Bemidji Daily Pioneer Newspaper, February 22, 1912, Page 6

simple majority vofe of the two houses |- of-the-legislature whenever:the repre- sentatives of the people feel that the needt of the;people require such.re- .moval. New!York has the ‘right’to " | 'coln actually applied in successful fash- a the’ MMmemm an . rhakvhue'nlmwn themselves yiser than the courts in the way they ‘have “approached and dealt with sich vi‘,u 1ow° nhovar‘llte xt vitheo J ¢ -eonstitutions; that are at lnult ltele only by the process:which James Rus- selliL.owell ‘when angwering the crit A CHARTER OF <+ DEMOCRACY vrrnz‘tm ‘of ‘Judgé:; "Uinider the’con-{ - ditions set forth .fn the extract from| = + (Continued from page 2) business and should encourage it where its activities make, as they oftcu 40 make, for the common good. In other words, our demand is that big business give the people a square deal and that the people give a square deal to any man engaged in big business who honestly cndeavors to do what is right and proper. On the other hand, any corporation, big or little, which has gained its po- sition by unfair methods and by inter- ference with the rights of others, which has raised prices or limited out- put in l*nm'oper fashion and has been guilty of demoralizing and corrupt practices, should not only be broken up, but it should be made the business of some competent governmental body by constant supervision to see that it does not come together again, save un- der such strict control as to insure the community against all danger of a rep etition of the bad conduct. Control Should Be Administrative. All business into which the element of monopoly in any way or degree en- ters and where it proves in practice impossible totally to eliminate this ele- ment of monopoly should be carefully supervised, regulated and controlled by governmental authority, and such con- trol should be exercised by administra- tive rather than by judi(‘i&‘l officers. In emphasizing the part of the ad- ministrative department in regulating combinations and checking absolute monopoly I do not. of course, overlook the obvious fact that the legislature and the judiciary must do their part. The legislature should make it more clear exactly what methods are illegal, and then the judiciary will be in a better position to punish adequately and relentlessly those who insist on defying the clear legislative decrees. I do not believe any absolute private monopoly is justified, but if our great combinations are properly supervised, #0 that immoral practices are prevent- o, absolute monopoly will not come % pass, as the laws of competition and eficiency are against it. The important thing is this—that tnder such government recognition as we may give to that which is benef- cent and wholesome in large busi- ness organizations we shall be most 7igilant never to allow them to crys- tallize into a condition which shall make privaie initiative difficuls. 1t is of the utmost importance that in the fature we shall keep the broad path of spportunity just as open and easy for our children as it was for our fathers during the period which has been tho #ory of Amevica's industrial history. In a word. then, our fundamental purpose must be to secure genuine squality of opportunity. No man should receive a dollar unless that dollar has been fairly earned. Every dollar received should represent a dol- lar's worth of service rendered. No watering of stocks should he permit- ted, and it can be prevented only by close governmental supervision of all gtoek iggnes <o ag to prevent overeap- allzation. We stand for the rvights of property, but we stand even more for the rizhts of man. We will protect the s off the wealthy man. bnt we maintamn that he holds his wealth subject to the general righl of the community to ree- alate its business use as the pubiie welfare requires. Welfare of Labor. We also maintain that the nation and the several states have the right to regulate the terms and conditions of labor. which is the chief element of wealth, directly in the interest of the common good. Tt ix our prime duty to shape the industrial and social 5 so that they may tell for the and moral upbuilding of the farmer and the wageworker, Just as they should do I the case of the busi- mess man. You, framers of this con- stitution, careful so to frame it that ander It he people shall leave them- selves free to do whatever is necessary in order to help the farmers of the state to get for themselves and their wives and children not only the bene- fits of DLetter farming, but also those of better husiness methods and better | conditions of life on the farm. Moreover, shape your constitutional action so that the people will be able through their legislative bodles or, fail- Ing that. by direct popular vote to pro- vide workmen's compensation acts, to regulate the hours of labor for chil- dren and for women, to provide for their safety while at work and to pre- vent overwork or work under unhy- ~'glenic or unsafe conditions. Sée to ‘it that no restrictions are placed upon legislative powers that will prevent the ‘enactment of laws under which your “people can promote the general wel- fare, the common good. So much for the ends of govern ‘ment, and T have, of course, merely sketched in outline what the ends should be. Now for the machinery by which these ends are to be achieved, and here again remember I only sketch in outline and do not for a moment pretend to work out in detail the meth- 0ds of achieving your purposes. Let e at the outset urge upon you to re- member that, while machinery is im- portant, it is easy to overestimate its importance and, moreover, that each eommunity has the absolute right to determine for itself what that machin- ery shall be, subject only to the funda- mental law of the nation as expressed in the constitution of the United States. Massachusetts has the right %0 have appointive judges who serve during good behavior, subject to re- have a long "térm elective Judiciarvy. Ohio has the right tp have a short tetin without the recall. Oregon and Arizoun have elective judiciary Calitornia. each and every one of thew the right to have a short term elective judiciary Persenally of the four the Massachusetts with the recall. sgystems [ prefer one if addition be made to it as [ here inafter indlcate. In the first place, short ballot. ing him up with a inultitude of othes average workaday citizen. sponsible position. { blame. know but little as to their duties and the way they perform them. Direct Nominations. I believe in providing for direct nomi- nations by the people, including there- in direct preferential primaries for the election of declegates to the national nominating conventions. Not as a mat- ter of theory, but as a matter of plain and proved experience. we find that the convention system, while it often re- cords the popular will, is also often used by adroit politiclans as a method of thwarting the popular will. In other words, the existing machinery for nom- inations is cumbrous and is not de- slgned to secure the real expression of the popular desire. I believe in the election of United States senators by direct vote. Just as actual experience convinced our people that presidents should be elect- ed (as they now are in practice, al- shough not in’ theory) by direct vote K the people instead of by indirect vote through an untrammeled electoral tollege, so actual experience has con- vinced us that senators should be elect- ed by direct vote of the people instead of indirectly through the various.legis- latures. I believe in the initiative and the ref- erendum, which should be used not to destroy representative government, but to correct it whenever it becomes mis- yepresentative, Here again I am con- cerned not with theories, -but with ac- tual facts. If in any state the people are themselves satisfied with their present representative system then it is, of course, their right to keep that system unchanged, and it is nobody’s business but theirs. But in actual practice it has been found in very many states that legislative bodies have not been responsive to. the popular will; therefore I believe that the state should provide for the possibility of di- rect popular actlon in -order to make’ good such legisiative failure. Recall of Judges. 1 As to the recall, I do not believe that there is any great necessity for it as regards short term elective officers. On abstract grounds 1 was originally in- clined to be hostile to it. I know of one case where it was actually used with mischievous results. On the oth- er hand, In three cases in municipali- ties on the Pacific coast which have come to my knowledge it was used with excellent results. I believe it should be generally provided, but with such restrictions as will make it avail- able only when there is a widespread and genuine public feeling among a majority of the voters. There remains the question of the re- call of judges. One of the ablest ju- rists in the United States, a veteran in service to the people, recently wrote me as follows on this subject: “There are two causes of the agita- tion for the recall as applied to judges. First, the administration of Justice has withdrawn from life and become artificial and technical. The 1 recall is not so much a recall of judges from office as it is a recall of the ad- ministration of justice back to life, so that 1t shall become, as it ought to be, the most efficlent of all agencles for making this earth a better place to live in. Judges have set their rules above life. Like the Pharisees of old, they have sald, ‘The people be accursed; they know not the law’ (that is, our | ‘rule’). - Courts have repeatedly defeat- ed the aroused moralr gentiment:ot a whole commonwealth. Téke ‘the ‘ex- ample of the St. Louis boodlers. Thelr gullt was plain and in the main con- fessed. The whole state: was aroused -and outraged. By an instinct that goes to the very foundation of all social |’ ‘order they demanded that the gullty be punished. The boodlers were convict- ed, but the supreme court of -Missourl, never questioning their gullt, set their ‘conviction ‘aside upon ‘purely technical grotinds. ' The same thing occurred in California. ' Nero, fiddling over burning Rome, was a patriot and' a statesman in comparison with judges who thus trifle with and frustrate the aroused ‘moral sentiment of a great people, for that sentiment is politically the vital breath of both state and nation. Itis to ‘recall ‘the administration of justice back from such practices that the re- ! cent agitation has arisen. “Second, by the abuse of the power to declare laws unconstitutional the courts have become a lawmaking in- stead of a law enforcing agency. Here again the settled will of soclety to cor- I betieve in the You cannot get good serv- ice from the public servant if you can- not see him, and there is no more ef- fective way of hiding him than by mix- 80 that they are none of them impor- tant enough to catch the eye of the The crook in public life is not ordinarily the man whom the people themselves elect di- rectly to a highly important and re- The type of boss who has made the name of politician odious rarely himself runs for high elec- tive office. and if he does and is elected the people have only themselves to The professional politician and the professional lobbyist thrive most rankly under a system which provides a muititude of elective officers, of such divided responsibility and of such ob- scurity that the public knows and can of Lincoln called ‘pettifogging the ‘con- stitution’ that.constitutions which were designed to protect society cen thus be made to defeat the comman good. Here again the recall is a vecall of the ad- ministration of justice back from aca- demical refinements to social service.” An independent and upright judiciary which fearlessly stands for the right, even against popular clamor, but which also understands and sympathizes with popular needs, is a great asset of popu- lar government. There is no public servant and no private man whom I place above a judge of the best type and very few whom I rank beside him. 1 believe in the cumulative value of the law and in its value as an impersonal, disinterested basis of control. I be- lieve in the necessity for the courts’ interpretation of the law as law with- out the power to change the law or to substitute some other thing than law for it. But I agree with every great Jurist, from Marshall downward, when’ | I say that every judge is bound to con- sider two separate elements in his de- cisfon of a case, one the terms of the law and the other the conditions of ac- tual life to which the law is to be ap- plied. Only Ly taking both of these elements into account is it possible to apply the law as its spirit and intent demand that it be applied. Both law and life are to be considered in order that the law and the constitution shall become, in John Marshall's words, “a living instrument and not a dead let- ter.” Justice between man and man, be- tween the state and its citizens, Is a Iiving thing, whereas legalistic justice 18 a dead thing. Moreover, never for- get that the judge is just as much the servant of the people as any other official. Of course he must act con- sclentiously. So must every other offi- cfal. He must not do anythi¥g wrong because there is popular clamor for it any more than under similar circam- stances a governor or a legislator or a public utilities commissioner should do wrong. Each must follow his con- sclence, even though to. do 'so costs him his place. But in thelr'turn the Deople must follow their conscience; and when they have definitely:decided on a given policy they must have pabs| llc servants who will carry-out thatf policy. lmpelehmsnt a leun. {Keep clearly in mind the dldtlnctléq' between the end and the means to at- taln, that end. Our aim is to get the type of judge that I have déscribed, to thie ‘letter given above: I would per- mslly ‘have favored the. recall: of the Judges both in California and in Mis. souri, for no damage that could have been. done by the recall would have equaled the damage done to the com- munity by judges whose conduct had revolted not only the spirit of justice, but the spirit of common sense. I do not belleve In adopting the recall save as a last resort, when it has become clearly evident that no other course wlill achieve the desired result. Dut elther the recall will have to be adopt- ed or else it will have to be made ‘much easfer than It now is to get rid not merely of a bad judge, but of a Judge who, however virtuous, has grown so out of touch with social needs and facts that he I3 unfit longer to render good service on the bench. It Is nonsense to say that impeach- ment meets the difficulty. In actual practice we have found that impeach- ment does not work; that unfit judges stay on the bench in spite of it. Im- peachment as a remedy for the ills of ‘which the people justly complain is a complete failure. A quicker, a more summary, remedy Is needed. But there is one kind of recall in which I very earnestly ‘believe and the ‘immediate adoption of which I urge. There are sound reasons for being can- tlous about the recall of a good judge who has rendered an unwise and im- proper decision. Every public servant, no matter how valuable, and not omit- ting Washington or Lincoln or Mar- shall, at times makes mistakes; there- fore we should be cautious about re- calling the judge, and we should be cautious about interfering in any way with the judge in decisions which he makes in the ordinary course as be- tween individuals. But when a judge decides a constitutional question, when he decides what the people as a whole can or cannot do, the people should have the right to recall that decision if they think it wrong. We should hold the judiciary in all respect, but it is both absurd and degrading to make a fetish of a judge or of any one else. |, ' Abraham Lincoln said-in his first inau- | gural: “If the policy of the government upon vital questions affecting the whole people is to be irrevocably fixed by de- cisions of the supreme court * ¢ * the people will have ‘ceased to be their own rulers, having to that extent prac- tlcally resigned their: government into | the hands of that eminent tribunal. Nor ‘ia' there in this view any assault upon the courts or the. judges.” Lin- lots or more. BEMIDJI The famous “THE BEMIDJI” has at last arrived. What is it? Itis the best 5 cent pencil in the world, bar none. and was made for the use of Northern Minnesota people. user, man, woman and child, should use “The Bemidji” lead pencil. where you will, there is none better for the: money. : g This pencil will be sold in Bemidji by | every. dealer who sells good pen- cils. The Pioneer will carry in:its columns the names of all dealers and you can therefore secure. it from your tavorite merchant It will retail everywhere for 5 cents eaeh or 50 cents per dozen. pencil i1s.a very bright, highly fmlshed golden ycllow hexagon pencrl with red rubber tip and brass cap. To Retailers thls pencil will be sold at manufacturer s price and in gross ‘heart that the American people are fit .In other words, those who take ¢his > fallible, but ‘I do say that our whole Many eminent lawyérs +who more or Jess . frankly disbeliexe .in our entire American system of government for, by and of the people violently antago- nize 'this proposal. They believe and. | sometimes assert that the American people are not fitted for popular gov- ernment and that it is necessary to keep the judiciary “independent of the majority or of all the people;” that there must be no appeal to the people from the decision of a court in any case and that therefore the judges are to be established as sovereign rulers | over the people. I take absolute issue with all those who hold such a posi- tion. I regard it as a complete nega- tion of our whole system of govern- ment, and if it became the dominant position in this country it would mean the absolute upsetting of both the rizhts and the rule of the people. If the American people are not fit for popular government and if they should of right be the servants and not the masters of the men whom they them- selves put in office, then Lincoln’s work was wasted and the whole system of government upon which this great| democratic republic rests is a failure. 1 believe, on the contrary, with all my ‘duestions of our day’ as.those: pom {ng the, proper, control. of, big' tlons. and of securing their rights to industria] workers. For Eczema Use a mild sootmng wash that instantly stops the itch. ‘We have aold many other remedies for skin trouble but none that we could per- sonally guarantee as we do the D. D, D. Prescription. If I had Eczema I'd use WRITE for particularsOf D. D. D. Prescription Barker Drug Store. Ynu"s ME“ how to become i compe- tent automobile driver and repair man. Many positions will be open in. Spring so prepare vourself now. Northwestern Motor Institute 228-230-232 Wisconsin St., Milwaukee. Wisconsin. GIVE ITATRIAL & NO DUST Puksiy! - smine STAYS for complete self government and that in spite of all our failings and short- comings we of this republic have more nearly realized than any other people 3 on earth the: ideal of ‘justice attained through genuine popular.rule. If the courts have the final say so on all.leg- |] islative acts and if no appeal can lie from them to the people, then they are the irresponsible masters of the people. The only tenable excuse for such a position is the frank avowal that the people lack sufficient intelligence and morality to be fit to govern themselves. | USED AND SOLU 3 HARDSARE DEALER QUID lsTovr poibA position - hold ‘that the people have enough intelligence to frame and adopt a constitution, but not enough intelli- gence to apply and interpret the con- stitution which they have themselves made. 1 do not say that the people are in- Jhistory shows that the American peo- ple are more often sound in.their de- cisions than is the-case-with any of the governmental bodies .to_which, for their convenience, .they have delegfit- ed portions of their power.’ Just as. the people and not the su- preme court.under Chief Justice “Taney were wise in their decisions of the vi- tal questions ‘of their. day, so. I hold Huflman' Harrls & Hsynolds Bemidji, Minn. Phone (44 It 1s called “The Bemidji” Every pencil Look. The AilAT All particulars will be furnished you upon request. The Bemidji Pioneer Publishing Company, Wholesalers and Retailers of Office and School Supplies 3 moval, not by impeuehl_n'ent! but by rect confessed evils has' been set at R 2