Eagle River review. [volume] (Eagle River, Wis.) 1890-1927, 1902-05-31

votes allowed to committeeman at meet
ings Of central committees; that Is, for
the city, county of Assembly each mem
Der might cast 'one vote for every nifty
votes or major fraction thereof cast by
his party in his precinct at the last gen
| eral election, instead of twenty-five
votes, as provided in the original bill;
and for the state 'One vote for every 100
| ballots or major fraction thereof cast by
| his party in his county at the last pre-
| ceding presidential election instead of
| 100 ballots, as provided in the original
| bill
"The substitute bill departed from the
| Stevens bill in the following section:
Section p. The platform of each pO-
! litical party shall be formulated i'll such
manner as the state central committee
of each party shall determine
"Instead of leaving the making of the
platform in the hands of the voters of the
party, where it belonged, the right to say
| how the platform should be formulated
| was vested in the state central committee
of a party. The Stevens bill, it will be
remembered, required the party candi-
| dates assembled in convention, Ofticered
| by the chairman and secretary of the
| state central committee, to make the
platform. Both provisions were, in my
| judgment, at variance with any proper
| theory of a primary election, out of har-
| mony with all the captivating phrases
| that we heard in the Legislature in ia
vor Of the primary election principle,
and Of all the usages of all the bodies
with which we are cquainted-churches,
| lodges, labor organizations, associations
| of business men, educators, or reformerS.
Destroyed Party Interest.
Zone would like to ask how long inter
est could be sustained among the mem
| bers of any other organization, if all of
| its functional activities, or of its policies,
| or Of it's plans for its growth and useful
| ness, were left to committees or officers
| elected at long intervals, and if no gener-
| al meetings were held from time to time,
in which the individual members would
be brought together and given an oppOr
| tunity to look into the affairs of the body
| and impart to it the vitality which it
would constantly be required to possess
| in order to retain it's members. These
bills relegated to the hands, first, of the
candidate, and then, of committeeman,
all sense Of party responsibility to the
|
of party activities. Nowhere is there a
line or word in either of the bills looking
to any method of calling the committee
| to account for any report of committees
or octfiers, excepting only the routine du-
ties as election officers already comment
ed upon and the utterance of the plat
| form.
'The very important party function of
declaring its own principles, its platform
upon which it appeared before the pub
lie, it's propositions relating to public
| policy, which it proposed to carry out if
placed in power was placed i'll both bills,
beyond the reach of the voter. The state
central committee had been evolved by
! successive examinations, in the way [
| have shown in a former communication,
and the method of it's selecting was a
! striking illustration of the delegation and
redelegation' of party authority, a pro-
| cess pertaining to the caucus and con-
vention system, which presented, to the
eyes of the friends of the supporters of
the Stevens bill, an insuperable objec-
ton to the preservation of that system.
This provision of the substitute bill re-
lating to the platform illustrates one Of
fronted the trainers Of the bill, and it
! would clearly seem to have been adopted
| arbitrarily, as offering an answer to the
question so often asked: If the party
meetings be discontinued, how can the
! party platform be promulgated? l can
see no justification, upon and ground
| advanced in behalf of either of the bills,
for the legislation of this character The
main argument used in behalf of both
| bills was the necessity of destroying the
caucus and convention system as the
source of all political uncleanliness, but
how any political chicanery could have
resulted from the silence of the bill with
respect to making a party platform was
! not shown.
Had the Legislature assumed that the
| caucus and convention system was char
| acterized by trickery and fraud at every
STEP and that the candidates brought for
| ward were all of inferior character; in
short, that every charge made against
the caucus and convention system by the
! friends of the bill was well founded,
nothing appeared to make it clear to
the Legislature that there was any rela-
ton of cause and effect between such
evil conditions and the making of the
| party platform, or that in the bills, or
either Of them, such certainty of relief
was assured that the Senate was justi-
| fed in designating the agents which
should declare the party platform.
Invasion of Rights.
"Both bills were an invasion of the
| rights which the people reserved to them
| selves when they ordained constitutions.
| Both bills showed the strange inconsist-
encies of the advocates of this legisla-
ton. They first sought to bewitch the
legislators by their plausible talk about
restoring lost political rights to the peo-
pie, keeping all political power i'll the
| hands of the people, the exercise by the
voters of their sovereign right of choice
| in making nominations for office by di-
| rect vote, the honorable place of politi-
cal parties in our plan of government;
and then they deliberately undermined
the hold of the party upon its commit
tees, took away from its members the
| means OF supervising the party deliver
| ances, ID instituted an enforced repre-
sentatiC to declare party policies. No
| excuse therefor was given, except as in
| ferred by q student of the bills, that
| when caucuses and conventions are done
| away with there would be no party spirit