" In a country like Germany, with more or less
stratified social classes, this factor in the differential birth-rate
is probably less operative. The solution in America is not to create an
impermeable social stratification, but to create a public sentiment
which will honor women more for motherhood than for eminence in the
largely futile activities of polite society.
In quite another way, too great democratization of a country is
dangerous. The tendency is to ask, in regard to any measure, "What do
the people want?" while the question should be "What ought the people to
want?" The _vox populi_ may and often does want something that is in the
long run quite detrimental to the welfare of the state. The ultimate
test of a state is whether it is strong enough to survive, and a measure
that all the people, or a voting majority of them (which is the
significant thing in a democracy), want, may be such as to handicap the
state severely.
In general, experts are better able to decide what measures will be
desirable in the long run, than are voters of the general population,
most of whom know little about the real merits of many of the most
important projects. Yet democracies have a tendency to scorn the advice
of experts, most of the voters feeling that they are as good as any one
else, and that their opinion is entitled to as much weight as that of
the expert.
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