ABSTRACT
The developing science of democracy is an arsenal of implements for the achievement of democratic ideals. Science can ascertain the means appropriate to the completion of moral impulse—means at once consistent with general definitions of morality and compatible with the fulfilment of moral purpose. The friends of democracy who have turned to science have been acutely dissatisfied with the ambiguity of inherited political, social, and philosophical literature. Democratic doctrine was affirmed by both the rulers of society and the most powerful exponents of revolutionary change. The Marxists did not reject democracy; on the contrary, they declared that the only path to democracy was the overthrow of capitalism. The expanding focus of scholarly attention is aptly exemplified in the publications of Charles E. Merriam, who began his career with History of the Theory of Sovereignty Since Rousseau—a conventional study of political doctrine. The expanding focus of attention brought with it the use of new procedures for the observation of reality.
