half dozen measures of real importance and genuine merit the country
would be no worse off should every other bill not yet acted upon fail of
passage. Certain it is that large sums of money would be saved to the
Government." And what observer does not know that scenes not unlike this
are repeated in almost every legislature in its closing hours?

As between such manner of even national legislation on the one hand, and
on the other the entire citizenship voting (as soon would be the fact
under direct legislation) on but what properly should be law--and on
principles, on policies, and on aggregates in appropriations--would
there be reason for the country to hesitate in choosing?

Among the plainest signs of the times in America is the popular distrust
of legislators. The citizens are gradually and surely resuming the
lawmaking and money-spending power unwisely delegated in the past to
bodies whose custom it is to abuse the trust. "Government" has come to
mean a body of representatives with interests as often as not opposed to
those of the great mass of electors. Were legislation direct, the circle
of its functions would speedily be narrowed; certainly they would never
pass legitimate bounds at the urgency of a class interested in enlarging
its own powers and in increasing the volume of public outlay. Were
legislation direct, the sphere of every citizen would be enlarged; each
would consequently acquire education in his rôle, and develop a lively
interest in the public affairs in part under his own management. And
what so-called public business can be right in principle, or expedient
in policy, on which the American voter may not pass in person? To reject
his authority in politics is to compel him to abdicate his sovereignty.
That done, the door is open to pillage of the treasury, to bribery of
the representative, and to endless interference with the liberties of
the individual.