THE ROLL CALL
The Roll Call ON MEN AND MEASURES Make Certain of Victory! ON THE DAY this is written, the approval of but a single state is needed to make direct election of United States Senators a part of the...
...There is no doubt that the people of Connecticut are for this reform quite as much as are the people of Massachusetts...
...What State Will Act...
...This matter is of such tremendous importance that nothing should be taken for granted...
...It is just as certain that the people of Florida favor direct elections as it is that the people of North Carolina favor it...
...The legislatures of Florida, Connecticut and Rhode Island are in session...
...I have hope...
...So the fight upon those new party leaders must be waged...
...In Connecticut, too, there is doubt about the action of the legislature, although there is considerable sentiment in favor of direct elections among the members...
...Our standards will be maintained, improved in every possible case and protected by adequate rates in every proper schedule...
...We know, too, of the economic loss that is incurred by the armed and militant conflict between capital and labor...
...There should be no let up of public interest...
...They have kept the faith with themselves and with their sister states...
...The legislatures of the following thirty-five states have ratified the amendment to take the election of our United States Senators away from the state legislatures and place it into the hands of the voters: THE ROLL OF HONOR Arizona Arkansas California Colorado Idaho Illinois Indiana Iowa Kansas Maine Massachusetts Michigan Minnesota Missouri Montana Nebraska Nevada New Hampshire New Jersey New Mexico New York North Carolina North Dakota Ohio Oklahoma Oregon Pennsylvania South Dakota Tennessee Texas Vermont Washington West Virginia Wisconsin Wyoming —Total, 35...
...They knew it to be, in fact as well as in name, "a rich man's club...
...And the Georgia legislature turned it down...
...Their votes are not reactionary...
...Repeal of the common-law defenses, compensation laws, industrial insurance to cover accidents, sickness and death—these are important matters before the people today...
...On this occasion he gave expression to his views concerning the work that lies ahead of Republican leaders...
...As the New Senator From Illinois Views It UPON his arrival at Washington, the new Republican Senator from Illinois, Lawrence Y. Sherman, announced himself as a progressive Republican and declared he would work with the progressive Republicans toward bringing the leadership of the party into harmony with the party itself...
...We must remember that the new party voter stands for the same things we stand for," he said...
...Among the thirty-five states that have already ratified it we find New England states, Southern states, Coast states, Middle West states—every grand division is in-eluded...
...The division in the Republican party ranks made a chasm through which the Democrats marched, but they think they were landed by an avalanche...
...Republicans are both conservative and progressive...
...In Delaware, the house ratified the amendment, but the Senate rejected it...
...The whole situation is like this: The Democrats do not know an avalanche from a chasm...
...Their state officers charged with the duty of notifying the Department of State of the action of the legislature should be made to feel that further delay is gross neglect of a public duty...
...Reason governs, not hysteria...
...ON THE DAY this is written, the approval of but a single state is needed to make direct election of United States Senators a part of the federal constitution...
...The fight of twenty-five years for direct election of United States Senators will not be ended until the legislatures have balloted...
...Rhode Island, not yet free from the shackles of Aldriehism, appears to be out of the question...
...There are forty-eight states...
...If it lies between Connecticut and Florida to take the favorable action that will incorporate this amendment into the Federal Constitution, then that state will have this honor whose legislature most faithfully represents the public will...
...If your state is on this delinquent list you may strike one more effective blow for direct election of Senators by writing to your Governor not to tolerate further procrastination...
...There was no more of a Democratic majority in the nation in November than there is now...
...And now that we are on the eve of democratizing "the greatest deliberative body on earth," let there be no abatement of interest or effort until the day on which the Secretary of State formally proclaims the adoption of the constitutional amendment placing the election of United States Senators directly into the hands of the voters...
...This is our country," he said...
...Sherman denied that he had a quarrel with the new party voter, but declared constant and insistent war will be waged upon the leaders of the third party...
...Danger in Delay FOR MANY YEARS the people of this country have chafed under the misrepresentative character of the United States Senate...
...We would not have been defeated last November had it not been that many of our voters stopped at the half-way house and voted with the new party...
...They avoid de-structive radicalism...
...Let us be certain that this splendid fight for a great progressive measure is not lost at the last moment merely because, thinking it over, we have left the field to the enemy...
...That happened also in Utah...
...Before his departure from Chicago he addressed the local Republican 1916 Club...
...We know that the day of brawn fighting brawn has passed...
...You cannot make an angel out of a man after he has his growth...
...WHAT state will be next to ratify this amendment...
...This is not a Democratic country," Mr...
...We know the better way is arbitration to adjust differences rather than strikes, lockouts, boycotts and black lists...
...Newspaper dispatches report that the bosses in Rhode Island are holding up the amendment in the Senate and that there is no likelihood of this state being the last one needed to make the amendment effective...
...Sherman declared...
...The states that have sent this official notification are: Arizona Colorado Idaho Illinois Maine Massachusetts Michigan Minnesota Montana Nevada New Hampshire New York North Carolina North Dakota Oklahoma Oregon Texas Vermont Washington Wisconsin Wyoming These states have done their full duty...
...Direct election of United States Senators is lot a sectional issue...
...Its work and its wages belong to our people...
...In Connecticut there is hope that if public opinion is strongly applied to the legislature it will insure favorable action...
...Let the people of these states turn their attention toward their legislatures in such a way that every member will realize that his action on this amendment will be given an accounting...
...This fact and the fact that the popular voting on Senatorial candidates is strongly supported by public opinion has encouraged Congressmen from Florida to express the belief that the legislature of their state will not fail to ratify the constitutional amendment...
...There should be no ceasing of endeavor to force reluctant legislatures to give true representation to what is most assuredly the popular will...
...The year 1916 will see either the return of the Republican party to triumphant power or it will witness its political death...
...We can forget the defeats of the past, but must profit now from those lessons...
...If this was the first time the Republican party was defeated we might feel alarmed, but it is the third time...
...Mr...
...That the Republican party stands for a reasonable protective tariff was a point on which Mr...
...Thirty-six must ratify a proposed constitutional amendment before it becomes effective...
...Florida, however, is regarded generally as the state most likely to take the step that will make this great reform a reality...
...In La Follette's of May 25, 1912, referring to the submission of this constitutional amendment to the states by Congress, it was written, "No fight is ever won until the last shot has been fired...
...Sherman laid stress...
...The other states—those that are delinquent in this respect—should delay no longer...
...I know we have the spirit to come back and make the Republican party the one real progressive party, and that by deed and not by mere words...
...And in that fact lies our hope of rehabilitating our party...
...To make it responsible to the public and responsive to public opinion it was necessary to abolish the system of electing Senators by the state legislatures—an undemocratic and too often a corrupt barrier between the voter and the United States Senator...
...Industrial justice is not now and will not with us be merely a campaign phrase...
...What We Must Do * IT IS up to the people of those states that have not yet acted to make the effort that will make certain the ratification of this amendment, but there is a duty that confronts the people of other states—states that have already acted favorably...
...Florida already has a primary system for selecting United States Senators...
...The latest returns available show that only twenty-one out of the thirty-five that have ratified this amendment have completed their ratification by officially notifying the Secretary of State...
Vol. 5 • April 1913 • No. 15
