The Black Hills union. [volume] (Rapid City, Pennington County, Dakota [S.D.]) 1889-1904, 1897-05-28
Number 2I.

public office. that is the imperative
mandate, or recall.
Or, suppose that many Of us thina1
that our fair city would be fairer with
out saloons. Do you not see how III
rect legislation would simplify ma
ters? l believe that if the question &
saloons or no saloons were put drectIF
TO the people Of Denver, the saloon
would go. Perhaps not, but l shou}.a
like to see it tried
For a few moments let us consider
some Of the arguments for and agains,.
an adoption of this Swiss system.
1t would destroy the lobby, THAI
third house." which is responsible fo..
much of our class legislation.
1t would tend to prevent politics from
becoming trade, for the power of tl.y
politician being curtailed, there woufI
lie little or no money in che business.
1t is hard to buy up nhole people.
and he who would atte:.pt it woutt
have no moneJ to waste on elected rer,.
resentatives.
1t would weaken party spirit ana
probably make an end ot party gov
eminent.
1t wonld put stop to tie wholesals.
reckless legislation which is now
rushed through our law aking bodies.
much of which serves OILY to maxi
mischief. Is 1t not true that to-dar
most reforms lie in the direction cf
repeating laws already OH the statute
books, rather than in making new
ones?
But you may say the people are not
capable of deciding such questions
True enough. We admit our ignorance.
But neither are we capable of electine
wise men to office, men able to decide
these questions for us. What proper.
tion of the people who voted for state
of the character and ability of the men
for whom they voted? A few knew
something of them personally, few
others knew something by hearsay.
while the rest voted for them simply
because they were the party nominees.
Party nominees! Selected, then, in all
probability, by clique of the least
trustworthy men in the community.
No, we are not wise enough or patri-
otto enough to legislate for ourselves.
but l believe that we could soon learn
how 1t we had chance to do it. How
much did we know about national
finances two years ago? We have had
the benefit of compulsory education Oh
that subject of late, for by some
strange process the last election turned
itself into referendum on the money
question. 1t has been rather agoniz-
ing to our spirits-much Of what we
have learned with SO much pains is not
true. But after all we are wiser than
we were, and I think that the average
man is now about as capable of legis-
lating on financial questions as the
financiers we have been sending to
Congress for the last twenty y-five years.
He couldn't make a worse mess of it
or change his mind oftener.
Pardon me If / have given You a
one-sided view of this subject l cam
see but one side. To me it seems the
one thing we must have in order to get
the many things we want. We can
not get iteasily. Working against us wa
shall have all the lawless and anarch-
istic elements Of the ecountry-the saloon
and gambling element, those corpora
tlons which have found it to their in
terest to own our legislators and those
legislators who have found it to theis
interest to be owned. But we have Jus
tice on our side, and there can be but
one outcome. Emily Marks in Facts"