corporations holding or using franchises or privileges wholly or in part within the city." To the educational section was added the requirement that "Text books shall not be changed oftener than once in four years"-a clause that had been negatived by the charter convention after a sharp debate. The section authorizing tenement house regulation was badly mutilated. Had the charter been passed by the legislature as it came from the charter convention, there is little doubt that it would have been approved by the people without much opposition. But the series of compromises laboriously negotiated in the convention with a view to pacifying all parties and all factions was broken down, and what had been harmony was transformed into violent discord. The fate of the charter did not long remain in doubt. Early in the summer the democratic organization declared against it, which, as Chicago is normally democratic on local questions, was alone sufficient to guarantee its defeat. The republican organization declared for the charter and undertook a campaign in its favor. But a large element of the republican organization had been unfairly treated in the ward apportionment, and was never more than lukewarm in its activity. Among the independent voters, widespread distrust was created by the action of the legislature in eliminating the direct primary law and the corrupt practices act, in striking out the provisions regarding the party circle and the election of municipal court judges; and in inserting a ward gerrymander in a home rule charter. The United Societies, an organization comprising about 500 societies, and representing about 90,000 voters, was greatly incensed at the failure of the legislature to enact the charter provisions regarding the regulations of Sunday observance, and was very energetic in the campaign against the charter. The intimation of the mayor to the United Societies that the saloons might be closed on Sunday unless opposition to the charter ceased, had the inevitable effect of arousing their enthusiasm to a still greater degree.3 The Federation of Labor also denounced the charter, for the reason. 'The United Societies of Chicago consists of a membership of about 490 societies. "They include the Belgian-American Club, the Bohemian Benevolent Association, sixty lodges of the First Bohemian Catholic Society, the Concordia Mænnerchor, the Chicago Turn-Gemeinde, the Croatian Liberty Society, the Germania Club of Chicago, that "the charter is a poorer and weaker instrument than that which the charter convention framed. All real reform and improvement seems to be purposely excluded." They also objected to the four years' terms for aldermen, to the removal of the city clerk from the list of elective officers, to the increased power of the mayor, to the discrimination against workingmen's wards in the new apportionment, and to any increase in taxation unless the system of taxation were fundamentally changed. The Federation of Teachers opposed the charter because of the provisions regarding the school system. The Woman's Suffrage Association attacked it because of the failure to grant the right of voting in municipal elections to women. The South Park board, which enjoys the lion's share of the revenue for park purposes, since the valuable property of the business district of the city lies within its borders, was also energetic in its opposition to the consolidation features of the charter. The cry of increased taxation and debt was raised, and used by all who for any reason opposed the adoption of the charter, and especially by those who during the Convention, opposed any limit on the local tax rate. An exceptional increase in the assessed valuation of property during the summer of 1907 made the objection more vehement. Against all of these forces there remained only the republican organization, or rather one faction of the organization. The inevitable result, long foreseen by those familiar with the situation, was the decisive defeat of the charter. The vote was 59,786 for, and 121,935 against, while the registration was 361,968. the First Hungarian Social and Sick Benevolent Association, the Krieger-Verein (Town of Lake), the Kreiger-Verein (South Chicago), the King Sobieski Society, the Luxemberger Philharmonic, the Luxemburger Sængerbund, the Militair-Verein, the Nord Chicago Mænnerchor, the Plattdeutsche Gilde (46 sections), the Pulaski Cavalry, the Roos Society, the Sant-Aldessandro Sokol Polski (Town of Lake), the United Swiss Organizations of Chicago, the United Croatian Societies (40 lodges), the Walhalla Society-in all 490 societies, representing over 90,000 voters of Chicago." ✦ At the close of the convention, Mr. Linehan, one of the leading labor members, had voted for the completed charter, and said, "If the members will organize, I will take pleasure in proposing them as delegates to the Federation of Labor." AN ILLUSTRATION OF LEGAL DEVELOPMENT-THE RALPH H. HESS University of Wisconsin Contemporary with the recent and very rapid industrial development of the United States has been observed an unexampled liberality of juristic thought. Especially has the process of settlement and industrialization of the West been pervaded by certain unusual social and economic influences, and likewise has been comparatively free from that judicial conservatism prevalent during the periods of colonization and settlement of the eastern and central portions of the country. Extremely dynamic forces, finding their origin in the manner of settlement, the physical characteristics of the country, and the personal attributes of the population, readily developed what may be termed specialized forms of social and legal institutions. As economic and political factors have become adjusted and a stable social poise has been approached, some of the diverging branches of the new sociopolitical life of the West have been pruned back to antecedent form, but others have become component parts of a permanent organization. Incident to the perpetuation of an unusual industrial structure, there have come about the development of new legal concepts which have assumed special relation to property rights in natural resources. This was possible only upon the abrogation of common law precedents and the renunciation of doctrines formerly conceded to be fundamental in American practice. It cannot be asserted that the tendency to innovation evidences a `changing conception of the aim of the law, but rather a recognition of the original or primitive relativity of its process and object. In this conception of law and lawmaking forces, remote experience need not govern present methods, and established precedents do not necessarily set forth, either in detail or in principle, law sufficient to actual and potential needs. The formation of rules of action in harmony with prevailing and potential environment is properly designated as scientific, when contrasted with the legal orthodoxy of following precedent for no other reason than that of custom. That is not an unusual juristic philosophy which grants prevalence to time-established principles, solely because of former recognition and application, proprio vigore-considerations which may neither find their source in the actualities of a dynamic society nor their object in a harmonious socioeconomic adjustment. The development of a wholesome regard for circumstantive and collective consideration in legislative and judicial processes is now commanding wide attention and is entirely salutary. Cases in point are not lacking. The absolute right of private property, the revered function of the last will and testament, and the domain of freedom of contract are rapidly being invaded; and an innovation which strikes even deeper into the vitals of the common law is exemplified by the progressive abrogation of the doctrine of riparian rights. That portion of North America lying west of the ninety-seventh meridian, composing over 40 per cent of the United States and a considerable proportion of Canada, receives an insufficient rainfall for the ordinary needs of agriculture. Of this area, a portion comprising seven States and two territories, together with the major portion of the Northwest Territories of Canada, is generally arid, having an annual precipitation less than half sufficient for the maturing of farm crops. Seven federal States and a corresponding proportion of Canada are semi-arid. Certain sections of these States lie within the rain belt and other sections are arid or subject to intermittent years of aridity. The steadily accelerating settlement of this western country, extending over an entire period of little more than fifty years, and in most districts of less than half that time, occupies a dynamic era of economic development and exponential growth of legal institutions Deane Mellville M. Bigelow, of the Boston Law School, has recently admirably presented this scientific conception of the law. See New National Forces and the Old Law, Atlantic Monthly, December, 1906. 'California, Colorado, Idaho, Montana, Nevada, Utah, Wyoming, Arizona and New Mexico. ton. Kansas, Nebraska, North Dakota, Oregon, South Dakota, Texas and Washing Notwith without precedent in the history of the Anglo-Saxon race. standing the facts that irrigation is one of the oldest arts of civilization, that the greatest nations of the ancient world maintained dominion for centuries in a rainless climate, and that, at the time of the first diversion of a western stream for the purpose of irrigation, 135,000,000 acres in foreign countries were being artificially watered and were sustaining dense populations, Anglo-Saxons are not known to have attempted the reclamation of arid lands until 1847. Since the beginning of history, this conquering race has been content to take for itself the humid parts of Europe and America while its weaker Romance rival has been confined to the supposedly less productive arid reaches of the continents. With the occupation of Utah, California, Colorado," and the succeeding States of the mountain and Pacific groups, came the realization of unfamiliar climatic conditions which could only be met by modified industrial methods. Unusual physical conditions and a necessarily revolutionized system of industry at once reflected themselves in social relations and customs. It is a recognized axiom of social law that economic conditions, in themselves extraordinary, tend to give rise to equally unique political institutions. For this reason, there is being brought about in Western America an innovation. in Anglo-Saxon law which promises to fall not far short of a revolution in our system of juristic thought and legal construction. Of special significance, is an independent and scientific development of rights of user in inland waters, and, at the same time, an unconscious recognition of the fundamental principles of a social theory of property, in so far as property may be made to comprehend rights to the use of streams, lakes, submerged waters, and glacial snows for the purposes of agriculture and mining. In spite of the more or less general recognition of the postulates of the common law of England, contemporary with early Anglo-Saxon sovereignty, the innovation was facilitated by virtue of the former prevalence of the civil law and the lapse of recognized precedent incident to the transfer of sover The Mormon colonists of Utah first diverted the waters of City Creek, near Salt Lake City, for the purpose of irrigation in the summer of 1847. $ 1847. 1849. 1859. |