britain for inquiry purposes in the nineteenth century, they have today almost completely ceased to be of any political importance. The tendency of the British Cabinet to treat "every serious criticism of the work of the Departments as an attack upon itself, to be resisted with the whole strength of its majority," has caused parliamentary discussions to become stereo-typed debates between opposing armies under rigid party discipline rather than informative and critical analyses of present-day conditions. The advantages of the English cabinet system over the American presidential system have frequently been pointed out. However, the major problem of government today is how to maintain an effective control over the administrative machine.