experiments, and these, attaining success, to further, and thus the work has gone on. The cantonal Initiative was almost unknown outside the Landsgemeinde when it was established in Zurich in 1869. Soon, however, through it and the obligatory Referendum (to use Herr Bürkli's words): "The plutocratic government and the Grand Council of Zurich, which had connived with the private banks and railroads, were pulled down in one great voting swoop. The people had grown tired of being beheaded by the office-holders after every election." And politicians and the privileged classes have ever since been going down before these instruments in the hands of the people. The doctrines of the French theorists needed but to be engrafted on ancient Swiss custom, the Frenchmen in fact having drawn upon Swiss experience.

The Optional and the Obligatory Referendum.

To-day the movement in the Swiss cantons is not only toward the Referendum, but toward its obligatory form. The practice of the optional form has revealed defects in it which are inherent.[E]

Geneva's management of the optional cantonal Referendum is typical. The constitution provides that, certain of the laws being excepted from the Referendum, and a prerequisite of its operation being the presentation to the Grand Council of a popular petition, the people may sanction or reject not only the bulk of the laws passed by the Grand Council but also the decrees issued by the legislative and executive powers. The exceptions are (1) "measures of urgence" and (2) the items of the annual budget, save such as establish a new tax, increase one in force, or necessitate an issue of bonds. The Referendum cannot be exercised against the budget as a whole, the Grand Council indicating the sections which are to go to public vote. In case of opposition to any measure, a petition for the Referendum is put in circulation. To prevent the measure from becoming law, the petition must receive the legally attested signatures of at least 3,500 citizens—about one in six of the cantonal vote—within thirty days after the publication of the proposed measure. After this period—known as "the first delay"—the referendary vote, if the petition has been successful, must take place within forty days—"the second delay."

The power of declaring measures to be "of urgence" lies with the Grand Council, the body passing the measures. Small wonder, then, that in its eyes many bills are of too much and too immediate importance to go to the people. "The habit," protested Grand Councilor M. Putet, on one occasion, "tends more and more to introduce itself here of decreeing urgence unnecessarily, thus taking away from the Referendum expenses which have nothing of urgence. This is contrary to the spirit of the constitutional law. Public necessity alone can authorize the Grand Council to take away any of its acts from the public control."

Another defect in the optional Referendum is that it can be transformed into a partisan weapon—politicians being ready, in Geneva, as in San Francisco, to take advantage of the law for party purposes. For example, the representatives of a minority party, seeking a concession from a majority which has just passed a bill, will threaten, if their demands are not granted, to agitate for the Referendum on the bill; this, though the minority itself may favor the measure, some of its members, perhaps, having voted for it. As the majority may be uncertain of the outcome of a struggle at the polls, it will probably be inclined to make peace on the terms dictated by the minority.

But the most serious objections to the optional form arise in connection with the petitioning. Easy though it be for a rich and strong party to bear the expense of printing, mailing, and distributing petitions and circulars, in case of opposition from the poorer classes the cost may prove an insurmountable obstacle. Especially is it difficult to get up a petition after several successive appeals coming close together, the constant agitation growing tiresome as well as financially burdensome. Hence, measures have sometimes become law simply because the people have not had time to recover from the prolonged agitation in connection with preceding propositions. Besides, each measure submitted to the optional Referendum brings with it two separate waves of popular discussion—one on the petition and one on the subsequent vote. On this point ex-President Numa Droz has said: "The agitation which takes place while collecting the necessary signatures, nearly always attended with strong feeling, diverts the mind from the object of the law, perverts in advance public opinion, and, not permitting later the calm discussion of the measure proposed, establishes an almost irresistible current toward rejection." Finally, a fact as notorious in Switzerland as vote-buying in America, a large number of citizens who are hostile to a proposed law may fear to record an adverse opinion by signing a Referendum list. Their signatures may be seen and the unveiling of their sentiments imperil their means of livelihood.

Zurich furnishes the example of the cantons having the obligatory Referendum. There the law provides: 1. That all laws, decrees, and changes in the constitution must be submitted to the people. 2. That all decisions of the Grand Council on existing law must be voted on. 3. That the Grand Council may submit decisions which it itself proposes to make, and that, besides the voting on the whole law, the Council may ask a vote on a special point. The Grand Council cannot put in force provisionally any law or decree. The propositions must be sent to the voters at least thirty days before voting. The regular referendary ballotings take place twice a year, spring and autumn, but in urgent cases the Grand Council may call for a special election. The law in this canton assists the lawmakers—the voters—in their task; when a citizen is casting his own vote he may also deposit that of one or two relatives and friends, upon presenting their electoral card or a certificate of authorization.

In effect, the obligatory Referendum makes of the entire citizenship a deliberative body in perpetual session—this end being accomplished in Zurich in the face of every form of opposing argument. Formerly, its adversaries made much of the fact that it was ever calling the voters to the urns; but this is now avoided by the semi-annual elections. It was once feared that party tickets would be voted without regard to the merits of the various measures submitted; but it has been proved beyond doubt that the fate of one proposition has no effect whatever on that of another decided at the same time. Zurich has pronounced on ninety-one laws in twenty-eight elections, the votes indicating surprising independence of judgment. When the obligatory form was proposed for Zurich, its supporters declared it a sure instrument, but that it might prove a costly one they were not prepared by experiment to deny. Now, however, they have the data to show that taxes—unfailing reflexes of public expenditure—are lower than ever, those for police, for example, being only about half those of optional Geneva, a less populous canton. To the prophets who foresaw endless partisan strife in case the Referendum was to be called in force on every measure, Zurich has replied by reducing partisanship to its feeblest point, the people indifferent to parties since an honest vote of the whole body of citizens must be the final issue of every question.

The people of Zurich have proved that the science of politics is simple. By refusing special legislation, they evade a flood of bills. By deeming appropriations once revised as in most part necessary, they pay attention chiefly to new items. By establishing principles in law, they forbid violations. Thus there