The Prince George's enquirer and southern Maryland advertiser. (Upper Marlborough, Md.) 1882-1925, 1917-03-23
MIR. RalstOn's Letter.

CtluhDuS, DlloT 10 IItul nluS from HIS
discoveries. pictured upon The west ern
edge of the known ocean all lma0 enable
monsters ~f the sea ard air. Whoever
sailed, therefore. far To the west felt
that he was exposing himself TO instant
destruction. But Il few years back 1t
was tho belief Of a large portion Of our
population that the ideas in government
paiticularly developed the far side of
the Mississippi River, were as mon
strous and rs dangerous to>human we'll
being as were those pictured in the
West iii the time of Columbus.
The result Of the trip of Columbus
was to dissipate the monsters into thin
air and to give to the sO-caled civilized
world of four centuries agr new out
let for its energies, new sources OF
weajih and tremendous impetus To
the development Of mankind. Those
Of Us who will today take trip to our
West aud witness the successful work
ipgs Of the Initiative and referendum,
once depicted to US as populstlc lnVen-
tions designed to swallow up our
civilization, vii discover that to tue
contrary they are broadening and de-
velopirg and beuefctent institutions.
MARYLAND for more than year, with
out a CONFUSION of nature aud without
destruction of society has had the Re-
ferendum. Already it has served to
allow repeal by its people Of law OBJ
ieclionable to the citizens OF one county.
More than that, it has undoubtedly,
even in its beginning. stood IN the way
of the passage by he Maryland General
Assembly of acts which the General
Assembly feared to have submitted to
a popular test, as they might have been
under the Referendum. If these slight
things may be done in green tree
what may be done IN the dry"
While we may rejoice that we have
the Referendum, Maryland has not yet
the more important thing, the lnitla-
tive, and it is the duty of the NJ xt legls-
lature-I would say its most important
duty-to submit to the clLlzens OF the
State on adequate constitutional amend
ment providing FOR it.
Even TODAY it is proper to describe IN
our State what is meant by the lnltla-
tive, although in one third and more OF
the States Of the Union where 1t exists,
such explanation would be upeIhuous.
By the Initiative, we mean the right or
a certain number of The voters, usually
five to eight per cent, to petition the
Governor To submit to the entire cleo
tOrate law Or constitutional amend
meat. Upon the submission Of the
petition, it becomes the duty OF the
Governor or other proper ottlcer to see
that the ballots at the foil ,wlng election
present this particular proposition IL
adequate descriptive terms to the voters
of the whole State or other jurisdiction
affected, aud upon lis receiving a MAJ
jority, the law or amendment is adopt ID.
The essential theory. is extremely
simple. FIVE per cent of the people
make motion. The Governor as pre-
siding officer puts it to the electors and
the people accept or reject the motion.
If State legislature were actually
always represe ntatlve and If 1t so did
lis full duty there would be no neces-
sity for the Initiative. That State legis-
latures do not always do their duty;
that they are guilty of sins Of omission
to be corrected by the Initiative or in
some other way, just as they are guilty
of sins of commission which may be
corrected by the Referendum. must
assuredly be admitted. If proof were
necessary it was afforded by my last
letter in which pointed out the manner
ln which the General Assembly treated
four constitutional amendments adopted
Nv luc ptOplC lSSS tudu WV ySaiS oSo.
That legislatures equally fail and must
ever fail to be thoroughly representative
is absolutely true, as will be evident
from moments thought. We send
men to the legislature who agree with
the majority upon certain general pro-
positions, but assuredly do not repre-
sent them on al AS voters we make
the best we can of the situation. When
thnSp nrnnnSltj0nS
which the majority in d large part unite
may never come before the legislature
in any shape, but an infinite variety of
other propositions are voted on. about
which the legislature received no man
date from the the people Some propo-
sitions may be rejected although the
majority of the people sincerely desire
their adoption and vice versa. For
wrongful rejection or re fusal to submit
to the whole people today We have nc
remedy and popular government fails.
A representative government is one
which represents Wemay well enough
be represented in ninety cases out OF
one hundred by the average Legislature
The matters usually determined ty it
are not of the grtvest Importance and
even if errors exist we may well put up
with them, but deeper matters of prin-
ciple should, as the believers in the
Initiative and Referendum feel, be SUBJ
iect 10 review at all times by the people,
the legislature often failing to be repre-
sentative for reasons given.
South Dakota among the States of
Union was the first to rise to an ap-
probation of this appaent governmental
defect, and adopt the Initiative and Re-
ferendum as part of its government.
In so doing it followed an example set
by Switzerland where, in both national
and caGtonal government, the Initiative
and Referendum have protected the
people for scores of years. Oregan
quickly followed the lead of Dakota and
from that time to the present some
eighteen or nineteen states have fol-
lowed their example, amoug them the
states of the entire western coast and
Maine on the East. northern states like
Ohio and Michigan, and southern states
like Mississippi and Arkansas, Republi-
can states and Democratic states.
No state of the Union having once
adopted tie Initiative and Referendum
has ever retraced this step. The people
feeling themselves in just control OF
their government, have been exceed
ingly jealous of any attempt to take
away their power.
In the foundation of our government
leaders of constitutional conventions
felt an extreme reluctance to trust gov
ernmental control TO the hands of the
people For this reason they provided,
save in the adoption of constitutions,
exclusively for representative govern
ment. They may have been in a mea-
sure excusa5le at that time, because the
average intelligence of the American
citizen of one hundred and forty years
ago was Intimately lower than today.
Schools were a rarity. Men could not
meet together to compare ideas with
the same freedom IS now, Newspapers
were almost unknown and the republi
can idea was as crude, though well
founded in principle, as were the social
institutions of the day. The theory
then was that the ptopl1, ignorant as
they were, could select superior men to
govern but were not themselves equal
to bearing any portion of the direct re-
sponsb:lities of government. Further