The Test of the Minnesota Primary Election System

If we may believe a few deep thinkers and a host of superficial ones, the present trend of thought is away from the old faith in democracy, which characterized the political thinking of the last century.Some few do not hesitate to pronounce the democratic movement of the nineteenth century wrong in principle and a failure in practice.Others less extreme express grave doubts as to its value.They believe that democracy has not done and cannot do a tithe of what its early champions claimed for it.At the same time they suggest that already the principle has been applied as far or even farther than is desirable.Yet, as if to make light of these pessimistic thinkers, there is at present in the United States a strong ten- dency to put into operation various political devices that once generally adopted, will extend the sway of democracy far beyond anything hitherto known in any of the large democracies of the.world.Of these devices the two that appear to find the greatest favor in the United States are the referendum and the primary election.Within a few months the city of Chicago and the State of Washington have experimented with the referendum or taken steps to do so.In Minnesota, on September 16, the primary election

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