Some one was needed to transact this business, and the professional politician was developed to supply the need.

There was no reason why such a need should have existed; because the amount of political business incident to state government could have been very much economized by a simpler method of organization.

But American democratic ideas during the years when the state governments took form were wholly opposed to simplicity of organization.

The state constitutions adopted during the period of Jacksonian supremacy seem designed to make local government costly in time and energy and irresponsible in action; and they provided the legal scenery in the midst of which the professional politician became the only effective hero.
The state constitutions were all very much influenced by the Federal instrument, but in the copies many attempts were made to improve upon the model.

The Democracy had come to believe that the Federal Constitution tended to encourage independence and even special efficiency on the part of Federal officials; and it proposed to correct such an erroneous tendency in the more thoroughly democratic state governments.