it will be most immediately necessary should be passed at this session." In fact, the order of any one Assembly to its legislation committee might equally well have applied to all.1 Except in North Carolina these committees never advanced beyond the starting-point. In some States they lived along, playing a small part from session to session; in others they quietly dropped out of use. In New Hampshire after the reorganization of the government in 1784, the importance of the committee declined, and its reports were no longer entered in the Journal. In Pennsylvania it was appointed only a few times, because there the President and Council were directed to do such work. In South Carolina it disappeared before 1790. Now comes demand for revival of the idea. For instance, Professor J. W. Garner, of the University of Illinois, told the American Political Science Association at its meeting December, 1913-January, 1914: "There must be some single smaller body for examining, sifting, and choosing from among the enormous mass of bills with which Congress is now almost continually overwhelmed, and for steering through the House the measures for which there is a real need."2 Elwood Mead in the "Independent," January 8, 1917, declared it a weakness in our legislation that there is no centralized authority for directing the business of the session. He wanted "a centralized, responsible authority, like the Cabinet of the British Government or of Canada, which will determine what laws are to be considered, and cast aside without mercy the mass of trivial and irrelevant bills that now discredit our legislative records and are such a dangerous nuisance to the business in this country." Ernest Bruncken, arguing to much the same effect in the "American Political Science Review" of May, 1909, varied the remedial agency somewhat. Holding that open and official leadership is required in the Legislatures to counteract the influence of the corporation-serving bosses, he went on to suggest: "In every Legislature there are a number of men whom everybody recognizes as more efficient and influential than the rest. Why should not these be gathered into a committee to which every bill must be submitted before it is put on final passage? In this way they could prevent the adoption of bills conflicting in form or purpose. They could develop a real, consistent legislative policy 1 Legislative Methods in the Period Before 1825, 80. • Proceedings, 182. By officially recognizing their position the power of these men would be made less irresponsible, and the probability of their being dominated by secret, outside influences would be greatly diminished. Such a committee would perform many of the regulating and unifying functions of 'The Government' in Great Britain, while at the same time we should avoid the drawbacks of the parliamentary system." The Legislatures show no inclination to accept such a remedy for their ills save as driven toward it by conditions. As usual they do not deliberately set out to study how their methods may be improved, but when conditions become intolerable, make reluctant and unsystematic concessions to the facts. The fore part of the sessions has not yet become irksome enough to compel a program. In some States the turmoil of the closing days has passed beyond the point of endurance. So here and there we find what are often called "sifting committees," appointed toward the end of the session, to select the most important measures and bring them forward for consideration. Iowa experience has been typical. Germs of the sifting practice appeared there in Territorial times, but it was not developed until 1860 in the House and 1864 in the Senate. With many variations of detail from time to time, it has now become an established custom. For some time such committees were made up of the chairmen of all standing committees, and then of members selected from the chairmen. Of late in each branch the committee has had seven members, not confined to chairmen. The Montana rules provide for the appointment of a joint steering committee, of five members from each branch, which after the fortieth day shall fix the order of consideration. In Nebraska the Senate may elect a "sifting committee" of seven, who may report such bills as are deemed most important for consideration, these to have precedence. By the rules of the New York Assembly its Committee on Rules has in the last ten days of the session what in practice must amount to almost complete control of the program. Any motion to change the order, thus letting a desired bill get the right of way, must be referred to the committee without debate, and its report thereon is to stand as the determination of the House, unless otherwise directed by a vote of a majority of all elected. On its own initiative the committee can shape the calendar as it thinks best, for it can report at any time, and the only restriction is that it shall not report as a special order a matter that the House has refused to take away from a standing committee. The ten-day period of control has been abnormally extended by setting a day for adjournment earlier than anybody expected an adjournment could be had. By this ingenious device the Committee on Rules in 1911 controlled the Assembly from April to October. In each branch of the Georgia Legislature the Committee on Rules is to arrange the calendar during the last seven legislative days of each session, and the order and manner so fixed can be changed only by a three-fourths vote in the Senate, a two-thirds vote in the House. Other of the States have not yet recognized the procedure by legislative rule, but carry it out by means of orders or resolutions. Governor Hodges of Kansas described to the Governors' Conference of 1913 what takes place toward the close of the session in his State: "A committee on revision of the calendar is appointed. The membership of this committee is always dictated by the party leaders and they absolutely determine what bills shall be considered, and the order in which they shall be considered. This committee usually consists of three in the Senate, and five in the House, and these eight men during the last week of the session, when almost fifty per cent of the bills are passed, absolutely dictate what enactments shall comprise one half of the laws upon our statute books. The committee becomes in reality a bicameral legislature of three and five members." In 1913 Oregon by joint resolution created an "advisory committee," composed of the presiding officers acting with one Senator and two members of the House. Its duty lay in "assisting the other committees in expediting legislation now before the Legislature." Frank E. Horack, describing the committee system in Iowa, says that although a sifting committee may help somewhat to bring order out of chaos during the closing days of the session, its creation may be considered as an indictment of the committee system itself or as a perversion of legislative procedure. "In fact, there are but two explanations of the existence of a sifting committee: either the standing committees have failed to accomplish their work during the time set for the session, or the creation of a sifting committee is a part of a prearranged plan to delay matters as much as possible so that in the closing days of the session 1 Proceedings 260. a single committee may take charge, through which the program of the leaders can be carried out with comparative ease." Possibly Iowa experience has given ground for the intimation that the practice can be perverted to sinister purposes, but it may be more charitably viewed as an attempt to meet the situation produced when there is not time enough to do all that should be done. If there must be choice in the closing days of a session, the choice must be either systematic or unsystematic. Nobody could seriously contend that chance and accident should govern. Why, though, must there be any need for choice toward the close of a session? Why would it not be far better to anticipate the need to take time by the forelock? Is there not some reason in Mr. Horack's suggestion that the sifting committee is an indictment of the committee system? If the charge be confined to the working of the system, rather than to its purpose, much is to be said in support of the criticism. Wherever custom or rule permits the continued introduction of new business, permits committees to take their time, permits reports to be made up to the closing days, inevitably there will be congestion at the end. The causes are easily eliminated. Those Legislatures that persist in perpetuating the causes have only themselves to blame if the results add to their burden of odium. The Norwegian Storthing has a steering committee that is suggestive. It is the Committee of Selection, with twenty-three members elected by the Storthing. Its first duty is to elect eleven standing committees. It may determine the number of members of each, but the Storthing itself or its Divisions may increase the numbers of their committees or create fresh committees if occasion arises. The Committee of Selection refers measures to the committees already appointed, unless on special occasions it should be found necessary to appoint separate committees. Four weeks after the members of the Committee of Selection have been chosen, eleven of its members retire by lot, and the others retire four weeks later, so that every four weeks either eleven or twelve members are replaced by election, the retiring members, however, being eligible for reëlection. Toward the end of the session this committee consults with the other committees in order to advise what measures should in its opinion be passed at once and what might without disadvantage be postponed.2 1 "The Committee System," Statute Lawmaking in Iowa, 546. R. Dickinson, Foreign Parliaments, 384. CHAPTER XXII PARTISANSHIP LEADERSHIP in a lawmaking body is generally assumed to be a concomitant of partisanship. Thus Woodrow Wilson blended the two things when arguing for what he thought would produce the best results. "Looking at government from a practical and business-like, rather than from a theoretical and abstractly-ethical point of view," he said, "treating the business of government as a business, it seems to be unquestionably and in a high degree desirable that all legislation should distinctly represent the action of parties as parties. . . . It should be desired that parties should act in distinct organizations, in accordance with avowed principles, under easily recognized leaders, in order that the voters might be able to declare by their ballots, not only their condemnation of any past policy, by withdrawing all support from the party responsible for it; but also and particularly their will as to the future administration of the government, by bringing into power a party pledged to the adoption of an acceptable policy." 1 Mr. Wilson was discussing Congress, where policies are few, and where the range of legislation is narrow compared with that confronting any State Legislature. Measured by public interest, the problems of Congress are individually of greater importance than an equal number of State problems, but those of the State are far more numerous. If none but State issues were to divide the voters of a State into parties, there could be no approach to anything like permanence of association on a two-party basis. Almost inevitably the result would be an evershifting division into numerous factional groups. This is probably the reason why partisan alliance in the States has been based on extraneous tests, such as beliefs regarding national issues, or has been a purely artificial device, resorted to for convenience, much as boys choose up sides for a ball game. Both phases appear in American party origins. The colonists naturally split into attackers and defenders of prerogative, the Governor being the center of controversy. At the same time, if R. V. Harlow drew right conclusions from his minute study of the assemblies in the Revolutionary period, 1 Congressional Government, 97-99. |