Yet they both have become so very powerful that they are frequently too strong for the state governments, and in different ways they both traffic for their own benefit with the politicians, who so often control those governments.

Here, of course, the parallelism ends and the divergence begins.

The corporations have apparently the best of the situation because existing institutions are more favorable to the interests of the corporations than to the interests of the unionists; but on the other hand, the unions have the immense advantage of a great and increasing numerical strength.

They are beginning to use the suffrage to promote a class interest, though how far they will travel on this perilous path remains doubtful.

In any event, it is obvious that the development in this country of two such powerful and unscrupulous and well-organized special interests has created a condition which the founders of the Republic never anticipated, and which demands as a counterpoise a more effective body of national opinion, and a more powerful organization of the national interest.
V GOVERNMENT BY LAWYERS The corporation, the politician, and the union laborer are all illustrations of the organization of men representing fundamental interests for special purposes.