Cattell, Kehoe, Stuckenbruck, Wyllie and Young, had served in the 1909 Assembly; Wyllie had introduced the Local Option bill of that session, which, however, was not permitted to come to vote. The six members had supported the 1909 anti-Race Track Gambling bill, and, so far as they had been given opportunity to vote, had clean scores on moral issues.

45

Direct Legislation, for which its proponents could not get a hearing before the Assembly committees in 1909, was at the session of 1911 deemed of sufficient importance to be given a special committee. The committee consisted of seven members, of whom three, Cattell, Kehoe and Young, had served in the session of 1909. The three at the 1909 session were recorded on test questions, every time on the side of progressive policies. As for the four new members on the committee, even at the opening of the session, they were recognized as heartily in sympathy with progressives policies, including the Initiative, Referendum and Recall.

46

The important committee on Ways and Means, in which originates the General Appropriation bill, and which passes upon every measure carrying an appropriation, consisted at the 1911 session of twenty-one members.

bly. Cronin had been, as are tens of thousands of others, a man on the fence on the liquor question, until the liquor interests pushed him off on to the Local Option side. By methods that are astonishing to say the least, the liquor interests are pushing other men now on the fence on to the Local Option side, by scores and hundreds every day.

45 The members of the 1911 Assembly Committee on Direct Legislation were: Tibbits, chairman; Cattell, Clark, Judson, Kehoe, Walsh and Young.

46 The members of the 1911 Ways and Means Committee were: Cogswell, chairman; Beckett, Chandler, Cunningham, Fitzgerald, Flint, Gerdes, Griffiths, Guill, Hayes, Hinkle, Hinshaw, Kennedy, Lynch, McGowen, Malone, Schmitt, Slater, Telfer, Wyllie, Young.

Of the twenty-one, eleven had legislative records. Of these eleven, Chandler had served in the session of 1907, and had stood for progressive policies at a time when Progressives were as few in the California Legislature as were avowed machineites at the session of 1911; Cogswell, Flint, Gerdes, Hinkle, Wyllie, Young and Telfer had made records as Progressives at the 1909 session; Hayes and Griffiths, in most instances had voted with the Progressives, while Schmitt, the eleventh of the old members to be given place on the 1911 Ways and Means Committee, had cast his lot, and usually his vote, with the old "organization element." The Progressives were generally admitted to be safely in control of the Committee on Ways and Means.

The several Assembly committees that have been considered may be regarded as the strategic committees of the Lower House.

The success which the Progressives had had in organizing Senate and Assembly had demonstrated that that faction had safe majority in each house. With the control of the committee organization of both Houses, the Progressives were in a position to carry out every pledge that had been made to The People.

But at the outset, the question was raised, How far shall the Legislature go? Division developed on every important issue. All the Progressives, for example, advocated the adoption of the Recall Amendment, but some of the best of the Progressives were for excluding the judiciary from the terms of the measure. The Progressives

47 Chandler, Cogswell, Flint, Gerdes, Hayes, Hinkle, Wyllie, Young, Telfer, Griffiths, Schmitt.

were agreed that United States Senators should be nominated by State-wide vote, and such nominations made morally binding upon the several members of the Legislature. But not a few of the Progressives stopped short of the Oregon plan, insisting that the nomination for Senators should be confined to the several parties, and no general popular vote provided.48 All Progressives were agreed on the advisability of the Short Ballot, but there were differences of opinion on the question of how far the Short Ballot should apply. Senators Larkins, for example, would have had the office of Secretary of State continued elective. The Progressives were for conservation, but badly divided on the question of the extent to which the conservation measures should be made to go. Similar division complicated practically every issue.

All this, of course, led to confusion. It was evident that the old "organization," even with the Progressives in control of both Houses, might yet be able to employ the division on the important questions to block good legislation, as had been done in 1909. Some positive note from a recognized leader was required to pull together

48 As a matter of fact neither the Lincoln-Roosevelt League nor the Republican party as controlled by the Progressives, nor yet the Democratic party, was committed to the Oregon plan. The last expression of the League on the subject will be found in its platform for the 1910 fight, adopted at the League's meeting held at Oakland, Nov. 22, 1909. The provision in point read: "We urge that the existing primary election law be so amended as to afford a State-wide advisory expression of party opinion as to their (United States Senators) election."

The Republican (Progressive) platform for 1910 committed the party to "such a revision of the primary law of the State as shall afford a State-at-large advisory vote as to the election of United States Senators." The Democratic platform was as ambiguous. It pledged the party to "a simplified Direct Primary law and the selection of United States Senators by the direct primary vote of The People."

the Progressives, who had little to fear from without, but much to fear from within their movement.

This was furnished in the "bracer" referred to in the last chapter, Governor Johnson's inaugural message to the Legislature.

CHAPTER III.

THE KEY TO THE 1911 LEGISLATURE. 49

Governor Johnson's Inaugural Address Brought Squarely Before the Legislature the Reforms to Which Both Parties Were Pledged, and Left No Room for Dodging or for Quibbling-The Effect Was to Define Definitely the Policies of the Progressive Administration, and Draw the Line Sharply Between Progressives and Reactionaries.

On January 4, 1899, the inaugural "conclave" that was to escort Governor-elect Gage to the State Capitol, formed in front of the old Golden Eagle Hotel at Sacramento. There has been nothing like that conclave since, and probably never will be in California again. The proceedings of that day showed the tinsel of the old "machine" order at its worst.

Several military gentlemen in uniform participated. Some of them rode on horses with which they were quite unfamiliar. Others rode in carriages. One of them tripped sadly as he descended the steps from the hotel. The Governor-elect entered a carriage; a small boy giggled; the procession started.

No circus parade ever made cheaper entrance upon a community. The "conclave," however, was forecast of

49 Part of this chapter follows closely an editorial article, "Governor Johnson's Message Strong for Popular Rule," which the writer prepared for the Sacramento Bee, and which appeared in the issue of that publication for January 4, 1911.