AMERICAN STATE GOVERNMENT EDITED BY PAUL S. REINSCH PROFESSOR OF POLITICAL SCIENCE IN THE UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN PREFACE The editor offers this second volume of readings to students and to the public in the hope that it may help to make more familiar the actual working of our state governments. It is matter for regret that there is no such source of information as the Congressional Record affords in matters relating to the national government. So much of the real activity of the state legislatures taking place in the comparative seclusion of committee, combined with the incomplete nature and intent of the current press reports, forces the student of the real life of the state lawmaking bodies to rely upon the agencies which are coming into existence to remedy this defective publicity and observation. State documents, too, are, in the main, rather statistical and local in character. The messages of the governors are frequently, however, quite invaluable sources, while the opinions of our courts and the conferences of the bar associations are a seemingly hitherto unworked mine. To the field workers in the study of actual government— the newspaper reporters and magazine writers—the public and students owe a debt they are not always conscious of. The editor desires to make grateful acknowledgment to the various publishers and authors, individually recognized in the text, who have generously permitted him to make use of selections from articles or works published or written by them. The editor of the present collection desires to express his deep indebtedness to his colleague and friend, Mr. William L. Bailey, for his invaluable assistance in the preparation of this volume. Not only did he furnish many of the selections, but he counseled with respect to the general plan of the book; and, finally, the editor, called abroad on a public mission, was obliged to turn over to him the arduous task of seeing the volume through the press. PAUL S. REINSCH 247017 Samuel P. Orth, Our State Legislatures Ernest L. Bogart, Financial Procedure in Legislatures James Bryce on Methods and Conditions of Legislation Senator Bourne on Popular Government in Oregon. William L. Carpenter, Courts of Last Resort H. T. Lummus, The Practical Working of the Appeal System. William H. Taft on Delays and Defects in the Enforcement |