ciudes in its membership many inferior and some venal men. Can it then be doubted that the power to destroy a minority party is a power not safely to be entrusted to such a body? No Necessity for Such Legislation Nor is there any necessity or call for legislation of this character. Here in Portland a system has grown up in the republican party of permitting the republican county committee to suggest the delegates to be elected to a republican county convention. The republican county committee has ordinarily been composed for the most part of men of high standing and of deep personal interest in the welfare of the community. The delegates selected to conventions. have for the most part been substantial and patriotic citizens. The system, nevertheless, is a bad one. The principle of representative government implies and carries with it that the people making up the different constituencies shall select their own delegates. Recognition of the evils of this system, which has grown up with no other support than precedent, has led many good men in this community to favor radical primary legislation, but the remedy can be found without radical legislation and even without any legislation whatever. I have no doubt of the power of the Oregon legislature to provide by law that primary elections in Oregon shall be conducted under the provisions of the secret ballot system, to provide for the registration of voters, to provide that each party shall hold an assembly in each electoral district for the naming of delegates a certain length of time before the primaries. I have no doubt of the power of the legislature to give every candidate voted for at a primary the right to watch the count of the votes. With legislation along these lines, except possibly the secret ballot system, I am in hearty sympathy. The holding of primaries under the secret ballot system would make them very cumbersome and would add enormously to the expense of maintaining a party organization. Such a law would tend to emphasize the power of the rich man in politics and I question very much whether the benefits to be de rived from such legislation would be ast great as the evils which it would bring with it. The Best System The best system of primaries in my judgment is the system which prevails or which formerly prevailed in the republican party in New York. A roll was kept of the republican voters in each election precinct and provision was made for the enrollment of new names and addresses from time to time as men moved into the precinct or as they changed their politics. Provision was also made for striking from the lists the names of dead men, men who had inoved away and men who no longer affiliated with the party. These lists were open to the inspection of all persons at all times and no one whose name was not found on the registry was permitted to vote at a republican primary. I believe such a system would work well in Portland. I believe that there should be coupled with it a provision permitting the voters in each ward in the City of Portland to meet together some days in advance of the primary and suggest names to be voted for at the primary election. These things might very properly be arranged by legislation, but they inight also be arranged by mere regulation of the respective political parties. In any event, there is no necessity and no call for taking the control of either of our great political parties out of the hands of its adherents and vesting it in the state. A democrat seeking to vote at a democratic primary should not be requited to submit his qualifications as an elector to the judgment of a republican election board, nor should similar control over a republican primary be vested, in a democratic board. Yet, if the state is to take the primary under its wing one or the other of the above conditions is inevitable. ment. Under representative government it has been proved that civilization will advance, law and order will prevail. History does not to the same degree vindicate a direct democracy. Suppose a corrupt man comes up for nomination as judge or as governor, it is comparatively easy to bring the evidences of his rascality before a convention of picked men selected by the different constituencies, and it is easy also for the candidate to rebut false charges made before the delegates to a convention with reference to his fitness for office. The difficulties on the one side and the other are enormously enhanced if the forum in which the matter is to be determined in the whole body of electors. Under the direct primary the sparsely settled communities will for all practical purposes be deprived of their voice in party government and citizens living in many sections of the state would be effectually denied all opportunity for nomination to state offices. These certainly are serious objections. inary system. It is in force in many of the counties of Pennsylvania and has been for many years. It was in force in the republican party in Lancaster County, Fennsylvania, where I lived immediately before coming to Oregon. The county was strongly republican and its electorate was intelligent and patriotic. If the system is a good one it should have worked well there. As a matter of fact it did not. It led to the organization within the republican party of two rings. which were known respectively by the rather inelegant titles of the "bull ring" and the "hog ring." Each of these had its organization in every election precinct in the county and each selected its ticket to be voted for at the primary each year. A man might almost as well have attempted to run as an independent candidate at the general election as to contest for a republican nomination without the support of one or other of these rings. Each ring was required to spend large sums of money to maintain its organization and it recouped these expenditures by heavy assessments levied upon candidates and by giving the real power and influence in the public affairs of the country to the men who contributed largely to the campaign fund. Poor men were given the offices, after paying heavy political assessments, but so far as real influence and power in the councils of the party were concerned it was possessed only by the man who had money and was willing to spend it. I believe that a direct pricharacter of candidates and the wisdom mary system would work in a similar of measures. The practical politician is manner in this community. The expenthe man for whom politics is a business diture of money in politics has aiready or a game. At all seasons he devotes reached a stage which alarms many his attention to politics and keeps postthoughtful people. I believe the efforted as to what is going on. Under any of the state should be to diminish rather than increase the amount of money expended for political purposes. A direct primary system means that each candidate for office must stand twice for election before the people, instead of once as now. The expenses of his campaign would be wellnigh doubled. This would mean an increasing pressure for higher salaries and an increased temptation to the public official to make money by improper methods. I believe in representative govern The Problem The problem of the primaries is, after all, a problem of education and of patriotism, rather than of legislation and regulation. The great difficulty is the inertia of public opinion. When the people understand a question they are likely to decide it aright. But the difficulty is to get busy men, however well mean ing, to take the time to examine into the system the practical politician is bound to control party nominations and in the main to direct party primaries. This will remain true until human nature is revolutionized. There is a law of human society which provides that he shall succeed in business who gives attention to business and the same law provides with the same certainty that he shall prevail in politics who gives his attention to politics. Under any system of primaries thousands of the best people in Portland of all political parties would neglect to vote, and the problem of good government in its last analysis is the problem of inducing these good people to take an interest in public affairs, to post themselves on the issues and questions arising within the party and without and to conscientiously perform their duty by voting and exerting an influence at every election. The Morgan and Lockwood Acts Just a word in conclusion on the two acts passed by the last Oregon Legislature. These acts have been known respectively by the names of their authors, as the Morgan Act and the Lockwood Act. The Morgan Act provides for a system of direct primaries in Multnomah County and the Lockood Act provides for a primary under the convention system in the City of Portland. The Morgan Act, had it been upheld by our courts, would have precluded the maintenance of any party organization within Multnomah County. I regard it as the most infamous invasion of personal liberty which has been attempted by any legislative body since. the passage of the Fugitive Slave Law of 1850. To illustrate its enormities it is sufficient to say that any citizen other than a member of one of the county committees of one of the great political parties who should attempt to do political work, even to the extent of asking an elector to vote for a favorite candidate for sheriff or mayor, would have been guilty of a crime and could have been sent to jail. An editor or a political speaker who should contend that the republican party in this community favored a protective tariff would also have been liable to fine and imprisonment under this act for making that statement. This act, as is well known, was declared unconstitutional by the Circuit Court for Multnomah County. The question of the constitutionality of the Lockwood Act is now being litigated in the Supreme Court of Oregon. This act is much more carefully drawn than the Morgan Act, but it is obnoxious to many of the objections which were urged against the latter. It takes the control of political parties absolutely out of the hands of their adherents and vests it in the state; it provides that the republican primary shall be held at public expense in 1902, while all other political parties are required to defray the expenses of their own primaries; it prescribes a test for voters other than the test laid down in the Oregon Constitution. Although the primary election provided for by the act is confined to the City of Portland the expense of the election is made a charge on Multnomah County. If the act is sustained it will be impossible to make a republican nomination for an office to be filled at a special election. This act perpetuates and gives the sanction of lew to the principal abuse which has existed in the past in primary elections in this county. It requires each county committee to submit a list of delegates to be voted for at each precinct, which list must be submitted to the county clerk four days in advance of the pri An Insidious Circular A place to don evening dress without going home is one of the latest conveniences offered to New York bachelors. In the November Century Eliot Gregory has this to say of it: An insidious little circular has of late been calling the attention of New-Yorkers to certain down-town parlors where a man may keep evening clothes, extra top-coats, and other changes of apparel, avoiding in this way the annoyance of going home to dress. As the colliers of Killingsworth, who witnessed the first journeys of Stephenson's "traveling-engine," did not, in all probability, appreciate the importance of the experiment going on under their eyes, nor foresee the revolution the little machine was destined to work in the habits of mankind, so the recipient of this circular doubtless fails to grasp its real purport or the possibilities that lie dormant in that innovation. The plan is only a germ as yet, but what changes will ensue when our women have seized upon and elaborated the scheme? With a wardrobe judiciously distributed in different parts of the city and its suburbs, a demoiselle will be able to go through the successive transformations required by her day's amusement, jump from riaing-habit to golf skirt, into luncheon-, reception-, and ball-dress, without the tiresome necessity of re-entering the family circle. Think what saving of nerves and cabfare will result! Two of New York's largest department stores already provide bath-rooms where customers can take dips between a tussle at the bargain-counter and a quick lunch. The phrase, "All the comforts of home," will soon be as obsolete as the place itself, and returning there except to sleep will be eliminated from the list of a damsel's duties. ** To Solve the Servant Problem It has long been evident to the thoughtful housekeeper that the only way to supplant the unskilled, wasteful and high-priced servant of this generation is to establish manual training schools for domestic science, where young girls, after a thorough course in one or all branches of household work, shall receive diplomas entitling them to certain situations at a fixed scale of wages. Perhaps no class of women workers is so weil paid as that of domestic servants, and certainly there is no other class about which we hear such constant complaint. Special preparation for special work is demanded in most trades and every profession, but the haphazard training of a domestic servant, or her lack of even that, does not debar her from a good home and money to spare. Not without much training of mistresses in the noble art of good housekeeping, and certainly not without the co-operation of housekeepers to keep up the standard and quantity of work demanded for a given wage in any community, can the training school fulfill its mission in hastening the millennium.-November Ladies' Home Journal. * We Eat Nearly Seven Pounds Daily The average adult in exercise requires as a day's ration about six pounds and thirteen ounces. Of this amount about five pounds will be water found in the common foods and taken as beverage. Of the remaining part, one-fourth will be nitrogenous matter, three-fourths carbonaceous, with about two hundred grains mineral matter.-November Ladies' Home Journal. * Mrs. Roosevelt Does Not Believe in Women's Clubs Mrs. Roosevelt is an ideal wife and mother. She is devoted, but she has not sacrificed her individuality to her devotion. She has not neglected her dress or her appearance. She has read deeply, and keeps herself fully informed in foreign and domestic affairs. A little volume of verse, published for private circulation, shows decided literary talent. A good horsewoman and an untiring walker, she is hardly to be called an athletic woman. She does not favor women's clubs, the only society to which she belongs being the Mother's Association of New York State. It will be remembered that she declined to become presidentgeneral of the Daughters of the American Revolution, although every pressure was brought to bear upon her.-R. C. Dorr in the November Woman's Home Companion. A New and Delicious Salad Salad in whole cabbage is made as follows: Select a firm, round cabbage: remove all outside leaves that are wilted or stained, cut and scoop out the center, leaving a firm bowl or shell of the cabbage. Mix two cupfuls of finely chopped cabbage with two cupfuls of celery: let stand in lemon-flavored ice-water half an hour, drain and dry, and add one cupful of nut-meats-pecans are deliciousand the pulp of one grape-fruit cut in small pieces; mix this with an egg-andbutter dressing, and when very cold fill the cabbage and serve on one of those pretty green-leaved plates which are sold for this purpose. The dressing is made by cooking one scant fourth of a cupful of vinegar with the yolks of five eggs and one-fourth of a cupful of butter, seasoning with sugar, mustard, salt and pepper, and when cold mixing with an equal amount of whipped cream.—Mrs. Larned in the November Woman's Home Companion. he adores because he is big and strong takes a hand in the boy's molding. Every association he forms leaves some trace upon him, for good or ill. You cannot throw him into the gulf and bid him sink or swim. He must be guarded and looked out for, and you must know whom he walks and talks with, whom he plays with, who sits beside him at school. He will not be specially hurt by a lad who eats with his knife, but a lad who is profane, or immodest, or furtive, may do him irreparable injury. Far more than she prizes pearls and diamonds let the mother prize her boy's confidence. Not merely when he is a little golden-haired cherub should she give him herself at bedtime hour, for a nightly chat, but when he is older, at 14 or 15, when he has trials and temptations, let him feel that he can tell her everything, and that she will not be shocked, nor censorious; that she will understand and advise. encouraged and invited to the home, and His friends of every degree should be as they share the boy's pursuits, the mother may be quietly observant, and see where she can help; she can do much pled lad, and her doors should be shut to prevent the ascendancy of an unprinciagainst one who is unclean in speech and behavior. Under God, the mother holds her boy's life in her hand. Nor is the father free from obligation. A boy's father epitomizes to him the whole story of manhood. A boy reflects his father's opinions, accepts his modes of thought, and aims to be as much like him as he can. A father is as sacredly bound to be his boy's chum and comrade as to be his tutor and governor, and to provide for him food and clothing. If a father keep pace with the boy, suiting his long steps to the shorter ones, there will be small danger that the little fellow will make a serious blunder in choosing his associates. |