Identifier: ArenaMagazine-Volume40 (find matches)
Title: Arena magazine - Volume 40
Year: 1908 (1900s)
Authors: B.O. Flower (ed.)
Subjects: Progressivism -- United States liberalism reformism social reform Christian Socialism Gay 90s political commentary Benjamin Orange Flower Progressive era social gospel
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00 majority for it in Texas, as soonas our people have come to understand it.And, mind you, what we are ready tovote for down there, we are ready to fightfor. Do nt, pray, let us even discuss sucha thing, puffed a fat bishop, who hadoverheard the conversation. This wouldmean nothing less than ochlocracy. Rep-resentative government is all right, butthis referendum means downright mob-rule. It is un-American, it is unconstitu-tional, and it leads to anarchy. Pardon me, sir, replied the Swiss,suavely, but has it not been said: Bytheir fruits ye shall know them* ? Areyou agreed to that? Yes, replied the bishop stiffly. Very well; here are the facts: Thereferendum was opposed at first in Switz-erland by the wealthy and the learned,the conservative and the reactionist forcesof society. To-day, after a trial of over aquarter of a century, its chief opponentsare the most radical Socialists, who findthe great body of the people too con-servative in their movements. In fact, Digitized by Google
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CARL S. VROOMAN 413 Digitized by Google 414 A Political Pilgrimage. the Federal Referendum has defeatedmore bills than it has passed. From itsestablishment in 1874 to January, 1895,the Federal Assembly passed 180 bills ofa general character. The referendumwas demanded for only eighteen of these,and the people accepted six and rejectedtwelve. Do you see anything very dan-gerous about that ? ° Well, no—ah—of course I was just—er—venturing an opinion. I have giventhe matter little study or thought. Per-haps there may be some truth in what yousay, and he waddled off, wheezing andperspiring and, who knows ?—perhapsthinking. The referendum is not altogether newto the people of the United States. Weuse it in every state in the Union whenadopting or altering a state constitution.In fifteen states the capital cannot bechanged, in eleven no law can be passedfor incurrence of debt not specified in theconstitution, and in seven no laws canbe passed establishing banking corpora-tions wi

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