PREFACE THIS volume includes all of the constitutional amendments providing for a state-wide system of initiative and referendum now in force, several of the most significant statutes elaborating the constitutional provisions, all of the constitutional amendments now pending adoption, six important judicial decisions, and certain materials relative to the state-wide recall. While no attempt has been made to go into the subject of the initiative, referendum, and recall as applied to local and municipal government, some illustrative papers showing the system in ordinary municipalities and commission-governed cities have been included.' We have published as an appendix the complete scheme of government suggested by Mr. W. S. U'Ren and a committee of Oregon citizens. This is one of the most suggestive documents to be found in recent American political literature, and it will be read with profit in connection with the chapters of Mr. Herbert Croly's Promise of American Life dealing with state government and administration. It is obvious that this volume will soon be partially out of date if the several projects for the initiative, referendum, and recall now pending are adopted. It is hoped, however, that new editions may be issued from time to time so that students of government may have readily accessible the primary materials for the study of these new institutional devices. We are indebted to Mr. H. H. Jones, of the Columbia Graduate School, for valuable aid in reading the proof. We have 1 Extensive documentary material on the initiative, referendum, and recall in commission-governed cities may be found in Beard, Digest of Short Ballot Charters. followed the exact language of the official document in every case, and must disclaim responsibility for the atrocious grammar and painful obscurities to be found in the texts, which (it is worthy of note) are, with few exceptions, legislative, not initiative, measures. COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY, C. A. B. B. E. S. |