The Bismarck tribune. [volume] (Bismarck, N.D.) 1916-current, 1932-07-29
(Official City, State and County
Newspaper
Foreign Representatives
SMALL, SPENCER, BREWER
QncorporatedD
CHICAGO NEW YORK BOSTON
Leave It To The LEGISLATURE


Decision of the Nonpartisan state
executive committee not to commit the
party to support of measures which
Gubernatorial Candidate VILLA M
LANCER proposed to initiate bodies we'll
for their political future and increases
the confidence of the electorate that
there will be no return to the ideas
and practices Of 1919 which put the
Nonpartisans on the political rocks
before.
The voters should be particularly
happy that they have been saved the
necessity of attempting to analyze 10
or more measures which would have
appeared on the initiative ballot If
hangers proposal had won accept
ance. The Taxpayers Association
already has proposed six and more
are in the offing from other sources,
according to reports received here.
1t is not a pleasant thing for the
average voter to face long ballot of
initiated measures, some of them
complicated and some of them per-
tanning to matters on which he knows
he is not too we'll informed. In the
background. too, there is always the
fact that the products contained in
political cans do not always conform
TO the advertisements on the label.
The knowledge is general that there
may be as many or more 'jokers" in
an initiated measure than in one
which has been enacted in the reg
ular way.
There have been evidences that we
are facing mania for initiating
measures. Since the success of six of
the seven measures which appeared on
the initiative ballot in June, the ten
dency to use this means of obtaining
relief or of achieving ends has grown
in popularity. Many persons have
realized that, with a large list of bills
to be voted on. an attractive slogan
and a flashy argument will go far
toward obtaining the support of many
persons.
1t would be no indictment of the
intelligence of the public if, with a
mass of issues to be voted on, it let
some slip through which were not
for their own best interests. After
ALL the average man has his own
business to look after and cannot take
the time to make an intensive study
of all the legislation which anyone
may seek to enact.
Another interesting fact is that
these measures were, in part, the pro-
duct of an imported expert. G. E.
Wallace, who drew them at Langer's
request, is former tax commissioner
Of North Dakota and now is tax COM
missioner of Minnesota. He is high
ly respectable and respected citizen
but there is no escaping the fact that
he was imported for this occasion and
that success for him might have paw
ed the way for others less capable and
less respectable.
There are many Nonpartisans who
feel that the importation of so-called
advanced thinkers in the early days
Of the Nonpartisan League contribut-
ed to their subsequent defeat. The
present leaders apparently do not
want to repeat this error.
In this they are. unquestionably,
not only politically sound but actively
patriotic. BY their apparent indorse-
ment Of the Frazier bill and their
attitude on other measures, the people
Of this state have given indication
that they no longer are accepting the
economic doctrines from the high pin
nacles without question. It is only
to assume that they would
be Just as wary Of imported political
noStrumS.
Sponsors of the initiated clause Of
the state constitution assured the
public when it was adopted that it
was q weapon to be used sparingly.
This attitude should not be changed
now.
OF the proposed measures which
were made public not one Of them
oould be classed as an emergency.
All OF them can and should be
by the legislature in the
1eliberative manner provided for by
the original makers Of the constitu-
lion. After all, 1t Is the best method.
Certainly the legislator who listens
o argument on a subject and who
sives 1t study Is in better position to
Judge than the voter who must take