these later years

The weak spot in his reasoning, if I may presume to suggest such a thing, was his tacit assumption that the voice of the legislature was the voice of the people. There is, in fact, no reason for confusing the people and the legislature: the two, in these later years, are quite distinct. The legislature, like the executive, has ceased, save indirectly, to be even the creature of the people: it is the creature, in the main, of pressure groups, and most of them, it must be manifest, are of dubious wisdom and even more dubious honesty. Laws are no longer made by a rational process of public discussion; they are made by a process of blackmail and intimidation, and they are executed in the same manner. The typical lawmaker of today is a man wholly devoid of principle—a mere counter in a grotesque and knavish game. If the right pressure could be applied to him he would be cheerfully in favor of polygamy, astrology or cannibalism.
H.L. Mencken, "Mr. Justice Holmes." From the American Mercury, May 1930. A review of The Dissenting Opinions of Mr. Justice Holmes, arranged by Alfred Leif, with a foreword by George W. Kirchwey; New York, 1930. With additions from the American Mercury, May 1932.

Came to mind after reading this + this.