The Waterbury Democrat., 1934-09-06
Republican Rank
 And File GaUe Aid
(Continued from Page n

-OII d6C
 inner circle is a larger circle of assistants whose advice is avail- able when the machine begins to creak and get noisy.
 Machine Has Feeders
 For the control of appointments the machine extends it's activities into republican departments of tion it extends it's rule into every republican key position in the General Assembly, including the republican leader of the House, the republican leader of the Sem ate, and the republican chairmen of important committees. At vari- ous times I have tried to talk over with one or more of these keymen, as man to man, the advisability of certain legislation likely to come before the House or the Senate. With few exceptions, I have met with no response to inquiries ex- cept evasion. As rule, the key men have had no opinions on pub lie questions which they were free to express. Why so? It was be- cause they had not yet received instructions from the machine. They were in no sense representa- tive of the citizens who elected them to one of the other branch of the General Assembly. They were representative of an invis- ible dictatorship wholly outside the frame of government set up by the Constitution and laws of the State of Connecticut.
 The invisible dictatorship has fared badly since 1880. It no long CT owns a governor. When I came in it threatened to annul by a legislative device the governors power under long-standing stat utes to nominate commissioners and judges of the Courts of the Common Pleas to the Senate or to the General Assembly as the case might be. Public opinion would not stand for that; so the attempt failed. The democratic majority or one in the Senate has enabled me to appoint group of commission CTS in sympathy with democratic policies. Several republican com missioners have also reluctantly come to recognize the governor as nossessing under the Constitution a.the supreme executive power or the state"
 Republicans Break
 In the last session of the Gen eral Assembly a large group of re- nublicans in the house, grown tired of being told what they must do, broke with the organization; and as representative of their con- stituencies supported the governor in his recommendation for state control of the manufacture and sale of alcoholic liquors as agasnst some form of decentraiized control having as it's object a return 10 that old profitable alliance between politics and liquor. While the question was being considered ana the vote was being taken, those iourneymen of the machine took visible form. They came right into the hall of the house of represen' tatives, walking the aisles and try ing to browbeat the members lnto line. Their failure was an omen of the temporary restoration of constitutional government in fhis state, of which there had been only a shell under the long rule of the republican machine.
 In the coming election the re- publican machine will make an heroic attempt to reinstate itself in that full and unrestrained power which it enjoyed in those happy days when it could quietly put through the General Assembly such measures as it might desire with | out debate or roll call.
 Water Rights Granted
 In 1925, for example. the Gen. eral Assembly passed an act incor- | porating the Connecticut Electric Service company as holding cor | poration for the Connecticut Light and Power company and its sub-
 salaries, though that fact was not
 stated in the bill. Again in 1927 an act was passed amending the charter of the Connecticut Light and Power company so as to give
 that company, in addition to cer- tain important gas rights, the wa ter rights of the upper Housatonit Eriver and its tributaries. In the 1 first instance there was only one | democratic member of the senate and in the second instance there were only two. In both instances the democratic minority in the house stood approximately in the
 proportion of one against ten re- publicans. Both bills were rushed
 through against. democratic protes,
 without debate and without roll call and were. signed by a repub- lican governor who during the year he. signed the second bill because q
 director of the Connecticut Ligh,
 and Power company.
 In accordance with an undisclos'
 ed plan the Connecticut Electric
 Service company sold out to the
 United Gas Improvement compan, in Philadelphia, in which another corporation, known as the United Corporation of Delaware. has, it i!
 said. a large, if not controlling in lterest. Bt this series of transac' I tions initiated by the republican machine great public utility sys
 tenn of Connecticut. owning vas l water rights in the state, has falleI