The Nonpartisan Leader Newspaper, January 20, 1919, Page 4

BY E. B. FUSSELL FEW minutes after 2 o’clock on the afternbon of January 7, 1919, a little group of men came out of the legislative chambers of the North Dakota capitol, walked together down- stairs to the door marked “Gov-~ ernor’s Office,” and entered. ; They - were members of a ¢ommittee from the farmer-controlled * senate of North Dakota, and members of a committee from the farmer-controlled house of representatives, and as Lynn J. Frazier, the farmer-governor from Hoople, stepped forward to greet them their spokesman said: “Governor, the legislature of North Dakota is -1 organized and ready for business.” : And that, in the writer’s mind, sums up the his- tory of a 10 years’ fight for justice on the part of North Dakota farmers and brings the story up to | (/. the present minute. £ g l Other legislative committees have waited on t } other governors in past years and have said that . their legislatures were organized and ready for business. They have told the truth, too, but it was not the same kind of an organization and it i was not the same kind of business that they were ‘ ready for. And the farmers of North Dakota, petitioning past legislatures to do business for them, were not the ones that did the organizing. When George Loftus led the crusade that cost his life, the farmers were not yet ready to do business. Two years ago it seemed that the tre- mendous popular vote must have crushed all op- defying the people’s will, blocked action. But today, with the indorsement of a vote that has placed farmers, with impressive majorities, in f both house and senate, in the governor’s chair and Al on the supreme bench, the. North Dakota farmers are truly “organized and ready for business.” The story of how the farmers organized, how their movement swept like wildfire through North Dakota and started to spread over the whole North- west, amazed the United States in 1916. Now that { i, North Dakotg is not only organized buf “ready for {11, business” the movement is a still bigger thing and i’ the eyes of every social and political reformer and every liberal in the United States promise to be on North Dakota, to see what kind of business the farmers do. From week to week the Leader will tell of the | business done by the North Dakota farmers in their legislature. It promises to be an epoch-mak- ing session; one that will be looked back upon, 10 or 20 or 50 years from now, as the turning point at which legislation ceased to be for the benefit of the classes and began to be for the benefit of the masses. A DIFFERENT KIND OF LEGISLATURE As this is written, on the first day of the ses- sion, with not one bill yet introduced, it is easy to { see that it is going to be a different kind of a ' legislature. The first thing the writer noticed, when he landed in Bismarck the day before the session started, was that there was a different kind of a crowd from what is usually around when a leg- islature opens. There was a predominance of tall, tanned men, wrapped in fur coats and wearing fur "hats. There was a marked absence of the sleek, well-groomed city men usually found around legis- latures, asking this senator or that representative to introduce this innocent little bill or that harm- less little amendment to help out the insurance companies or the banks or the railroads. No, there are practically no lobbyistz at all, or if there are any, they must be camouflaged. I L s e e ey e e N Y - dreds, at the beginning of a legislative session, pestering the lives out of senators and representa- tives with ~petitions asking for appointment as stenographers and committee clerks and doortend- ers and pages and what not—pestering the legis- lators until a list of employes is usually. made up longer than the list of legislators. In one western state that the writer knows of, a state senator remarked that. there were enough good-looking committee clerks and stenographers’to provide a feminine dancing partner for every legislator, not - R position, but a little group of senate reactionaries, And there were practically none of the dressy . ®uths and girls that are usually around, in hun- ° counting those employes that really worked and so wouldn’t have time to dance. 4 But what happened this year wgs that the farm- ers were preparing for business before the session actually started. A little unofficial employment agency was opened at the state capitol where every one who wanted a job during the legislative ses- sion could apply-and state his or her qualifications. Applicants were specifically warned not to attempt to “play politics” by going out among the legis- lators with petitions. And when the legislature convened, a neat typewritten list of all applicants, showing their qualifications, was ready for both houses. A list was also made up of the positions that needed to be filled and of others which were either mere “grafts” that could be abolished or else had so little work that_they could be consoli- dated. And the legislators got together and de- cided on their employes, getting along with. some- thing like 30 less than they had at the last session, thereby saving the state several thousands of dol- lars ‘at the start. And yet some people say that farmers are not businesslike. SOLDIERS REMEMBERED IN APPOINTMENTS Apparently, too, North Dakota has gotten a com- petent bunch of employes. There is a good sprink- ling of khaki and Grand Army ‘buttons among them, but not one of the .soldiers is a pensioner on the state of North Dakota. They are all work- ing for a living and enjoy it. Take Ben Mooney, for instance. Mooney is a North Dakota boy, a homesteader in Grant county, who was across early and lost an arm in the fighting at Catigny. He can’t do a job that requires two hands, but as senate doorkeeper he is busy all the time. He didn’t A FEW YEARS AGO IN GO HOME , AND SLoP i N. D. Lawmakers Ready for Business / Most Important Legislature Opens With League Representatives in Full Control—Great Measures to Be Passed Quickly ask to be “put on the payroll,” but for a job, and he got it. But I started to tell what the crowd looked like " on the day before the session. They were these fur-coated farmers, milling around in the lobby of the McKenzie hotel, shaking hands and talking over the election and crops. : Every once in awhile the big revolving door of the hotel would .start to turn and in would come another fur-coated, fur-capped figure. . “It’s Ole,” or “It’s Jim,” the ¢rowd would shout and they would bear down upon the newcomer and shake hands all around and wait for the next one. The night before the session the first caucus was . held, not in the old Northwest hotel, but in a\ new meeting place, Patterson’s hall. The hall filled up with earnest looking men with “We’ll Stick” buttons. The question of the speakership. came up. ' Two names were presented to the caucns—L. L. Stair of Bottineau and>Walter J. Maddock of Mountrail. The vote was taken and the ballots.were counted®®—first one for Stair, then one for Maddock—nip and tuck all.the way. When the count was finished Stair had won by one vote. But in a minute the legislator who had proposed Maddock’s name was on his feet and the vote was made unanimous, This was the main business of the caucus and a few minutes later it adjourned. All this time the members of the anti-farmer minority had been standing around.. They looked -innocent—they seemed to have no program and no plans. But there must have heen meetings—they must have had a plan all the time. Shortly after the League caucus had been held: a messenger was sent to Maddock, the defeated’ candidate for the League indorsement for speaker, and he was promised the solid support of the anti- ° NORTH DAKOTA AND— WHAT AR DELICIOLS WANT LEGISLATION EH2 WHRT RIGHT HAVE You 60T To ) MILLER B LEGISLATOR 1 < b el &b A& B 4 A d -» 'y @Y PR 'S 1 At a - 2 Ll Al @ Ao 1 ¥ ' vl = Al & 4 .~ * wi & o ~y Iy <1 & s B B g f wi & i ¥ Y‘.'g 5 o ¥ 5 R T+ i el ? > & d B ! vl ¥ A\ ¥ ¢! T o)