Watertown leader. [volume] (Watertown, Jefferson County, Wis.) 1909-1911, 1911-08-18

the ultimate best good Of society may
demand the assertion of sturdy oppo-
sition. Such a provision, firmly be-
lieve, Is more likely to result in the
recall Of good officials than of bad
ones because the time-serving, unscru-
pulous politician will be swift to con-
form his action to every shifting opin-
ion Of his constituents, while the Off
cial of honesty and integrity and cour-
age, who prefers his duty to his office,
will stand by what he believes to be
right and sound and wise, even though
for the time being he may stand alone.
1t has happened very often that the
governor of p state or the mayor of
city has incurred the violent opposi-
ton Of temporary majority by the an
nouncement of policy which, when
put into operation, has been found to
work to the advantage and upbuilding
Of the community. With the recall in
existence, such an officer would have
been swept out of Office in response to
a spasmodic impulse, afterwards found
to be wholly unwarranted. 1t Is far
better in the long run that our public
officials be permitted to serve out the
short terms for which they are elected,
unless they so conduct themselves as
to become amenable to removal by i'm
parchment or by punishment under
specific provisions of law.
JUDGES AND CONSTITUENTS.
While l thoroughly disapprove of
the initiative and the modern refer
endum and the recall as applied to ex-
ecutive and legislative officers, l could
we'll subordinate my judgment to that
Of the people of Arizona If they had
not gone further and provided that the
recall should embrace the judiciary as
well. The power to recall a Judge who
renders an unpopular judgment is to
my mind so utterly subversive of the
principles of good government that l
can never get my own consent to with
hold my condemnation and disapprOv-
al of it.
The senator from Oregon-not the
father of the composite citizen" but
the junior senator, Mr.. Chamberlain
in his speech of April II last, asks:
But as an abstract proposition, why
should a judicial officer be Independent
of the wishes of his constituents?
Oh, Mr.. President, much of the vice
and fallacy Of the argument for the
right to recall judges rests in this
assumption that the Judge, like a con-
constituency. What is a constituent?
He is a person for whom another acts.
A constituent implies as a necessary
corollary, a representative who speaks
for him. A judge has no constituents;
he is only in a restricted sense rep
resentative officer at all The people
who elect him can with propriety
make known their wishes only through
the laws which they enact The judge
is the mouthpiece of the law. His
constituents are the statutes duly
made and provided. If his decisions
are wrong, the remedy Is to appeal to
a higher court-not to the people The
scales of justice must hang level or
there Is an end of justice. The re-
call puts into the scale, upon one side
or the other, in every case where
strong public feeling exists, the arti-
ficially induced anxiety of the Judge
| for the retention of his place. Bound
by all the sacred traditions of his Of
| fee to decide impartially between the
parties according to the law and the
evidence, he begins the discharge Of
his high duties with a personal inter-
est in his own decision
The Judge represents no constitu-
ents, speaks for no policy save the pol
icy of the law If he be not utterly
foresworn, he must at all hazards put
the rights of single Individual above
the wishes of all the people. He has
no master but the compelling force Of
his own conscience. Every circum-
stance which diminishes his independ-
ence and his courage, which closes his
ears to the righteousness Of the causes
and opens them to the voice of clamor,
makes for injustice.
If charged with incompetency, dis
honesty or corruption, common fair
ness demands that he should be tried
in the open before an impartial tribu-
nal, where he may be heard, not with
a limitation of 200 words upon his de-
Tense, but in full, and where he may
face his accusers and test the truth
of their accusations by those orderly
methods of procedure which the expe-
rience Of centuries has demonstrated
are essential to the ascertainment of